A blog of two halves

Even with jetlag, she’s better than you!

Contrasting fortunes for Chelsea's men and women's sides in London derbies on Sunday.

27 February 2023
By Tim Harrison
Categories:
Chelsea FC
Image 1

Sam Kerr scores Chelsea Women's second goal during the Vitality Women's FA Cup Fifth Round match between Chelsea and Arsenal at Kingsmeadow. PICTURE: GETTY IMAGES

Chelsea Women 2-0 Arsenal Women

What wouldn't Chelsea manager Graham Potter give for a little of Emma Hayes' stardust and form at Kingsmeadow?

While the men were being beaten 2-0 at White Hart Lane on Sunday in the Premier League, the women were powering through to the FA Cup quarter-finals after defeating Arsenal by the same scoreline.

Among the scorers Sam Kerr, just hours after getting off a plane from Australia. "She's better than you, she's better than you… even with jetlag, she's better than you," crowed the Chelsea fans.

Meanwhile a grim-faced Chelsea club owner Todd Boehly sat brooding in his padded VIP seat at Tottenham wondering just what more his syndicate has to do to achieve a win. Leeds visit Stamford Bridge this weekend.

But for Chelsea Women, life gets better and better.

The team are still in with a good shout of four trophies, starting this weekend when they travel to Selhurst Park to face – yet again – Arsenal in the final of the League Cup.

"We have an unbelievable mentality; we are elite performers and we do it all the time," said chuffed manager Hayes. "I think we have the mentality of champions."

Who would doubt that after Kerr's goal, in her 100th game for the Blues, and a first-half curler last weekend from midfielder Sophie Ingle clinched the win over their north London rivals?

Hayes says that her Chelsea team "simply refuse to lose", and she takes a huge pride in the collective effort. "Without sounding too corny, winning is our aim," she added.

The views expressed in this blog are those of the author and unless specifically stated are not necessarily those of Hammersmith & Fulham Council.

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Tim Harrison

Tim is our Chelsea FC blogger.

He also writes our Shepherds Bush Cricket Club match reports during the football close season.

Tim has been writing Chelsea match reports since the late 1980s for newspapers and, more recently, websites.

When he first reported on the Blues, the press box was a metal cage suspended over the lip of the old west stand - and you reached it via a precarious walkway over the heads of the fans.

But he has been a Chelsea fan since his father took an excited seven-year-old to watch Chelsea v Manchester United in the mid 1960s... and covered his ears every time the chanting got too ripe.

In July 2005 he wrote The Rough Guide to Chelsea, published by Penguin, which sold 15,000 copies.

His favourite player of all time is Charlie Cooke, the mazy winger who lit up Chelsea's left wing in the 60s and 70s.

When he isn't watching the Blues, Tim acts, paints, writes and researches local history.

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