The WSL title race is getting heated as a top of the table clash is set to take place as Manchester City head to Kingsmeadow to take on Chelsea and third place Arsenal take on fourth place Manchester United at Meadow Park.
Chelsea have established a three-point lead on Man City so the fixture this coming Friday could be a title decider where Chelsea could further establish a gap of six points or Man City could go joint top. Outside of those two teams, Arsenal will have one eye on the game hoping for a draw to reignite their own title hopes.
The Blues have dealt well so far without their star player, Sam Kerr, who has been another victim of rupturing her ACL, but with such a big game on the horizon will she be a big miss? On the opposite end to this fixture, Jill Roord joined Sam Kerr on that list of women who have ruptured their ACLs recently, but again, so far, City have dealt well with that blow.
There are some very key players that could determine the result of this fixture, Lauren James, Fran Kirby and Erin Cuthbert just on the Chelsea side and Chloe Kelly, Khadija Shaw and Lauren Hemp from City, but of course that's just to name a select few.
Since Chelsea's shock runaway defeat to Arsenal in December, neither City nor the Blues have lost in the league, but something must give. Chelsea go in having the advantage as they’ll be the home team with their support behind them but also knowing Man City need to go full steam ahead knowing a Chelsea win or even a draw only further relegates any chances of lifting the title but with a front three of Kelly, Shaw and Hemp by all means we could see a repeat similar to Chelsea’s defeat at the Emirates with Kelly and Hemp being big game players and Bunny Shaw scoring hat-tricks for fun lately, although she did go off unexpectedly against Arsenal in the FA Cup through injury, so City will hope it’s only minor and that she will be available to travel to London, but from this fixture City will be on a high as they walked away 1-0 winners thanks to Laia Aleixandri but the main difference maker was Khiara Keating who kept that clean sheet intact many of times throughout the 90 but more importantly in injury time in the second-half.
If either team walk away with three points, it’ll be a tough mountain to climb for the Gunners, who don’t have an easy fixture themselves and they go up against Man United, who funnily enough, are the only team out of Arsenal’s top three challengers they have yet to beat in the league this season, drawing to United in early October, in fact, they haven’t beat them in their last five head-to heads but if they’ve any hope in winning the title, surely this is the game to break that streak, not only that but it seems both managerial jobs could be on the line in this one where only three points may keep Jonas Eidevall and Marc Skinner in their positions, for now at least.
Arsenal have defeated Chelsea and City so why are they sitting below the two in the table?
The next three in the table are Man United, Liverpool and Tottenham Hotspur is the reason as to why. The previously mentioned draw to the Red Devils dealt a blow to Arsenal but even bigger blows were the defeats to Liverpool and Spurs which proves that every single point gained and lost in any game matters by the end of the season, although they written that wrong off with a 2-0 win against Liverpool in the reverse fixture and will be looking to do the same against Spurs with the support they will bring to the Emirates, which is the fixture that immediately follows the United fixture for Arsenal along with Chelsea away following that fixture so Arsenal have to be ready to take all 9 points from those games as they aren’t out of the race just yet and this would put them right back into full contention if not be the table toppers by this point.
But if Arsenal draw to United it will be a real struggle to catch Chelsea or City no matter the result in that game and if they lose to United, that’ll only leave a single point between third and fourth meaning title challengers Arsenal could even finish below all three teams and United are by no means pushovers so their goal at this stage of the season will be to defeat Arsenal and finish third in the table.
The question is will Chelsea win their fifth consecutive WSL title come May or can anyone stop the five-peat from happening?