Wiegman delivers 'proper England' performance

BBC News

2 days ago

With doubts circling and pressure increasing, England needed to step up at Euro 2025 - and they did. A 2-1 defeat by France on Saturday meant the defending champions had catching up to do in Group D.But England ensured their hopes of qualifying for the quarter-finals remained intact with a commanding victory over the Netherlands."Proper England", as midfielder Georgia Stanway had called it earlier this week, returned as Sarina Wiegman's side played with fluidity and creativity. They were back to their defensive best and Wiegman's positional switches worked a treat. Now they must build momentum.
How Wiegman dealt with scrutiny
Wiegman knows what it means to be under the spotlight, having led England to back-to-back major tournament finals.When you have set that standard, anything less is a disappointment. England's level dropped dramatically against France which increased scrutiny on Wiegman, who suffered her first defeat at a Euros after winning 12 games in a row over the previous two tournaments.It was also the first time the reigning women's European champions had lost the first match of their defence at the following finals.Wiegman admitted the scrutiny was "hard" but she focused on the task in hand."I always knew ahead of this tournament that it was a very hard group. It can happen but then you need to win the other games," she said. "So yes, I was excited but at the same time I felt a little tense too. I think that's completely normal as you really want to stay in the tournament and you want to win. "I just had to focus on my job, review well and think about how we could bring people together."Wiegman has often delivered in the big moments and no manager has won more Euros matches than the Dutchwoman (13 - level with Germany's former manager Tina Theune).She also boasts the best goals-per-game rate in the competition among managers to take charge of four or more matches, with her sides scoring 40 in 14 games.Having come under criticism for her decision to start Lauren James in the number 10 role against France - which left England vulnerable defensively - Wiegman made all the right choices against the Netherlands.James started on the right wing, with Manchester United's Ella Toone starting in the number 10 role. They scored three of the four goals on the night.Jess Carter, who struggled against France at left-back, was moved into central defence, swapping with Alex Greenwood, and England kept a clean sheet."The priority was that we wanted to skip and exploit space. The Netherlands pushed up so we wanted to go over them. That worked really well," said Wiegman."When you're in their half of the pitch, you can start playing. We had some nice crosses and we spoke about that too. "[James] came in good positions but she can also do that in midfield. In midfield today we wanted Ella [Toone] because she can make good runs in behind."The plan worked.Netherlands striker Vivianne Miedema had just eight touches in the first half and the Dutch conceded more than two goals in a single match at a major women's tournament for the first time.They also managed just four shots against England - their fewest on record (since 2011) at a major tournament.
'That's a proper English performance'
England midfielder Keira Walsh said the players "had to acknowledge that sometimes it is a bad day and it was a really bad day against France".They wanted to put it behind them and do their talking on the pitch, as team-mate Stanway stressed this week.Striker Alessia Russo felt they produced the "proper England" performance that Stanway had talked about."'Proper English' to us means we'll work hard until we can't run any more, stick together and know that we are very dominant on the ball," said Russo."We were picking up the ball in right areas and were clinical with our chances. We wanted to return to our roots and we know we're capable of performances like that."Russo was among the standout performers as she picked up three assists - the first player on record (since 2013) to provide as many in a women's Euros match.James' double means she has now been directly involved in more goals (eight) than any other European player at the past two major tournaments.Stanway and Toone impressed in midfield, while Carter thrived in the centre-back role, with Greenwood producing the goods at left-back."We can change the structure of the team with so many different players. That's a strength of ours, that each individual player is so good at something," said Lucy Bronze."[Greenwood] isn't the fastest player on the pitch and I think she completely marked Chasity Grant out of the game. She was front-footed, she was aggressive. "Jess Carter was covering her every single minute of the game as well. I think that's a proper English performance."Carter told BBC Radio 5 Live that the two defenders had felt "isolated" in the defeat by France and they wanted to combat that.Wiegman made the decision to swap them in training and tested it out."I'm not one to question and ask for a reason, I just do the job I'm asked to do," said Carter."This game felt the total opposite with Alex and the whole team. She was phenomenal at left-back."
Has optimism been revived?
England were one of the pre-tournament favourites and despite defeat by France, qualification for the quarter-finals is in their hands.If they beat Wales in their final group game, they will qualify for the last eight.Wiegman admitted the "consequences of the result were huge" against the Netherlands - but it was nothing they did not expect. "We knew exactly that we were going straight into finals [against strong opposition]," she added. "Losing the first game, it was not the end of the world but it doesn't put you in the best position. "We knew we had to perform really well and the team did."Were England written off too soon? They won Euro 2022 and reached the 2023 World Cup final after all."Everybody else was panic stations, but we still needed to win this game whether we beat France or not and we knew that," said Walsh."The objective didn't change. We wanted to take the game to them and put things right that we didn't the other day."I think we did back up what we said in the media and I think everyone was just on it from the first whistle to the last."