Chelsea maintained their edge in the race for the Women’s Super League title, the league leaders surviving losing a lead twice to earn a point against a tenacious Manchester City.
A win either way would have put the WSL trophy tantalisingly close to the hands of either Chelsea or second-placed City, who sit two points behind them with two games each to play, but it was the Chelsea manager, Emma Hayes, who was jumping up and punching the air on the full-time whistle in the knowledge that, should they beat Tottenham and Reading, the league will be theirs.
Goals from the potent England wingers Chloe Kelly and Lauren Hemp cancelled out a strike from Sam Kerr (that put her ahead of Arsenal’s Vivianne Miedema in the fight for the golden boot on 18 goals) and a Pernille Harder penalty but City are left knowing only a slip-up from their opponents will change their fortune.
Hayes had stretched the truth when she said she had a fit squad to pick from. The absence of her captain, the centre-back Magda Eriksson, who landed awkwardly on her ankle in the FA Cup at the weekend, was glaring.
Partnering England’s Millie Bright was the Wales international Sophie Ingle and, with neither known for their pace, the young City wingers Chloe Kelly and Lauren Hemp would stretch the Chelsea back line early on.
They weathered the storm though and it was the visiting team, who have never won at the Academy stadium in the league, that took the lead.
Buoyed, perhaps, by having forced a goalline clearance from the City centre-back Alex Greenwood – who filled in alongside the US defender Abby Dahlkemper in the absence of City’s captain, Steph Houghton – after Ellie Roebuck’s clearance from an Erin Cuthbert corner was headed back by Kerr, Chelsea took control.
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Greenwood had matched Kerr for pace before plucking the ball from her feet as she raced into the box from the right, but one minute later a thumping header from the Australian forward, from a corner, flew between Greenwood and the near post.
City’s reply was swift. The stand-in right back Jess Carter, with Maren Mjelde out for the rest of the season, would do well to hold off England livewire Lauren Hemp but just shy of the half-hour mark she stepped back from the winger, allowing her to whip a cross across goal, evading the weird attempt at a backheeled clearance from Bright, for Kelly to tap in at the back post.
The game rippled into life and Chelsea would take the lead again not long after. A slow pass from Dahlkemper was latched on to by an alert Kerr and she raced into the box, beating Greenwood, only to be felled by Roebuck.
Whether she got a touch on the ball before sweeping the legs from Kerr it was very hard to tell but the European player of the year Harder coolly send the young keeper the wrong way as she sidefooted in the resulting penalty.
Chelsea had the lead, but play was much tighter than it had been in the reverse fixture in October, where the London team were comfortable 3-1 winners. Taylor had attributed that to City’s late summer acquisitions taking time to settle. “Now we’re a different team,” he had said, though the game in Manchester ended a record-breaking run of 12 successive WSL wins.
There was more evidence to suggest City would be as worthy champions as the league leaders after their slow start to the season, and more evidence of shoddy defending from England players, in City’s second equaliser. A poor backward pass from the usually sparkling Fran Kirby fell to Kelly after Bright swiped at air in an attempt to clear and the former Everton winger’s cross was swept in by Hemp. The USA forward Rose Lavelle, who has struggled for minutes in Manchester and came on for a quiet Ellen White, would race the ball back to the spot and with City on the front foot, a corner headed goalward by Hemp was tipped acrobatically on to the bar by Ann-Katrin Berger.
from Football | The Guardian https://ift.tt/2QNIt1X
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