England Women’s manager, Sarina Wiegman is “prepared” for the 2027 FIFA Women’s World Cup Play-Offs.
England’s 3-0 victory over Ukraine last night (9 June) wasn’t enough to automatically qualify for the main tournament after reigning world champions, Spain beat Iceland 6-1 in Reykjavik to top their group.
Wiegman’s Lionesses consequently finished second and will now have to qualify via the play-offs, where they will meet Hungary, Greece, Romania, Belarus, Kosovo, Lithuania, Croatia or Kazakhstan in the first play-off round.
That round is scheduled for between 7-13 October across two legs, with England away in the first leg then at home in the second leg, with the draw scheduled for 18 June.
The second play-off round is also a two-legged tie between 26 November – 5 December, of which England will again be away in the first leg then at home in the second leg if they get past their first-round opponents.
Wiegman however isn’t too fearful of the play-offs as she explained to UK broadcaster, ITV post match that they have plenty of preparation time with no major women’s tournament this summer
“Of course, there is no major tournament for us this summer so there is a little time off.
“We’ll be getting prepared for 18 June for the play-off draw and then we start our preparations straight after.
“We knew there were two scenarios, either you qualified or you go into the play-offs and we know the FIFA window is in October and then November and December, so we’ll get ready.”
Wiegman also spoke of her pride at how England responded to a costly 4-0 loss to Spain in their penultimate group match with a comfortable win over Ukraine at Hill Dickinson Stadium, Liverpool, as Jess Carter’s header plus goals from Georgia Stanway and Beth Mead sealed the victory.
“I’m happy with how we showed up, how we played the game against a very defensive Ukraine,” explained Wiegman on the performance on Merseyside.
“Of course we wanted a response, the whole team did straight after the Spain game and of course everyone was really disappointed.
“But we also knew we had another game to play and we had to stick together and I think that is what we showed today.”
Wiegman also acknowledged that there is still plenty of improvements to make from defensive and midfield standpoints, with all eyes on qualifying for the World Cup via play-offs whilst no player is guaranteed a spot in the squad if do indeed qualify.
“We have seen good things and also things that we want to improve on. We have a year and we know some things that we really have to improve and be ready. On Friday, some things got exploited and we are trying out some things too.
“So you see many players playing at the back, we have played many players in our midfield too, so we need that year to work out what is best for us, what are the best players to play.
“We’re also playing players who are improving, and also they have a year to get more competition in. That is exciting and then you can really finalise and tweak and make the last decisions on how you want to play.”
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