Jonathan Liew's Blog, page 66
August 2, 2022
Men’s football boom offers roadmap and warning for women’s game | Jonathan Liew
In the glow of Euro 2022 victory, should women’s football aspire to be something similar yet very different to the men’s game?
Jill Scott didn’t sleep a wink. She sauntered off the Wembley pitch, went straight into what was – by all accounts – a long and messy night of celebrations, and then simply bowled out of the team hotel on Monday morning to join the victory parade in London. Perhaps, for a stalwart midfielder who had just tasted victory in her 10th and very possibly last international tournament, she was fearful that if she slept she might eventually have to wake up.
And for a glowing but hungover nation, there remains a certain surreal dreamlike quality to the events at Wembley Stadium on Sunday evening. The very fact of victory was startling enough: a first major international trophy for 56 years in either the men’s or the women’s game, clinched on the sweet green grass of home. The manner of victory was more startling still: a winning goal in the 110th minute against the eight-time champions Germany, a lead skilfully and cynically sequestered in the final minutes with a display of time-wasting and gamesmanship that proved beyond doubt that the English can shithouse with the very best.
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July 31, 2022
Football comes home as Lionesses make history – Women’s Football Weekly
Faye Carruthers, Suzanne Wrack, Ceylon Andi Hickman and Jonathan Liew celebrate England’s success as they are crowned champions of Europe in front of a record-breaking crowd at Wembley
England are European champions.
No, this is not a drill – the Lionesses created history by winning their first major women’s tournament in a dramatic Euro 2022 final against Germany at Wembley.
Continue reading...England’s win against Germany is only the beginning for the women’s game | Jonathan Liew
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 podium
England 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...July 30, 2022
England and Germany meet again for Euros final but goalposts have moved
Teams met in the 2009 Women’s Euros final but that belongs in a different era – Sunday will show how far the game has come
The most striking difference is the feeling of space. Space in the stands and space on the pitch. As England and Germany step out for the final of the 2009 European Championship, the Olympic Stadium in Helsinki is less than half full: the rows of black plastic seats creating their own shade, the noise simply evaporating like steam. In large part this is attributable to the fact that the final – for some mystifying reason – is being played on a Thursday evening in September. Some of the English newspapers haven’t even bothered to send anybody.
The crowd of just over 15,000 is treated to a ragged rout: Germany running out 6-2 winners, forcing England’s loose assemblage of mostly semi-pro players to chase them to exhaustion. The level of commitment is unstinting. The level of technical ability is surprisingly good. What’s missing is the intensity: the tactical sophistication, the speed of thought and action, the physical conditioning that allows modern players to sprint and change direction and leap and slide with the same vigour in minute 90 as in minute one.
Continue reading...July 27, 2022
Lionesses roar into Wembley final – Women’s Football Weekly
Faye Carruthers, Suzanne Wrack, Ceylon Andi Hickman and Jonathan Liew react as England progress to the final of Euro 2022 after sweeping aside the Swedes. Plus, will it be France or Germany who they meet at Wembley on Sunday evening?
England are Euro 2022 finalists!
Rampant, rambunctious, riveting and riotous fun by the end of it with Russo stealing the headlines after THAT naughty back heel. The 13-year wait is over - the Lionesses are into a major tournament final for the first time since 2009. A 4-0 win – cruising, no stress – were we even watching England?!
Continue reading...Alessia Russo banished all fear with the cheeky backheel that foxed Sweden | Jonathan Liew
Moments of inspiration are so rare at this level that the England striker’s semi-final goal was the last thing anyone expected
Look, 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 watching.
Fear is one of the most underrated elements of elite football. It is why wingers try to squeeze in a cross instead of taking on a defender. It is why defenders hoof the ball clear rather than picking a pass through the lines. It is why moments of genuine inspiration are so rare at the top level. And the bigger the stakes, the bigger the quantum of failure. Aversion to risk is what makes us human. And so as Russo gathers the ball in the Sweden penalty area with 22 minutes to play in the European Championship semi-final, pretty much the last thing anyone expects her to do is the thing she actually does.
Continue reading...July 26, 2022
No angst, no heartache but full of risk: this is an England team like no other | Jonathan Liew
The Euro 2022 final will be the biggest moment of their lives but the Lionesses have the chance to turn old vices into new virtues
It was rampant, it was dominant, it was refined and frankly - to anyone remotely conversant in the argot of English football – it was just a little bit weird. England, the host nation, have swept into the final of Euro 2022, schooling and subduing the world’s No 2-ranked nation Sweden in a 4-0 rout at Bramall Lane. No angst, no stage fright, no bitter heartache. Just fluid, expressive one-touch football and the sort of goals you score in your dreams. Quick, check their passports.
England expects: for so long this inflated expectation has felt like a lead weight on this team, freighting their every step with meaning, setting them up for inevitable failure. England’s women have never won a major tournament in their history. On Sunday evening, at a sold-out Wembley Stadium, against either Germany or France, they will get the chance to turn old vices into new virtues.
Continue reading...The Sydney Project: how athletic excellence traps McLaughlin but also sets her free | Jonathan Liew
World record holder has to deal with the difficult feelings that come with knowing she is a figment of the ambition of others
It’s 2022. Sydney McLaughlin is 22. She crosses the line and sits down on the track. There are no wild celebrations or overt displays of emotion. Maybe she’s simply stunned at the fact that she’s just run a world 400m hurdles final in a time that would have earned seventh place in the final of the 400m flat. Maybe she’s reflecting on the mathematical improbability of lowering the world record from 52.16 to 50.68 in the space of 13 months. Maybe she’s just thinking about the lactic acid still burning inside her legs.
At the press conference, the focus is not on what she has just achieved but what she might yet achieve. More world records? The 50-second barrier? A switch of events? The world has seen a miracle, and all it wants to know about is her next trick. “The sky’s the limit, for sure,” she says. “I need to ask my coach about our next goal. He calls the shots.” She doesn’t say what she wants for herself.
Continue reading...July 21, 2022
Georgia Stanway blown away by ‘surreal’ England support: ‘We’re a united nation’
Georgia Stanway says she can feel the country uniting behind England before next week’s Euro 2022 semi-final. Stanway scored the winning goal in England’s quarter-final victory over Spain on Wednesday night, a moment she described as “the greatest of her career”, and revealed that members of the men’s team that reached last summer’s European Championship final have been in touch to offer support and advice.
According to figures released by the BBC, England’s thrilling comeback against the pre-tournament favourites in Brighton was watched by 9.1 million viewers, of whom 7.6 million watched the live coverage on BBC One with another 1.5 million on the internet.
Continue reading...Euro 2022, Lewandowski and Fulham ticket prices – Football Weekly Extra
Max Rushden, Archie Rhind-Tutt, Beth Fisher and Jonathan Liew discuss England’s quarter-final triumph and what’s happening in Germany
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On the podcast: England comes back to see off Spain in extra-time in the quarter-final of Euro 2022. Did Sarina Wiegman make the right substitutions or should they have started? How are Germany preparing for their derby with Austria? The latest Women’s Football Weekly pod is also out now too.
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