\n<\/p>\n
Sarina Wiegman has said Jess Carter is \u201cready to perform and compete\u201d in England\u2019s semi-final against Italy on Tuesday night, praising the defender\u2019s strength of character in the face of racist abuse received during Euro 2025.<\/p>\n
Wiegman is expected to keep faith with Carter after a below-par performance against Sweden in the previous round \u2013 one of many in the team that night \u2013 but said they had discussed the possibility of her not playing. \u201cOf course we had conversations,\u201d the manager said. \u201cAlthough it is a hard situation, Jess is a very strong person and she wants to move on too.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe also felt \u2013 as we did \u2013 that we had to address this. You can\u2019t just let it go, so we did not. Then we know that there\u2019s a match going on, we want to perform, we\u2019re ready to perform, she\u2019s ready to perform and compete, and that says a lot about her and the team.\u201d<\/p>\n
The midfielder Georgia Stanway echoed Wiegman\u2019s sentiments and took aim at those who sent the racist messages on social media. \u201cThe people that are saying these things and doing things like this are not fans,\u201d she said. \u201cWhen we pull on that shirt we are doing it for the people we stand next to, for our families and the actual people who are there watching the games and enjoying the games. I say it with power because I really believe in that, we believe in that: the people who are like that don\u2019t deserve to be called fans.\u201d<\/p>\n
The decision to tackle the abuse of Carter as a collective, with the team releasing a joint statement shortly after Carter released her own, has further united them. Stanway said: \u201cIf anything it has probably brought us closer together as a team. There\u2019s some things that we will never be able to understand and this is one of those. We need to cut it out of society and football. Of course we don\u2019t know the steps that it takes in order for that to happen, but right now all we can do is show our support, our togetherness, and we can be united in what we want to make sure is right.\u201d<\/p>\n
England will not be taking the knee in protest at racist abuse and discrimination because it is not \u201cdoing what we want it to do\u201d any more, Stanway said. She hopes standing will \u201cbring up more conversation and more change\u201d.<\/p>\n
Italy\u2019s manager, Andrea Soncin, expressed his team\u2019s support for Carter before the fixture in Geneva. \u201cThere is the greatest of solidarity with her and towards anyone suffering violence and abuse,\u201d he said. \u201cIt should not be tolerated. We have a responsibility with the position we are in to send the right messages. We need to give educational messages, including to children. It is a cultural campaign, a cultural battle.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Juventus defender Cecilia Salvai added her backing for Carter, saying: \u201cI hope she can detach from this tomorrow.\u201d<\/p>\n
In 2021 Juventus were accused of racism after posting a picture of Salvai in which she was using her fingers to narrow her eyes while wearing a red training cone on her head. The club quickly apologised and withdrew the image, saying it was not meant to have \u201cracial overtones\u201d.<\/p>\n
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Sign up to Moving the Goalposts<\/span><\/p>\n No topic is too small or too big for us to cover as we deliver a twice-weekly roundup of the wonderful world of women\u2019s football<\/p>\n Privacy Notice: <\/strong>Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.<\/span><\/p>\n after newsletter promotion<\/p>\n Salvai said Italy\u2019s players would discuss possibly supportive gestures for Carter on Tuesday. \u201cWe will talk and discuss tonight,\u201d she said. \u201cWe are open and willing to do anything to send a strong message.\u201d<\/p>\n Wiegman said Leah Williamson had recovered from the injury which forced her off against Sweden, and warned England against underestimating Italy. \u201cIt would be really disrespectful to think we are the favourites,\u201d she said. \u201cThey made the semi-final just like we did and that\u2019s very impressive for any team. Complacency is the biggest mistake you could make. You have seen how they have played \u2026 we have to be at our very best to win.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Sarina Wiegman has said Jess Carter is \u201cready to perform and compete\u201d in England\u2019s semi-final against Italy on Tuesday night, praising the defender\u2019s strength of character in the face of racist abuse received during Euro 2025. Wiegman is expected to keep faith with Carter after a below-par performance against Sweden in the previous round \u2013<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11621,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[53],"tags":[5061,5058,311,1413,4397,5057,5060,4737,5062,1905,5059,1214],"class_list":{"0":"post-11620","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-carter","9":"tag-compete","10":"tag-england","11":"tag-football","12":"tag-italy","13":"tag-perform","14":"tag-praises","15":"tag-ready","16":"tag-semifinal","17":"tag-team","18":"tag-wiegman","19":"tag-womens"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11620","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11620"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11620\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/11621"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11620"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11620"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11620"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}