Early loss against France brought team together, says England coach Wiegman

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Soccer Football - UEFA Womens Euro 2025 - Group D - England v Wales - Arena St. Gallen, St. Gallen, Switzerland - July 13, 2025 England manager Sarina Wiegman on the pitch before the match REUTERS/Annegret Hilse

ST. GALLEN, Switzerland - If Englands opening loss to France at Euro 2025 was a cause for concern, coach Sarina Wiegman said being faced with a huge challenge right out of the gate might have been a blessing in disguise for the reigning champions.

Wiegmans team bounced back to beat the Netherlands 4-0 in a must-win match and then thrashed tournament debutants Wales 6-1 on Sunday -- and now ride a confident wave of togetherness into their quarter-final match against Sweden.

We didnt have a good start against France, but that gave us also the urgency to fix, to do things better as a team on the pitch, getting the connections better, Wiegman said. With that loss, the urgency came.

The team really responded well on that, and now hopefully we can show that again against Sweden. We built momentum also from the France game, because that really brought us together.

Sweden, who lost to England in the semi-finals at Euro 2022, were barely challenged in this years group stage, winning all three of their games by a combined score of 8-1.

England finished second in their group, which means, provided they get past Sweden in the quarters, they will avoid world champions Spain