Aston Villa Women 0-1 Chelsea Women
In the end it was a hard slog to beat Aston Villa in last weekend’s FA Cup semi, but Chelsea squeaked through with a well-directed header from Sam Kerr to set up a Wembley final against Manchester United on 14 May.
But first, there’s the little matter of this Saturday’s lunchtime crunch Champions League clash with Barcelona at Stamford Bridge... and Emma Hayes knows her team will have to go up a gear.
The Chelsea squad, once seen as top-heavy, now appears stretched and tired, with defenders Millie Bright and Kadeisha Buchanan on the sick list alongside Fran Kirby.
But look who’s back! Pernille Harder, missing since November because of a protracted hamstring issue, was on the bench on Sunday for the 1-0 win at Walsall’s threadbare quagmire of a pitch at the Bescot stadium.
She wasn’t called on to play, but she could yet spring an appearance to take some of the striker’s strain off Kerr who, with Kirby and Harder both out of action, has had to be on duty pretty much continuously.
“That was a tough game,” sighed Kerr after the Villa match, while praising her Chelsea teammate Guro Reiten, who supplied the crucial cross that led to the solitary goal on the hour mark.
Hayes summed up the semi-final as “a difficult pitch and an ugly game”. It was certainly tense at the end as the Blues clung on for the win in the face of concerted Villa attacks.
“There was not a lot of grass in the penalty areas,” Hayes added, pointing to the bare earth in large patches of the pitch which made the game feel like one of those clips from the 1970s of footballers playing on ploughed fields.
Barcelona will feel they are favourites in the Women’s Champions League semi-final, and will be looking to take a lead back to Spain for the second leg of what promises to be a tough clash.
Meanwhile, the Wembley final on 14 May is heading towards being sold out. Last month, before the finalists were even known, 40,000 tickets had gone, with the remaining ones (£5 for U16s and between £15 and £30 for adults) available here on Wembley Stadium's website.
It will comfortably exceed last year’s Wembley crowd of 49,094 who witnessed Chelsea’s victory over Manchester City.
The views expressed in this blog are those of the author and unless specifically stated are not necessarily those of Hammersmith & Fulham Council.
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