Sven 'too frightened' to leave Nancy, says Ulrika
TV presenter Ulrika Jonsson today claimed her former lover Sven Goran Eriksson wanted to leave his Italian girlfriend but was “too frightened” of her to do so.
Speaking in her first interview since her affair with the England manager hit the headlines in April, Ms Jonsson said: “He was going to end things, irrespective of me.”
Being with Nancy Dell’Olio “was not the life that he wanted”, Ms Jonsson told the Daily Mail.
“I can only believe what people say, he’s frightened of her.”
Ms Jonsson, 35, told the paper, whose sister publication the Mail on Sunday begins its serialisation of her autobiography tomorrow, that her relationship with Eriksson “felt nice and warm”.
“It wasn’t shabby, shoddy or cheap,” she said.
During the affair, Eriksson, 54, risked the affair being discovered as he was driven by his chauffeur to Ms Jonsson’s house in Berkshire and “phoned two or three times a day”.
The Dog Eat Dog presenter said she did not look back on the four-month relationship with her fellow Swede “with any longing” but added: “I do have moments when I think ‘Well, that’s a great shame’.”
Eriksson yesterday said he does not worry that revelations in Ms Jonsson’s autobiography could affect his position as England manager.
Speaking ahead of tonight’s Euro 2004 qualifier in Slovakia, Eriksson dismissed the book as “other things which are not that important and shouldn’t be that important at all to England fans, the players and the staff”.
“I have absolutely no idea what is coming out,” he said, “so you can’t be afraid of what you don’t know will happen. I want to win this game and that’s it.”
