England defender Jess Carter said she felt a sigh of relief when her non-black teammates missed penalties during their shootout win over Sweden in the Women’s Euro 2025 quarter-finals, fearing Lauren James would suffer “astronomical” racist abuse if the forward had been the only player to miss her spot-kick.
England overcame a two-goal deficit to force penalties in Zurich, eventually triumphing 3-2 in a dramatic shootout that featured 14 attempts.
Sweden goalkeeper Jennifer Falk saved four England penalties, including James’ second effort. Beth Mead, Alex Greenwood and Grace Clinton, who are all white, also missed their spot-kicks for England.
“It’s horrible to say but it’s almost like a sigh of relief when other players that weren’t black missed a penalty, because the racism that would have come with LJ (James) being the only one that missed would have been astronomical,” Carter told ITN on Monday.
“It’s not because we want them to fail — it’s about knowing how it’s going to be for us (England’s black players) if we miss.”
Carter said in July that she had been the target of online racist abuse since Euro 2025 began in Switzerland and announced that she is stepping away from social media for the duration of the tournament.
“It makes you feel really small. It makes you feel like you’re not important, that you’re not valuable,” the 27-year-old said about the impact the abuse had on her.
“It makes you second guess everything that you do — it’s not a nice place to be. It doesn’t make me feel confident going back on to the pitch. My family was so devastated by it as well and so sad.”
England, who traditionally take a knee before matches as a gesture against racism, opted not to do so ahead of their semi-final against Italy following Carter’s revelations about the abuse she faced.
She also admitted to feeling fear when England manager Sarina Wiegman informed her she would be playing in the final against Spain, which England won 3-1 on penalties after a 1-1 draw.
“That’s the first time I’ve ever been scared — too scared to play,” Carter said.
“I think it was a mixture of such a big game, but then on top of that (I was) scared of whatever abuse might come with it, whether it’s football based or whether it was going to be the racial abuse that was going to come with it because I did something wrong.”
