Chelsea received their newest ladies Super League title defense to a flying start when Aggie Beever-Jones and Maika Hamano yielded a 2-1 victory over Manchester City.
After being unbeaten when completing a domestic Treble in the first campaign of Sonia Bompastor at the helm, the Blues 2025-26 started a hard-fought victory over a potential title rival at Stamford Bridge.
England’s Euro 2025-winning goalkeeper Hannah Hampton denied Khadija Shaw early before Ayaka Yamashita got a palm to the bent shot of Sandy Baltimore on the other side.
The first goal of the campaign went the way of Chelsea in the 31st minute. Nathalie Bjorn released Ellie Carpenter the right flank and after beating Alex Greenwood, the latter delivered a beautiful cross for Beever-Jones to sweep home.
The city was unfortunate not to draw the level when Greenwood rattled Hampton’s crossbar from a free kick in the first half, and the visitors also started the second period on top with Yui Hasegawa who rose twice.
But Chelsea got their second goal somewhat against the run of playing in the 64th minute, with Hamano home from the cutback of Wieke Kaptein.
Niamh Charles spent her own net five minutes later with an uncomfortable header, but Shaw missed the best chance of City for an Equalizer and the team of Andree Jeglertz also lost Greenwood and Lily Murphy to injury.
What a way to start the season !! #Cfcw pic.twitter.com/pgvnslxzvq
– (c) Health FC Women (@chelseafcw) September 5, 2025
Debrief data: Bompastor reaches 20 in record time
Chelsea won 19 of their 22 WSL matches (three draws) last season and showed no signs of losing weight after Bompastor had replaced the legendary boss Emma Hayes.
And Friday’s victory means that Bompastor has reached 20 WSL victories in just 23 trips, the least needed to touch that count, causing the former Arsenal coach Jonas Eidevall (25) to catch up.
Chelsea is now unbeaten in 26 WSL games that go back to Hayes’ time. Only the blues itself (33 games between February 2019 and January 2021) and City (31 between May 2015 and May 2017) once enjoyed longer undefeated runs in the WSL.
City may feel hard, after gathering 17 shots from the eight of the hosts, although they have just deposited the expected goals (XG) battle (1.4 to 1.23) and could not start after Charles’ own goal.
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