THE OTHER NATIONAL TEAM · ENGLAND
During the men’s World Cup, FemGol will trace the history of some of the women’s national teams from the countries taking to the pitch. Because a country’s football doesn’t fit in a single team.
England open their 2026 FIFA World Cup campaign today. The men’s national team, known as the Three Lions, begin their Group L match against Croatia in Dallas, with the ghost of the 2018 semi-final to lay to rest against the very same opponents. Under the usual heavy pressure of English football, which hasn’t seen a major men’s trophy since 1966, today the side that wants to finally win something takes to the pitch.
But the England that already knows how to win wears the same crest and very nearly the same name. They are the Lionesses. And where this series last met lionesses still waiting to roar on their own continent, these are the opposite: lionesses who have already ruled theirs. Only now they arrive wounded. And a wounded lioness is the most dangerous of all.
The ones who actually lift trophies
While the men pile up decades of lost finals and unkept promises, the Lionesses have become a winning machine. European champions in 2022, at home, against Germany, with Wembley on its feet. And champions again in 2025, in Basel, retaining the title — something only Germany had ever managed. They are, right now, two-time queens of the continent.
That 2025 final was won against Spain. One apiece, a goalless extra time, and a shoot-out in which Hannah Hampton saved two penalties before Chloe Kelly buried the decisive one. For England it was a reckoning with a name on it: the 2023 World Cup final, which Spain had taken 1-0 through Olga Carmona’s goal in Sydney.
There is no argument about the rivalry of this decade in women’s football: it is England–Spain.
The wound in Mallorca
And yet the back-to-back European champions are still not at their own World Cup.
The blow has a date and a place: 5 June, Son Moix, Palma. Spain beat England 4-0 in qualifying for Brazil 2027 and turned a big match into a statement. Patri Guijarro opened the wound, Alexia Putellas widened it with two goals, and Clàudia Pina signed off a night England won’t forget in a hurry. This was not just any defeat: it was Spain reminding the European champions that the throne does not erase the memory.
England did their job afterwards — 3-0 against Ukraine — but it was no longer in their hands. Spain thrashed Iceland 6-1 and took the group. Same fifteen points, different goal difference, and the head-to-head in Spain’s favour. The cold detail of a table became a verdict: Spain to Brazil through the front door; England, off to fight for their ticket in the play-offs. All of it with Sarina Wiegman entering what looks like her last dance — her contract runs out after the 2027 World Cup — and under pressure to prove the 4-0 was an accident, not a crack.
Two ways of understanding football
What makes this duel great is that these are not two versions of the same team but two opposing ideas. Spain rule through the ball: patience, possession, an almost ideological conviction that a match is mastered by keeping it. England compete from somewhere else: structure, physicality, know-how, that very English habit of surviving until the opening comes. Spain want to take you apart piece by piece; England want to hold on until you slip.
When they meet, women’s football looks at itself in the mirror. That is why every match between them leaves a mark: a World Cup final, a European final, a qualifying thrashing. There is no need to force the story; it writes itself.
A wounded lioness
The play-off road is the kind that sharpens you. England go in seeded from League A: a first round over two legs in October and, if they come through, a second in November or December. Two ties just to avoid missing a World Cup as the best team in Europe. There are few motivations more dangerous than that.
Because that is the point. The Lionesses will reach Brazil 2027 not as comfortable favourites but as a side that is hurting, called into question and with something to prove. No epitaphs: a wounded lioness does not become prey — she becomes harder to read. And if they come through the play-offs, waiting on the other side, sooner or later, is the only team to have beaten them twice this cycle. Spain are already there. The fourth chapter of this rivalry deserves a stage, and there is no bigger stage than a World Cup.
Let it come. Because it surely will. And because a country’s football does not fit into a single side.
