GENEVA (news agencies) — All seven trophy-winning teams at the Women’s European Championship since 1997 were led to glory by a female coach.
The streak collectively by Sarina Wiegman, Silvia Neid and Tina Theune is even more impressive because they were always in the minority at Women’s Euros where most of the coaches were men.
It’s the same again at Euro 2025.
Nine men and seven women are working as head coaches in Switzerland this month. At Euro 2022 there were 10 men and six women.
That’s progress, but the majority is still a kind of mansplaining in women’s soccer.
UEFA managing director of women’s soccer Nadine Kessler — a playmaker for Germany on Neid’s champion team in 2013 — believes it should be better.
“It’s still not enough female coaches, but it’s the best edition we have so far,” Kessler told media.
The seven women coaching at Euro 2025 include Gemma Grainger with Norway (and formerly Wales) and Pia Sundhage with Switzerland.
“I hope that we’re standing here at Euro 2029 and the majority of coaches are female,” Grainger tells the news agencies. “I have no issue saying that whatsoever.”
“For me, the game should be about making sure the opportunities are there for female coaches but making sure that female coaches are at the right level to deliver.”
Sundhage is a storied veteran — a two-time Olympic champion with the United States — who has seen and heard it all about programs to develop and promote women coaches. She worked on such projects in Sweden and says she has been asked the question many times since.
“Football education is very expensive,” Sundhage says. “It’s not 100% sure that the club will pay for everything. You have to (pay) from your own pocket. That’s not the case on the men’s side.”
UEFA funds coaching scholarships and now mandates each Euro 2025 team “to play all matches under the direction of either a female head coach or a female assistant coach.”
“We try to proactively influence this,” Kessler says about the “Duties of the associations” clause in tournament rules.
Still, one of the most respected men coaching in European women’s soccer calls this quota “very strange” — because UEFA does not also require men’s national teams to hire a female coach.
