The Women’s Champions League kicked off this week and the first round of the inaugural league phase did not disappoint. Holders Arsenal were dealt an early defeat, while on a difficult night for Chelsea, Manchester United emerged victorious in their European debut. Barcelona and OL Lyonnes are battling for the title of early competition favourites, and Wolfsburg, Atletico Madrid and Real Madrid enjoyed bountiful nights in front of goal. Below, The Athletic walks you through some of the key talki
Holders Arsenal were dealt an early defeat, while on a difficult night for Chelsea, Manchester United emerged victorious in their European debut.
Barcelona and OL Lyonnes are battling for the title of early competition favourites, and Wolfsburg, Atletico Madrid and Real Madrid enjoyed bountiful nights in front of goal.
Below, The Athletic walks you through some of the key talking points from the first two nights of fixtures.
Manchester United win… but need more help
“Chelsea are losing!”
So rang the delighted screech of a young Manchester United fan outside Progress with Unity stadium, an hour before United’s Women’s Champions League debut against Valarenga on Wednesday night.
Sometimes it’s the little things that get the blood pumping, like being the only English side to emerge from the first week of the Champions League league phase clutching three points.
And, actually, this is quite a big thing, even without the schadenfreude of domestic rivals’ slip-ups or the fact that much of United’s match was, football-wise, very unspectacular. A 1-0 victory on United’s Champions League debut represented the culmination of seven years of the club’s slow rebirth after the women’s team was disbanded in 2005 following the Glazers’ takeover.
United were deserved winners in a match that lacked much in the way of texture or thrill. A first-half penalty from Maya Le Tissier ultimately separated the two sides, a touching moment for the United captain as she sent Valarenga keeper Tove Enblom the wrong way. The goal capped off yet another reliable performance from arguably England’s most in-form centre-back.
A rousing, roaring clash may have felt more fitting for the occasion, and would have given a better indication of how far United may get in this competition, but Valerenga never threatened to deliver it. They mustered three shots, one on target, with 32 per cent possession, and only caused some concern in the final 10 minutes as the game was stretched.
Marc Skinner’s side will face far sterner challenges. They’ve been drawn with Atletico Madrid, Juventus, Lyon, Wolfsburg and Paris Saint-Germain, all of whom — bar PSG — won their opening matches. They will test the depth of Skinner’s thin squad and punish them for any complacency in front of goal (United managed 16 shots, seven on target, but few distressed Enblom).
Despite the historic occasion, the only United board member at Leigh was Collette Roche, United’s chief operating officer, meaning Skinner’s post-match entreaties for more investment will need to be relayed back to Sir Jim Ratcliffe and the Glazers.
They missed out on seeing a squad moving in the right direction, buoyed in defence by Le Tissier and teasing out a convincing attacking synergy with summer signing Jess Park at its heart. They were more than capable of being the only English side to emerge victorious this week but need more if they are to make this debut campaign as memorable as possible.
Chelsea toil at Twente
Sonia Bompastor’s post-match entreaty to Chelsea at FC Twente concerned desire — specifically the need for her side to find more of it following their 1-1 draw.
The notion that the nine-time Women’s Super League champions need more hunger in the one competition that has historically evaded them may sound faintly ridiculous but this was a night that left plenty to be desired from Chelsea.
The WSL champions dominated the stats, having 64 touches in their opposition’s penalty area to Twente’s 34, 188 successful passes into the final third to Twente’s 34, and missing three big chances out of four created to Twente’s one chance made and taken. But the Dutch champions were hungry, a young team (all bar two of their players are 25 or under) that was a textbook example of tenacity, particularly on the counter.
Bompastor opted to rotate her squad from the weekend’s 1-1 draw with United, resting midfielders Erin Cuthbert, Wieke Kaptein and Keira Walsh while pushing Sandy Baltimore to left-back. But a squad that has long been praised for its depth felt anything but robust.
Ultimately, however, this was a game of execution, an element that Chelsea have struggled with at times this season despite their quality. In four domestic matches, they have scored nine goals, yet against Manchester United and Leicester they could only manage a single goal, unable to capitalise in dangerous positions. A late penalty, coolly converted by Baltimore, was required for Chelsea to return home with a point from Twente.
“We created a lot of opportunities and couldn’t score more than one,” Bompastor said in her post-match assessment. “We had multiple situations in the box and we had 18 crosses, but only six times we were first on the ball. This is not enough when you play a Champions League game.”
Chelsea have a kinder draw than others in the league phase, with plenty of time to recover. And while Twente’s post-match celebrations emphasise these are big points dropped by Chelsea, the point they salvaged could be critical if they are to avoid having to trawl through the playoffs.
Let’s talk about OL
Arsenal are in crisis, apparently.
A four-game winless run in all competitions and two losses in as many matches (3-2 in the WSL against Manchester City, 2-1 against OL Lyonnes) for the reigning European champions certainly feels crisis-adjacent, and Tuesday night’s defeat to OL Lyonnes highlighted recurring issues – a dearth of ball progression, a defence still lacking adequate recovery pace and height, and goalkeeper Daphne van Domselaar struggling to find rhythm.
But all of that fails to mention OL Lyonnes, who really deserve a mention. Arsenal might have opened the door for OL’s Melchie Dumornay to punish them but the 22-year-old Haiti international’s tenacity and finesse to execute was emblematic of her team’s performance.
Much will be made of the 21 goals (!) scored in five matches under former Barcelona manager Jonatan Giraldez, appointed this summer, but this was full-throttle football aimed at the jugular. OL pressed high and fast, forced turnovers with their physicality, passed not into safe, lateral space but straight into Arsenal’s danger areas, all while replenishing from a bench like some magical Mary Poppins-inspired Michele Kang carpet bag: USWNT midfielder Lily Yohannes, UWCL all-time top goalscorer Ada Hegerberg, Germany forward Jule Brand.
There had been questions over how convincingly Giraldez could embed his possession-based philosophy in a first season with so much squad change, particularly with France’s Primera Division acting more as a niggling formality (OL Lyonnes have won 18 of the past 19 league titles). Tuesday’s deserved win is the latest suggestion that he might already have the answers.
Are Barcelona back?
Speaking of teams with still pristine records in the 2025-26 campaign and a growing penchant for gracing our timelines with goals… hello, Barcelona. We’ve missed you.
Tuesday’s 7-1 thrashing of Bayern Munich was vintage Barca, an artfully terminal clinic in How To Football that began in the fourth minute with two-time Ballon d’Or winner Alexia Putellas’ curling finish and culminated in the 92nd as Claudia Pina made it seven with her second goal of the game.
All of which makes it 38 goals in seven matches this season for Barcelona, with just two goals conceded. The urge arises to announce that Barca Are Back, to place bets on their inevitable triumph and forget about those 17 departures from the first team this summer that we were yammering about so much last month.
And maybe we should. But we should also mention how little Bayern seemed fussed on working off the ball, serving more as politely social distancing escorts to Barcelona’s attack than any type of meaningful opposition. It is undeniably a disappointing result for the German giants, but Barcelona’s slick attack should strike fear into their rivals.
Results
Juventus 2-1 Benfica
Paris FC 2-2 Oud-Heverlee Leuven
Arsenal 2-1 Lyon
Barcelona 7-1 Bayern Munich
Real Madrid 6-2 Roma
Twente 1-1 Chelsea
Manchester United 1-0 Valarenga
St Polten 0-6 Atletico Madrid
Wolfsburg 4-0 Paris Saint Germain
This article originally appeared in The Athletic.
Chelsea, Manchester United, Barcelona, Champions League, Women's Soccer
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Category: General Sports
