England beat Republic of Ireland in Euro 2025 qualifier as it ...

England captain Leah Williamson speaking to ITV: "The most important thing was three points. It’s what we came here for. Obviously we would have liked it to be more convincing, a bit like the first half, but sometimes you’ve got to see out games and with 32,000 Irish fabs against us as well as the the 11 on the pitch, it was a good finish to hold out."

On how much she enjoyed her first England start since April 2023: "Honestly I just really, really love playing for England. When I put this badge on I feel 10 times taller, 10 times stronger. The girls are such a great group of girls and I loved every second of that."

On what got her through her ACL injury: "This. I had my eyes set on this. These days with ACLs, you come back hopefully in a healthy way but I wanted to be good enough to play for England again. The standards are so high and the players that have been here have made them higher. This was the thought and I felt today was a completion of that journey."

On if she is in a good place now: "I think so. Everyone tells me it will take a while for my body to feel like it used to. See out the season and hopefully just keep getting stronger."

On the important of winning after drawing with Sweden: "It says a lot about out standards that we all think that is a setback now. We knew we had to come here and win which is why I am so happy with it. It wasn’t a convincing 20 minutes but I'm very happy with three points."

What needed to be better? "We just needed to keep the ball a bit better. That's what we did the first half and we controlled it, they controlled us for that last 20 minutes. We defended hard and stayed in the game which is important but I'd like to have seen us keep the ball better than we did."

On facing group leaders France next: "We'll get better, they will probably get better as well but you can expect a competitive side in June."