Ladies Euro 2025: Rainbow bracelet divide the opinion between captains

Rainbow -Bracelets at the European Championship for women appear to be more division than perhaps intended for a symbol that promotes tolerance and inclusion.

UEFA gives team captains the option to wear bracelets with the bright colors of the rainbow flag or regular monocolored versions with the word «respect» when they play.

«Standard yellow and blue bracelets are provided to all teams and rainbow bracelets are available on request,» UEFA told The Associated Press.

Both versions have been worn so far during the tournament in Switzerland, with the choices of the captains who are confronted with control of the meaning behind their decisions.

The rainbow bracelet is intended to show solidarity with the LGBTQ+ community, while it also stands for diversity.

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«UEFA is dedicated to make football a safe and hospitable environment for everyone, independent of whom we love, our gender identification or gender expression,» said the administrative body for the Euro 2022 of the women, where it also gave team captains the opportunity to wear rainbow bracelets.

UEFA was confronted with criticism in the previous year when it is Munich’s plans to illuminate his stadium in rainbow colors for the German game against Hungary during the European Championship for men.

The Germans wanted to protest against a law taken by Hungarian legislators the week before that forbidden to share any content with minors that revealed homosexuality or sex.

When Germany played France in their quarterfinals on Saturday, the German captain, Janina Minge, wore a rainbow bracelet while her French counterpart did not.

Switzerland -captain Lia Walti wore the day before a rainbow bracelet in the quarterfinals of her team against Spain. Her opposite, Irene Paredes, did not.

Norway captain Ada Hegerberg wore a rainbow bracelet, just like Wales captain Angharad James, Glodis Viggosdottir van Iceland, Leah Williamson and others in England.

England defender Lucy Bronze also wore a rainbow pole tire during the quarterfinals victory of her team in Sweden, whose captain, Kosovare Asllani, also wore a rainbow bracelet.

Elena Linari became the first to wear a rainbow bracelet for Italy when she led the side against Spain, but Cristiana Girelli wore a simple when she returned for the quarterfinals against Norway.

‘Restrictive’

France Captain Griedge Mbock Bathy suggested that the message of the rainbow bracelet is too restrictive because of the focus on LGBTQ+ rights.

«Emphasizing a single problem may also exclude the others,» she said. «We cannot be any cause through our diverse group because there are so many causes to defend.»

Mbock said that the France team «is so diverse that we can not only emphasize one cause. I think the bracelet with the word ‘respect’ really represents what we want to convey as a message and that is the most important thing.»

Then it was told that nine of the 16 countries participating in Euro 2025 were told the Regenboogbrandband, coach Laurent Bonadei of France defended the choice of his team not to do that.

«Our has written ‘respect’ on it. Respect As a word collects many causes such as racism. I think it is really a nice» respect «,» said Bonadei.

‘One Love’ -Controverse in Qatar

The Swedish player Nilla Fischer, the former captain of Wolfsburg, was the first in Germany to wear the rainbow bracelet in the women’s bundesliga in 2017. She inspired others to follow, both in women’s and men’s sports.

Germany was a strong campaigner for Rainbow bracelets on the men’s World Cup in Qatar in 2022. That developed into a confrontation with FIFA about the compromise «One Love» campaign, which contained a heart design of the rainbow type that had to be a symbol against discrimination. It was still largely seen as a snub for the host country, where homosexual acts are illegal and the treatment of migrating employees was a decade -long controversy.

FIFA forbade the bracelets and threatened to book team captains that wore them, so that the German players could cover their mouths for the team photo for their opening match, suggesting that they were silenced.

The German Minister of the Interior at the time, Nancy Faeser, who was also responsible for sport, wore a «One Love» bracelet on the stands next to FIFA President Gianni Infantino.

Qatari supporters later hit back by keeping pictures of the former Germany player Mesut Ozil while covering their mouths during the Germany match against Spain. She referred to the racist abuse in Germany of Ozil, a descendant of Turkish immigrants born in Germany, who became a scapegoat for the Early World Cup exit of Germany in 2018.

Germany -Coach Julian Nagelsmann called in 2024 to an end of political explanations and said they were too distracting for his players. The German men’s team ultimately failed to deliver in the field.