France coach Bonadei not focused on penalties despite England's wild shootout win

Straits Times

20 hours ago

BASEL, Switzerland - France coach Laurent Bonadei has not given much focus to penalty kicks ahead of his team's quarter-final clash with Germany at Euro 2025 on Saturday, despite the wild shootout between England and Sweden on Thursday.
Reigning champions England reached the semi-finals after squeezing past Sweden in an error-filled shootout.
"We worked a lot on (penalties) before the 2023 World Cup in a specific way, and this time, I preferred not to overload them with this too much, because we don't know how it happens," Bonadei told reporters.
"Last night, we saw players who were really under pressure. And, yes, you can actually put them under pressure during the training, but it's not the same as during the game. When it's the game, when they are tired, when there's a pressure of the audience, maybe it can be completely different.
"The players do it in an individual way with their own pace at the end of every session, sometimes they try two, three, four, or five penalties, but it's very difficult to recreate the context of the game."
France poured in 11 goals from nine different scorers in their three group games to establish themselves as one of the best attacking teams at Euro 2025.
France captain and defender Griedge Mbock is set to return against Germany after being sidelined for a month with a calf injury, and said she is not nervous about kicking off her European campaign in what is sure to be an intense quarter-final.
"I'm not scared. I trust my co-players, and I know that even within the pace, I haven't played for one month, but I know that my teammates will be able to help me and to fill the gap, any gap, if I have a lack of pace," she said.
"We are a collective and I'm lucky because I'm in this collective sport and I can count on my co-players. This is a real plus. No, I'm not really scared." REUTERS