'That goes too far' - Sarina Wiegman dismisses possible bright side of England's Nations League failure & admits she was lost for words in squad huddle after Scotland thrashing

The Lionesses boss was left disheartened as her team failed to make it to the knockout stage of the Women's Nations League despite thrashing Scotland 6-0 in their final group game.

England had to better Netherland's win over Belgium by at least three goals and things were going to plan for a long stretch, but a late goal by Damaris Egurrola meant that the Dutch registered a 4-0 win thereby knocking Wiegman's side out of the competition.

Speaking to reporters after the match, the manager said: "I said: ‘We have to score now'. We were pushing to score that goal anyway, because things can change any minute. So, then they scored, and we said now we have to go, we couldn’t play any scenario because there was no time, it was the end of the game, so she just ran forward, got the goal, that was really good, and I thought now we’re going to get it, but … it was not enough. We were waiting for some long minutes, and we really thought we got it, and then we didn’t make it. I said I didn’t know what to say. All I could say was I’m really proud of our performance and what we did this whole week. But it’s not enough and it’s really, really disappointing."

When quizzed on whether it will benefit England to have a summer off, Wiegman replied: "Well, you want to go to every major tournament. The career of a football player is only a certain amount of time, so if you can play every major tournament of course every player wants that. In the bigger picture, we have to look at the calendar. The players are not robots and they need some rest, too. That’s very obvious. But instead of a tournament? That goes a little bit too far, for me."

The outcome of the Nations League group stage was not just disappointing for England, as it also ended team Great Britain's chances of making it to the 2024 Paris Olympics. The top two teams that emerge from the Nations League finals, excluding France, will book their berth in the final competition in Paris.

With their exit from the Nations League confirmed, the Lionesses do not have any more fixtures left in this calendar year. Further details around fixtures for 2024 will be announced in due course.