Rivalry for Wiegmann? The 3️⃣ most exciting women coaches at the Euros | OneFootball

While only six of the 16 teams had a female coach at the European Championship, this time there are at least seven female head coaches at the tournament in Switzerland: for Wales, Switzerland, Spain, Poland, Norway, England, and Belgium. That's still not half, but at least it's a small step.

Of course, when it comes to female national coaches, the name that comes to mind for most is England's Sarina Wiegmann. With the Netherlands and most recently with England, she has achieved success after success. But Wiegmann has gotten some promising competition from the new national coaches. Three coaches we should keep a special eye on are Spain's Montse Tomé, Pia Sundhage in Switzerland, and Rhian Wilkinson for Wales.

Spain: Montse Tomé

First and foremost, Tomé, who was already an assistant coach when Spain won the World Cup title in 2023. After that, she took over as the first woman to coach the Spanish national team and continued the winning streak. Under her leadership, Spain won the first UEFA Nations League for women and reached the semifinals at the 2024 Olympics in Paris. Now she wants to continue the winning streak with the team.

📸 Judit Cartiel - 2025 Getty Images

But before it all started, she had to smooth out the waves around her squad first. Because in her 23-player squad, World Cup star Jenni Hermoso is missing. She had distanced herself from the national team, Tomé had not nominated her. The topic had made headlines, but should be ticked off at the start of the EM. At least the 43-year-old has several other well-known players in the squad.

The national coach was quite successful as a player herself, but never won the really big titles. Only with Levante did she win the league title, with the national team she reached the U18 final in 2000. After a few appearances in the A-team, she ended her active career in 2012 and worked as a sports teacher.

📸 JAVIER SORIANO - AFP or licensors

At the same time, she pursued her career as a coach, took a course and met Jorge Vilda there, who made her his assistant with the national team in 2018. In 2019 and 2020, she was also the head coach of the women's U19 in Spain.

Wales: Rhian Wilkinson

As a player, Wilkinson has a lot more experience than Tomé. Between 2003 and 2017, she played for the Canadian national team and won the Olympic bronze medal. Her father was also a Canadian national player, but in rugby. In Canada, she played for Ottawa Fury, Boston Breakers, or Portland Thorns, and also played in Norway. In 2017, she finally ended her active playing career and switched to coaching.

📸 Dan Mullan - 2025 Getty Images

Wilkinson coached the U17 and U20 in Canada and then moved to the national team's coaching staff. In 2021, she was finally the co-coach of the British team and traveled with the team to the Olympics, before taking over as head coach of the Portland Thorns and leading the team to the championship title in the NWSL in 2022.

In 2024, she was announced as the head coach of the Welsh women's national team, where Wilkinson now has a three-year contract. With this position, the 43-year-old returns to her mother Shan's country of birth, where she lived in Cowbridge in south Wales as a child for a year. With the national team, she achieved a historic success: Wales qualified for a European Championship for the first time.

📸 Dan Istitene - 2025 Getty Images

The challenges that follow are great. Wilkinson symbolized these in her first training camp with Wales through a photo of Yr Wyddfa, the highest mountain in the country. And she climbed up there to announce her squad for the EM. The media had to go this way with her.

Switzerland: Pia Sundhage

A special pressure will be on Pia Sundhage. That she can handle pressure and achieve success from it, the 65-year-old Swede has proven several times in her impressive career. Both as a player and as a coach, Sundhage has been very successful. She played 146 games for the Swedish national team and scored 75 goals, became European champion with Sweden, and won numerous titles and cups in the Swedish league.

📸 FABRICE COFFRINI - AFP or licensors

After gaining experience as a player-coach, Sundhage finally switched sides completely. Since then, a considerable list of coaching positions has been filled. At the club level, she took her first position as head coach at Boston Breakers in 2003 and was named Coach of the Year in her last season. She then moved to the Norwegian club Kolbotn and later to Örebro in her Swedish homeland.

Sundhage has also been around a lot with national teams and has gained experience all over the world. She was an assistant coach in Sweden, the USA, and China, and as a head coach, she won two Olympic gold medals with the USA, Olympic silver with Sweden, and the Copa Americana Femenina with Brazil. In 2024, she was finally appointed national coach of Switzerland.

📸 Daniela Porcelli - 2025 Getty Images

The excitement was great when she took over the position. But success has not materialized yet. Switzerland has been without a win in eight games. The pressure is not only on the coach, but on the whole team. Before Sundhage named her squad, she held a kind of casting at two training camps to see who could withstand the pressure.

After that, criticism was loud that she had finalized the squad too late. Additionally, some players are said to have complained that Sundhage trains too hard and doesn't take injuries into account. The opening match against Sweden on the first matchday will show whether the criticism is justified or if Sundhage can continue to achieve success.

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇩🇪 here.

📸 David Ramos - 2025 Getty Images