Meet the experts: Anna Signeul

Signeul started her coaching career in Sweden, working with Caroline Seger, Nilla Fischer and Linda Sembrandt at the start of their youth international careers. Signeul also attended FIFA Women’s World Cup 2023™ and FIFA U-17 Women’s World Cup 2022™ in India as part of the Technical Study Group, and she is a UEFA Pro Licence holder. Alongside her TSG duties Signeul also supports FIFA and UEFA as a consultant on the development of women’s football.

Women’s competition

“The women’s tournament will be fabulous; it comes so close to a brilliant women’s World Cup where the teams were so evenly matched, and the lower-ranked teams did so well. There were shocks where big teams like Germany, Brazil, Canada and USA went out earlier than expected and when we see the standard of emerging teams like Colombia, Nigeria and Zambia, it is clear there will be no easy games. Japan are strong too, and Australia. Most teams could win it.

“The favourites must be Spain, they are already reigning World champions at senior, U-20 and U17 levels so it’s incredible to think this is their first time ever to compete at the Olympics. It will be exciting, there are small squads (16 outfield players plus two goalkeepers), the games come in very quick succession, so all the players need to be fully fit because of the demands on such a small squad,” she explained.

“In other tournaments, the best teams have bigger depth in the larger squads, so this is a bit of a leveller. It’s also very demanding on players – six games to win it and will have to play almost every match,” she added.

Men’s competition

“The men’s tournament is very intriguing, so many nations have qualified for the first time, so this will be very exciting for their country, and it will be interesting to see how they compete. In addition, we have some big nations and some very established players so the blend of experience among the next generation of players will be interesting to see.

“As we have just seen recently, many players who played in the last Olympic Football Tournament competed in the Euros and Copa America. This is also an interesting competition from the coaches’ point of view. France are led by Thierry Henry and Argentina have Javier Mascherano as their head coach so the approaches they take will be good to observe,” she noted. 

Signeul will be based in Lyon for matches in both competitions, before returning to Paris for the gold medal matches.