This was Sarina Wiegman’s England at their very best: energetic and thriving under pressure

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It will never be remembered as fondly as the six straight victories throughout the last European Championship, which featured an 8-0 group-stage win, a come-from-behind quarter-final victory, a 4-0 semi-final success and a memorable extra-time triumph in the final. But their 4-0 thrashing of the Netherlands in Zurich was perhaps England’s most impressive performance of the Sarina Wiegman era. Under immense pressure, the Lionesses controlled almost the entire game, shutting out the Dutch and creating chances from every angle.

In the immediate aftermath of the 2-1 defeat by France on Saturday, Wiegman refused to concede her starting XI had been top-heavy and unbalanced, putting too much pressure on Keira Walsh and Georgia Stanway in the deeper midfield positions. But the tweak to her side for England’s second group game created something more balanced: Ella Toone in for Beth Mead, with Lauren James moving to the right.

England offered more energy in the centre of the pitch and James was perfectly prominent from the right, the role where she has generally played her best football for England. She is able to pop up in central positions when playing from the wing, as she showed for both goals, the first of which was a magnificent strike.

Lauren James, right, thrived in a tweaked positon (Harry Langer/DeFodi Images/DeFodi via Getty Images)

But there was further change not evident from looking at the team sheet, too. Jess Carter, overrun at left-back against France, moved into the centre of defence, switching positions with Alex Greenwood. This was clearly something England wanted to keep secret: in the warm-up, they spent most of the time practising drills in their ‘old’ positions. There is a history here: in England’s goalless draw with the United States late last year, they swapped positions just a minute into the game. Wiegman loves their versatility, even if Carter has recently voiced her frustration at perennially being considered a utility player, rather than a specialist in one role.

She was untroubled at centre-back, the position she prefers, while Greenwood provided a left-footed option for crosses towards the head of Alessia Russo, who really should have converted an early chance from that supply line. Russo will be the only England player coming away from the game disappointed, having failed to find the net. But her close friend Ella Toone rounded off the scoring, and while Toone is not always the most prominent of No 10s, she tends to pop up in the box at the right time.

In fact, wherever you looked, there were contributions that justified Wiegman’s decisions. Her choice of Hannah Hampton as No 1 for this tournament prompted plenty of questions, as well as the sudden retirement of Mary Earps. In 2022, Earps was herself initially favoured over other options for her distribution skills, but it is clear Hampton is now superior in that respect. Her exquisite, back-to-front through ball for Russo led to England’s opener, and from there she had little traditional goalkeeping duties to perform.

Meanwhile, Wiegman’s faith in Stanway, who is clearly a key part of her plans despite missing the entire second half of the season for Bayern Munich, paid off when the midfielder struck England’s second. Wiegman is increasingly criticised for ‘having her favourites’, but there is a reason they are her favourites.

Wiegman was keen to stress in her post-match interview that the Netherlands are very different opponents to France, and suggested there was little point comparing the two different line-ups. That is a fair argument, and it seems unlikely Greenwood would have fared well against the speed of Delphine Cascarino, for example. But this was nevertheless roughly the sort of system many England fans would have liked from the outset of this competition, and Toone was the subject of regular chanting from England supporters throughout the game. Wiegman did concede that it “did look like a more balanced team”, and it would be a surprise if she deviated significantly for the final group game against Wales.

But, ultimately, the credit should go to the players. It should not come as a surprise that this group is capable of delivering under pressure. In 2022, they won a European Championship on home soil with a huge level of expectation. They won a World Cup semi-final against hosts Australia two years ago in an atmosphere that, in the context of women’s football, felt almost unprecedented in its hostility. Still, this was a different type of pressure, when losing would have meant ridicule, when the players would have been criticised for being unfocused, when squad harmony and a lack of hunger would have been blamed, when the tabloids might have got stuck into players’ personal lives.

Those are the go-to concepts when England fail at football. But Wiegman and her players are rarely found wanting in psychological terms. The issue against France was a pure footballing one, and whether or not Wiegman regrets her XI that night, she has found a system that will surely take England through to the knockout stage. And while it will most likely be in second place rather than first, that will probably mean ending up on the opposite half of the draw to Spain — like at the last World Cup, the team to avoid for as long as possible.

Suddenly, that 2-1 defeat by France feels like a blessing in disguise.

This news was originally published on this post .

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