Lionesses Stumble at the Euros – What Went Wrong?

Do we want to talk about that game?

England became the first-ever holders of the trophy to lose their opening group stage match. It also marked Sarina Wiegman’s first loss at the Euros—she had previously won all 12 matches in the competition.

Well, I guess we’re here now.

The game would have looked very different had Alessia Russo’s goal not been disallowed. England only really played for 20 minutes of a 90-minute match. For me, the best player was Lauren James—she was creative and consistently trying to make a difference. But we lost Russo after that first goal. While criticism of the referee and VAR is valid—the decision could easily have gone the other way in a different game—it doesn't excuse the performance we saw.

England’s pass accuracy was poor at 82%, which, while better than France’s 77%, didn't translate into control. France capitalised on the English defence switching off. At times, there were more successful passes between English and French players than there were between England’s own. Defensively, we underperformed—we let France through too easily, and they grew in confidence knowing just how simple it was to break our back line.

The first round of substitutions made little difference, but when Michelle Agyemang came on with a note instructing her to get a goal, the game changed—though it came 10 minutes too late.

That said, I want to give Keira Walsh a moment for that worldie of a goal. It offered a brief flicker of hope and momentum. Only her second goal for England, and what a strike it was. I only wish it had been the winner.

France outclassed us.

Mathematically, our hopes of progression rest entirely on beating the Dutch. If we can beat both the Netherlands and Wales, and if France beat the Dutch, we’ll go through with two wins and one loss. But that path now makes our journey even tougher. If the Dutch beat France, it comes down to goal difference—how many we can score past the Welsh red wall in the final group game.

Should England progress in second place, the challenge doesn’t stop there. We would likely avoid Spain until the final—since they’re on the other side of the draw—but we’d almost certainly face either Germany or Sweden in the knockouts, most likely Germany. Our old rivals. Another potential Euro 2022 final rematch. They most recently beat us 4-3 in a friendly, where England went 3-0 down.

Post-match reactions

England skipper Leah Williamson said:

"We lost the game with cheap one-on-one defending. We learned from those mistakes and grew in the game, but weren't good enough.
We couldn't keep the ball in the areas we needed to keep it. We got better as they tired, but it wasn't enough.
When you lose the ball and you’re that expansive, you’re emergency defending.
It is tough when you're done on the counter-attack against quality like that, but we hold ourselves to higher standards in individual battles.
Tomorrow, we will have a new game plan, different spaces available and a different type of opposition."

Sarina Wiegman expressed her disappointment but had a different take:

“I am very disappointed about the result.
I felt we started well, scored a goal—unfortunately, it didn't count.
Then we played ourselves a bit out of the game by playing short passes, which helped them.
We had to get out of that first press and skip [it], that harmed us a bit.
Then, of course, they scored goals, and in the end, we played with four attackers and tried to get the goal over the line, but we didn't.
We started well and then we started playing short passes – that's what they wanted because they wanted to press.
We needed to get in behind them and try to skip players.
When we were out of that press, we were sloppy.
We know they are strong on counter-attacks and have compelling and fast players.
We have to step up.
Tomorrow, we review and recover, and then it's straight onto the game against the Netherlands on Wednesday.
Sometimes you lose games—that's part of sport—but we must stick together, recover well, and talk to each other.”

Notably, Wiegman disagreed with Williamson’s claim that England’s defending was “cheap and emotional.”

If you look at the stats—possession, passes completed, and passes attempted—England actually performed better. We had a higher percentage of attacking play and, on paper, could have won the match. France only had two more attempts.

Still, we can’t ignore how well France played.

Hannah Hampton made three saves, while the French keeper made none—highlighting that England only managed two shots on target. One goal was disallowed, and Keira Walsh scored the other.

A major issue for England—as it was for Australia—was ball recovery. England were sloppy in their passing, and France recovered the ball 47 times compared to England’s estimated 30.

Jess Carter summed it up:

“We played like we looked scared today.
We weren't aggressive enough.
We worried about their threats behind us and what they could do rather than doing what we could do.
We didn't do as well on or off the ball.
The only positive thing to take was the last 10 minutes.
Watching it from the side, I believed that we would get a goal, and I felt we could get a second one.
We have to focus on those last 10 minutes and take that into the next game.”

Let’s hope England can reset, refocus, and come back stronger. The margins are thin, the stakes high, but there’s still a path forward.