ENGLAND defender Lucy Bronze is confident the Lionesses have a squad full of “winners” as they prepare to begin their European Championship defence.

The England squad have gathered at St George’s Park ahead of their Euros quest and will open their campaign on July 5 against France in Zurich.

Chelsea secured a domestic treble as they failed to lose a single game in the Women’s Super League last season, while Arsenal stunned Barcelona to lift the Champions League and nine players from the current England squad played for those two clubs last term.

Despite the high-profile changes in the England squad – they defend their title without Mary Earps, Fran Kirby and Millie Bright – the travelling squad includes 13 players who lifted the trophy back in 2022.

Bronze underlined the amount of talent England have at their disposal this summer, saying: “I think mentally, we’ve got a lot of winners on the team.

“We did fantastic [at the 2023 World Cup], but I think now we’ve got a group of players who [for them], their mentality is to win.

“The fact that Arsenal won the Champions League this year. The fact that so many Chelsea players have accomplished so many things this year. [Manchester] United players getting the [FA Cup] final.

“We’ve got players who want to win, can win, have shown that they can win and we bring that all together in the England team. We want to win and do that on a consistent basis.”

An estimated 574,865 fans attended the 2022 tournament in England across all 31 matches including 87,192 in the final at Wembley Stadium.

By March this year, 500,000 fans had already snapped up tickets, which indicates the growing popularity of women’s football.

Bronze thinks this year could prove to be the best in Europe yet and added: “It could potentially be the biggest tournament that we’ve had in Europe.

“The World Cup was huge, but it was halfway around the world, I think it missed out on so many fans and our families as well.

“The Euros in England was fantastic for us here, but I think we’ve got an opportunity to grow even bigger, so the distinct thing will be the size of it.”

England will be boosted by the return of forward Lauren James, who trained this week for the first time since she suffered a hamstring injury in April.

Bronze added: “I think if she’d been fit all season, Chelsea could have had an even better season and England results as well, probably, because we all know that she’s that good.

“She’s always been focused on coming back and being 100 per cent, but it’s important that we’re all aware that she’s coming back from injury.

“She doesn’t need to put pressure on herself to win an England a game because we have some of the best forwards in the world playing. LJ is one of them.”