Lucy Bronze puts England's Euros run in perspective - 'That's insane to think of right now'
Lucy Bronze has been quick to remind England's younger players how far the Lionesses have come in just 10 years as they bid to make another major tournament semi-final. England are many people's favourites for Thursday's meeting with Sweden, but it's not that long ago that they went into big knockout games as clear underdogs.
This time around, England's younger stars have joined a squad fresh off the back of a Euros win in 2022 and a World Cup final the following year. And part of the 'Proper England' message being spread through the squad is about reminding the newcomers about that journey.
'We've never negated tactics or anything else that comes with the game with the term 'proper England',' Bronze, 33 said. 'It was more the fact that we've said, again, we're a new England, a new team.
'What was meant by that was we had 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.
'But England in the past it was, you have to dig out performances and you are maybe the underdog, you're not the favourite. Whereas this England team has developed, football has changed.
'Obviously we're a very talented team, a lot of technical ability, tactics, all that comes in the game, 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.'
The 'Proper Eng;and' conversation was highlighted by Bronze's team-mate Georgia Stanway after the 2-1 defeat to France. The response has been decisive, with big wins over the Netherlands and Wales, and Bronze has pointed to her and her team-mates' ability to block out the noise around their slow start.
"We never made ourselves the centre of attention - I think that's a lot of the noise from the outside," she said. "Coming off the back of the French game and having that talking point brought the team closer together, I think you saw that with the two performances that came from that.
"We're not too focused on noises around other teams or ourselves. We're only focused on what we do on the training pitch, what we do in games, how we recover, how we perform and how we lift each other up."
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