England’s semifinal record the result of hard work and unity

GENEVA, Switzerland — Having scored the first of England’s two goals in their stunning quarterfinal comeback against Sweden, strapping her own injured leg up in extra-time, before ditching the strapping and hammering home what turned out to be the winning penalty in the shootout, right back Lucy Bronze was asked in this age of “proper England” whether that was a “proper Lucy Bronze” performance.

“Lucy Bronze is proper England,” she responded.

Tuesday’s game against Italy will be England’s sixth major semifinal in 10 years; Bronze and fellow defender Alex Greenwood have been part of the squad for all six.

“It’s amazing speaking to them about the journey and the change in the things that we have at our base camp, for example,” defender Esme Morgan, who came on against Sweden as a substitute, said. “And it’s really special knowing how far the game has come, and it’s a big source of pride that England have consistently got to the last stage of these tournaments.”

Reaching the final four seems normal for the Lionesses now, but it wasn’t always this way and has been the result of a lot of hard work over the past decade.

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Semifinal success

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The 2015 World Cup in Canada was start of the “Bronze Age” (it was only Bronze’s second major tournament) and, as England reached World Cup semifinal for the first time, she played on the left wing, right back, scored a thunderbolt winner against Norway in the round of 16, and netted a key header against Canada in the quarterfinals. England went on to lose to Japan in the semifinals, but came third, overcoming perennial foes Germany 1-0 in extra time in the third-place playoff. It proved to be one of the launchpad moments for this team.

The Lionesses then also reached the semifinals of Euro 2017, where they lost 3-0 to Netherlands (who were under the management of Sarina Wiegman); one player from that team told ESPN that the secret behind their progress in both tournaments was down to “pure fight” and a “complete underdog mentality.”

But by the time of the 2019 World Cup in France, England were no longer underdogs and went into it with high expectations and an experienced squad. They put in their best performance of the tournament in the 3-0 quarterfinal win over Norway, but then ran into the United States in the semifinal, where a missed penalty and a tea-cup celebration sent them home. By this point, the investment in the team — then managed by Phil Neville — was rising every year; the training facilities were improving, the money on offer in the Women’s Super League was increasing each year, and the footballing superpower we know now was starting to take shape.

When Wiegman took charge of England in 2021, all that hard work paid off and she was unequivocal in the way she felt England should be. Off the pitch, she banned the players from wearing jewelry while playing football as it affected their training metrics; messaging to the players was direct, with little room for ambiguity. On the field, she switched captain from Steph Houghton to Leah Williamson and her experience of winning major tournaments led to England dancing to the sound of “Sweet, Caroline” after winning Euro 2022 on home soil.

That experience was key a year later as England reached the final of the 2023 World Cup, losing 1-0 to Spain. Once again, Bronze starred on the field, but was also their spokesperson off it when needed.

“If we hadn’t have got to the semifinals, I would have said we would have underperformed,” she said at the time. “Our performances haven’t been our best, granted, but the results have been there … We got past the hurdle last year in the Euros and finally made it to the final. We got past that dreaded [feeling of] always being beaten in the semifinals so we’ve got that in the locker.”

The ‘why’ is the motivator

As England prepare for their sixth major semifinal in 10 years after a tense buildup of retirements and negative press, Bronze is still there. And still leading from the front.

Before the tournament started, each player sat down and told the other 22 in the squad why they want to play for England and what has driven them to this point. On the wall of the team room in their camp at the Dolder Grand hotel in Zurich, the players have a photo of them as youngsters, but another of them from their England journey. Bronze’s is from the third-place match at the 2019 World Cup (a game England lost 2-1 to Sweden, where she looked utterly exhausted.

“I will give anything, and I will give everything when I play in an England shirt,” Bronze says of why she chose that photo. “I wanted all the girls to know that that’s my ‘why.’ My ‘why’ is to give everything for this team because I just love playing for England so much.”

After the opening-game loss to France, she addressed her teammates again and reminded them how they lost their first match back in 2015 and ended up reaching the semifinals. All was not lost, and they trusted one another to respond.

“I think we’ve made ourselves very vulnerable, whether it’s individually, as Sarina herself has made herself very vulnerable, staff, players,” England forward Beth Mead said to the BBC. “I think that gives us so much more togetherness, so much more trust of each other, that we’re willing to share really tough moments with each other. How can we help each other in those moments?

“I’m super proud of how we’ve actually dealt with that as a squad. In the past, I feel like maybe teams that I have been a part of might not have been able to do that so positively and quickly in hard moments.

“I really think that Sarina has instilled that into us as a team, and we know she’s got our back, we’ve got her back and you can see that in the way, obviously, we have come back in performances and it’s not gone quite right and we’ve still, you know, given that ‘Proper England’ attitude.”

Unity is holding England together

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“Proper England” has been England’s mantra in Switzerland and that theme of togetherness has been fundamental to their run to yet another semifinal.

The “positive clicks” clique — the group the substitutes have formed to keep spirits high, and intensity at a level where they are ready to jump into action whenever needed — has been key. We saw that against Netherlands where England had to win to avoid going out after only their second match (and did so, 4-0), then against Wales where England prevailed 6-1, and then in that helter-skelter quarterfinal against Sweden that saw them come back from 2-0 down with the help of their subs to progress on a penalty shootout that saw nine misses. They needed a huge slice of luck, but it’s unity which has carried them forward.

We’ve seen that togetherness on show again in the last couple of days. On Sunday, defender Jess Carter released a statement where she talked about the racist abuse she’s been subject to through the tournament. The players responded with a collective message; supporting Carter, condemning the abuse she’s received and announcing that they’d no longer take the knee before matches.

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Once more, it was Bronze who fronted up to the media. She spoke brilliantly for 20-odd minutes as she left the world in no doubt over the anger and sadness the Lionesses felt at the racist abuse Carter received. But also how they would stand together.

“We’re all very professional and able to focus on football whilst supporting each other,” she said. “We all support Jess; Jess supports the team. No matter what we’re all going through we’re all able to do that and I think we’ve shown that in this tournament and in previous tournaments, in previous meetings with different players going through different scenarios whether it’s something going on at home, deaths of parents, to racism, to homophobia.

“There’s so many issues that go on, this team stand up and speak out for and we all support each other through all, and whilst we’re doing that we’re still successful as a football team and I think that’s what gives us this platform to be able to speak out and to push even more.

“Moments like that empower us both off the pitch and on the pitch, so for us it’s about how we’re empowered as players to make a change and know that driving for success will help us make those changes.”

Make no mistake, England will be emotionally charged when they face Italy on Tuesday in Geneva. On the field, they’ll be keeping everything crossed that Williamson is fit to face Italy after she turned her ankle against Sweden, and they’ll be hoping the performance is more akin to Netherlands and Wales than France and Sweden.

If it was collective fight which got them through to their first-ever World Cup semifinal back in 2015, it’s been the “proper England” mentality and the strength of the pack this time around. And it’s also been Bronze. “She just sort of put her shoulders back and played like, ‘I’m not letting us go home,'” Morgan said of her teammate against Sweden.

England have embraced a mentality of winning matches at whatever personal cost, but also ensuring that if one member of the squad is hurting, the rest of the pack rallies around them. And it’s what has them on the verge of yet another final.