Eight days after winning the Women’s FA Cup final against Notts County at Wembley, Chelsea Ladies moved to the top of the Super League thanks to a 4-0 win over Birmingham City.
Eniola Aluko scored twice, once in each half, in a rampant display. Having taken the lead thanks to Aluko’s 34th-minute effort, following a solid save from Rebecca Spencer to deny Drew Spence, Chelsea’s Gemma Davison was sent off shortly before half-time. However Gilly Flaherty scored on the stroke of half-time to make it 2-0 before Aluko’s second and a tidy dink from the debutant Fran Kirby sealed an impressive win.
“With Sunderland dropping points yesterday we wanted a win today to keep pressure on them at the top and we did that very well,” the England striker Aluko said afterwards. “The team is on a high after winning the FA Cup last week but it was important for us to focus because Birmingham are a team who are difficult to break and we knew that we would have to put in a performance.
“This is a team now that doesn’t panic when things don’t go our way in games, we don’t implode because we know the quality that’s in our team and there’s a lot of steel in that dressing room.”
Manchester City moved to within three points of Chelsea having fought off some late pressure to beat Arsenal 3-2 at Boreham Wood, a win which sees them continue their 100% winning record since the Women’s World Cup and deny the London team an opportunity to go top.
Lucy Bronze’s header gave the visitors the lead after 23 minutes but Alex Scott equalised with a cross-cum-shot which deceived the City keeper, Karen Bardsley.
City regained the lead thanks to Izzy Christiansen on the hour mark before Toni Duggan doubled the advantage eight minutes later when cutting in from the left.
Natalia Pablos Sanchon made it 3-2 nine minutes from the end to set up a nervy finish but City held on to keep the pressure on Chelsea.
“It was a great team performance in the end to get the three points, I’m buzzing,” Duggan told BT Sport at full-time. “We’re in the mix (for the title) and we’ve never shied away that we want that title.”
Four games remain in WSL, with only three points separating the top four. Chelsea are top of the pile on 20, Sunderland have 19, Arsenal are a further point back and City, with a game in hand, are fourth on 17.
