Why ‘sloppy’ and ‘scared’ England need a rapid transformation at Women’s Euro 2025 | OneFootball

As England’s players fronted up in Zurich and vowed to take responsibility for their opening performance in the defeat to France, defender Jess Carter admitted to something that you wouldn’t expect to hear from a team who entered the tournament as champions. “I think we played like we were a little bit scared today,” Carter said. “We maybe were worrying about their threats in behind and what they can do rather than doing what we can do.”

Carter had endured a difficult night herself, tormented by France winger Delphine Cascarino. Lucy Bronze struggled too on the other side, outnumbered by a combination of Sandy Baltimore, Sakina Karchaoui and Selma Bacha. Captain Leah Williamson, in a typically honest assessment of her team’s defeat, said England paid the price for “cheap defending one-v-one”, which all stemmed from the same issue. “Not good enough with the ball,” Williamson said. “We couldn’t keep it.”

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England became the first holders to lose their Women's’ Euros opener against a strong France team (Getty Images)

Sarina Wiegman conceded that England were “sloppy” and had created their “own problems” with the sort of wayward, hesitant passing into midfield that invited France to press. "When you lose it and you're that expansive, it is tough,” Williamson added. “We got exposed at moments losing the ball when we didn’t want to lose the ball,” said Wiegman. “That’s what we need to find a solution for.”

If the tactical set-up in midfield came under question, England lacked conviction and appeared to become spooked by France in the period following Alessia Russo’s disallowed goal. “When I say scared, I think it's maybe just a bit more of an awareness of France and their abilities,” Carter said. “They're a top, top team.”

England are the first team to lose their opening match at a Women’s Euros as defending champions, but the manner of their performance continued a pattern. “We struggled, we couldn’t keep the ball, we didn’t have any real threat,” Williamson said after last month’s Nations League defeat to Spain. “We’ve got to deal with players and runners better than we did today,” the Lionesses captain said after April’s defeat at Belgium. Either statement could have applied to the France game, too.

But England didn’t take the warning. Bronze said earlier this week that England “could be the best team in the tournament” if they got the balance right, and there is no doubt that the ceiling of this Lionesses side remains high when everything clicks. The issue is England’s floor, and how low it can be if put under pressure by stronger opposition. “We all have days where we're just having a bit of a mare on the ball and unfortunately today there was more than one player doing that,” Carter said.

The question facing Wiegman is whether she asks England to play so expansively again when facing the Netherlands. Apart from the opening 15 minutes, the Lionesses barely threatened France until the 19-year-old striker Michelle Agyemeng was thrown on and caused some problems. “They were surprising with the long balls,” admitted France’s head coach Laurent Bonadei, who was relieved to see his side hold on after Keira Walsh pulled one back. “It became a vertical game.”

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France were relieved to hang on (Getty Images)

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Wiegman said England created their ‘own problems’ (Getty Images)

If Wiegman’s native Netherlands were watching England’s struggles against France following their opening 3-0 win over Wales in Group D, you could imagine that the Dutch would be far happier for the Lionesses to try and play through them then go at them. “Of course I know them very well,” Wiegman said. “They definitely want to have the ball and play but they also want to press high, so we’ll get prepared for that.”

The Lionesses are into knockout tournament mode already, where they of course have a strong record after winning the Euros and reaching the World Cup final. But if England lose to the 2017 champions Netherlands and France beat Wales, both England and Wales will be out of the Euros before they play each other on Sunday.

“There's no added pressure within the group, but we just need to stick together,” said Ella Toone, who had perhaps been unfortunate to lose her place in England’s midfield. “I’ve got loads of confidence in this team,” Grace Clinton added. “Not just watching them at the last Euros but the experience we have in the team. In the last two years I've been here I’ve seen us not only come back from being in a losing position but win so many games.”

If they are to survive, England need to focus on themselves. The problems in their defeat to France were clear and only a rapid transformation from the lows of the opening game will be enough to save their Euros campaign from crashing to an early end.