Phil Neville: England Women comfortable with raised expectations
Written by News on 02/04/2019
England Women head coach Phil Neville insists his side are comfortable with expectation levels that have gone “through the roof” heading into this summer’s World Cup.
England will head to the tournament, which begins on June 7 in France, as the third-ranked team in the world – only USA and Germany are ranked above them – following their win in the SheBelieves Cup last month.
England host Canada, who are ranked fifth, in Manchester City’s Academy Stadium on Friday before facing Spain at Swindon Town’s The Energy Check County Ground on Tuesday, and Neville is keen to keep building positive momentum.
“We always said before SheBelieves that the important thing was to win the tournament,” Neville told Sky Sports News.
“We were not shy about telling people that and we went out there and we delivered. The challenge is that once you win, people want to knock you off your perch.
“SheBelieves is not the World Cup but what actually has helped my team is standing on that platform with a medal around their necks and celebrating a massive achievement in winning a competition like SheBelieves.
“The challenge now is we have got two really tough games against Canada and Spain and they will be coming here knowing full well that we are a scalp to beat.
“So we have got to keep improving. The hardest thing in football is to win again and to keep going out there and winning.
“So we are really looking forward to the games. The expectation levels are going through the roof and I get the sense that my players are really enjoying it.
“We have played ten out of the top 12 teams in the world in the past 12 months and we have done well against every single one of them.
“This is against the fifth-best team and the 12th-best team so we have got to keep chalking off these good performances and these victories to keep the momentum going.”
(c) Sky News 2019: Phil Neville: England Women comfortable with raised expectations
