‘Wales must bin Netherlands loss to shock France’

Wales ‘ most-capped player Jess Fishlock “believes 100%” that the side can spring a surprise against France at Euro 2025 and has urged her team-mates to put the 3-0 opening defeat to Netherlands “in the bin”.

Wales ‘ all-time leading scorer has won league titles in six different countries but, like the rest of the squad, is competing in a major international tournament for the first time.

Already huge underdogs in group D, Wales have been written off even more heavily following a chastening defeat in their opening game in Lucerne.

Their next match is an equally daunting test in St Gallen against France, who won their opening contest 2-1 against reigning champions England.

“If you’re going to ask me if I still believe that, then I will say, wholeheartedly, I still believe.

” The biggest message is not to dwell too much on the game and the loss. I think we really need to take what we need to take from it, move forward and throw the rest in the bin.

Fishlock feels Wales have the mindset to bounce back and pull off a shock.

“Do I think we can surprise people? Absolutely”, she said.

“This team is still on a journey, it’s not like we qualified for the Euros and all of a sudden everything is perfect – that’s just not how this sport works.

” We are in a group with three unbelievably great teams and yes we have to learn perhaps a little bit faster than usual but do I believe that we can do that? 100%.

“I have full confidence in this group to continue on this path now.

Fishlock believes the key to Wales shocking France will be nullifying their threat and picking their moments to strike, having failed to register a shot on target in their opening match.

” France are a great team, “she added”. They’ll cause us different problems to Holland. They’re very powerful, very comfortable on the ball, love wide areas.

“They’re very good but we can be very good too and we just have to work together and nullify them as much as possible and then try and expose them with the players that we have. So we’ll be doing a lot of work on that, I’m sure.

” We don’t have to win it in the first five minutes. We have to stay in it as long as possible and use the players that we have. We have some fantastic players that can cause damage to any team. “

Wales have received a boost for the game against France with the news that midfielder Ceri Holland is fit to start.