WIEGMAN’S ELEVEN
Given the number of rakes they’d trodden on, Sideshow Bob-style, without sustaining a fatal handle blow to the face, Football Daily fully expected Sunday’s final against Spain to be the match in which an almost supernatural reservoir of good fortune enjoyed by the Lionesses at Euro 2025 finally dried up. Pummelled in their opener against France before stumbling and lurching through the knockout rounds like the world’s most tea-timely football email pinballing its way home off a series of lampposts and trees after a lock-in down our local drinker, England surely couldn’t pull off another smash-and-grab against a team of world champions who can play football to such an ethereal level it often resembles a completely different sport. And while it looked like our prophecy would come to pass after Mariona Caldentey had put the red-hot favourites in front with a bullet header before the break, it was Spain who got the Basel brush-off and Leah Williamson who hoisted the trophy skywards after spot-kicks to prompt a post-match team pogo that reverberated around England before continuing, accompanied by celebratory champagne, cake and karaoke, long into the Swiss night.
