England’s Sarina Wiegman has won the UEFA Women’s Coach of the Year award after victory at UEFA Women’s EURO 2022.
Wiegman, who led England to victory at UEFA Women’s EURO 2022, finished ahead of Lyon’s Sonia Bompastor and Germany’s Martina Voss-Tecklenburg in the voting to win the award. The decision was announced during the 2022/23 men’s UEFA Champions League group stage draw ceremony in Istanbul.
In a video-recorded message, Wiegman said: “It’s really nice to receive this great award, I’m very honoured and humbled. I would like to congratulate Sonia and Martina for their nominations and their great achievement with their teams.
“This award is really for everyone involved with the England team, the FA, the staff and of course, most of all, the players. Thank you very much.
“Things have been set in place and gone very well since I started with the team in September. We’ve really enjoyed it and we’ve performed at our highest level. Our fans have been great too, so thank you to all of them for supporting us so much.
“Now we are looking forward again. Hopefully we qualify for the World Cup and then next year we go to the World Cup and try to improve the game, perform ourselves and enjoy the game of course.”
The top five
1 Sarina Wiegman (England) – 200 points
2 Sonia Bompastor (Lyon) – 94 points
3 Martina Voss-Tecklenburg (Germany) – 71 points
4 Jonatan Giráldez (Barcelona) – 27 points
5 Tommy Stroot (Wolfsburg) – 22 points
Why did Wiegman win the award?
Wiegman, who took her native Netherlands to victory as UEFA Women’s EURO 2017 hosts and also the 2019 FIFA Women’s World Cup final and has twice been named FIFA’s coach of the year, was appointed by England last summer. Even before her bid to lead another host nation to EURO glory, Wiegman had overseen 14 unbeaten games with 12 wins and two draws, scoring 84 goals and conceding only three, including victory in a home four-nations tournament involving Olympic champions Canada, Germany and Spain.
The finals started with a 1-0 win against Austria in front of nearly 70,000 fans at Old Trafford. England then beat Norway by a competition record 8-0 and while Wiegman could not attend the 5-0 defeat of Northern Ireland due to illness, she was back for the knockouts as the Lionesses edged out Spain 2-1 in extra time, blew Sweden away 4-0 in the semis and then saw off Germany 2-1 after extra time, watched by a competition record 87,192 at Wembley.
Not only were England champions, but they had done so in swashbuckling fashion, their tally of 22 goals a new record and taking the Lionesses past 100 in Wiegman’s unbeaten first year in charge. Wiegman became the first coach to lead two different nations to Women’s EURO glory and just as with the Netherlands in 2017 had done so with a perfect record, again overseeing a run that put the female game in the spotlight in the host country like never before.
What is the UEFA Women’s Coach of the Year award?
For this award, coaches in Europe, irrespective of nationality, were judged on their performances across the whole season in all competitions – both domestically and internationally – at either club or national team level. Lyon’s Jean-Luc Vasseur was the inaugural winner in 2019/20, followed by Barcelona’s Lluís Cortés in 2020/21.
How were the coaches shortlisted?
An initial shortlist of five coaches was selected by UEFA’s technical study group.
The top three nominees were voted for by a jury comprising the following:
• The coaches of the 16 clubs that participated in the group stage of the 2021/22 UEFA Women’s Champions League
• The coaches of the 16 nations that played at UEFA Women’s EURO 2022
• A group of journalists selected by the European Sports Media (ESM)
Jury members chose their top three coaches, with the first receiving five points, the second three and the third one. Coaches were not allowed to vote for themselves.
