\n As Chelsea\u2019s domestic season came to a close with a 1-0 win over Manchester United, head coach Sonia Bompastor reflected on a transitional season and shared her optimism over what is to come from her side.
\n <\/p>\n
After joining Chelsea in the summer of 2024, Bompastor won a domestic Treble in her first campaign in charge, and this season retained the Women\u2019s League Cup, qualified for next season\u2019s Women\u2019s Champions League with a third-place finish and has reached the Women\u2019s FA Cup semi-final.<\/p>\n
While the Blues have been ahead of the curve in the women\u2019s game, other teams have begun to close the gap, prompting an honest assessment of where we can identify areas for growth.<\/p>\n
\u2018I think if you reflect in terms of results, for sure, we have been so used to winning so many games, trophies, and titles,\u2019 said Bompastor. \u2018But this season we couldn’t achieve as much as we did previously.<\/p>\n
\u2018We have already started a lot of reflections within the club to make sure we are in a better place for next season. We knew we were coming into a transitional period since I joined the club.<\/p>\n
\u2018The first season was really successful for us. This season, in terms of success, it was more difficult, but both seasons have been transitional seasons for the club.<\/p>\n
\u2018The competition is becoming bigger and bigger. I think in terms of the gap between Chelsea and the other teams in England, but also in Europe. More teams are now able to invest in the women’s game, to invest in their team, to invest in players to be able to compete against Chelsea.<\/p>\n
\u2018Chelsea have been a club who have been showing the pathway. Right now, most of the clubs are catching up and making sure they can compete against us. So, it\u2019s for us as a club to have a vision around, \u2018okay, how can we maintain the success in the long term at a club like Chelsea?\u2019 That’s the question we need to ask ourselves.\u2019<\/p>\n
New rules state that our qualification for the Champions League next season means we will not feature in the League Cup in 2026\/27.<\/p>\n
Bompastor explained how the club will focus on ensuring we have all the right tools to perform at the highest level in an increasingly competitive WSL next season, as well as in Europe.<\/p>\n
\u2018We have been competing in four competitions, and going into next season, there will be three competitions,\u2019 she continued. \u2018You build a squad to have the depth to compete in every competition, because when you have this level of quality in the team, you have a lot of international players, and they play many games in the season.<\/p>\n
\u2018I\u2019ve said this before, but when you come here, you can see the difference between this league and all the other leagues in Europe. When I was at Lyon, 80 per cent of the games, we could play at 60 per cent, and it was enough for us to win.<\/p>\n
\u2018I could play some of the games with players coming from the academy and still win games. That’s not the case here. Here, you have to compete in every league game because every match brings you a challenge in different ways.<\/p>\n
\u2018Sometimes it’s a physical challenge. Sometimes it’s a tough game because they are big clubs. Sometimes it’s a tactical challenge. You need to make sure you are ready for every game. There is no space for you to drop a little bit because when you do that, you lose or you drop points. <\/p>\n
\u2018Our job is to reflect and to make sure we make the right decisions for the future.\u2019<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" As Chelsea\u2019s domestic season came to a close with a 1-0 win over Manchester United, head coach…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":447553,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[85,46,105],"class_list":["post-447552","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/447552","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=447552"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/447552\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/447553"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=447552"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=447552"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=447552"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}