Lionesses star Jess Carter has admitted she breathed a ‘sigh of relief’ after a white team-mate missed a penalty during England’s triumphant Euro 2025 campaign.
Carter, 27, stepped away from social media midway through the tournament after receiving a torrent of racial abuse, before playing the entirety of the Lionesses’ 3-1 penalty shootout win over Spain in the final.
The centre-back, who plays for Gotham FC in the United States, has opened up on the ‘violently aggressive’ racial abuse she received – and admitted she feared the worst for team-mate Lauren James when she missed a penalty during the win over Sweden in the quarter-finals.
James, who is of Grenadian and Dominican descent, was the first of four Lionesses stars to miss a penalty during the shootout, with Beth Mead, Alex Greenwood and Grace Clinton also fluffing their lines from the spot.
Speaking to ITV News, Carter admits she was relieved when one of her white team-mates missed from the penalty spot after James.
The England defender said: ‘It’s horrible to say but it’s almost like a sigh of relief when other players that weren’t black missed a penalty, because the racism that would have come with LJ (Lauren James) being the only one that missed would have been astronomical.
Racially abused Lionesses star Jess Carter has admitted she breathed a ‘sigh of relief’ after a white team-mate missed a penalty during England’s triumphant Euro 2025 campaign
Carter played a crucial role as the Lionesses won Euro 2025 with a win over Spain in the final
‘It’s not because we want them to fail – it’s about knowing how it’s going to be for us (England’s black players) if we miss.’
Carter went on to reveal that she was scared about playing in the final in Basel, largely as a result of the abuse she has received from racist trolls.
She added: ‘Sarina (Wiegman) spoke to me on the build-up to the Spain game and said that she was wanting to play me. I didn’t say anything to her, but in my head I just thought, “Are you sure?”
‘The night before the game I was scared. That’s the first time I’ve ever been scared; too scared to play.
‘I think it was a mixture of such a big game but then on top of that, [I was] scared of whatever abuse might come with it, whether it’s football based or whether it was going to be the racial abuse that was going to come with it because I did something wrong.
‘(The abuse) makes you feel really small. It makes you feel like you’re not important, that you’re not valuable.
‘It makes you second guess everything that you do – it’s not a nice place to be. It doesn’t make me feel confident going back onto the pitch. My family was so devastated by it as well and so sad.
Fans came out in support after Carter announced she was stepping away from social media
Carter admits she feared the worst after Lauren James missed a penalty in the quarter-final
‘They obviously want to be there to support me being away in Switzerland, but they weren’t able to be there the whole time. And I think that how it impacts the people around you sometimes is even worse than how it impacts you.
‘The messages started going from “she’s not good enough” or “shouldn’t be playing for England”, or “should be ashamed of her performance” or whatever, and then it started being about, the reason I was rubbish was because I was black.
‘I’m not going to go into detail but it was violently aggressive racism from the minute I stepped on a pitch from the France game.’
Ahead of the final against Spain, Lionesses veteran Lucy Bronze, 33, launched a fiery condemnation of the vile comments aimed at Carter and revealed abuse has been on the rise in the women’s game as it has grown in popularity.
During the tournament, the Lionesses announced they would no longer be taking the knee before matches, insisting that the gesture had lost its power and meaning.
‘We all know that any player of colour who’s played for England has probably gone through racist abuse. That’s a sad fact in this day and age,’ Bronze said.
‘(We’re feeling) anger and sadness that our team-mate has gone through this. We don’t want it to happen. We want to be focused on the football.
‘We want Jess and anybody else who puts on an England shirt to be brave, to be happy when they play for England.’
Lucy Bronze (above) launched a fiery condemnation of the vile comments aimed at Carter
Announcing her decision to step back from social media, Carter posted on Instagram: ‘From the start of this tournament, I have experienced a lot of racial abuse. Whilst I feel every fan is entitled to their opinion on performances and results, I don’t think it’s OK to target someone’s appearance or race.
‘I am grateful for all the support from the genuine fans, but I am taking this measure to protect myself in a bid to keep my focus on helping the team any way I can. Hopefully speaking out will make the people writing this abuse think twice, (and) others won’t have to deal with it.’
Carter admitted to ITV that it was her sister who persuaded her to announce her decision to step back from social media publicly.
She said: ‘I didn’t want to initially, but my sister was like, if this was your niece or nephew, if this is Michelle [Agyemang] or Lauren James or Khiara [Keating] what would you want to do? How would you want to support them?
‘You wouldn’t want them to be quiet and do it by themselves, so why should you do it? I guess if it wasn’t for her I probably wouldn’t have spoken up about it.’