Former England captain Casey Stoney has been appointed the brand new head coach of Canada Ladies’s nationwide group (CANWNT).
initially reported on Friday that Canada Soccer had agreed phrases with Stoney to take over as the brand new head coach of its ladies’s group and this has now been confirmed.
“I’m honoured to hitch Canada Soccer as the pinnacle coach of the ladies’s nationwide group,” stated Stoney, who beforehand labored as assistant coach for the England Ladies’s group below former supervisor Phil Neville.
“Canada has a proud custom in ladies’s soccer, and I’m excited to work with such a gifted group of gamers.
“Along with the federation’s new management, we’ll attempt to construct on previous successes and proceed to develop the game in Canada on and off the sector. I sit up for the journey forward and to partaking with the unimaginable ardour of Canadian soccer followers.”
Stoney will take the reins from Andy Spence, who was positioned in cost on an interim foundation after Bev Priestman was handed a one-year suspension from soccer by for her function within the final yr.
In November, Priestman was sacked by Canada after members of Canada’s teaching group had been requested by senior teaching employees to fly drones over a New Zealand observe session and acquire “surreptitious movie footage” earlier than the Paris Olympics on July 20 and 22, 2024.
CANWNT progressed to the quarter-final stage of the event the place they had been defeated by Germany, regardless of being deducted six factors of their group because of the incident.
Stoney, 42, has been out of soccer since she was sacked by San Diego Wave in June 2024. Throughout her three seasons on the Nationwide Ladies’s Soccer League () facet, she received the NWSL Protect in 2023 and the NWSL Problem Cup the next yr, whereas she received the NWSL Coach of the 12 months trophy in 2022.
Stoney was beforehand the primary coach of Manchester United Ladies, guiding them to promotion to the Ladies’s Tremendous League (WSL) within the group’s first-ever season and two fourth-place WSL finishes earlier than stepping down in Might 2021.
As a participant, Stoney featured for English sides Arsenal, Charlton Athletic, Chelsea and Liverpool, in addition to making 130 appearances for her nationwide facet.
Stoney’s leap to the worldwide sport ought to shock no-one
It all the time felt like a matter of when, not if, for Casey Stoney’s subsequent main managerial appointment after she was let go by the San Diego Wave final June. It additionally felt inevitable that Stoney would land at a giant identify — and her leap to the worldwide sport ought to shock no-one.
Irrespective of how her scenario with the Wave truly ended, public sentiment across the Wave’s resolution was virtually completely in her favor, with the membership making the transfer too quickly based mostly on outcomes, or in any respect. Stoney’s repute and inventory was primarily completely unhurt, particularly contemplating the Wave’s earlier outcomes and Protect win in 2023.
Contemplating the Wave’s outcomes after her departure, nothing helped show that Stoney was the difficulty.
Canada Soccer has swung large and gotten an actual identify
For Canada, this can be a tremendous attention-grabbing appointment — not simply due to protection and investigations round the usage of drones, however as a result of Canada Soccer’s funds have been a battle. The federation has swung large and gotten an actual identify within the ladies’s soccer house, and made its assertion of intent firstly of this cycle main into the 2027 World Cup and 2028 Olympics.
It feels, at first look, like an ideal match contemplating Stoney’s repute as a defensive-minded head coach and Canada’s historical past of profitable video games and tournaments on gritty defending. In fact, there’s additionally the sheer enjoyable of potential spicy CONCACAF match-ups between Canada and the USWNT to sit up for now as nicely, with Stoney and Emma Hayes on the touchline.
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US Ladies’s nationwide group, Manchester United, England, Canada, UK Ladies’s Soccer, Ladies’s World Cup
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