Spain defeat ‘felt like a hit on the chin’, says Wiegman

Syndicated reporting provided by Stats Perform and reviewed by the SoccerNews editorial team.

Sarina Wiegman described England’s defeat to Spain as a “hit on the chin” as her side look to bounce back in Women’s World Cup qualification.

The Lionesses lost 4-0 to Spain on Friday after goals from Patri Guijarro, Alexia Putellas (two) and Claudia Pina secured the win in Mallorca for the reigning world champions.

It was the biggest loss of Wiegman’s tenure as Lionesses head coach and her career as an international manager, while it was England’s largest margin of defeat since 2009.

Spain are now top of the qualifying group ahead of the last round of fixtures, with England taking on Ukraine while their rivals face Iceland.

England must better Spain’s result against Iceland if they want to automatically qualify for next year’s Women’s World Cup, or they will have to progress via a two-legged play-off.

“Of course it was a difficult Friday night that hurt. But we’ve moved on too because we have another game [on Tuesday],” said Wiegman.

— Lionesses (@Lionesses) June 7, 2026

“There was good energy in the team, the team stuck together and we really want to show that.

“We sat on the pitch straight after the game and said, ‘okay, this one is really hard to take’. It felt like a hit on the chin.

“You can’t always control everything. We wanted to control more last Friday, definitely. We want to get control of the game on Tuesday also. But how are you going to make sure that it’s never going to happen?

“You’re not going to be sure. You want to make the chance as high as possible to improve your style of play, and to get your game plan right and execute it. And that’s what we always want to do.”

England have won each of their five meetings with Ukraine across all competitions, winning 6-1 in their most recent in Turkiye back in March, their biggest victory over their opponents.

England have also won each of their last five home matches without conceding in all competitions and could equal their longest run of wins alongside a clean sheet on home turf, set in September 2010, April 2013 and August 2014 (all runs of six).

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