{"id":389264,"date":"2026-01-25T06:23:11","date_gmt":"2026-01-25T06:23:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/389264\/"},"modified":"2026-01-25T06:23:11","modified_gmt":"2026-01-25T06:23:11","slug":"chelsea-boss-sonia-bompastor-says-the-title-race-is-probably-gone-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/389264\/","title":{"rendered":"Chelsea boss Sonia Bompastor says ‘the title race is probably gone’"},"content":{"rendered":"

In seasons gone by, Chelsea have led the way, winning games relentlessly – but this time City are playing that role.<\/p>\n

Chelsea are scoring far less regularly, with 24 league goals in 13 games so far compared with 38 by this stage last season. <\/p>\n

They have conceded eight goals – two more than at this stage a year ago. While that is still the current best defensive record in the WSL, they are keeping fewer clean sheets – six in 13 games this season compared with nine last year.<\/p>\n

On-pitch performances back up the numbers.<\/p>\n

When Chelsea kicked off their title defence with a 2-1 win over Manchester City <\/a>on the opening night back in September, it suggested they would be the team to beat once again in 2025-26.<\/p>\n

That evening Bompastor’s side exhibited every ounce of their ruthless, winning nature. The problem is, it has not been consistently evident since.<\/p>\n

In the autumn, nervy wins over Aston Villa, Leicester and Tottenham enabled them to keep pace at the top of the table but a run of three draws in four slowed momentum.<\/p>\n

At that stage, nine games in, Manchester City’s lead at the top was just three points but the true sickener for Chelsea was the 1-0 loss at home to struggling Everton.<\/p>\n

That was Sonia Bompastor’s first loss since succeeding Emma Hayes in the summer of 2024, and ended her side’s 34-game unbeaten league run.<\/p>\n

That handed City a six-point advantage, which they retained into the winter break.<\/p>\n

Although Chelsea kicked off 2026 with a 5-0 thrashing of West Ham, City are yet to blink. Instead, Chelsea have been the team to falter again, this time losing to London rivals Arsenal on their own patch.<\/p>\n

Former Blues midfielder Fara Williams summed it up best on BBC One: “Chelsea just didn’t turn up.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In seasons gone by, Chelsea have led the way, winning games relentlessly – but this time City are…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":389034,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49,50,51,47,52,48],"class_list":{"0":"post-389264","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/389264","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=389264"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/389264\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/389034"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=389264"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=389264"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=389264"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}