Chelsea win sixth straight Girls’s Tremendous League title to show home dominance didn’t finish with Emma Hayes

They are saying good issues come to those that wait.

Persistence and perseverance are two rules Sonia Bompastor values after taking the time to be taught the artwork of teaching in Lyon’s academy system earlier than graduating to the primary staff, and ultimately accepting a rigorously chosen alternative to handle within the Girls’s Tremendous League.

However neither have been wanted throughout her first 12 months in control of Chelsea. This season has been an exhibition of inevitability from the reigning champions. A reminder to all who recommended their crown would possibly slip following the top of the Emma Hayes period that the established hierarchy is not any much less immovable.

It is occurred once more. The Blues have one other collector’s merchandise for the trophy cupboard. The one distinction is that this 12 months they’ve gained with video games to spare. No jeopardy-filled finale for Bompastor – she’s completed the job earlier than even the good Hayes may in her final three title-winning campaigns.

Little or no of this season has been nip and tuck. In that means it is felt completely different, even perhaps shocking. It’s as if Arsenal, Manchester United and Manchester Metropolis had been knocking on the door for thus lengthy it was starting to open, just for Bompastor to slam it mercilessly shut. The signal studying “closed for business”.

Earlier years have definitely indulged the thought Chelsea might be dethroned for much longer. Hayes herself famously conceded the title after dropping to Liverpool late in her closing season: “It’s not to be. I don’t think the title is there anymore,” she stated, earlier than eclipsing Man Metropolis on objective distinction alone. It felt imply however that is the secret.

Chelsea do not care who they trample on their strategy to silverware so long as they get there. Such an insatiable starvation is tough to search out – a lot much less preserve for thus lengthy. Pure, remorseless want is a continuing, reimagined through the years however all the time current. It is the hand that feeds this title-winning machine many times.

And but nobody predicted that such an unyielding strategy would switch to Bompastor’s Chelsea so shortly. How may they? Folks spoke a few interval of transition. A recess of types. Some in-between time the place the Frenchwoman, having by no means coached overseas earlier than, will get used to her environment and the squad she inherited will get acquainted with their new chief.

Bompastor has shattered that pretence.

That is merely unrelenting Chelsea 2.0, extra affected person in possession, however nonetheless in a position to impose themselves in the identical exhaustive means each Hayes staff did. A unit by which each single half acts out its half exactly, all aligned with the identical ‘win at any value’ perspective.

However this, their six-peat, is as spectacular as it’s problematic for the WSL and its bid to remain aggressive. How do rivals develop into challengers once more? Arsenal fell on the closing hurdle in 2021-22. Man United suffered the identical destiny the next 12 months, and Man Metropolis most lately. The cycle of home dominance – Europe stays frustratingly out of attain – is so unflinching it defies perception.

Odd, then, that only a few Chelsea gamers have been stat leaders in their very own proper this season. No best-in-class performers among the many biggest present on the town – how can that be? It appears peculiar that from again to entrance many of the WSL’s highest-achieving people play for different golf equipment.

There are just a few outliers however this newest title has not been about excellent solo acts – like when the peerless Fran Kirby ran the present in 2020-21 or when Sam Kerr bagged 20 targets on the way in which to the Golden Boot in 2021-22. Or when the maverick high quality of Lauren James spearheaded final 12 months’s conquest.

The story of this season has been much more nuanced. Discovering the distinctive within the unexceptional is one thing solely Chelsea are able to.

Defensively, Lucy Bronze is the one participant to function prominently in any of the classes used to measure defensive solidity. She ranks second for interceptions behind Tottenham’s Ash Neville. No Chelsea participant is listed inside the highest 5 for tackles, clearances, possessions gained or photographs blocked.

Hannah Hampton’s (11) clear sheet report is spectacular however not as grand as Man United’s Phallon Tullis-Joyce (13) – by far the best-performing goalkeeper within the league this season. Tullis-Joyce tops the charts for variety of targets prevented too (6.9).

Offensively, Chelsea’s main scorers Aggie Beever-Jones and Guro Reiten have eight targets apiece, rating them fifth behind Shekiera Martinez (West Ham), Elisabeth Terland (Man Utd), Alessia Russo (Arsenal) and Khadija Shaw (Man Metropolis). Beever-Jones is equally positioned for photographs on the right track (17) – which is identical quantity Man Metropolis’s Vivianne Miedema has posted having missed half the season with damage.

Johanna Rytting Kaneryd locations fifth for possibilities created (33) however is miles off Arsenal’s Katie McCabe (45) and Liverpool’s Marie Hobinger (38). The Chelsea winger has touched the ball within the opposition field 116 occasions, with team-mate Mayra Ramirez shut behind (114), however it’s Russo (133) who sits high, whereas all of the passing metrics are dominated by Man Metropolis and Arsenal gamers.

These numbers will really feel comparatively inconsequential when carrying a WSL winners medal, besides to focus on an apparent theme. With celebrity striker Kerr spending all the season sidelined with an ACL damage and James solely managing six league begins Chelsea have wanted to depend on being collectively good. Interact a pack mentality. And that doesn’t imply profitable a title taking part in anti-football, as a result of some performances and outcomes have thrilled.

However their would possibly has been most keenly felt within the power of the staff, because the squad with the very best cumulative expertise pool throughout the board – depth past different WSL sides’ wildest creativeness. Substitutes for his or her substitutes. Options for each downside.

Chatting with Sky Sports activities on the finish of March after roaring again to defeat Man Metropolis from two targets down within the Champions League, Bompastor stated: “I’ve told my players you will have different statuses.

“Typically you’ll begin the sport. Typically you will not be within the squad. Typically you’ll be a finisher. And it doesn’t matter what standing you have got, you’re right here to assist the staff. It is in regards to the membership, the staff and what we obtain collectively.”

Very few WSL managers have a fraction of that luxury nor the bullishness to use every inch of it. Bompastor, who described this title as “sudden”, has squeezed and formed her squad, prodding at each imperfection and demanded extra. Domestically they’ve barely flinched. The treble could be very a lot on.

And so right here we’ve this nation’s biggest ever ladies’s soccer staff, already within the realm of nearly untouchable, with the potential and means to develop into even better.

*information appropriate as of April 29 (doesn’t embrace statistics from video games performed April 30)