When England went ahead early in their first fixture of the new Women’s Nations League campaign on Friday, they seemed to be in a strong position to come away from Portugal with all three points. The Lionesses were dominant for a good hour and always looked the most likely to score next, with their hosts lacking any significant moments in attack. That was until Francisco Neto made game-changing substitutions and Sarina Wiegman didn’t react.
A triple-change with half an hour to go saw Portugal switch shape and introduce Barcelona starlet Kika Nazareth, who scored a superb equaliser 15 minutes later. It was a goal that felt like it had been coming for at least 10 of those minutes, with the home team turning the screw, taking over the game and eventually getting what they deserved.
As Portugal continued to come forward and trouble the England defence, all eyes were on Wiegman and how she would counter this. A substitution was surely needed, at least to kill some of the opponent’s momentum, but it wasn’t until nine minutes after Kika’s goal that one came.
It sparked a lot of criticism of the coach in the moment, but it also highlighted a wider issue: England have still not established a ‘super-sub’ formula like the one that led them to European glory three years ago, despite this being an obvious problem for most of that time.