Katja Nyberg is the daughter of Robert Nyberg, the first Finnish handball player to play professionally abroad. She was born in Stockholm while Robert was living in Sweden. The family later relocated to Finland where she grew up. Nyberg played sports from an early age, mainly javelin throw and other athletics varieties. She started her handball career in Helsinki club Sparta IF with her father as coach.
Club career
Nyberg played for Sparta until she was 18. As handball in Finland was not competitive enough, she decided to pursue a professional career abroad. She first moved to Sweden where she played for Stockholmspolisens IF for one season, then signed a contract with Norwegian club Larvik HK and played there for 7 years. During her seven seasons in Larvik, Nyberg achieved great success. She was named Player of the Year of the Norwegian league in 2001 and 2005. She also won the Cup Winners' Cup in 2004/05 and reached the semi-finals of the Champions League in 2001/02 and 2003/04. By the time she left the club, she had scored an average of 6.65 goals per match, with 765 goals in 115 matches. In 2005, Nyberg signed a one-year contract with Slovenian champion Krim Ljubljana. However, her season in Ljubljana was prematurely ended in October of that year when she suffered a serious shoulder injury. It required surgery and kept her away from the handball court for nine months. By that time, her relationship with Gro Hammerseng had already become public and both had expressed their desire to play for the same club. They received offers from other clubs, but ultimately chose Ikast, where Hammerseng was already playing. Nyberg lived in Denmark and played for FC Midtjylland Håndbold for 4 years. On 17 February 2010, she signed a two-year contract with her former club Larvik HK and has played for them since the 2010/11 season.
National team
Katja Nyberg gained Norwegian citizenship on 16 January 2001 and made her debut with the national team on 23 March 2001 against France. She was not allowed to play for Norway in official tournaments until 2002 because she had competed at the 1999 Junior World Championship qualification for Finland. Her first major competition as a Norwegian player was the 2002 European Championship where Norway received a silver medal. She then received a gold medal at the 2004 and 2006 European Championships. Nyberg missed the 2005 World Championship due to the shoulder injury she suffered in Ljubljana, but she was with the team two years later when Norway won the silver medal at the 2007 World Championship in France. She was also voted Most Valuable Player of the tournament. Apart from this individual recognition, one of her biggest achievements with the national team to date was winning the gold medal at the 2008 Summer Olympics. Nyberg played a total of 99 games and scored 321 goals for Norway between 2001 and 2008.
