Women's Euros Preview!
Women's Euros Preview!
A short one this week to kick start the Women's Euros which commences on Wednesday!
The Week In Ball
A little bit of housekeeping then before we get into the good stuff.
Gabriel Jesus has (finally) signed for Arsenal. I find myself being extremely nonplussed about this signing. I don't know what it is, he's clearly a good player, we clearly need firepower and yet.. I remain open minded, I just don't have any excitement.
On the flip side, City have announced the signing of Kalvin Phillips, increasing the team's adorability ten fold.
In good business news Forest seem to be really on top of things for their return to the EPL, getting Dean Henderson on loan from United and signing Taiwo Awoniyi from Union Berlin. That's a signing that really excites me.
Elsewhere Lukaku has got his move back to Inter and still the Frenkie de Jong saga rumbles on.
It does seem however that Christian Eriksen has finally agreed to... go to Manchester United. I am not taking this well and would appreciate your thoughts at this difficult time. Please understand that my tweets may be even more unhinged than normal today (Monday 4th).
The other notable piece of news to mention is Christoph Gaultier to PSG. It's not been confirmed but seems likely to happen last I heard.
Kick Off
It's nearly here! The much awaited 2022 Women's Euros starts on Wednesday with hosts England kicking off against Austria at Old Trafford. I'll be there cheering on the gals and then at the Studs after party, do come along if you're in the Manchester area, tickets still available!
Anyway, partying aside we should be in for a cracking tournament and maybe, maybe it will come home?
16 teams will compete, the full list is here, in a competition lasting just over three weeks, ending in a showpiece final at Wembley on the 31st July.
As I often allude to, I am not a women's football expert. I certainly know more than I did a year ago but even that isn't anywhere touching on what I know about the men's game. So I'm going to cop out and direct you to a number of excellent resources to get you up to speed with the teams and their players:
The great Sophie Lawson has previewed each of the games, links to each one available in this handy tweet
The Athletic have a feed here with previews, full squad lists, news, opinion and so on here. For the beginner or even the knowledgeable watcher this piece on who to watch etc. is a must.
Another run down of some great players is here from the always wonderful Tifo, featuring the absolute boy Flo Lloyd Hughes, which means you know it's gonna be good. Make sure you follow her for Euros updates as well.
If you're into stats and analytics check out this from the lovely Jessy Parker Humphreys and Alex Ibaceta. Also excellent follows.
As for me, I'm hoping this tournament is exciting, fun, dramatic and really shows people that women's football is just as valid as men's. I'd like to think that by the end of it I'll have a much better grasp of the players and the abilities of the various teams.
Do tune in to the games, they're available on the BBC if you're in England, I don't know where else if you're not, sorry... If you do watch the opener look up into the gods of the Sir Alex Ferguson stand and give me a wave hehe.
Football 'eritage
While the promotion and knowledge of the 2022 Women's Euros makes it seem like it's a long established competition with a strong pedigree it has in fact only been going officially since 1984 when England, Sweden, Italy and Denmark competed in a four team tournament with Sweden the victors.
From 1987 it was held every two years until 1997 when it began to mirror the men's tournament and was held every four years. This coincided with the Women's World Cup commencing officially in 1991 and being held every four years from the outset. This meant there were two years (1991 and 1995) where the Euros and the WC were played in the same year.
For as long as it's been around the Women's Euro's has been dominated by Germany. As someone without a wide or deep knowledge of women's football it surprised me considering that historically, for me anyway, the most well known club sides are probably Lyon, Barcelona and Arsenal, none of which, last time I checked, are in Germany.
Last time the domination of six straight Euros was broken by the Netherlands. This year who knows...
The {Offside} Thirst Trap
Normally during a tournament I'd do some in depth research to find the hottest player in each team and do a thread on Twitter. It feels different doing it for the women's tournaments though. I could intellectualise it and talk about power and historical objectification of women and so and that would all be right and true but essentially the vibe just feels off.
That doesn't mean there aren't hot players to look out for though so here are a handful to keep a thirsty eye on:
France's Marie-Antoinette Kototo
Spain's Alexia Putellas
England's Leah Williamson
I appreciate these are all pretty obvious choices but you also can't deny that they're good ones ;-) Always happy to take nominations for other candidates.
Merch Stand
Most of the kits for the Euros have been released and so I did one of my ranking threads
None of them are horrible (though I do have strong reservations about the Belgium away colour and Iceland's is just boring) and mostly they're much much better than the Men's.
When it comes to England I actually like the current men's ones, the blue away in particular, but the women's away? Now that's something else. I think it's meant to be orange but it reminds me a lot of the red highlighter in a highlighter pack which was always my favourite because it was a bit different from the others. Either way it's gorgeous. Look at the lovely black trum and the iridescent badge. Beautiful.
I want to marry the France away kit.
Check out the thread for the rest of my opinions.
Extra Time
A quick note to say hi and thank you to the people who came and spoke to me at the Stadio Live last week! It was very lovely and very weird to have real life people acknowledge the newsletter and be so kind about it <3
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