Les Bleues to face Iceland, Norway, and Switzerland

The French women's team will face Iceland, Norway and Switzerland in the league phase of the 2025 edition of the Nations League. Matches will take place in February, April and June.

The draw for the women’s UEFA Nations League 2025 took place this Thursday, November 7th, at UEFA headquarters in Nyon. In the presence of coach Laurent Bonadei, France, finalists in the 2024 edition, were placed in Group A2 where they will face Iceland, Norway and Switzerland, with the latter coming out on top when the two teams last met in October.

The league phase, comprising six matchdays, will begin next February with the first two matches and come to a conclusion in early June. Following these games, the four group winners in League A will qualify for the final phase which is scheduled for autumn 2025 and includes a new dimension, this being that the semi-finals will be played over a two-legged format before the third place play off and final are contested.

In addition to the automatic promotions and relegations between Leagues A, B and C, the third-placed teams in League A will play a two-legged promotion/relegation play-off against the second-placed teams in League B. The two best third-placed teams in League B will face the two best second-placed teams in League C.

 LEAGUE A GROUPS 

• Group A1: Germany, Netherlands, Austria, Scotland
• Group A2: France, Iceland, Norway, Switzerland
• Group A3: Spain (defending champions), England, Belgium, Portugal
• Group A4: Italy, Denmark, Sweden, Wales

Before getting underway, France will round off their 2024 season with two friendly matches, firstly against Nigeria on Saturday November 30th in Angers. They will then face Spain, the reigning world champions, on Tuesday December 3rd in Nice. The Nations League will then serve as preparation for the 2025 Euros, which will take place between July 2nd and 27th in Switzerland.

 THE REACTION FROM THE COACH 
Laurent Bonadei: "A mini-European championship"

“This is an interesting group that has been presented to us with three teams that we know well, having played all three of them recently. These are opponents that we respect even more since our recent results against these nations have shown that they are good teams. Iceland held the French team to a draw at Euro 2022 (1-1). The same thing for Norway (0-0) in Reims last year. And we have just lost against Switzerland in Geneva (1-2). It will be interesting to play in Switzerland again to find our bearings in the country that will welcome us wonderfully in July for the Euros, and to learn from our last defeat in order to progress. These are teams that we take very seriously. The context of the fixtures will not be taken lightly, with dates in February and April when it is winter and spring in countries further north with perhaps matches on synthetic pitches. We will give our all in our group to finish in first place and qualify for the final phase like in the first edition. We managed to reach the final on that occasion. In League A, the four groups are tough. We know that there will be no easy matches. It is a mini European championship at the end of the day.”