When Arsenal completed a dramatic second-leg turnaround against Bayern Munich and Chelsea battled to a historic shootout defeat of the eight-time European champions Lyon in the Champions League quarter-finals, it hinted at a shifting of the sands.
It was the first time in five years and only the second time in the competition’s 22-year history that two English teams had reached the final four. When Chelsea play at home to Barcelona in their first leg on Saturday and Arsenal visit Wolfsburg on Sunday, it would be easy to paint their feats as coincidental, their relative strength coming at times of transition for other European powers. There would be an element of truth to that, particularly in the case of Lyon, who staggered to the quarter-finals with a lengthy injury list.
However, there is also a wider narrative at play, with the investment in the Women’s Super League and its growth starting to present itself in Europe. England’s top division stands at a crossroads, ready to step into the next phase of its development, with a company set to be launched by the Football Association to lead the league towards independence. Heading the consultation on what the top two divisions should look like is the highly regarded former Nike director Nikki Doucet.
Critically, in England, all major players in women’s football, from clubs to the FA to media partners, are broadly singing from the same hymn sheet on the potential for growth, profitability and sustainability. The level of commitment and self-interest varies but most parties are taking the future of women’s football in the country extremely seriously.
That is reflected in the profile of the individuals in the working group which Doucet is overseeing, with Manchester City’s chief football operations officer, Omar Berrada, Arsenal’s chief executive, Vinai Venkatesham, the Manchester United director Patrick Stewart and West Ham’s vice-chair Karren Brady among the 12 participants.
This latest stage of women’s football marks a decisive shift from a time when there was much more passive support and growth was driven from the top down, with the investment of one or two clubs forcing the bar a little higher each year.
Other top European leagues are still at this stage. In Germany, Borussia Dortmund launching a women’s team hints at a potential broader increase in interest in the Frauen-Bundesliga, which has been dominated by a two-horse race between Wolfsburg and Bayern Munich in recent years.
In France, the football federation is widely accused of a lack of support for and interest in the league and the national team. There, success has been driven by Lyon’s owner, Jean-Michel Aulas, who has invested heavily in his women’s team and reaped the rewards.
Those driving the Women’s Super League forward are stealing a march on Europe and that should reap benefits in European competition – but only if the WSL recognises the knock-on benefits of European success and helps clubs competing to be in the best place to achieve it.
It is a double-edged sword, because more investment and support means competitiveness increases as clubs take their women’s teams more seriously, but this brings a tough fixture list to which not enough attention is paid.
Whereas, to a certain extent, many of Europe’s top clubs face two-to-four seriously competitive matches a season, with the occasional outlier, increasingly in the WSL victory is far from a sure thing. That makes the match calendar around European knockout games important.
That the Arsenal and Chelsea squads are on their knees, riddled with injuries, is not an accident and is far from ideal. Teams at the top of the table are playing games too tightly packed together and teams further down are not playing enough. Both situations have an effect on injuries.
There are numerous other factors at play, from poor pitches to a lack of top-quality medical staff and facilities. Players for men’s teams have been trained and built from a very early age to handle three games a week as professionals. Female players haven’t had that level of preparation.
The match calendar, in that context, is the easy fix. As for Chelsea’s chances against Barcelona and Arsenal’s against Wolfsburg? It would be preferable to be posing that question with squads in a far healthier place.
