Sarina Wiegman offers support to Beth Mead as England forward deals with injury

Beth Mead has been backed to use her positive outlook to bounce back from her injury disappointment by England boss Sarina Wiegman.

Mead had enjoyed a phenomenal 2022 on the pitch until she ruptured an anterior cruciate ligament last month in Arsenal’s Women’s Super League match against Manchester United.

It ended a year in which she fired England to European Championship success on home soil, was named player of the tournament and finished runner-up to Alexia Putellas in the Ballon d’Or.

Mead, who recently signed a new contract with Arsenal and is the favourite to win BBC Sports Personality of the Year on Wednesday night, achieved all this after dealing with her mum being diagnosed with cancer in 2021.

And national team boss Wiegman is hopeful Mead’s positive personality will help her battle back from injury, with England’s World Cup campaign starting in July.

“It is so sad and I really feel for her,” Wiegman said. “Of course anyone that gets an ACL (injury) you feel for but she did so well and was in such a good place. She still played well and felt OK but also her personal things with her mum, that’s very sad and also on her plate.

“She really wanted to play also for her mum to make her proud and now she has this injury. She is a very positive person so I hope she just recovers.

“It is too early to say whether she will be (fit for the World Cup), so we take it easy now. First recover and then over the next months we will see how it will develop. No push. She has to become fit again and take care of herself.

“She knows she will get all the support from Arsenal, all the support from us and the FA.”

Ballon d’Or winner Putellas is currently out with an ACL injury and Mead’s Arsenal team-mate Vivianne Miedema last week become the seventh WSL player to sustain the long-term injury this season.

It has resulted in calls for the football calendar to be looked at.

Wiegman believes there are too many games being played and highlighted the jam-packed international schedule between 2021 and 2025 where two Olympics and Euros are scheduled in addition to next year’s World Cup.

She added: “In general for the top, top level players the schedule is too much.

“For the top players worldwide, we have five consecutive tournaments in a row with the Olympics. I think the level of the game has improved and so the load on players physically and mentally – and you can’t split that because we are all human beings – does ask so much of them.

“The growth has gone so quickly so players also need a proper rest to get things settled down and they don’t have the rest.

“After the Euros for example, the Manchester City players only had a couple of days off because they went into the Champions League round again. That is not good. You can have that some times but they need a rest.

“They need some rest just to get some head space and get the head and body right. I think FIFA, UEFA and the federations we just need to do a little better job and all think of the players.”