Category World News

Who: Spain vs. England
What: UEFA Women’s Euro 2025 final
Where: St Jakob-Park in Basel, Switzerland
When: Sunday, July 27, at 6pm (16:00 GMT)

Follow-up: From 3 p.m. (15:00 GMT) until our live text commentary stream, we’ll have all the preparation.

It hasn’t been easy for the Spanish women’s football players to go from being nobodies to being title contenders in less than ten years.

The national team has to fight for better coaching, fair travel policies, and state-of-the-art training facilities.

They won the Nations League last year, the World Cup in 2023, and they now face England in the European Championship final on Sunday.

Former Spain defender Marta Torrejon stated on Friday that it has been a constant struggle for the national team to achieve acceptable work conditions that would enable them to perform at their best.

Where did Spain’s women start to prosper?

Torrejon endured the harsh years, when playing for her country sounded like a “waste of time,” as she put it.

And she is aware of how much the situation has improved in recent conversations with Barcelona teammates who still represent their nation.

After the 2019 World Cup, Torrejon became Spain’s 90th appearances-capable player and retired from international football. Since then, the 35-year-old has assisted Barcelona to win a number of other titles as well as three Champions League titles.

She also participated in one of the revolts Spain’s women staged to demand more from the game’s owners.

Ignacio Quereda, the team’s coach, had been in charge of the team for almost 30 years, and Torrejon and other players successfully pushed for his resignation following the 2015 World Cup because of his poor preparation before its first competition appearance.

Former players later charged Quereda with verbal abuse, an allegation he refuted.

“It was a pleasure playing for the national team, but the player’s preparation and attention were minimal.” To put it simply, it sounded like a waste of time, according to Torrejon. In Barcelona, “the level of physical training and practice both fell short” [and] fell short. It was like stepping back.

I’ve been told that’s not the case right now, and I’m delighted to hear that.

Torrejon said she saw positive changes under former Spain coach Jorge Vilda when Quereda was in charge, but that after her retirement, she realized there was still untapped potential in the team.

What did Spain’s Rubiales controversy involve?

Some players announced in 2022 that they would no longer play for Vilda unless Torrejon started a more reputable operation after Torrejon left the team. The federation supported him. The team won the 2023 World Cup thanks to the return of some of his players, making history with them.

Luis Rubiales, the president of the then-federation, kissed a player on the lips during the Sydney awards ceremony without her permission, overshadowing the festivities.

Vilda initially supported Rubiales, but when the players rebelled against him, they were swept away with him. On Saturday, Vilda will lead Morocco, which will face Nigeria in the Women’s Africa Cup of Nations final.

Torrejon claimed to have heard from Barcelona legends Alexia Putellas and Irene Paredes that things have improved since Rubiales and Vilda’s departure.

Spain may be fired by England’s cautious Rubiales situation.

Ella Toone, England’s Ella Toone, acknowledges that Spain may have extra motivation heading into the final after their World Cup triumph two years ago was overshadowed by the events that occurred at the Sydney final.

The only goal of the game came from Olga Carmona, who scored the only goal of the game in the first-ever Women’s World Cup victory over England in 2023.

However, Jenni Hermoso’s forced kissed by Rubiales made headlines later.

Rubiales was fined 10 800 euros ($11, 670) in February of this year for sexual assault.

The Spanish players had a difficult time during the World Cup, and what they did in the match should have been the main focus, Tone said to reporters in Zurich on Friday. “It was a tough period for them and for what they did in it,” Tone said.

They ought to have celebrated what they thought was a fantastic tournament.

England’s path to the Euro 2025 final: how did it go?

England has long held its position as a top player in women’s international football, but their final four match with Italy almost set off a shock.

Only Michelle Agyemang’s 96th-minute equalizer made the game playable in extra time after Barbara Bonansea gave the Italians a lead.

With penalties looming, Chloe Kelly then left it late to settle the game.

In their final eight matchup against Sweden, the English had to come from behind.

Spain’s path to the Euro 2025 final:

The training methods have been improved by Montse Tome’s replacement. Spain leads the Euros in goals scored, ball possession, passing accuracy, and clean sheets.

Aitana Bonmati relied on the team’s analysts to inform her that the opposing goalkeeper frequently left her near post unprotected in the 1-0 semifinal victory over Germany. A clever winner came out of a tight angle as a result.

That kind of tactical insight from the staff, according to Torrejon, was previously unthinkable ten years ago.

how Barcelona contributed to Spain’s development

Torrejon and Patri Guijarro of Spain both agree that the national team has grown thanks to the constant investment Barcelona has made in the women’s game over the past ten years.

At Spain’s camp in Lausanne, Switzerland on Friday, Guijarro stated, “Every day, we work well in our clubs, and I think that isreflected in the successes of the clubs, but also in the national team.”

Guijarro also attributes the professionalization of the 2021 women’s soccer league to “allowing players to devote ourselves fully to football.”

One of Spain’s 23-member squad includes Guijarro, one of the 11 players from Barcelona. Bonmati and Putellas, who have won the last four Ballon d’Or prizes between them, make up the Barcelona contingent.

From 2015 to 2020, former Barcelona official Xavier Vilajoana oversaw the women’s team and the training facility. The club also established a training regimen for girls during that time, dramatically increasing its funding for women’s football.

According to Vilajoana, having the same coaches coach the boys’ and girls’ teams was a crucial decision. In this way, all children were taught the Barcelona style, and ball possession, short-passing, and pressure became fundamental components of the women’s teams as well.

Let’s face it: Women’s football was a result of our years spent in a very sexist society. Vilajoana said it is obvious that society’s mentality has improved. However, I also think that Barca’s play has influenced how we perceive women players as [as men] as being.

In the background, Spain’s vibrant feminist movement aided inflating the players’ efforts to achieve equality and success.

Many of us players gave it our all for the national team, according to Torrejon, “but we weren’t able to get this far.” We all knew we had talent, after all. Simply put, we needed more assistance.

news from the England team

After suffering a knock in the semifinal against Italy, Lauren James must work out.

In the event that James doesn’t recover, Beth Mead might replace him on the wing.

Leah Williamson and Esme Morgan, who is currently serving in defense, will now play for her in the tournament.

news from the Spain team

Laia Aleixandri is returning from a one-game suspension for accumulating yellow cards at the tournament. The defender will immediately make a return to the starting lineup.

After a goal and an assist in the dying minutes, Athenea del Castillo is pressing Claudia Pina and Mariona Caldentey for a spot on the flanks.

Starting lineups for England and Spain were anticipated.

England: Hampton, Bronze, Williamson, Morgan, Greenwood, Stanway, Walsh, Toone, Kelly, Hemp, Russo, and Moreno.

As Israel’s forced starvation and Palestinian bombardment fuel global outcry, the United Kingdom claims to be working with Jordan on “forward plans” to airdrop aid into besieged Gaza and evacuate children in need of medical care.

On Saturday, two infants in Palestine passed away, the latest among them. In the last 24 hours, there have been five additional deaths in Gaza hospitals as a result of famine and malnutrition. There are now 127 hunger-related deaths in the area, including 85 children.

In an emergency call with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and French President Emmanuel Macron on Saturday, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer confirmed the idea.

The UK government claimed the leaders had been told in a read-out of the call.
According to Britain’s Press Association, “it would be vital to ensure robust plans are in place to turn an urgently needed ceasefire into lasting peace.”

The readout stated that the UK will also be developing plans to airdrop aid and evacuate children in need of medical assistance with partners like Jordan.

At home, Starmer’s Labour government has been tarnished for doing too little and arriving late to ease Palestinians’ agonizing conditions.

Since October 2023, hundreds of thousands of people in the UK have been publicly speaking out against Israel’s genocidal war.

More than 100 people were detained by police in the UK last weekend during peaceful demonstrations in the country calling for the end to the campaign group Palestine Action&nbsp.

In a campaign coordinated by Defend Our Juries, demonstrations took place on Saturday in Manchester, Edinburgh, Bristol, Truro, and London.

As France has stated it will do at the UN General Assembly meeting in September, Starmer is also under increasing pressure to accept a Palestinian state. The prime minister was urged to follow this course of action by more than 200 British parliamentarians this week.

Despite claiming it had reduced sales of weapons, there has been more controversy over claims that the UK government has continued to sell arms to Israel.

Despite a government suspension in September allegedly causing allegations that the UK Parliament has been purposefully “misled,” a report in May found that UK businesses have continued to export military equipment to Israel.

The Palestinian Youth Movement, Progressive International, and Workers for a Free Palestine reported that the UK had sent “8, 630 separate munitions,” all of which fell under the “Bombs, Grenades, Torpedoes, Mines, Missiles, And Similar Munitions Of War And Parts Thereof-Other” category.

“Awaiting the green light to enter Gaza.”

UNRWA’s head of the UNPLO, Philippe Lazzarini, claimed that proposed airdrops of aid would be a pricey, ineffective “distraction” that could kill famined Palestinians.

In response to severe food shortages brought on by its punishing months-long blockade, Israel announced on Friday that it would allow airdrops of food and supplies from other countries into Gaza in the coming days.

Lazzarini, however, claimed in a social media post that the airdrops would “not” end the deepening starvation and instead demanded that Israel “lift the siege, open the gates [and] guarantee safe movements [and] dignified access to people in need.

He claimed that airdrops are “costly, ineffective, and] can even kill starving civilians” (). He urged Israel to allow the UN and its partners to operate at the same scale in Gaza without imposing any bureaucratic or political restrictions. “A man-made hunger can only be addressed by political will,” he said.

He claimed that UNRWA has “waiting for the green light to enter Gaza” with the equivalent of 6, 000 trucks in Jordan and Egypt. He claimed that driving aid through is much simpler, more efficient, quicker, less expensive, and safer than airdrops, adding that it is also more honorable for Gaza’s citizens.

In response to the ongoing hunger crisis in Gaza, more than 100 aid and human rights organizations demanded an immediate and permanent ceasefire and the lifting of all humanitarian aid restrictions this week.

Gaza’s population is becoming increasingly starvation, as a result of the Israeli blockade of aid. Palestinian journalists risk their lives by exposing the use of starvation as a tool of genocide, which Western media frequently softens or obscures.

Contributors:
Human rights lawyer, Diana Buttu
Jewish Voice for Peace, Health Advisory Council, Alice Rothchild
Anas al-Sharif, correspondent for Al Jazeera
Author of Mass Starvation is Alex de Waal.

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Featuring:

In a street near Novosibirsk, Siberia, a group of uniformed men, at least one of whom is masked, approach two watermelon sellers. The men are dressed in black, wearing tactical vests with patches bearing the emblem of a bogatyr – a mythic warrior of Slavic folklore – riding on horseback.

They inform the traders, who they believe to be foreigners, that they are carrying out illegal trade, and the security forces load their goods into a van to be seize by the authorities.

These black men, however, are not authorized to work for law enforcement.

A video of this operation was uploaded online on Monday morning by the Russian Community, or Russkaya Obshchina (RO), who boasted of shutting down an “oriental bazaar”.

With 1.2 million subscribers to its official YouTube channel, over 660, 000 subscribers to its main Telegram channel, as well as its own app, and support from powerful allies within the clergy and security services, the RO has grown to be Russia’s largest and most powerful ultranationalist organization.

Alexander Verkhovsky, the director of the SOVA Centre, which tracks hate movements in Russia, calls this a classic movement of Russian ethnic nationalists.

“There used to be]the slogan] ‘ Russia for Russians’, but now that is considered too radical. But he claims that this is the main point.

RO also asserts that it upholds conservative moral and religious principles, and that it backs the Kremlin, even in the Ukraine invasion.

“These points define their entire ideology… There have always been nationalists, but the fact that the largest and most prominent Russian nationalist organisation is fully loyal to the government – this is an unusual situation”.

Folk music and a constant stream of anti-immigrant messages

RO was founded five years ago by Omsk politician Andrey Tkachuk, anti-abortion rights activist Yevgeny Chesnokov and Andrey Afanasyev, a host on the TV channel Spas, which is owned by the Russian Orthodox Church.

As other, tightly knit ethnic communities in Russia already look out for each other, like Chechens or Armenians, one member claimed last year to the BBC that the idea was to create solidarity among Russians themselves.

In order to facilitate community events like Maslenitsa (Butter Week), which feature folk singing and dancing performances in the lead up to Easter, many of the Community’s activities are benign.

But an examination of RO’s various Telegram groups reveals a narrow focus on ethnic Russian interests, to the exclusion of Russia’s other non-Slavic groups – although there are a handful of minority members – and a stream of anti-immigrant content.

A young female follower of the Community’s Saratov branch, who can’t be identified because of fear of repercussions, told Al Jazeera, “The blacks will devour everything in their path if the Slavs do not unite in some way defend their borders and values.”

According to observers, the group’s other activities include vigilantism, which is frequently done with the authorities’ clear or covert support.

According to Verkhovsky, there are a number of tactics to target immigrants and non-Russian minorities. One is making official complaints and denunciating what it deems to be immoral, such as homosexuality, abortion, or “Russophobic behavior.” Although neither of the former is technically prohibited in Russia, there are laws prohibiting “propaganda” related to LGBTQ and “childfree” themes.

Another tactic is raids, such as the one on watermelon sellers in Novosibirsk. These are places where migrants live or work, Verkhovsky asserts.

Members of the Russian Community or other vigilante organizations, like Northern Man, frequently appear where immigrants are employed and engage in “violation” – as in the case of the Novosibirsk watermelon stall, unlicensed trading. They then detain the alleged violators and hand them over to the police.

“Practically any citizen can complain to the Russian Community and claim that some “bad” people have offended him,” says Verkhovsky.

“Ideally, the complainant is Russian, and these “bad” people are not Russian,” the author says. And then the Russian Community will go to protect him”.

The group occasionally accompanies police as “volunteers” during joint operations, though this is uncommonr. Verkhovsky noted that different police departments have different opinions of RO, and while some may seem to welcome them, some officers have already filed charges against community members before having the case dropped by the prosecution.

Defying a “crime wave”

The vigilantes assert that there is a “wave of immigrant crime.”

There is crime among foreigners in Russia: For instance, Georgians make up more than half of the “thieves-in-law”, an elite fraternity in the criminal underworld. In addition to making headlines, gangs of young immigrant men frequently engage in vicious brawls and beatings.

However, these highly publicized incidents and people only account for a small portion of Russia’s overall crime rate. According to Sergei Shoigu, secretary of Russia’s Security Council, foreigners committed just 2 percent of all reported crime nationwide last year, while comprising roughly 4 percent of the population.

Additionally, Valentina Chupik, a lawyer who provides free legal services to immigrants, claimed that the majority of these crimes are related to the misuse of paperwork rather than the victimization of Russians.

“These crimes [missing paperwork] are the inevitable result of the organization of illegal migration, which are committed by homeowners who rent apartments to immigrants but do not comply with the law’s requirement to register them there,” she claims.

As well as immigrants, RO campaigns against alleged immorality and “fifth-columnists” in Russian society. Chupik is regarded as one of these fifth-columnists because he has grown used to getting threats and insults, even from RO supporters.

She claims that they regularly threaten me.

“My employees are also threatened, as well as volunteers. I occasionally appear in posts on their Telegram groups. They call me right away and then write to me.

Messages seen by Al Jazeera tell Chupik, “there’s a special spot for you in hell” and to “wait for the bottle”, alluding to sexual assault.

Al Jazeera contacted several RO representatives for comment, but they did not respond.

There has been an increase in xenophobia since ISIS-affiliated gunmen fatally attacked a Moscow music venue last year. The police have ramped up arrests and other restrictions on immigrants, especially those from Central Asia. Verkhovsky says it’s difficult to determine how much the general public views immigrants negatively, but polls show a sharp rise in immigration-related concerns.

To be accepted in the war, to support it

In the 2000s, Russia suffered a scourge of far-right-wing violence, peaking in 2008 when skinhead gangs carried out 110 racist murders nationwide. A Tajik and a Dagestani were shot dead and beheaded while filming a particularly obscene scene in a forest close to Moscow. After a third suspect, who was already imprisoned, incriminated the two men in his suicide note in 2022, two men were finally found guilty of the double homicide.

For a time, available outlets for xenophobic sentiment dried up somewhat.

Verkhovsky argued that the authorities significantly repressed this movement in the 2010s, and almost all of these organizations either stopped or were completely eradicated.

And those who wanted to participate in these ideas were either afraid or simply unable to go anywhere.

Some far-right activists moved to Ukraine, where they found common cause with like-minded locals.

RO is a relatively recent development. It forgoes the old-fashioned thuggery and prefers to work alongside the authorities. And its brand of nationalism aligns with the Kremlin, supporting the invasion of Ukraine and actively fundraising for soldiers and their families. Andrey Tkachuk, the founder, has even professed ignorance about the country’s national identity in interviews.

Verkhovsky notes that “the state’s tolerance for any groups that support the]war has increased significantly.” “In general, the authorities don’t like any grassroots initiatives, but here they’ve quite notably tolerated it. This is only possible during a conflict.

Verkhovsky points out that many of the activists are “inclined towards violence,” and the leadership can’t always hold them back, even though the Russian Community operates largely within the confines of the law and serves as more of an unofficial auxiliary to law enforcement than the skinheads of the past, who eagerly filmed their brutal assaults.

In May, for instance, activists armed with pepper spray and a Taser allegedly burst into an apartment near St Petersburg where two men and a woman were drinking and taking illicit drugs. One of the men, who was of Armenian descent, died in the fiery argument, and the woman suffered serious injuries after jumping from a seventh-storey window.

According to reports, the activists told witnesses, “Let him burn,” claiming that the man was a “pusher.”

And last week, a mass brawl erupted between dozens of RO members and Chechen and Ingush workers on a building site northeast of Moscow, after an Ingush security guard reportedly evicted a drunk man from the premises.

The organization made it known on Sunday that the Chelyabinsk region of west-central Russia’s local authorities had labeled it an “undesirable organization” on the grounds of “extremism.”

However, RO has friends who are well-known: According to reports in the Russian media, Alexander Bastrykin, the head of Russia’s Investigative Committee, has repeatedly intervened on behalf of its members, including filing charges against police officers who detained them on various charges. And, in June, sources within the security services told reporters from the independent Russian news site, Meduza, that they use RO as a tool for managing “interethnic conflicts”.

A vicar sacraments the savior.

The Orthodox Church’s influence is another distinguishing factor from the old, racist gangs. The group has campaigned against mosques, requires its members to profess Orthodoxy, and has been blessed by a vicar on behalf of Patriarch Kirill, the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, himself.

Verkhovsky claims that “the Russian Community and other organizations of the same type have a very positive relationship with the Russian Orthodox Church.”