Injury shortly before kick-off denied the tournament’s best finisher the ending she had craved for an entire career While England danced along to “Don’t stop me now”, Alexandra Popp made a long and lonely walk along the touchline to the pocket of Germany fans in Wembley’s north-west corner. She had been stopped before she had even begun. Two or three of the travelling support were able to catch the pieces of kit she tossed up: a water bottle, a bag, perhaps a spare shirt.Popp lobbed up several gifts although, true to form, there was not a towel in sight. She has never thrown that in and it is why, even in an arena pulsating with the glory of one of...
Football was an intrinsic part of the nation’s identity for years while women were excluded. After winning Euro 2022, they have reached the top of the podiumEngland won. In the end, perhaps that was the only thing that mattered.This is the brutal bargain of high-end sport: it offers hard edges, black-and-white certainties, one pedestal and one precipice. And in front of 87,192 delirious, sweat-soaked fans at Wembley, they beat Germany 2-1 to become champions of Europe for the first time. Continue reading...
Is age, unfamiliarity or deep-seated sexism sweeping me along to the Euro 2022 final without an agonising knot of nerves?In 2014, Cambridge United played Gateshead in the National League play-off Final. Four minutes to go and we were 2-1 up when Ian Miller, our centre-back, went down with a broken ankle. We’d used all our subs. The referee played 10 minutes of injury time. TEN MINUTES. It felt about a year. Gateshead put a header just wide as the clock flicked to 99 minutes. My voice had gone. I could barely breathe. The relief at the final whistle is almost impossible to articulate.Every fan recognises that agonising knot of nerves that goes beyond the pit of the stomach. It is...
Moments of inspiration are so rare at this level that the England striker’s semi-final goal was the last thing anyone expectedLook, we’ve all tried it. The skill itself is not the thing. Anyone who has ever kicked a football at any level has at some stage tried the cheeky backheel with which Alessia Russo foxed the Sweden defence at Bramall Lane on Tuesday night. It is a staple of playground kickabouts, five-a-side games and pre-match warm-ups the world over. And yet there seems to be an unspoken acceptance that as you travel up the echelons, such impertinences are ultimately left behind, for fear of waste and inefficiency, for fear of embarrassment, for fear of how it might look to everyone...
England managed to survive Sweden’s early threats to turn their semi-final into a comprehensive victorySports quiz aficionados will doubtless soon be asked what Edmonton, Enschede, Lyon and Sheffield have in common?The answer, obvious to all Lionesses fans, is that they hosted England’s four successive semi-finals in the past two World Cup and European Championship tournaments. Continue reading...