
Sarina Wiegman and England women starting from ‘zero’ heading into Euro 2025
CNN
Less than a month away from the start of the Women’s Euros in Switzerland, England heads into the tournament as defending champion, ranked No. 4 in the world and with memories of success lingering.
Less than a month away from the start of the Women’s Euros in Switzerland, England heads into the tournament as defending champion, ranked No. 4 in the world and with memories of success lingering. Sitting in the Wembley Stadium dressing room where those Euro 2022 celebrations took place, Lionesses head coach Sarina Wiegman remembered seeing a group of players and a nation that were not only ready to win, but desperate to lift some silverware. However, she recalled being keen to extinguish that sentiment pre-Euros. “I’ve talked to many people before the tournament even started then, and many players said they were desperate to win a tournament. So, I asked them to take off the word ‘desperate’ and just do everything to get prepared and be at your best,” Wiegman recently told CNN Sports. That mentality change got them over the long-awaited finish line at Wembley in 2022, but the 2025 tournament in Switzerland brings with it a new cycle and fresh challenges. The landscape of women’s and girls’ football has changed dramatically in England, and globally, since the Lionesses’ landmark victory.

A federal judge signed off on arguably the biggest change in the history of college sports on Friday, clearing the way for schools to begin paying their athletes millions of dollars as soon as next month as the multibillion-dollar industry shreds the last vestiges of the amateur model that defined it for more than a century.