Eriksson responds to affair claims

The speculation over their coach's private life is overshadowing England's World Cup build-up

LONDON, England -- England football coach Sven Goran Eriksson has responded to front page press reports about his love life, telling reporters: "My private life is my private life and that's it."

Eriksson, 53, broke his silence on Monday, five days after the first story linking him with fellow Swede and TV presenter Ulrika Jonsson, 34.

At a news conference, Eriksson was asked if he was choosing Jonsson or 37-year-old Nancy Dell'Olio, the Italian lawyer with whom he lives in north London.

"That's a question which is private," he said.

"The England squad is not private -- you will know on May 7 who is going to be picked or not picked -- but my private life I prefer to have that private.

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"It's not easy, as I have seen in the last three or four days, but I never had any intention of commenting on my private life. I won't do it today or any other day.

"My job, I go on with, even if have to use violence, almost, to get into the car in the morning.

"It's not pleasant to be followed 24 hours a day, not by one person but by about 20 -- but I can't do anything about it."

The coach said he had not discussed the matter with his players, nor had he filed a complaint against the press.

Eriksson is said to have developed a close relationship with Jonsson, a former TV weathergirl, after being introduced by Prime Minister Tony Blair's director of communications, Alastair Campbell.

Speculation about whether the couple were having a relationship reached fever pitch after they were spotted -- sitting separately -- at Manchester United's match with Chelsea in London on Saturday.

Dell'Olio said the stories were nonsense and insisted she and Eriksson would be staying together.

"What the papers have printed is rubbish," she told The Observer, a British Sunday broadsheet.

But Jonsson's mother is said to have told a Swedish newspaper her daughter and coach were "very happy" and had a future together.

The newspaper quoted Eriksson's mother as saying: "The boy is over 50 years. You can teach children to walk but you can't tell them what road to take."

Eriksson, who became England's first foreign manager last February after a successful club career in Italy, was hailed as a saviour after turning around the team's qualifying campaign.