Lead Women’s Football Writer
@FootballCo
. Long suffering Bradford City fan who also endures the pain of following the Colts. Will often spam the TL with tennis.
Last year was the end of Marta at the World Cup, these next few weeks will see the end of Marta at the Olympics and then the end of Marta in a Brazil shirt altogether will follow.
As she prepares for her final major tournament, a piece on the 🐐
Wiegman on James: "It was a moment of a split second. It was later in the game so players get tired. She’s inexperienced on this stage and had done well but she lost her emotions. She doesn’t want to hurt anyone. She’s the sweetest person I know."
Five years ago, Manchester United did not have a women’s team.
On Sunday, they will play in their first Women’s FA Cup final.
What a rollercoaster journey it has been.
Beth Mead says the England team are speaking to the
#USWNT
about how they can show solidarity with them amid the awful abuse suffered by players in the NWSL. Nothing decided yet but “we are working on something to show our support for them.”
Millie Bright, asked how she has been sleeping the last few nights in the build up to this World Cup final:
"I've slept really well thank you. I've got a lovely big bed that's kept me nice and cosy."
Chelsea have come into this game without Sam Kerr, without Mia Fishel, without Mayra Ramirez, without Millie Bright, without Maren Mjelde, without Ann-Katrin Berger, without Nat Björn, with Lauren James having been ill and Fran Kirby only fit for the bench. Fair fucking play.
Aitana Bonmati outside the stadium here at Brentford giving away anything decent she can find in her bag to the fans after signing a ton of autographs 😂
🚨 Big Chelsea team news:
Magda Eriksson is BACK and will be part of the squad for tomorrow's Conti Cup final against Manchester City.
Emma Hayes: "She's had a couple of setbacks. We’ve had to take the right amount of time to get it right. She is in a really good place."
Tobin Heath on Vivianne Miedema: "She's fantastic. Her quality speaks for itself. Being able to play on the same pitch, it is one of the reasons why I came to Arsenal, the quality players. I think the team can take big steps in these big competitions."
If Lucy Bronze wins the Champions League with Barcelona this weekend, she will be the first Englishwoman to do so with two different clubs.
It begs the question - where does she rank among her country’s greatest ever players?
Wiegman on Earps saying she let the team down: "I spoke to her very shortly and I don’t want her to talk like that, because you win as a team and lose as a team. She didn’t let the team down. Everyone does their best. You only let your team down when you don’t put effort in."
Extensive break in play as Maanum in need of serious medical attention. Didn't see her go down, off the ball and out of shot on BBC, but McCabe frantically called for attention as she raced towards her. Being put on a stretcher now. Well wishes go without saying, horrible scenes
If it wasn’t impressive enough that Vivianne Miedema has just become the first player to hit 100 goal contributions in the WSL… She’s done it in 83 games.
70 goals and 30 assists in 83 games. Insane.
Vivianne Miedema absolutely outstanding tonight.
59 touches
30/39 passes completed
14/20 in final third
7 times possession won
4 chances created (most on pitch)
2/3 tackles won
1 dribble completed
1 foul won
1 match-winning goal!
Looks like that break did her good, eh.
#UWCL
The
#UWCL
group stage line up is confirmed!
Pots for Monday's draw:
1️⃣
🇫🇷 Lyon
🇪🇸 Barcelona
🇩🇪 Wolfsburg
🏴 Chelsea
2️⃣
🇫🇷 PSG
🇩🇪 Bayern Munich
🇨🇿 Slavia Praha
🏴 Arsenal
3️⃣
🇸🇪 Rosengård
🇮🇹 Juventus
🇪🇸 Real Madrid
🇦🇹 St. Pölten
4️⃣
🇨🇭 Zürich
🇦🇱 Vllaznia
🇵🇹 Benfica
🇮🇹 Roma
Remember when I drove down to cover the Birmingham vs Villa game last month and it was called off 5 mins before kick off? Postman just dropped this off. Thank you
@AVWFCOfficial
👏🏼
England and U.S. players stand together with a ‘protect the players’ banner. All wearing teal armbands, too, and the Wembley arch is currently lit up in the same colour, to show solidarity
Asked Emma Hayes why she thinks her Chelsea team are in a position to do something they've never done before and retain the WSL title.
She explained it with a great analogy about, well, geese
Football Manager is set to introduce women's football teams! 🎉
The game has also agreed to sponsor Leicester City Women 🦊
I spoke to
@milesSI
,
@FootballManager
's studio director, and
@tinakeech
, its new head of women's football research, earlier 👇🏼
Earps on James: "In the moment, you're just gutted. That emotion lasts a couple of seconds but it's just being logical and moving on. I have a lot of faith and trust in my team-mates. Quality, resilience, all the characteristics you need as a winning team, they showed tonight."
Rapinoe: "I feel like there's not really a huge gap anymore [between Europe and the U.S.]. We saw it in the Euros, the Champions League. The level of football right now is insane. It's going to be an incredible game. I'm so excited to play."
Van de Donk on her return to Arsenal: "It’s great to be back. Everything is very familiar. Those six years meant a lot. I developed as a player a lot. I always enjoyed playing there."
Chelsea’s second successive WSL title win wasn’t just Emma Hayes. It wasn’t just Fran Kirby and Sam Kerr. It wasn’t just Magda Eriksson.
It was 23 players, an entire club full of staff and an attitude built on complete and utter unity.
Full time: Arsenal 3-2 Chelsea. Absolutely sensational game of football ends with the Gunners on top. They exploited weaknesses in Chelsea’s defence and held on at the end when the Blues had to go for it. Miedema was simply sensational - goal, assist, big hand in the third too
Catarina Macario hasn't played for club or country for almost 12 months.
But the risk that comes with signing the
#USWNT
star is far outweighed by the reward.
This is a perfect signing for Chelsea.
Greenwood sent off for a second yellow for timewasting, which seemed ridiculously harsh. Then Roord and Kelly are booked for dissent. I'm sorry but that's absolutely ridiculous
“She’s a cheat code. She was always going to be this good. It was just a matter of time.”
Big praise for Lauren James last night from her England captain, Leah Williamson 💪
Full story below as Lauren James swaps Man Utd for Chelsea. 🤝
@NizaarKinsella
understands it's a deal worth an initial £200,000, which could rise to £300,000 with add-ons. 💰
Record fee between Women's Super League clubs. 🏴
Walsh off on a stretcher. Clearly said 'I've done my knee' to the physio. In terms of the football, that's probably the most devastating injury that England could possibly be hit with at this tournament. Walsh is the one player in this team who simply cannot be replaced
Guijarro on playing alongside Walsh: "Playing with Keira, it makes football easier. It's true that it's not easy to adapt to FC Barcelona. She's done that in record time. She's adapted so well because of her ability to understand football."
We’ve hyped up Alex Morgan coming to the WSL. We’ve hyped up Rose Lavelle. We’ve hyped up Sam Mewis. We’ve hyped up Tobin Heath. We’ve hyped up Christen Press.
We’ve NOT hyped up Denise O’Sullivan, the most important player on the best team in the NWSL
I know Aston Villa haven't defended brilliantly but I really don't know why Stina Blackstenius hasn't played more for Arsenal this season. Causes so many problems with her clever movement. Feel like Alessia Russo benefits from having her to bounce off / create space, too.
🏴 Alex Greenwood vs Colombia:
88 touches
66/70 passes completed
10/13 in final third
5 times possession won
4/4 dribbles completed (!)
3 interceptions
2 blocks
1 chance created
Oozed class. Again.
This time last year, I hadn’t even graduated. 10 months ago I was working six days a week, working til 2am behind a bar and getting up at 5am to drive to a freelance job hoping of getting a break into journalism. On Sunday, I’ll cover a World Cup final. Pretty proud I must say
Giraldez on Bronze's recovery from her early mistake: "Sometimes you have bad luck. Lucy is an amazing player who did an amazing job during the season. The mistake isn't important, it's how you react. The reaction was excellent."
Arsenal, Chelsea and Man City have locked out the WSL's top three every season since 2015.
In that time, they've lost just 11 of their 263 games against the teams below them.
Will this year be any different? Man Utd and Everton will hope so...
Heath on the WSL showing solidarity with the NWSL after recent allegations of sexual abuse: "I played in the NWSL for most of my career so it was a very emotional and hard time and it was great to see the players in the WSL standing with the NWSL players because..."
No player has ever scored more than two hat-tricks, ever, in the history of women's football at the Olympic Games.
Barbra Banda has scored two hat-tricks in her first two matches at the Olympic Games.
#Tokyo2020
Vivianne Miedema also spoke to the media today ahead of Arsenal's
#UWCL
clash with Juventus. I asked her about the break she took recently and how important it is that players feel they can ask for that, with the amount of games and lack of rest.
Here's what she said ⬇️
2024 Olympic women's football tournament line-up:
🇫🇷 France
🇺🇸 USA
🇧🇷 Brazil
🇨🇴 Colombia
🇨🇦 Canada
🇳🇿 New Zealand
🇪🇸 Spain
🇦🇺 Australia
🇯🇵 Japan
🇩🇪 Germany
🇿🇲 Zambia OR 🇲🇦 Morocco
🇳🇬 Nigeria OR 🇿🇦 South Africa
CAF play-offs take place April 1-9 to confirm final two nations.
Christine Sinclair’s returning announcement. Jess Fishlock stomping on a bouquet of roses. Nadia Nadim heckling a fan from the car.
This is the story of the rivalry between
@OLReign
and
@ThornsFC
.
It may well be the best one in the entire women’s game.
Putellas absolutely devastated. Laid on the floor by the penalty spot near the Barca fans being consoled by player after player and staff member after staff member. Eventually gets up and gets an embrace from Hegerberg and a little word in the ear
Women’s footballers: ask for help / support / less games due to so many serious injuries
FIFA: doesn’t expand Women’s World Cup squads like it has for the men’s
Also FIFA: introduces a new competition and more games
🫡
Eight years ago, Riola Xhemaili swapped volleyball for football.
Today, she’s the youngest member of Switzerland’s
#WEURO2022
squad.
My
#NXGN
profile on the ‘tricky’
#SUI
and Freiburg midfielder, who has an incredibly bright future 🌟
“There were plenty of times I’d have a lot of frustration with Emma, because I wasn’t getting the game time I felt I deserved.”
Ahead of tomorrow’s FA Cup semi-final, an interview with Chelsea’s Jess Carter about, well, everything 👇
Chelsea have Sam Kerr, Pernille Harder, Beth England and alllll the attacking talent you can count. But captain and centre-back Magda Eriksson could be their most important player and her presence will be key in tomorrow’s huge clash with Man City
After seven stable years with the Portland Thorns in the NWSL, Tobin Heath’s career has had a wild 18 months, really.
But that rollercoaster has led her to an incredible new chapter that starts Sunday: representing Arsenal, the club she loves.
Full time scores around the WSL 🏴
🔴 Arsenal 0-0 Aston Villa 🟣
🔵 Birmingham 0-1 Spurs ⚪️
🔵 Brighton 3-1 Bristol 🔴
🔵 Chelsea 5-0 Reading 🔴
🔴 Man Utd 2-0 Everton 🔵
🟤 West Ham 0-1 Man City 🔵
Chelsea champions; Bristol relegated.
Tobin Heath sticking around for Manchester United this month, rather than heading to
#USWNT
camp, is absolutely huge - especially for tomorrow’s game against Chelsea.
A piece on her impact at the club so far, both on the pitch and off the pitch
Full time: Man City 1-1 Arsenal.
Huge for Arsenal and their title race to come from behind at the death and get a point. Did miss the chance to extend their lead more though, after Chelsea's draw earlier today. City two points off the top three.
“Sam Kerr was like a mum to me last year. Pernille and Magda as well - they were always making sure I was okay.”
For my latest
#NXGN
profile, I spoke to Chelsea youngster
@jorjafox6
about her rise through the ranks, loan at Charlton and future aims 🔵
Hayes: "I think Fran has really struggled with a diminishing role in the team, I think that's fair. When I look at Fran, I think of her tenure at the club, I think icon, legend. Everyone wanted her to score today."
“It’s funny how people talk about our league. They mostly look at our results, which are big, and just assume that everyone’s so shit. But the fact is people aren’t shit - we are just really, really good.”
Interview with Barcelona’s
@CarolineGrahamH
🔵🔴
🇳🇱 Victoria Pelova vs Wolfsburg:
33 touches
14/19 passes completed
6/7 in the final third
3 times possession won
2 chances created
2 interceptions
2 fouls won
1 assist
Biggest game of her career to date and she stepped UP.
What next for Chelsea? Last night might have been a rout on paper, but there’s no reason for them to panic.
Emma Hayes’ side are where Barcelona were two years ago. A few tweaks, some more experience together, and they’ll have another shot at the
#UWCL
From a devastating elimination, to not thinking about the tournament at all, to suddenly having a chance to go, to finding out 65 days before the opener that they would.
Inside Portugal’s crazy, crazy qualification for the Women’s Euros 🇵🇹
#WEURO2022
Asked Williamson if Heath's free-kick was something they've practiced on the training pitch - she says they've been working on bits of creativity like that, but this one was "off the cuff".
Asked Jonas Eidevall for an injury update on Lina Hurtig after he said she'd be back soon. He says he didn't say soon. I tell him he said before Christmas and Christmas is soon. After a slight pause he realises it is. Something tells me he hasn't done his Christmas shopping yet
Football is a simple game. 22 players chase a ball for 90 minutes - and in the end, Germany wins.
The question is - why?
Ahead of
#GER
’s
#WEURO2022
opener, I spoke to some people to try and find out…