Chelsea won at Juve 2-1 and Arsenal beat Hoffenheim 4-0 this week in the Women's CL. Both French sides (Lyon & PSG) won 5-0 at home. Promises to be a good campaign. I'll try and get to some games when things get interesting in the KO stage.
Juve-Chelsea was a good game. Chelsea were probably the better side, but Juve looked threatening despite their low possession for a good part of the game. Cuthbert opened the scoring for Chelsea, and Juve's equaliser by Bonansea was pure class with the cross from the left flank, by Cemoia I think, and great finish. Overall, I think Chelsea had a few more players who stood out positively, especially after Juve switched to a more offensive style of play, which ironically led to them suffering wave after wave of Chelsea attacks. Harder, Kerr and Kirby are up there with the best frontlines in the game. Nevertheless, credit to Juve for improving so dramatically over a few years. I certainly didn't expect them to challenge an established Chelsea that much. I also saw my beloved Bayern beat Häcken 4:0 at home to get their first victory in the CL after a somewhat disappointing draw away at Benfica. Good performance overall and we've got a strong, deep squad too. The next game away in Lyon will be a massive clash (their 5:0 home dismantling of Benfica was another deafening reminder of their continued ambitions).
Not sure what the hierarchy is like in Germany. I know Wolfsburg & Hoffenheim have good sides. Don't think Bayern ever won the CL?
What do you mean you know Hoffenheim are good, but question Bayern? Bayern made the CL semis last year and were capable of beating Chelsea. We are the reigning Meister and current BL leaders. Hoffenheim are decent, but got hammered in the CL by Arsenal, although I expected Hoffenheim to have a good chance of winning after Barca battered the Gunners in the first game. They had no chance though, as Arsenal redeemed themselves. I rate Bayern as good as Arsenal, if not, better. As for Hoffenheim, not bad, but against Arsenal, only Jule Brand was absolute class. She's a major left-wing talent with great ball control. Yes, Wolfsburg have been world-class for over a decade.
Must be me not paying attention at the right moment. We haven't played Bayern very often if I'm not mistaken. Anyway, the draw for the Euros finals is at 6 CET. I'm up for that!
I thought some of the club European draws took a while.. Properly dragged this out. They've had Ellie Goulding performing and all sorts Anyway.. They eventually did the draw for the tournament. Group A: England, Austria, Norway, Northern Ireland Group B: Germany, Denmark, Spain, Finland Group C: Netherlands, Sweden, Russia, Switzerland Group D: France, Italy, Belgium, Iceland I've got tickets for Netherlands v Sweden and then Group B winners v Group A runners up. I guess that'll probably be Germany v Norway
Have fun watching Spain v Norway then. Germany have, by far, the biggest pool of players, but for some reason we've been overtaken by a number of nations very quickly, Spain included. Even at France 2019, Spain dominated possession and created several chances against Germany, but lacked the final bite in front of goal (not dissimilar to Barca v. Wolfsburg in the CL 19-20 semis, wasting chance after chance and getting knocked out as punishment). I think the Germans were very relieved to overcome a toothless Spain in 2019, but the example of Barca improving bigtime in converting chances leads me to believe Spain will have done a similar job. Having watched Germany in the odd friendly since, I see them at the same level that saw them fall short of the Swedes in 2019, but if I turn out to be wrong in the sense of underestimating the Germans, then I'll be the first to gladly admit it.
Probably. They'll certainly be one of the favourites. Given the standard of the WSL keeps getting stronger each season and that there's also home advantage for this particular tournament, you'd think it should be a really good opportunity to win it.
Booked 9 group stage games. We've been blessed to play all our group games at Rotherham AND the quarter-final if we finish top. Will try and do all England games (esp on the South Coast, not that bothered by the opening game at OT, it's usually soured by terrible pre-game "performers") and basically all grounds. First part of criticism though: it's a bit stupid that towns of groups C & D are so far apart. Rotherham & Manchester are 1h away by train & car (srsly? how slow are your trains?) and same with Sheffield & Leigh. Should have done Rotherham & Sheffield and Leigh & Manchester, that way fans could go to 2 games in the same day. Oh and how come the top seed play all their games at the same ground (except England of course)? Ridiculous. I'm sure I'll have other things to complain about as we get closer to the tournament. Back to domestic football now!
Tottenham and Arsenal kicked off what has been dubbed as "women's football weekend" because of the men's internationals. Have to reiterate that Arsenal, Chelsea and City are the strongest in the division and have the advantage of years of being established in the women's game. Spurs v Arsenal kicked the weekend off. Usually go in to these games thinking a 1 or 2-0 defeat would be a "good result" given the gulf in quality. As it is, Spurs went in to injury time 1-0 up. Miedema once again stepping up for Arsenal to claim a draw but probably Tottenham's best result in the women's game. I don't think they've ever beaten Arsenal. It means Arsenal drop their first points of the season. It also means Spurs maintain their good start, it's a London top 3 at the minute as City have been below par. Really big game between City and Chelsea tomorrow. City are probably still favourites to finish 3rd but can't afford too many slip ups, Chelsea also have the opportunity to capitalise on Arsenal dropping points. Really encouraging to see Tottenham start competing in these sort of games. I think it'll very likely depend on what the two Manchester clubs do but that third spot is up for grabs this season.
Chelsea with a 4-0 win in Manchester. City drop to 9th! The gulf between the top and the rest means you usually write off the games v Arsenal, Chelsea and City and just hope to keep the score respectable. However City have dropped in to the bracket with the rest of the league. They've lost to Arsenal and Chelsea by 5 and 4 this season which is incredible by their standards. Feels like a top 2 going for the title and a bottom 2 fighting to stay up. Those inbetween, probably with the exception of Reading, will be fighting it out for that 3rd Champions League spot. Brighton occupy 3rd currently. I'd still put Manchester City as favourites but 7 points from 7 games is a terrible return with the quality they have in their squad. Their manager has to be under a lot of pressure.
What's happened with City this season? Every time I've seen them play they've looked a world away from everybody else but when I saw them against Utd the other week, they looked disjointed - almost like they'd been thrown together that morning. Have they lost key players or is it the same team that was good but now just getting on a bit?
In fairness to them they've been on the end of some bad luck. I've watched a couple of games where decisions have gone against them. They lost to Spurs with a goal that wouldn't have stood in the men's game with VAR. They've also had some injuries to key players which hasn't helped. That said, they've still got a better squad than most of the teams in the league. You might forgive them getting hammered by Chelsea and Arsenal because of the absences but they've still got a better squad than the rest of the league and internationals throughout the team. There's a good few in that 11 yesterday that walk in to most of the other teams in the league. No excuse for the start to the season really and they've also had disappointing exits in the cups (domestic and European) which adds to the pressure on the manager. They'll still likely finish 3rd because their squad is too good not to but they've made it harder on themselves. With only 22 league games in the campaign, you can't afford too many slip ups. They're already 8 points off that 3rd Champions League spot so are going to need a good run of results for the rest of the campaign.
I thought that Northern Ireland's women's team 11-0 away win to North Macedonia today was an incredible scoreline until I noticed that Belgium women had matched that scoreline against Armenia , I wonder how many more they'll score in the 2nd half
Final score in the Women's World Cup qualifier Belgium 19 v 0 Armenia Ridiculous really , what can the Armenian team get out of this ?
Anyone applied for tickets for the Euros this summer? I got all of mine except the England games at Brighton & Southampton. Must be in quite high demand. Still confident I'll get some at some point during the selling process.
