ZURICH – The sight of Chloe Kelly grinning at Swedish goalkeeper Jennifer Falk as she stepped up for her penalty said a thousand words.
You could be forgiven for wondering what she has to do to start for England. Score the winner in a European Championship final at Wembley?
The decisive penalty in the Finalissima a year later? Or keep their title defence alive in Switzerland with two assists in three minutes?
Chloe Kelly's penalties are iconic
— BBC Sport (@BBCSport) July 17, 2025
When England couldn't afford to miss, she kept her coolpic.twitter.com/xvrBKnRVdZ
Kelly was the player who brought calm to the chaos against Sweden. That was a choice; she does not have to be like this. At this tournament she has played just 128 minutes.
Plenty of players in her situation would rattle the cage, demand a promotion. Instead, this was another brilliantly unfazed rescue act from the bench.
Some of her most important contributions go unnoticed. Before delivering the performance of her life in the shootout, goalkeeper Hannah Hampton was quickly trying to stem a nosebleed.
“You only need one nostril, girl,” Kelly shouted towards her. She had already given Leah Williamson a pep talk as she lay on the ground with a sore ankle: “I was just saying, ‘wait a little longer, because we need someone to warm up!’”
Before setting up her equaliser, she gave a running commentary to fellow substitute Michelle Agyemang. “I was like, ‘come alive now Mich, come alive now’,” Kelly said afterwards. “For the last five minutes I felt like she had real energy.”
For all the pre-tournament talk of an unhappy camp after the retirements of Mary Earps and Fran Kirby and the withdrawal of Millie Bright, there has been a united front in Switzerland.
The players not in Sarina Wiegman’s regular XI have a group chat and celebrate their goals with a trademark celebration of snapping their fingers – they call it “the positive clicks”.
Kelly has epitomised that spirit. She did not come on until the 78th minute of the quarter-final, with the Lionesses 2- 0 down and on the brink of going home. Over the next three minutes, she set up goals for both Bronze and Agyemang and kept the dream alive.
Amidst the bedlam that ensued in the shootout, she was one of just three English players out of seven who converted her penalty after her trademark hop and skip run-up.
“There is nobody I’d rather have in that position,” says Esme Morgan. “She is so reliable, so composed and calm. She said afterwards she made eye contact with the goalkeeper and they were smirking at her so she just started laughing.”
When Kelly joined Arsenal in January, on an initial loan that was made permanent this month, her aim was that she “just wanted to be happy again”. These were the moments she had in mind.
The 27-year-old treads the line between infectious, effervescent main character energy and knowing she will always be fighting for her role, even at her new club. Arsenal have just made Olivia Smith the first female £1m footballer and she operated as both a No 9 and a right-winger for Liverpool last season; if she is used as the latter, she will be vying with Kelly and Beth Mead for their places.
At this Euros, and perhaps for the foreseeable future, Kelly will be hard-pushed to displace Lauren James now the Chelsea forward has found a home on the right. Mead was then brought on ahead of her in the Sweden game as part of a trio of subs.
But when she got the nod from Wiegman, Kelly was ready, strapping on the shin pads with pictures of her dog and her wedding. The earliest she has come on was in the 57th minute against Wales, with England already 4-0 up.
Against Italy she is set to start on the bench again but at least, as she yelled to Alessia Russo while dancing on the pitch at full-time, “we’re in the semi-finals, baby”. Until Grace Clinton interrupted the dance by spraying her with Lucozade.
None of this was even vaguely plausible when Kelly was dropped in February. At first, Wiegman believed she had enough credit in the bank even when she was not playing at Manchester City.
By the time the Nations League came around, it had run out. The Lionesses boss told her to “show what she is about”. She has done just that and more.
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