European Women’s Soccer: A Weekend of Highs and Lows
As the UEFA Women’s Champions League (UWCL) semifinals took center stage, it was easy to overlook the bustling action across Europe’s top domestic leagues. But rest assured, there was no shortage of drama and excitement.
Let’s start with the UWCL, where Barcelona delivered a crushing blow to Chelsea at Stamford Bridge, sealing an 8-2 aggregate victory. Meanwhile, Arsenal pulled off a stunning comeback against Lyon, booking their place in the final with a memorable performance.
In the English Women’s Super League, Crystal Palace faced the harsh reality of relegation after a dominant West Ham United side scored seven goals against them. On the same day, Manchester City kept their European football hopes alive with a narrow 1-0 win over Leicester City.
Over in Germany, the Frauen-Bundesliga saw Bayern Munich clinch their third consecutive title with two games to spare, thanks to Leipzig’s 3-0 loss to SGS Essen. In Italy, Fiorentina surprised newly crowned champions Juventus with a 3-1 victory, while Inter celebrated a 4-1 triumph in the Derby della Madonnina against AC Milan, and Lazio secured a 4-0 win over Como.
In Spain, the battle to avoid relegation in Liga F continued to heat up. With three matches remaining, the drama is far from over. Real Madrid, who defeated Madrid CFF 7-3, remain in pursuit of Barcelona at the top of the table.
Chelsea’s Euro Dreams Dashed Again
For the first time in 18 years, Arsenal have reached a continental final. Their commanding 4-1 victory over eight-time champions Lyon overturned a 2-1 first-leg deficit, securing their ticket to Lisbon for the final, a stage they have not reached since the 2006-07 triumph, when the competition was still known as the UEFA Women’s Cup. They also become the first English team to reach the final since 2021, when Chelsea suffered a 4-0 defeat to Barcelona in Gothenburg, a painful memory for the Blues repeated at Stamford Bridge on Sunday.
Chelsea, meanwhile, endured a humiliating exit. Despite narrowly losing to Barcelona at the semifinal stage in each of the past two seasons (1-0 on aggregate both times), they were comprehensively beaten 4-1 again, crashing out 8-2 on aggregate against the reigning champions.
This season was meant to mark a new era for Chelsea under 2021-22 UWCL-winning coach Sonia Bompastor, who was tasked with delivering the continental success that eluded Emma Hayes during her 12-year reign. After back-to-back semifinal heartbreaks, Chelsea appeared closer than ever ahead of this campaign, but after a crushing six-goal deficit, they now seem as far away from European glory as they ever have been. — EK
Bayern, Deutsche Meister
Back in October, as Bayern travelled to Wolfsburg, there was already talk that a win at the Volkswagen Arena would equate to a third straight title. On that day, it was in fact the hosts who were victorious. The following month, the Bavarians drew at Freiburg and at home to Eintracht Frankfurt in the span of five days. And for a while, it looked as if there would be a four-way sprint to the finish line, but one by one, the challengers fell away.
From Wolfsburg’s stumbles, to Bayer Leverkusen running out of steam, to Frankfurt suffering two critical losses after the Winterpause, only one team stayed the course, refusing to drop a single point following that pair of draws back in November.
It hasn’t always been perfect or pretty from the Bavarians this season, but Bayern’s quality shone through every time they took to the pitch in domestic action with homegrown Klara Bühl and Danish superstar Pernille Harder (who can now boast 10 successive league titles with four different teams) leading the charge as the team has grappled with injuries and knocks throughout the year.
Although head coach Alexander Straus has already announced his departure to join up with Angel City FC in the NWSL at the conclusion of this season, his tenure in Germany has marked the full changing of the guard as Munich have cemented their place at the top of the tree. — SL
Crystal Palace Hit Glass Ceiling
Crystal Palace’s debut season in the top flight ended in heartbreak as a crushing 7-1 defeat to West Ham confirmed their relegation. With no way to escape the drop, they will return to the second tier for the 2025-26 campaign.
Palace struggled throughout the season, collecting just nine points from two wins and three draws. A spirited victory over 11th-placed Aston Villa briefly offered hope, narrowing the gap to safety. However, a string of defeats, combined with Villa’s crucial wins, saw the gap widen to seven points. With only two games remaining, the Eagles ultimately ran out of time for a late revival.
It’s a story that has become all too familiar for newly promoted teams. Just like Bristol City last season, Crystal Palace have suffered immediate relegation. The gap between the WSL and the Championship appears wider than ever, suggesting that the yo-yo pattern between divisions is unlikely to end anytime soon. — EK
Quick Hits
- EIGHT. Returning Lionesses give City more reasons to smile. Sunday afternoon didn’t mark the first time in recent history that Leicester City have made things uncomfortable for Manchester City but, just as they have on previous occasions, the Sky Blues found a way through thanks to Jess Park‘s late winner. The three points are enough to keep a faint glimmer of a top-three finish open for City. but the moment for the visitors was the return England duo Lauren Hemp and Alex Greenwood, who had both been sidelined since last year.
- SEVEN. Inter finally claim derby honours. Even as Elisa Poli slalomed through the AC Milan box, ready to dispatch the ball into the bottom corner and restore Inter’s lead, there was the question of whether or not the Nerazzurre would finally be able to hold onto an advantage in the Milan derby, following three frustrating draws already this season. But rather than implode, the visitors in Vismara only strengthened their advantage, adding a pair of late goals through Tessa Wullaert for a much-deserved win over their city rivals. But more beyond the win, Inter confirmed a second-place finish — their highest ever in six years in Serie A — and a European berth for next season.
- SIX. Spanish relegation race heats up. With three matchdays of the Liga F season left, the picture of which two teams will drop into the second tier has yet to come into focus with Valencia‘s 2-0 win away to Real Sociedad enough to keep their survival hopes alive although they remain routed to the floor of the table. Still hanging in the drop zone, but within touching distance of safety, Betis will be ruing the two points they let slip after Natalia Padilla-Bidas cancelled out Rosa Márquez’s opener, not least with Tenerife and Barcelona still to come. Similarly, both Levante and Espanyol improved with respective draws against Atleti and Eibar but neither are home and dry yet.
- FIVE. The Fiorentina rollercoaster loops once more. Having wrapped up the Italian title last weekend – their first Scudetto for three years — Juventus may well have been expecting to continue the party in Florence on Friday but swiftly ran into a Fiorentina team who’d again found their goal-scoring touch, and more vitally, their balance across the pitch. One of Italy’s more erratic teams this season, the Viola could yet upset the odds and find themselves finishing above Roma to claim Serie A’s third and final Champions League spot but as ever this year, the Fiorentina team that shows up is as predictable as a coin toss.
- FOUR. Leipzig fail to take flight, again. Still only nine years old, and just in their second season in the Frauen-Bundesliga, it’s arguably expecting too much of the Roten Bullen to be a consistent mid-table team yet, but following Leipzig’s 3-0 loss at home to Essen on Saturday, RB now find themselves without a win in five, unable to even trouble SGS’s backup goalkeeper, Kim Sindermann over the weekend. Unlike Essen — one of the FBL’s last standing independent teams — RB are well capable of spending big over the summer to further strengthen their squad, with these early years providing more of a learning experience, even as this season peters out.
- THREE. Le Bihan shines for the Biancocelesti. Two teams trading paint all season, Como and Lazio have separately put in convincing performances this season — a first season for both in their current iterations — and have also played out a quintet of exciting games as both have adapted to Italy’s top flight. In their last meeting of the campaign, it was Lazio who came out on top, thanks in large part to Clarisse Le Bihan’s hat trick punctuating the 4-0 win for the visitors. Although it’s still early days, the inclusion of both in Serie A only looks like it will add more chaos moving forward.
- TWO. Goalkeeping takes a holiday in Madrid. Filippa Angeldahl’s belter from 25 yards was undoubtedly the pick of the bunch as Real Madrid played out a crazy 7-3 win against Madrid CFF. For all Las Blancas’ goals, including Filippa Angeldal‘s and Alba Redondo‘s braces, Linda Caicedo‘s stoppage-time strike as well as Caroline Weir‘s ninth of the season, the visitors managed to score three and, arguably, should have had at least two more with Real’s sloppy defending on show throughout.
- ONE. Seagulls finish on a high. As Brighton & Hove Albion fans have swiftly leaned this season, a Dario Vidosic team will rarely play boring football and even if the consistency is, as of yet, lacking for the Seagulls (who have had to contest with their fair share of injuries this season), the excitement is not. Away to Everton on Sunday afternoon, Brighton were again box office, coming from behind twice before stealing all three points in added time thanks to Nikita Parris‘ low drive. And although it was a team effort from the visitors at Walton Hall Park, Parris continued to show her worth as an experienced head in the team that marries maturity with youthful exuberance. — SL
Originally Written by: Emily Keogh and Sophie Lawson
