Champions Chelsea beat title rivals Manchester City 2-0 at Stamford Bridge to move above them into top spot in the Women’s Super League and keep up their perfect start to the season.
Sonia Bompastor, the successor to Emma Hayes as Chelsea boss, has become the first coach in WSL history to win their first seven games in the competition thanks to second-half goals from Mayra Ramirez and Guro Reiten just four minutes apart.
Chelsea needed the individual brilliance of Ramirez to unlock the game, billed by some as a title decider in the build-up, as the striker shrugged off City defender Alanna Kennedy before firing into the far corner after carrying the ball from halfway.
Reiten then delivered a pinpoint effort from the edge of the box to deliver the killer blow after a set piece. City struggled to keep up with Chelsea as the game wore on and could have easily conceded a third.
Guro Reiten extended Chelsea’s lead with a calm finish
City’s Khadija Shaw, the WSL’s top scorer, failed to punish two misplaced Chelsea passes in the first half, pulling her shot wide initially before putting too much on a pass when playing in Jil Roord.
Lauren Hemp, one of the star performers in the WSL this season, missed out with a knee injury and her absence as the league’s most prolific creator was felt with City unable to break down their hosts in the final third despite bossing the possession.
Chelsea, victors in all seven of their WSL games at Stamford Bridge, spent last season chasing City and Arsenal for the title, but this crucial win leaves them two points clear with a game in hand and in full control.
Chelsea boss Bompastor was delighted with Chelsea’s performance against “one of the best teams in Europe”, but is keeping her feet firmly on the ground when it comes to title ambitions.
“I’m really proud of my players. I think they had a great performance,” Bompastor said after the game. “It’s a really good start, of course, and it brings us a lot of confidence, but the reality is we didn’t win anything yet.
“I really enjoyed [the goals] because I know how much it’s difficult to score, especially against Man City, a really good team that has a lot of great players.
“I just wanted to enjoy because you don’t get that much opportunities to have this great environment.
“Playing a game against Man City, one of the best teams in Europe, and getting a good result, clean sheet, everything is almost perfect. So, yeah, if you don’t enjoy now, you will never enjoy.”
Asked if Chelsea are the team to beat, she added: “Yeah, maybe at the moment the opposition can think that, especially because we had seven wins in a row in the league.
“But that’s our standards, you know. Joining Chelsea, I was really aligned with the vision and the ambitions. We are the holders in this competition, in the league, and we just need to keep these standards.
“If everyone thinks we are the team to beat, that’s fine for us. As a manager, I love to embrace the pressure. That’s the job. And for my players, having this feeling to be the team to beat, that’s a really good feeling.”
Gareth Taylor insisted errors at key moments cost his Manchester City side in their loss to Chelsea
Man City boss Taylor felt his side’s failure to capitalise on Chelsea’s errors cost them in a game that was tight until Ramirez’s opener 15 minutes from time.
“My emotions are fine. Obviously we’re disappointed, but I think it was a game of errors for both teams,” he said. “A lot of opportunities came from mistakes. In the first half, they made more than us and we weren’t able to capitalise.
“The game looked like it was going towards kind of a 0-0 and quickly it slipped away from us. But I think in terms of those errors, we slightly evened it up in the second half.”
Chelsea could go five points clear of City if they win their game in hand but Taylor was not keen to discuss how this defeat impacts his side’s chances in the title race.
Asked what the result means for City, he said: “Are we going to talk fantasy here or are we going to talk about the game?
“I can’t control what Chelsea do in the next game. We are still up and around the top of the league, we had a very good start to the season. We’ve had a setback.
“I can’t tell you about what they’re going to do with their game in hand.”
Chelsea’s player of the match Erin Cuthbert tells Sky Sports why they have had such a good start to the season
Chelsea midfielder Erin Cuthbert, player of the match against City, told Sky Sports that their perfect start to the season under Bompastor is partly down to the fine work of her predecessor Hayes.
Hayes spent a trophy-laden 12 years at Chelsea, winning the league seven times, five of those coming in her final five seasons consecutively before leaving to become head coach of USA Women.
“I see a lot of similarities between Emma Hayes and Sonia Bompastor,” Cuthbert said after the game.
“They are both winners and they don’t care how the job gets done as long as it’s done. Emma left a great foundation for Sonia to build on.
“All pre-season and so far in the season we’ve been working on what Sonia wants to do. She doesn’t mind if it is possession or chess – she would like to have the ball but – it does not matter as long as we are limiting the opposition and have great players that can hurt them.
“We saw tonight we had countless opportunities on the transition.”
