Spain edge Germany to set up Euro 2025 final with England – Women’s Football Weekly

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0:49Hello, I'm Faye Carruthers, and welcome to the Guardian Women's Football Weekly. So the gold and the Toblerone will meet in Basel after Spain saw off Germany to book a place in the Euro 2025 final where they'll face England. It was the world champion's first ever win over Germany and who else but Itana Bonmati to score the decider in extra time. This tournament just keeps serving up more and more drama and more and more late nights. And now we have a rematch of the World Cup final. We'll review last night's semi-final plus we'll take your questions and that's today's Guardian Women's Football Weekly.

1:31Tom Gary, who's rubbing his eyes immediately. I feel like we literally need sleep updates from everybody in the pod this tournament with these ridiculous extra time late nights sending us all slightly delirious. How are you?

1:47Faye Carruthers:I'm doing very well. I'd be doing a lot better if teams could win matches in 90 minutes, but that's OK. We forgive them. They're entertaining us in many different ways. and the tournament serving up some really compelling drama. So, yeah, we go again. One more. We're nearly there and I think we're all tired. And it can't be that late. The first thing I said to my husband this morning, I think I'm going to go to bed before midnight for the next few days because the final is a 5pm kickoff. So, yay. Alex Ibaseta, I bet you didn't care what time it finished. What drama. how are you? Good, tired as well.

2:27Yeah, it's just quite demanding when the mats go to the taxi time, especially if you're working. It's just like you have everything ready in the 90 minutes and it goes into 30 minutes. The next time you're just like, really? You're making me work 30 more minutes and that's it. But it is true what Tom said, you know, it's entertaining and we're here for that. So we're catching up on our sleep these next few days. Chris Poweroth, are you entertained? entertained how could i not be entertained fay and and i've been going back and forth these last couple of games and getting the early flight out of wherever so going to bed at two or three o 'clock and then getting up at five to go to the airport i'm just getting a bit old for it frankly yeah i was going to say i mean that is literally living on fumes i i get upset if i don't get you know eight hours normally i've been getting five and a half to six but i know that you guys have been getting more like three to four, which is just utterly, utterly brutal.

3:25However, Tom has cheese to get him through. Tom, I have an email for you from Raphael. This is for Tom. I hope you're doing well, not having too much cheese. I always giggle when I hear of your experimenting with rich winter food in the middle of a heat wave. Fondue and raclette will wait until November as far as I'm concerned. By the way, I almost laughed out loud when listening to Tom describe his disappointing experiment in St. Gallen. Flema Cooker is actually originally from Alsace. I don't know if that's the right pronunciation in France. My brother-in-law is from Strasbourg and I think he'd die on the spot if he was told that Flema Cooker is one, Swiss and two, glorified pizza.

4:10How do you respond?

4:12Faye Carruthers:I stand corrected and gladly advised of the real culinary reasons behind it. I actually I had another phlegm cooker since we recorded the pod after the St. Gallen and I would say that the experience was significantly better so maybe I just had a bad sampling is that right have I redeemed myself are you just reining yourself back in again so you don't upset upset the Swiss for the last five days of your uh of your tour maybe maybe we want to make it out with friends, don't we? We certainly do. Spain have many friends and many admirers and they've reached the final of the European Championship for the first time after edging out Germany in the second semi-final to set up another showdown with England.

5:03It finished Germany nil, Spain won after extra time thanks to a goal in the 113th minute from Itana Bonmati. Tom, it was a competitive encounter, a significant achievement for Spain. What did you make of the game?

5:18Faye Carruthers:Yeah, actually, the celebrations from Spain perhaps reminded a lot of us that this was their first European final. I think perhaps because they've been so good to watch for so many years now, maybe it's easy to forget that they've still got relatively few finals historically. So it was a really tight, good semi-final, very competitive. I thought Germany played the game really well tactically to try and halt Spain as much as possible. Probably did as well as you could really expect anyone to do in a tactical sense against this really good Spain team. Germany defended well. They had the most number of duels won in 68 to 52 in Germany's favour.

6:00Faye Carruthers:They battled really well. They won the most tackles. They actually had some quite good chances to score that I think they'll maybe really be frustrated they didn't take. But overall, Spain with a better team technically they're the best team in the tournament and I'm quite glad as a neutral that they're in the final because that final is two fantastic, fantastic teams and I'm really pleased that Bon Matisse scored the winning goal because we all know what a difficult start to the tournament she had and this story now to go from a hospital bed to scoring this winner in the semi-final to take Spain to Basel is quite the movie script So what a player and bring on Sunday.

6:41Yeah, we'll talk about Itana Bonmatti in a second. But overall, Alex, your team are through. And if you looked at the data, Spain outpossessed and outcreated Germany across the pitch. 67 % possession, 22 shots on target, 626 accurate passes. Obviously, the stats kind of tell one part of the story, but it wasn't easy for them, as Tom said. Did you always think that they'd find a way or were you starting to prepare yourself for a shootout? It's definitely an interesting one because obviously I think every single team that Spain have played so far this tournament have not changed the tactic. The tactics are the same.

7:23It's a low, deep block. You're kind of very, very compact, closing down the spaces in the midfield. You're closing down passing lanes. I mean, Spain, it's not that hard to figure them out. They go from center-backs to midfield to width to back to the center. It's kind of the general notion of how the ball kind of moves along the pitch. So if you close down those passing lanes, if you close down those spaces, if you leave Alex Simpoteas and Ida Elbomati with no midfield spaces where they usually operate, you do frustrate Spain. But we've seen them in the tournament outscore what it is as load blocks.

8:01but historically as well, those low blocks have always been the kryptonite. They've been forced to make different decisions, to find different paths of the ball. And you saw it a lot, especially I think Badrini Icaro is one to say for this, with Alexia Aidana being dropped deeper into Italy's half and closing down spaces. It was Badrini who had to kind of step up into the spaces and dominate the ball and dominate passing. but yeah it was tense I think Germany was a team that Spain came up against that had probably the most clear chances to be able to get something out of their counter-attacks and small chances and the opportunities that they got we had Katakoi make that last minute save in normal time from that rebound Karabul had that free kick that could have easily gone and it bounced under Katakoi.

8:57So, you know, Germany were kind of the team that I actually held my breath every time they attacked. And with the likes of Clarabu, Lea Schiller, you know, those are quality players that can finish the game that do have, you know, cold blood when you're up against Katakoi 1v1. So this was probably the most nerve-wracking match in terms of from a Spain's perspective. But Spain played well, you know, you said it there, they dominated the match, so you knew it was coming. but you know it is football and anything could happen at any moment. It is football and it is the Euro 2025 tournament where it feels anything can happen but ultimately we have the two teams in the final that we all predicted but we've got to talk about Itana Bonmati because she very rarely fails to deliver anyway Chris but exactly as Tom said she started the tournament being hospitalized with a bout of viral meningitis.

9:50I don't think any of us expected to see her until the latter stages of the tournament at most you know here we are three weeks later she's sending her team into the final I mean it's easy to say but I mean what a player she's an absolute delight to watch and you know just at that moment when you think if this is going to go to penalties is anyone going to score a penalty that's what I was thinking it's like what are we going to see again and then you've just got you know Bon Matty Bon Mattying do you know what I mean it's just like you know just letting that but just letting the ball run as well it reminded me of you know old days of our grassroots sunday league football where the coach would say let the ball do the work and that we thought that was because we were all a bit shit excuse my leg and so it's better to let the ball do the work but you just what it was just beautiful to watch um yeah i mean arguably she'd be and katrin burger at the near post and you know after like her heroic San Catra Berger that is throughout the tournament you know I felt a bit sorry for her at that moment but as I say it's just Bon Matty Bon Mattying sorry excuse the London accent of saying Bon Matty Alex my apologies and I just think you know it was just it was classy it was just classy and I also really liked at the end I don't know if you caught it and it's interesting watching on TV because I've been watching a lot of the games in the stadia to watch her going to talk to all the opposition players at the final whistle, which I just think is really classy.

11:17Lucy Bonds always does it as well, I notice. And there's just something about that. And it's not in a, you know, you can sort of see it's not in a patronising way. It's just to kind of understand kind of, you know, what the battlefield has been like. I mean, huge props to her. Obviously, I hope she has a terrible game on Sunday and some of her form and all of those things. But yeah, what a player, what a player. Yeah. Let's focus a little bit more on Germany for the moment, Tom. 10 days or so ago. They looked like a completely different outfit. I think we'd all written them off, hadn't we, when they were torn apart by Sweden.

11:50They were slated in the press back home for their inability to defend. I mean, partly because they've barely got any defenders left. They had their backs against the wall for this game and the 120 minutes against France in the quarterfinal as well. No fit defenders are on the bench, but somehow they've managed to prove the naysayers wrong. And as Alex said, they were actually, the team that were getting you sitting up on the edge of your seat.

12:19Faye Carruthers:Yeah, they can go home with their heads held very, very high. I think that we can't underestimate what the impact of playing those 120 minutes against France. Almost all of them with 10 players must have done from a physical exhaustion point of view and how well they've recovered to compete so competitively against Spain in that semi-final. I thought that Anne Kutunberger had another really good game for the vast majority of the game Clearly she'll be disappointed with the winning goals we've beaten at your near posters Any goalkeeper would be from a positioning point of view But we do also need to sort of shout out how well she played for the normal 90 minutes And of course how wonderful she was in the quarterfinal I think there's a lot of hope and optimism now around this Germany team For the next sort of probably three tournaments that they could be really strong now there's a lot of things that are promising about the way they played under Christian Vuc, for example.

13:11Faye Carruthers:But I just think that they are, as with so many teams, there's a gap in technical skill to Spain that was quite evident. We've thrown praise at Bon Mati, understandably, but I want to shout about Patry because she had more than 100 passes completed last night. And just to give you an example, no German player had more than 40, and that was Anne Kutchenberger. So, you know, she's got three times more than any outfield German player. She's played more progressive passes than anyone else, 21, and she's created seven shots. So for one player to do that in a major semifinal, she really stood out for me.

13:49Faye Carruthers:And at the moment, for the time being, Germany haven't really got a player of that, that high level of that level of the Patrick Bon Mati. They haven't got a massive, massive superstar who, you know, we will talk about for Ballon d 'Or. They've got some very, very good players, but they should hopefully come away from this campaign going into the World Cup and the next Euros with a huge amount of confidence with the fact that they, the improvements they've made from the last World Cup are vast. So a good campaign from them and they were nearly there, nearly. Yeah, I mean, the retirement of Alexandra Pop, they definitely miss having a striker without a doubt.

14:31They just had no end product, really. They did manage to exploit the Spanish defence at times with speedy transitions, and Clara Ball, I think, was the epitome of that. But was their game plan, Alex, because it could have panned out very differently, was their game plan a blueprint of how you can try and get at Spain? I'm trying to get you to give us some positives for England on Sunday. Yeah, I literally, like every single team that Spain have played have done the same exact thing. And it is a blueprint because, you know, and I think it's quite interesting because England will probably be the first team who doesn't play like that.

15:15When you look at all the formations coming up against Spain, most of them are back five. As much to Serena likes to throw curveballs once in a while. I don't think she's going to make her team play in the back five, much less kind of be scared, sort of say, of Spain. I think the finals actually are quite different to what the rest of the games that Spain have played this tournament. England open up a lot more, but obviously they see a bit more fruit because they are attacking a lot more than sitting defensively. Switzerland barely attacked. Belgium, you know, was the team that impressed the most because you look at them and the quality isn't, you know, as high as that of Germany, of England, for example, even Italy.

16:01But they still got, you know, a few goals in. But that meant that they exposed themselves out in the back, which meant that Spain scored the amount of goals that they scored. So there's no really, you know, getting around it. If you expose yourself, Spain will score. It's just what they do. It's what they're doing. It's the players that are able to do it. I think what's important to know also that key players are doing really, really well. Claudia Pina, for starters, is absolutely amazing down the wing, finding the space, it's top of the box. Again, Padre Icaro, I think she's, you know, we talk about Aitana Alexia quite naturally because both of them are having good tournaments, but we're kind of used to that by now.

16:39Let's move on to the next midfielder, it's Padre Icaro, because when she plays well, the entire team plays well, the entire team works. So it's going to be interesting because England aren't going to play down to kind of, you know, sitting back, compact defensive line. They're going to open themselves up, which means that they can score and they definitely have the quality to score, especially when you look at the defensive weaknesses that Spain have. We've talked about it. You know, the slow pace in the centre-back positions. You have Alessi Russo, who's easily, you know, able to run in between the two centre-backs to get, you know, first touch into space and get yourself in a 1v1 with the keeper.

17:16You know, the wingers go up in what he's on a right year. And Ola Carmona, they like to play quite attractive. So, you know, you have the likes of Lauren Hemp, Chloe Kelly being able to run into those bases as well. So it's going to be a really good game. I think for once, it's not going to be us watching Spain repetitively try to score for the entire 90 minutes. So it's going to be interesting. But yeah, I think everybody knows what Spain doesn't like. But at the end, you know, they've managed to win every single match with every single team that's played like that. Yeah, yeah. And I wonder whether actually England will be quite, you know, pleased in lots of ways, because I don't think they've done particularly well against the combative players and teams this season, and that's what they would have got from Germany.

18:03Tom and Chris have both mentioned Anne Katrin Berger, and it was kind of a tale of two keepers in many ways, two contrasting fortunes as well. But I have to say, the commentary line of the night to close out the first half of Extra Time from Friend of the Pod Robin Cowan was, it's burger time. I mean, it was, but perhaps not quite in the way that she thought. I did message her with some clapping emojis and she replied saying she was delirious at that point. But look, you know, we've said it already. Anne Katrin Berger should have done better for the goal. Stepped up immediately to apologise, which is a mark of the player.

18:38But Christian Vuk said she didn't have to do that. She made so many wonderful saves that got us to where we are there's no blame we're very proud of the team I mean it is just that tough life of being a keeper Chris you end up being hero or villain don't you and you can make all the stops but one mistake and it's and and it's all over yeah and I think that's very much the position right it's like and that's why keepers are a slightly different breed to everybody else because you have to have a different mentality you know because you can do like you know Alex mentioned it katakoi didn't barely did anything but had to pull out an incredible stop just before the end of normal time and ann katrin berger's had an exceptional tournament i keep watching that save and i you know i'm not necessarily a fan of watching saves but that it was unbelievable what she did in the quarterfinal and you know a scoop exactly it's like saving the tournament serves the tournament i think it's one of the best saves i've ever seen you know across across football and so you know Christian Fouke is exactly right it's like they wouldn't have been there if it hadn't been for her and you know one mistake and then that's that and you can be exposed across the pitch in any other way but as a goalkeeper it's you know the the spotlight is on you but that's what makes goalkeepers goalkeepers and to be honest the thing that always gets me about goalkeepers is you are volunteering for people to fire footballs at you at a really hard pace.

20:04So you've got to have a different mentality to everybody else. So fair play to her. She had a great tournament and that was just a slightly sad way to end it for her, really. Yeah. Katakoi was actually named by Susie, Tom and Marva in our predictions as the player to be receiving the Golden Glove. And that world-class double save to keep out Germany late on was incredible. But she gets criticised, actually, for her shot-stopping. She didn't really have to face that many. So I think that's probably part of the reason why. But she really stepped up when her side needed her, Tom.

20:40Faye Carruthers:Yeah. And also, I know you're saying she didn't have to make many saves, but she was quite commanding, like aerially as well, I thought, in the box last night. And I know that we went with that prediction, probably because we thought that Spain were going to have the most clean sheets overall, not necessarily specifically because of her. and it does tend to go to the team, the goalkeeper of the team that ultimately wins. But actually, she has had a really good tournament when called upon and when needed. So I think we are often forgetting, again, how because of the players are so wonderful on the ball in midfield, we forget just how good the rest of the Spain team also is away from your Itanas and your Alexias and so on and so on.

21:25Faye Carruthers:And I think the save that was, I'm going to forget the exact minute now that it was, but essentially right at the end, In fact, she made two really strong saves. But the one save we're all thinking about right in the top corner up to her, high to her left, was probably the second best save of the tournament. If we think about the Kajunberger save against France being the best save of the tournament, this is probably the next one behind it. I thought it was a really important save. And you could see the reaction from all of her Spain teammates all going, sort of rushing straight to her, giving a huge pat on the back.

21:56Faye Carruthers:They knew how important that was. And we cannot underestimate how strong the whole team is. There's no weak link really in the Barcelona team from 1 to 11, all of them top class. And that was another example of it. Yeah, it was. And a lesson in patience maybe for Spain. Alex, how much have they developed that side of their game over the last 12 months and learnt not to get frustrated when things aren't quite clicking for them? Yeah, I think this tournament has been a changing point, I think, for a lot of reasons. and I think that mentality and consistency has been kind of one of the main things that Spain has been able to grow.

22:33You know, we saw them in the last Euro three years ago and their mentality was weak. We saw them, you know, it wasn't down to them. It was down, you know, Alexi Podilla started to direct for the tournament. Jorge Villa didn't really know what to do with the team and there was a lot of profusion. There was a lot of uncertainty in a lot of positions and it wasn't down to them. But essentially, now you look at them and they don't rely on kind of anyone external except for themselves. When it comes to kind of picking themselves up, to figuring stuff out on the pitch, to kind of motivating that, you can tell that there's a togetherness.

23:09And I think there's key things that have lifted them up. You know, you have a player like Ateneada Castillo. You know, she's a player that's always been quite inconsistent, I think. And she comes from club that they're not really good togetherness. they don't have a good mentality so you put her in a squad on the national team she's always been quite dependent and you come into this tournament and she's absolutely performing I think that's down to everyone being on the same page supporting each other and playing good football I think the progression the biggest change that Spain have had over the last year the last couple of years has been their mentality to figure out things on the pitch but figure them out together there's no individual player it's always kind of been the divide between Barcelona players and everyone else that's been quite a clear line a lot of the time historically but now that division isn't there anymore they're all together, they're all fighting for the same thing their mentality is there they're able to resolve things on the pitch in a more practical manner especially when you're playing against teams that literally cut down your planning what can be before they weren't a team that were capable of figuring that out on the pitch, they put their head down, they would be notably frustrated.

24:25You saw them yesterday, they were, I think, frustrated by the 15th minute, the way that Germany was playing, but that didn't mean that they put their head down. That literally just fired them up. They kept pushing, they kept being consistent. So I think when you look at Spain, I think mentally, for so many different reasons, whether it be football or outside of football, mentally, they're the strongest that they've ever been. Yeah, you can tell that for sure. They're also as strong as England are in terms of their depth. You know, we've talked a lot this tournament about what Serena Wiegmann has to bring off the bench.

25:00But it's the same with Spain, Chris. Athenia came off the bench, made an impact again. Her cutting pass was the one that led to the goal. Salma also had an impact, as Alex said earlier. And when you look at who, you know, they're coming up against in the final, how important is that going to be? Because we've seen that that is what has pushed England over the line is those impact substitutes. This is going to be an interesting tactical battle from that perspective for both managers, I feel. Absolutely. And I think we've seen it in the knockout stages as well that things are happening towards the end of the game, right?

25:37Whether it's in injury time or towards the end of the game. And that's when your subs really matter. and, you know, it really shows you what a squad game it is. You know, you really don't think about what that first XI is because when you think about who the sort of the players have been in this tournament, whether it's been for England or for Spain, it's not necessarily the starting XI that spring to mind automatically. You know, exactly what you just said about Athenia last night, about Michel Adjermang the night before. You know, this isn't just like our sub coming on to try and see what's happening.

26:09It's like, you know, very much how the game is being managed. So, you know, it's going to be very interesting to see on Sunday what sort of plays out. I guess it depends what happens in the first 60 minutes, right? 60, 65 minutes. But sorry for the cliches, but it is a squad game, particularly in a tournament where, you know, the games are coming thick and fast. And you've got to manage, you've really got to manage, you know, your rest and recovery and all the rest of it. You've got to build between games and ensure that everyone's ready. So I think it's going to be really interesting. For sure.

26:43Yeah, it's going to be fascinating. Right, that's it for part one and part two. We're going to look a little bit more broadly at where this leaves both teams going forward.