England retain the Euros: 16 Conclusions on heroes Carter, Hampton, Kelly and a broken leg
England have done it again. Here’s 16 conclusions on Sarina Wiegman’s genius, the wall that is Jess Carter, Hannah Hampton’s penalty heroics, Chloe Kelly being Chloe Kelly and an actual broken leg…
1) Battered by France in the opening game, a two-goal comeback against Sweden in the quarter-final before winning a horrible penalty shootout, 96th and 119th-minute goals in the semi-final to get past Italy, and then this.
Across three knockout games England led for a total of four minutes and 52 seconds. They weren’t close to being the best team in this tournament. They probably weren’t second best, or even third. But they, and we, don’t give a damn. Sarina Wiegman has created a team of winners, and they’ve won… again.
2) She’s an extraordinary football manager. After triumphing on home soil as Netherlands boss to win the European Championships in 2017, Wiegman did the same with England in 2022. She even followed each of those successes with a run to the World Cup final: her Dutch side lost to the United States in 2019; and England were beaten by Spain two years ago.
This was her fifth final in as many major tournaments as an international manager, an unprecedented feat in either the women’s or men’s game, made even more remarkable by neither England nor the Netherlands reaching a final in that time when not led by her.
Maybe she doesn’t rotate enough. Maybe the path to glory would have been smoother had her so-called ‘finishers’ actually been starters, or at least earlier finishers. But those criticisms were part of hastily deleted match reports against Sweden and Italy by journalists who should have known better than to doubt a manager unrivalled when it comes to tournament progression, who’s now won three of her five finals and is the first manager to lead an England team to major tournament glory away from home. Incredible.
3) Leah Williamson had a tough time convincing anyone that England were “not the underdogs” for the final up against the team who triumphed over them in the World Cup two years ago and which had won their last ten games on the bounce, scoring 38 goals.
Having seven starters all playing for Barcelona makes for a level of understanding that’s impossible to match; allied with outstanding individual technical ability, which for large parts of this game appeared to be a level or two above England’s, meant the Lionesses needed to be near perfect, and/or hope they hadn’t reached their clutch and good fortune quotas in the preceding games.
But the final wasn’t so much about luck or outstanding moments, more unbelievable effort. The strength, both physical and mental, to play largely without the ball for 120 minutes after playing 120 minutes in both the quarter-final and semi-final before it is quite extraordinary. That can only come through complete unity.
4) Wiegman is direct but “not blunt”, as she’s eager to stress, with players consistently citing her clarity of their roles in the squad as key to her success. Starters know they’re starters, just as regular substitutes know exactly what’s required of them when they enter the action; those who are little more than tour cheerleaders are made to feel the importance of that backseat role.
Mary Earps and Millie Bright weren’t happy with their demotions so didn’t come. In a more fragile environment the absence of those previously crucial members of her squad would have led to cliques and divisions. But if anything it’s ensured harmony, with Wiegman so acutely aware of the danger in airing dirty laundry at a major tournament rather than before it.
“Yes, she’s a manager, but she’s also a human being,” Ellen White said when asked about Wiegman. “We like communication and we like honesty, and that’s what she gives you. We wanted to win for the team but we also wanted to win for Sarina.”
And although Wiegman has barely tinkered with the starting line-up, nor her regular substitutes, you would have a hard time telling those key figures apart from those who didn’t play a single minute in the tournament during the celebrations at the end of the game. They all feel a part of it, and thus they all feel like winners.
READ MORE: Heroic Hampton and ‘cool’ Kelly deliver unthinkable glory for incredible Euro champions England
5) It took less than three minutes for England to put Plan A into action. The ball was set back for Williamson in the right-back position, which triggered Alessia Russo to make her move in behind Spain’s high line. It was the ideal direct football required to put pressure on a side which is unlikely to feel any besides, such is their ability to monopolise possession – they had 65 per cent of the ball across their five previous games and just shy of that here.
Russo really should have passed it with two options in the box, but saw her shot from a tight angle saved by Cata Coll, who made a bit of a hash of it, though unfortunately not to Lauren James’ advantage at the back post.
Lucy Bronze found herself in a similar position to Russo moments later in what we then expected would be a fruitful avenue of attack for England for the rest of the game.
6) That didn’t prove to be the case, but despite Spain very quickly taking hold of proceedings, England will have felt they should have taken the lead in either that moment or in the 19th minute, when the high press worked to a tee.
Russo went, then James and finally Lauren Hemp, to pinch the ball off Olga Carmona’s toe before forcing a very sharp save on this occasion from Coll.
Again, it felt like another attacking method which would reap rewards if England continued to push. But again, that didn’t happen.
7) It’s easy to shout at England for dropping off when that one example of the high press worked so well, but that press relies on triggers – a poor touch or an errant pass – and those mistakes were so rare from Spain, who also have no obvious weak link for England to open up passing channels to to then spark that press.
They essentially have ten ball-playing midfielders (including their goalkeeper) and a proper striker’s striker in Esther Gonzalez, who only needs to excel at finding space in the box and finishing as she can rely on her team-mates to do everything else for her.
The interchanging of positions, not just in the forward line but between full-backs and wingers, the three in midfield, those midfielders and whoever’s ahead of them, was ridiculous; England couldn’t cope with the combination of every Spain player knowing their roles but not feeling as though they were restricted by it and at times – particularly in the first half – they looked as mesmerised as we were watching at home.
8) Spain’s goal was a great example of that fluency. Georgia Stanway became the 427th player Aitana Bonmati has wriggled away from this season, before Athenea del Castillo found Ona Batlle with a pass which is this Spain side all over – between England centre-back and full-back – with Mariona Caldentey powering in a header after a perfect cross to the back post.
It wasn’t great defending from England. James was attracted to the ball to leave space for Del Castillo, no-one tracked Batlle’s run nor put any great pressure on to block her cross, and Bronze was caught on her heels by Caldentay.
But it was also excellent football from an excellent football team who – let’s face it – were always going to score one goal. Just the one.
9) Wiegman will have prepared England for exactly this game. Their backs were against the wall in the 1-0 victory over Spain in February, as was the case in 2-1 defeat in June and the World Cup final two years ago. They were never going to beat Spain playing Spain’s way and the message ahead of the game, reiterated at half-time, will surely have been to ‘stay in it’.
But the England boss, along with the rest of us watching at home, will also have wanted a bit more attacking intent from her starting players despite the reasonable temptation to rely on ‘the finishers’ given what they produced against Sweden and then Italy.
For long periods of that first half they were too happy with not conceding rather than looking to turn the Spain defence, as they threatened to do early on.
10) It was a ‘finisher’, albeit more of a middler in this case, who turned the tide.
Even in her five minutes at the end of the first half, Chloe Kelly put the willies up Spain, producing one dangerous cross (pretty much the first one of note from England) and a shot, as the defenders ahead of her looked genuinely terrified and scampered back towards their own goal.
They were right to be scared, and although they may feel as though they should have seen the Kelly assist coming, there’s a big difference between knowing what she’s going to do and being able to stop it.
After making a yard of space on the left side of the box by chopping onto her right foot, she drifted a cross straight onto Russo’s head. Ten minutes later Kelly was denied a goal to go with her assist by a brilliant Coll save.
We would have understood starting a clearly unfit James had there not been such a wonderful player in reserve, but particularly given James limped out of the semi-final, the Chelsea star’s place in the XI felt something close to negligence on Wiegman’s part, loathe though we are to criticise her.
11) But then we found out that Bronze played the whole tournament with an actual broken leg. A fractured tibia, to be precise. That’s the second-biggest bone in the human body, broken. It was broken. Seriously, it was broken.
She was almost embarrassed to admit to it at the end of the game; more annoyed that it wasn’t that problem (the actual broken bone) that forced her off but a separate injury. We can only assume one of her muscles ceased to exist somehow or a sniper took a shot at her from the stands.
What a warrior.
12) The goal was also reward for Keira Walsh after what must have been an incredibly frustrating tournament. She was being followed wherever she went here, as was the case against France, Sweden and Italy, but made Spain pay in a rare lax moment from their trio of midfield harriers.
She should take the general opposition team focus on her as a great compliment to her quality in working the ball into spaces behind the midfield, and Stanway deserves great credit too for moving ahead of Walsh and towards the left channel to create the angle for her deeper-lying teammate.
And what a header by Russo. A lesser striker would try to flick that sort of cross into the other corner when backpedaling to give the goalkeeper some catching practice. But that’s how to score from that position – heading the ball back in the direction it came from. A truly top-level combination of poise, strength and skill.
13) Spain made all the running in extra time. It took less and less effort from them to create chances and more from England to stop them. It was agony to watch.
Salma Paralluelo could and should have been Spain’s hero but inexplicably opted for a flick when a yard out rather than a toe poke, but other than that – despite an uptick in their already very favourable possession and seemingly innumerable opportunities to create chances from good positions – Spain were pushing against an immovable England defence, and the indefatigable, wonderful Jess Carter in particular.
We’re normally suppressing a chuckle when a defender roars with delight at doing ‘defender stuff’ – leave the celebrations for your glove-wearing, twinkle-toed wingers, we tend to think – but we were shouting along with Carter in the 122nd minute after she blocked Bonmati’s cross back onto the Spaniard and out for a goal kick.
Our bellowing in unison was in part because England had made it to what proved to be the safe haven of penalties, but also because we imagined the reactions of the loud and pathetic minority who abused Carter earlier in the tournament and should be rounded up and shoved in a jail cell while that five-second clip plays over and over on screens fixed to every wall.
“Everyone has doubted us and doubted me personally but I think we just proved to you what we’re capable of,” Carter said after the game. You both absolutely did not need to prove anything to those pencil-dicked wankers, but also absolutely did.
14) Hannah Hampton admitted at the end of the game to not knowing whether Kelly’s penalty could be the decisive one when she hopped and skipped up to smash it into the top corner, with her focus solely on her job and the sticker cheatsheet of Spanish penalty takers on her arm.
She saved two, the first from the WSL Player of the Year and Champions League winner Caldentay, and the second from the reigning and two-time Ballon d’Or winner Bonmati. Not bad, that. Brilliant really, as she has been all tournament.
Just like Kelly. And it had to be her, didn’t it?. No shirt swinging above the head this time, just a casual finger point to the fans and the ‘was it ever in doubt’ expression that she put into words at the end of the game.
“I was cool, I was composed. I knew I was going to hit the back of the net. I don’t miss penalties twice.”
Our hero again and we suspect not for the last time. She’s ‘got something about her’, that one.
15) FA CEO Mark Bullingham insisted Wiegman is “not for sale” when asked how many millions another federation would have to pay to steal her away from England; he should now be asked about a sideways move.
We’re not advocating a switch to coach the men’s team before the end of her contract, which expires after the 2027 World Cup, as she and the England women deserve at least one more opportunity to claim that missing gong together, and – barring some stunningly poor performances from the men – Thomas Tuchel will be leading them in the US next summer.
But faced with the misogyny which will inevitably trump the xenophobia but also pair with it to create a jambalaya of intolerance from pricks disguising themselves as some sort of woke police, the more we see of and hear from Wiegman, the more confident we are that if anyone can deal with that bigotry, while guaranteeing the bare minimum of a tournament final, and probably a major tournament trophy, it’s her.
Williamson has described Wiegman as “the missing ingredient” for the Lionesses, turning them from talented underachievers into perennial winners. And we can think of no reason other than the absence of a Y chromosome for Wiegman not to be given an opportunity to do the same for the men, if indeed she wants it.
16) But this isn’t about the men, it’s about women’s football and, just football. We won’t claim to have enjoyed the last month – most of it has been torture, in truth – but it ends with the highest of highs with plenty of other joyous moments along the way.
Williamson admitted “we rode our luck” but what a ride. Ten goals in the final two group games having been spanked in the first, the rise of Michelle Agyemang, the worst penalty shoot-out in living memory, Hannah bleeding Hampton, Chloe bloody Kelly and an actual broken leg.
England have won the European Championship, again.
