Chelsea on verge of WSL title after Sam Kerr’s double sinks Tottenham
Sam Kerr scored twice against Tottenham to put Chelsea tantalisingly close to retaining their Women’s Super League title on Wednesday. With one game left to play, against Reading on Sunday, and a two-point gap to secondplaced Manchester City (who travel to West Ham) the league is the Blues’ to lose.
Kerr took time to settle at Chelsea, having joined in 2019 from Chicago Red Stars, but her double in Barnet, which was basking in the sun before torrential rain arrived, means she has scored 20 goals in 21 WSL games to move two clear of Arsenal’s Vivianne Miedema in the race for the golden boot (Tottenham have scored 17 goals this season).
In five back-to-back golden bootwinning seasons in the US and Australia (2017-18 and 2018-19 in the WLeague and 2017, 2018 and 2019 in the NWSL) Kerr broke the records for the most goals scored in a season for both leagues, 18 in the US and 16 in Australia.
“She’s a delight to coach and I’ve figured out the strategies that work best with her,” said the Chelsea manager, Emma Hayes. “When it’s your season things go for you in the same way it did for Beth [England] last year and I think the ball is falling to her. She’s taking responsibility for the team, which I think is important, she’s doing it again and again. I feel a bit bad not leaving her on to get her hat-trick but we’ve got other games to prepare for and I didn’t want to take any risks this evening.”
Despite the poor form of Tottenham, who have not won in the league since 17 January, this game could have been tricky for Chelsea. The intensity of their Champions League semifinal against Bayern Munich could have told in their legs three days later. But regardless of who is on the pitch the slick, ruthless streak of this quadruplechasing team remains.
“That’s why I made five changes,” said Hayes, who brought in Jonna Andersson, Erin Cuthbert, Beth England, Guro Reiten and Chelsea’s longest-serving player, Drew Spence.
“On one level you disrupt your rhythm, but you have to understand that took a lot out of us emotionally on Sunday. I think I was concerned about what our response would be tonight because I think this is the hardest game – it’s why I’ve always said the team that goes the furthest in Europe has the hardest chance to win the league.
“So the fact that we’re in this position and in the final of the Champions League is a real testament to not just the squad, but my backroom staff. They’re the people that keep everybody on the pitch – that’s why we’re here.”
Tottenham made five changes too, with Chloe Peplow, Esther Morgan, Lucy Quinn, Siri Worm and Angela Addison all in, but they had time to prepare, having not played in 11 days. Yet it was the visiting team who dominated even as they struggled to break the deadlock while their former goalkeeper Becky Spencer held firm.
In the first 20 minutes she had more touches than any of her teammates, getting behind a Spence header, pushing out another from Niamh Charles and saving a rasping effort from Sophie Ingle to her right.
“Effectively we’ve done a lot of what our gameplan was to nullify the threats, after we weathered the storm early doors,” the Tottenham manager, Rehanne Skinner, said. “It was about continuing to work hard and maintain our compactness so that we didn’t make it easy for them. They were going to have to do something a little more special to break us down really.
“Ultimately for us, we worked hard – the players put in a real shift today which I’m proud of and credit to them for that.”
Hayes paced around but was uncharacteristically quiet and looked confident. Shortly before half-time the patience of her team was rewarded as a free-kick was played back to the centre-back Millie Bright who floated the ball over the top to Reiten at the far post. The Norwegian nudged it quickly across the face of goal for Kerr to poke in at the far post.
Chelsea quickly got the better of Spencer in the second half. The keeper did brilliantly to paw away Kerr’s header from a Reiten cross but she could do nothing to stop Kerr’s close-range volley on the rebound.