Defender Lucy Bronze speaks on the pride she feels to wear the England shirt ahead of a Euro 2025 quarter-final clash against Sweden.
The Lionesses now set their sights on a quarter-final meeting with Sweden at Zurich’s Stadion Letzigrund on Thursday July 17. A victory for England will mean that they book their spot in their sixth-consecutive major tournament semi-finals.
Euro 2025 marks Bronze’s seventh major tournament with the Lionesses, currently the player with the most appearances in the squad. The 33-year-old says her passion for hard work is what motivates her as a footballer.
“My ‘why’ has always been the same,” Bronze said. “I’m very fortunate that my family gets to follow me around and support me. But, I’m someone who’s based off of hard work and enjoying it.
“My ‘why’ is that I just love working hard and I love the game, it’s as simple as that. I started playing football because I love it, that’s literally it. When I loved it, I wanted to work hard.
“I have a picture of myself, actually from Sweden in 2019 and I look absolutely exhausted. I want all the girls to know that that’s my ‘why’, to give everything for this team because I just love playing for England so much.”
‘Proper England’ once had to dig deep for results says Bronze
Coined by midfielder Georgia Stanway following the side’s match day one defeat to France, the term ‘proper England’ has followed the side around all tournament. Originally used by Stanway to express the desire to return to a passionate and gutsy style of play, Bronze reiterated the need for England to remember how far they have come.
“I think we’ve never negated the tactics or anything else that comes with the game with the term ‘proper England.’ I think it was more the fact that we’ve said we’re a new England, a new team.
“That was what was meant by that, we have a lot of younger players and new players who have very different experiences of playing for England compared to the likes of myself, where we know that England used to have to dig deep all the time. 2015 was the first time we beat Germany, that’s insane to think of right now.
“England in the past, it was that you had to dig out performances and it was that you were maybe the underdog, not the favourites. Whereas this England team has developed, football has changed. We’re a very talented team, a lot of technical ability, tactics, all that comes with it but we don’t want to ever forget that we are England, we are proper England and if push comes to shove, we can win a game by any means possible.”
You can read all of the latest news, analysis and opinion at Euro 2025 on The Halfway Line.
