Who are the stars of the EURO 2022? For our dossier, we have put together a selection of ten players from ten countries. These are ten names and faces to remember.
The 21-year-old striker from Norfolk has been playing for Manchester City in the FA WSL, the Football Association Women’s Super League, since 2018. The English team has many established stars such as Lucy Bronze and Ellen White, with Hemp already a part of the next generation of football players. In recent months, she has attracted attention with her ambitiousness and determination to score against her opponents.
Turning 27 during this year’s EURO, Ada already has quite a bit of experience under her belt. After starting her career with Stabeak in Norway, she moved to Potsdam in 2013 at only 18 years old. There she learnt German and attracted the attention of Olympique Lyon. Hegerberg has been playing for Lyon since 2014 and is considered one of the best strikers in the world. After four years of playing abroad, she is now back playing for Norway.
Lea Schüller has scored many goals in the Budesliga over the last two years for both Bayern München and the German National Team. She herself has said that she needs to score more goals against strong opponents. Perhaps the 24-year-old from Krefeld will be able to do that at the EURO 2022.
In terms of technique, Spain plays the best football in the world today. FC Barcelona is considered almost undefeatable and is almost exclusively made up of national team players. One of these players is midfield genius, Aitana Bonmati. The 24-year-old from Sant Pere de Ribes is often in the shadow of world footballer Alexia Putellas. However, Bonmati attracts attention time and time again with her spectacular passes.
The Dane was regarded early on as one of the greatest attacking talents in European football. At Linköping FC in Sweden, she was brought up to the top of her game by coach, Martin Sjögren. There she also met her Swedish partner Magdalena Eriksson. Today, the two are integral to the English Premier League club Chelsea and are icons within the LGBTQ community.
Much like Pernille Harder, Lieke Martens also played in Sweden for a number years (Gothenburg and Rosengård), before moving to FC Barcelona in Spain. In the summer of 2022, she moved to Paris Saint-Germains in France. At the EURO 2017, the speedy Martens was perhaps the most important player as the Netherlands overtook Germany as the European champions. Martens was also named World Player of the Year.
The Swedish striker originally comes from a town near Linköping and played together with Pernille Harder at Linköping FC. When Sweden became European Under-19 Champions in 2015, Stina was the standout player, scoring in every game. In the final, she scored twice against Spain (3:1). Then she was drawn abroad and joined Montpellier HSC in France. However, not feeling entirely comfortable in France, she came back to Sweden and became a champion with Gothenburg in 2020. Since 2022, she has been enjoying her second adventure abroad – with Arsenal FC in London.
Katoto is also a striker. In 2019, however, coach Corinne Diacre did not want her playing in the World Cup in France, with Diacre claiming she was too unstable and lacked ambition. Today, Marie-Antoinette is arguably an indispensable player, scoring goal after goal for the French National Team.
Over the last number of years, Italy, a country famous for its men’s team, has been catching up enormously in the women’s game. The strongest team in the Femminile Serie A is Juventus from Turin. One of the best players at Juventus is 32-year-old striker Cristiana Girelli. Even against the strongest of opponents, Girelli is always good for a goal and remains highly ambitious.
Sveindis has an Icelandic father and a Ghanaian mother. She is considered one of the greatest talents in the history of Icelandic football and is currently learning German and playing for the top German football club, VfL Wolfsburg. Watch out for Sveindis’ throw-ins at EURO 2022 – the 21-year-old can shoot extremely far with her throw-ins being almost like corner kicks.
