Chelsea face Manchester City at the weekend at Stamford Bridge, where the two unbeaten teams in the Women’s Super League will both look to extend that run into match week ten.
Both teams played in the UEFA Women’s Champions League midweek, with Chelsea drawing nil-nil with BK Häcken while Manchester City beat Inter Milan 4-1, so both sides will be looking to further their unbeaten streaks.
Chelsea’s last game in the Women’s Super League saw the Blues draw with Everton at home after a Lucy Bronze own goal equalised the scores for Everton despite Sandy Baltimore’s opener in west London.
Sonia Bompastor and her side will have to work hard and be ready for the challenge that comes from facing Manchester City after the Manchester side won their last two meetings: 3-2 in the Women’s FA Cup and 5-1 in the league back in February.
Bompastor insisted that her side would have to be “a good team from minute one until the end of the game and make sure we really switch on” in order to get the win at home.
Stopping Bunny Shaw and Manchester City
Bompastor was asked about Manchester City star striker Khadija ‘Bunny’ Shaw in her pre-match press conference and how she planned to stop the striker from scoring in the game after her hat-trick against West Ham United the weekend before, with Shaw also being the league’s top scorer with 12 goals.
“She’s in great form. I think if we focus too much on her, another player from Man City will find a way to create a goal.”
“We know they have a lot of quality as a team, they have a lot of great individuals.”
The Chelsea manager continued, backing her own team: “Everyone believes in the quality of the players we have on the pitch. We believe in what we are doing as a team to defend, especially the box. But I think we have to have a really good performance tomorrow.”
Being Clinical
Chelsea are a dominant side in any competition that they play in, but recently under Bompastor they have struggled to be clinical in games where they have needed to get the goals to win.
She reflected on her previous two games and their lack of finishing: “we have hunger going into the game tomorrow because I think the Everton game was a game we didn’t produce much on the pitch in terms of the attacking aspect.”
“Against Häcken one more time, we were dominant in the game, so we will need to keep working and I’m convinced tomorrow we’ll create opportunities and we will have to be clinical. It is an important game and we know Man City, maybe we’ll have a few opportunities that we need to make sure we are being clinical.”
Bompastor furthered the point about being clinical: despite being the team that creates the most chances, they often do not go into the back of the net.
“It’s important to reflect on the game and the performance, knowing you’re able to create those chances and opportunities. I think it’s more for us when we are in that situation to make sure we are composed, we are paying attention to the small details and the mentality to be ruthless when you have those opportunities.”
Reflecting on Manchester City Losses
Bompastor’s last two games against Manchester City resulted in Chelsea losing 8-3 on aggregate: a 3-2 loss in the Women’s FA Cup, which the City side went on to win to complete their double, and a humiliating 5-1 loss to them at the Etihad Stadium in the Women’s Super League last season in February.
When asked about what she learnt from those two games, Bompastor answered, “I think from that game [the FA Cup loss] the mental aspects were the most important ones. I think when you are leading at home by 2 goals and you have 15 minutes left in the game you can’t let the game go the way it went. We took the learnings and we know from that game the quality that City have on their side.”
“I need to be the one that brings solutions,” Bompastor said when reflecting on the 5-1 loss in February. “In terms of defensive aspects, when you concede 5 goals it's not good enough so you need to find a way to be compact. I think we considered it a lot in transitional moments.”
“I think coming into this season we have fixed some of the things we were probably not good at last season. I think this season we are conceding less goals and we need to be strong in terms of the defensive aspects. Also making sure we help the players perform at their best level is something as a coach I need to provide.”
