With only days until the quarter-final against Belgium, the Swedish national team has had three confirmed covid cases in the squad.
Two slopes are affected – Hanna Glas and Emma Kullberg.
In addition, three other players have been put under investigation after they showed symptoms of illness (Jonna Andersson, Jennifer Falk and Hanna Bennison).
- Of course, there is some concern, everyone wants to play in the quarter-finals and everyone wants to be ready and contribute, says Kosovare Asllani to SVT Sport.
Although it is unclear how the infection got into the Swedish national team bubble, Sweden's team captain can state during the match against Portugal that there is something to look out for inside the facilities where the players stay.
- Everything from the doping room, the media rooms to the changing rooms have been incredibly small overall.
There is nothing we can influence, so there has been a lot of automatically being close to people you don't want, says Asllani.
I think Sweden has taken responsibility
After the match against Portugal, the Swedish star was asked to be photographed together with several opposing players.
In connection with that, she took off her mask, but sees no problem with her actions.
- I had a certain distance there and I took it off for a second with distance, what else can I do?
- I thought she probably wants a picture when my face is visible.
But I try to take responsibility in everything else and influence what I can influence, but of course it becomes difficult when someone wants to take a photo with you, says Asllani.
She feels that the Swedish team did what they could to keep the infection away.
- It is always easy to look back and you can think that now and say that we should have had more restrictions, but I think we are among the tighter national teams.
We keep to ourselves over here (Carden Park, Chester) and make sure not to be in contact with people who haven't been tested, says Asllani and continues:
- But you see other national teams that are out and about on the streets of London and meet people however they want.
I think we take a big responsibility here in the national team and it's just unfortunate that it got in, it's impossible to say where it came from.