England and Spain meet again in final

Zurich: There’s a sense of déjà vu about the Women’s European Championship final that pits defending champion England against World Cup winner Spain.

The two nations faced off in the World Cup final two years ago with Spain edging an open match 1-0.

“I think obviously that was a massive disappointment and I feel like from a collective we probably feel

like we didn’t have our best performance that day, but I think … if you’re trying to pull on that too much then you’re going to be too emotional with too many things going on,” England midfielder Keira Walsh said on Thursday.

“Obviously you think about it a little bit but I think for us, put it to the side and focus on the game on Sunday. We’ve got so many new players in this team who are really confident and bring so many things to this team, so it’s exciting and we can just focus on the positives.”

Both teams needed 120 minutes to get through their gruelling semifinals.

England’s super-subs had their part to play again on Tuesday with late goals first taking the match to extra time and then securing a last-gasp 2-1 victory over Italy.

It will be a first Euros final for Spain but even before the tournament it had been the favorite to add the European title to its collection after winning the World Cup and Nations League in the past two years.