Podium pride for England Para in 2025

As we look back on 2025 for our England para teams, it’s with great pride at some of our achievements and the strides we continue to make both on and off the pitch.

This year, we had six major international tournaments and we’ve had a number of podium finishes so it's really unprecedented in our programme for that sort of level of achievement and success.

It's been a bit of a point in history for us where we've not only delivered at the major championships, but we've podiumed and we got the gold with the blind men’s team at the IBSA Nations Cup which they achieved after quite a period of development for that team.

It's really reaffirming for us as a programme that what we're going after is making a difference and we're really starting to see the fruits of our labours in terms of our players getting together more frequently and making sure they've got good, competitive development opportunities, so that when they do get to the major tournaments it feels like they're just as able to deliver as they have done in training and other minor competitions.

We’ve now been building to this for some time and with one gold and then four silvers out of the competitions this year, the majority of the teams are really performing and the next step to get to the gold doesn't feel too far away.

When I look back at how close we were in the final of the men’s partially-sighted World Championship in November, when it took a last-second goal for Ukraine to edge it, it feels like we’re getting nearer.

We know Ukraine are an unbelievable force in not just para football, but para sport generally but we're getting closer. That's what we're taking from this - we’re making changes, we’re trying new things so they're no longer the nemesis who we can't beat and we've got to just find a way of finishing it off and sealing the deal.

December also saw the second year of our Para Football Awards, when we had a chance to really reflect on not just the year gone by for us as a programme, but where we've come from. What really brought it home on the night was marking the passing of Robin Williams who was previously a member of our men’s blind team and it's because of these individuals that the sport is moving and growing at the rate it is so I think it's always really important to remember where we came from in order to get to the place that we’re going.

We were also able to present players from every team with their caps for the major tournaments they’ve performed in, and reward and recognition is something that from a cultural perspective we've placed a lot of emphasis on.

For us, it’s really important not just to recognise player and team achievements, but also the people involved whether that's players or staff. For the first time this year, we had the Para People Awards as part of the evening, where we were recognising outstanding players and staff who go above and beyond the performance on the pitch.

That, for me, was really special and it was quite an emotional evening really when you just sit back and see where we've come from and where we were, to now think we're in a really, really brilliant place.

We talk a lot about this ‘One Para Football’ concept where we want to be like an army of para footballers that support each other irrespective of the format they play in and you just got a real sense that we are as one. That gives us real power when we go away, now that there’s real support and connection between players from the different squads.

And we’ll see that again in 2026, starting in January when we return to Tenerife for a multi-squad training camp for the first time since 2024.

We find that camp is really beneficial for a number of reasons. There's lots of evidence to indicate why training in warm weather in the depths of the English winter is really important, but what we find is that it really shapes the start of the year and the rest of the season.

And what we're also doing this year is running a home version of the camp at the same time to ensure the specific requirements of each team are met whether that be from a technical and tactical perspective or physiological development. For example, our Powerchair squad will have a couple of days back at St. George's Park, where obviously the facilities and the setup is much more suitable and appropriate for what they need to achieve.

That's really positive and we're going to connect the two camps at some point to just share how it's going and all of those things.

It all really sets us up well for 2026, when we've got the deaf women’s team competing at the Euros in March so for Steve Daley as the head coach, it gives him a real opportunity to have some concentrated time with his players to really set them up for that competition.

In August, we've got the blind men's European Championships and in October we've got the blind women's European Championships and the Powerchair World Championship, so it’s going to be another busy year and one we’re all looking forward to.