Little Lioness army roar for England 800-miles away as team takes on the Dutch

The mighty roar of hundreds of little England Lioness fans will be felt all the way in Zurich, as Lionesses' fever has gripped a British primary school amid the Women's Euro 2025.

The 218 pupils at Newsome Junior Academy in Huddersfield, West Yorks have been following the Lionesses' Euros journey in assembly, thanks to deputy headteacher and Lioness super fan Naomi Thackray-Harris. Naomi, 36, has even named her year 5 class 'Bronze class' after inspirational Lioness Lucy Bronze. And the Manchester United season-ticket holder said the children were 'ecstatic' when Lucy, 33, signed a huge banner telling the England defender about the namesake class.

Naomi told the Mirror : "I do an update every week in assembly, Euros fever has completely taken over the school. The children come in telling me they stayed up past bedtime to watch the game or the first half.

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"The whole school has done a sweepstake so every class has two teams from the Euros that they're going to follow all the way through. Unfortunately, Bronze class didn't get England, we did get Spain but we know who we really want to win."

Although Naomi can't make it to Switzerland to watch the Lionesses, she was in the crowd to cheer them on at their send-off match against Jamaica. And the Bronze class banner is still giving the team a boost from 800-miles away, after Lucy spoke of the support she feels all the way in the England base in Zurich.

Northumberland-born Lucy said: "If you look really closely you can see my signature because it's an absolutely massive banner - I didn't realise they were going to keep bringing it to games. It's really nice, people always point it out and see it.. and it's nice to see that support from fans and different places.

"I love that it's connected to a school... Maybe they do inspirational teams or people and you see kids writing about you and your story and it has given them confidence, or something they can connect with at school. I think that's really nice."

It comes as the England women's team are feeling the pressure of a must-win game following their defeat to France. The squad must win against the Netherlands on Wednesday, or face being eliminated from the Euros with a game to spare, unless Wales cause a shock against France later the same night.

Winger Lauren Hemp, though, isn't shying away from the pressure, and instead relishes it. She said: “I think this team, a lot of the time we thrive under pressure and obviously it's one of those situations where every game we go into we want to win.

“From how we acted the last 10 minutes of the [France] game, we know what's at stake and we obviously want to get as far as we can. And we are reigning champions. It is important to remember that and gain confidence from that."