Having 32 teams in the Women’s World Cup rather than 24 made for a brilliant group stage. Just about every group went to an exciting last round. If there’s a key message to take from the opening fortnight, it’s that the biggest mistake any established nation could make would be to underestimate a smaller team.
There have been three major casualties already. A couple of others were on the brink. Why? It’s likely a combination of some nations developing fast but also some big nations really underperforming. Canada, Brazil and Germany have real quality, especially Germany, and yet all three have flown home.
Canada’s demise was uncomfortable to watch. It’s a real shame the Olympic champions had to fight so hard to get decent pay terms from their association. It disrupted preparations and can only have affected their performance. On the pitch, they’ve always been defensively solid but could have a hard time scoring. If they’re going to continue to be a top team on the world stage, there’s work to be done on and off the field.
Brazil started so brilliantly against Panama, scoring great goals. Debinha also scored a nice goal against France. It was structure they lacked. They clearly lost the marking – if they even had a marking plan – against France when Wendie Renard scored the winner. And when they needed to break down Jamaica, particularly in the second half, they lacked the attacking structure and patience to escape a low block. In top-level football, freedom can only follow once a proper structure has been established. Never the other way around.
The demise of Germany was a little harder to explain. They have a really exciting generation of players coming through with a midfield that should probably be at its peak when it includes Sara Däbritz, Lina Magull, Melanie Leupolz and Lena Oberdorf. The one obvious weakness was their defensive line, injury meaning the full-backs had to play out of position. But in the Colombia game, it was the South American team who brought an intensity you’d normally associate with Germany. They fought fire with fire and Germany got badly rattled.
In that last game, against South Korea, they suffered for a lack of structure. They had clear aerial supremacy and should have sought overloads to cross the ball into the box and yet never found the clarity to capitalise. It rather summed up their whole World Cup and followed a pattern where a really strong generation of players has performed poorly for the last five years, aside from at last year’s Euros. And yet when you face German players at Champions League level you would never doubt their high quality.
But let’s hand rightful credit to those teams who lit up the group stage. Before the tournament too many of them had to fight off-field battles: Jamaica had to set up a GoFundMe page, South Africa played a friendly they had to fill out with local players. Such problems are unfortunate and unnecessary before a World Cup and for those teams, unlike for Canada, the hardships have had a galvanising effect.
Often in international football the team with less of the ball wins. If you get the structure right and fight hard enough the end result can be beautiful. Look at the joy we saw from Jamaica, South Africa and Morocco as they went through. Nigeria got out of a very tough group. That’s extremely well done.
Women’s football has become much more global with more players from smaller nations exposed to and educated in top-level clubs. That helps national coaches given limited time with international players. Investment helps, too. Reynald Pedros was very successful with Lyon and Morocco’s association hired a top coach by bringing him in.
The big associations have had to address changes. Historically, women’s coaches had far longer with their players than in the men’s game, with more Fifa dates available. Club football now takes precedence and that changes the conditions and alters the dynamic.
The US team always operated on their own calendar but have had to slide more in line with everyone else. They’re still a really talented side, featuring truly world-class players and I would never count them out, but they’ve been a real disappointment so far. In 2019, they redesigned a counterattacking game from which their success came, along with their set pieces. This time, they’re struggling in buildup play and have lost that danger on the counter. I’m also not seeing much from their set pieces.
In international football, you always need to build around the culture your players come from. Spain lost 4-0 to Japan but will stick to their plan. Barcelona have had huge success with that slow buildup style but Spain haven’t been able to use the Barça central defensive partnership after Mapi León made herself unavailable. Without her they lost probably the best left-footed player in the world. It would make a difference to anyone.
For me, the coach of the group stage was Sarina Wiegman. Against Haiti, England weren’t creating enough in attack and looked vulnerable on the counter. She fixed the creative part against Denmark by bringing in Lauren James as a second No 10 and having Rachel Daly’s attacking threat off the left. They still looked vulnerable, and then lost Keira Walsh. So, in the China game, Sarina played a back three, keeping those attacking players in the same position while Lauren Hemp was introduced into the central areas to show off her abilities. It was pragmatic and really very impressive.
The next level for a coach is to be able to make effective changes not just between games but during the match. That’s what will be required from Sarina and her coaching counterparts once the knockouts begin on Saturday.
