Williamson back for World Cup qualifiers as Wiegman denies contract is ‘distraction’ | OneFootball

Sarina Wiegman insisted that entering the final 17 months of her contract as England’s head coach was not a distraction, as she named her first squad of 2026 and recalled the fit-again captain, Leah Williamson, for next month’s meetings with Ukraine and Iceland.

Williamson’s fellow Euro 2025 winners Hannah Hampton, Alex Greenwood and Lauren James have also been recalled after injuries, along with Jess Carter, who missed the Lionesses’ final matches of 2025 to recover from the NWSL playoffs. However, England are without Ella Toone, Beth Mead, Niamh Charles, and Missy Bo Kearns through injury as they get their 2027 World Cup qualifying campaign under way.

That conclusion of that tournament in Brazil marks the end of Wiegman’s contract. She has led England to historic success since taking charge in 2021 and said of her future: “No update. It’s pretty far away. We are in conversations all the time and we’re still very happy from both sides. We’re now really focusing on this qualification. We want to qualify and the best possible way is to do that in June [automatically, avoiding playoffs]. We’re going for that and let’s firstly do that.”

Asked how she would ensure questions about her contract do not distract the team she said: “There is no distraction whatsoever. We want to really focus on this qualification. We’re really excited to get started. I haven’t heard anyone in my team or staff that has been occupied with that.”

England, seeking to add a first world title to back-to-back European titles, begin on neutral territory in Turkey against Ukraine. “It’s very sad and heartbreaking what Ukraine have experienced, and that we can’t play in Ukraine,” Wiegman said. “But the alternative is to go to Turkey, which is far away, but I think the accommodation we have, the training ground we have, is a good solution.”

England face Ukraine in Antalya on 3 March before hosting Iceland at Nottingham Forest’s City Ground on 7 March, in a difficult-looking group that also includes the world champions, Spain, whom England have faced in the past two major finals.

The international window is longer than usual, with Fifa permitting teams to play three matches rather than the standard two, but Wiegman said England opted against a friendly on top of their qualifiers. “My opinion, the FA opinion, is that, at this moment, we think it’s best to play two [matches], because with the congested agenda and the amount of games, the players play so much, so we didn’t want to use the third one,” she said. “In an ideal world we would have wanted to play the first game a little bit earlier. It would have been best to play [the first qualifier] at the weekend, to have a little bit more time in between [the qualifiers], but we couldn’t control that.”

Wiegman has given a first call-up to the London City Lionesses defender Poppy Pattinson and chosen Ellie Roebuck among the goalkeepers instead of Manchester City’s Khiara Keating. “The message [to the players] is that we want to qualify as soon as possible,” the head coach said. “It’s a huge challenge with the group we have but I’m excited to see that.”

Header image: [Photograph: John Walton/PA]