Despite completing the treble without losing a domestic game in her first season managing in England, the Chelsea head coach, Sonia Bompastor, was still not fully satisfied as she set her sights on adding a first European title to club’s the honours list.
Bompastor’s team, who were3-0 winners against Manchester Unitedat Wembley to finish their 30-match home campaign unbeaten, wereoutclassed by Barcelonain the Women’s Champions League semi‑finals in April. They celebrated the club’s sixth Women’s FA Cup in 10 years on Sunday, but Bompastor said: “We are super happy but we didn’t win the Champions League, which was also one of our goals.
“Some of the people there on the pitch were already mentioning ‘we are missing the Champions League’, so that’s who we are, that’s our goal. I want to make sure we are all able to achieve that goal, to win the Champions League with the club.
“Everyone is saying ‘maybe Chelsea will run away from the pack’ in the league in England, but our goal for us is to compete against the best teams in Europe, so it’s nice to have this domestic treble but we want to make sure, in the future, and hopefully next season, we are able to compete against the best teams in Europe.”
Chelsea have now won 18 major women’s trophies – all of which have come in a dominant spell since 2015 – and this year they have appeared further ahead domestically than ever, winning the title by their largest margin, 12 points.
Bompastor said: “We want that competition, to produce our best. We want to make sure we’re top of the league and bring everyone else with us – this is what we want to achieve – but we need the other teams to still invest and come with us.”
The gap in financial investment between Chelsea and United in terms of budgets was symbolised in the director’s boxes as the champions were watched by the Chelsea co-owners Behdad Eghbali and Todd Boehly, whereas United’s Sir Jim Ratcliffe was not present for the second season running. There was still a significant delegation of senior United figures – not least the chief executive, Omar Berrada.
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Bompastor said: “It’s really enjoyable for us to see all the people from ownership were here, but even more important to feel they were really behind the team. It just shows as a woman, when you play in football, and the women’s game, you are in the right club, and you really want to give that back on the pitch for all these people.”
Asked about Ratcliffe’s non‑attendance the United head coach, Marc Skinner, said: “I don’t know why Jim wasn’t here, but we were really well represented. Omar’s up there, we’ve got the Glazer family in massive support, and Jason [Wilcox, United’s technical director] as well, so I know [you] are trying to find a story, but we’ve just lost a final.
“Those are the people I deal with every day. They need to see that [match] for us to be able to look at what we need to do to close a growing gap in finance, that Chelsea have.
“The reality is, it’s the investment in the team that needs to happen, it’s not whether you’re visible. As long as our team is being invested in. We need to close that gap.”
Chelsea were also supported at Wembley by their new minority owner Alexis Ohanian, husband of Serena Williams, who bought a 10% stake in the women’s club for £20m last week. At half‑time, the Reddit co‑founder told the BBC: “These are the queens of global soccer and they’ve got the trophy case to prove it, so I feel so humbled.
“The sky’s the limit and what I love about this club is, this club is unapologetically ambitious. This will be a billion-dollar franchise one day.”