No matter the occasion, Chelsea remain the benchmark

Sonia Bompaster outwitted her opposite number, Nick Cushing, to see Chelsea extend their league atop the WSL, win the season's first available piece of silverware, and advance in Europe.

Manchester City and Chelsea faced each other four times in three competitions across the last few weeks. At times it felt like a test series as each time tinkered with personnel and tactics.

Here’s some key takeaways.

Both teams are strong down the right, but weak defensively on the left.

Chelsea won three of the four meetings, 7-4 on aggregate. Of those eleven goals, eight came down the right. Kerolin Nicoli has had a big impact on City since her January move from North Carolina Courage, and collected a goal and an assist in the three games she played.

But Chelsea exploited Leila Ouahabi and Laia Aleixandri far too often. City can’t get Alex Greenwood, nor the industriousness of Lauren Hemp on their left flank, back quick enough.

City didn’t exploit Millie Bright enough

Player to player, few forwards can wrestle off Millie Bright. She’s a captain by example, for club and country. As City’s goals showed in the League Cup final and their league win up north, run at the England captain and she will back off.

Both Aoba Fusion And Kerolin Nicoli had Bright on the back foot, the latter showing the damage she can and will continue to do on City’s right flank. Chelsea aren’t called the mentality monsters for nothing. If teams want to knock them off their perch, exploiting Bright could be the way to go.

It doesn’t look good on the surface.

Derby County’s Pride Park hosted the first of the meetings, selected for the League Cup final in December. It’s considered a (men’s) Premier League standard ground, so why was the pitch?

This isn’t a one off at elite level women’s football, with Real Madrid during international week refusing to let their women’s team host Arsenal at the Bernebeu, instead using the patchy Estadio Alfredo De Stefano.

The players deserve better and the administrators of the game are missing a trick not providing the best playing surfaces to enhance play, and therefore the spectacle.

Anything you can do….

Speaking of Arsenal’s trip to Madrid, they had to reverse a 2-0 deficit; unprecedented in the quarter finals of the Women’s Champions League.

The Arsenal managed it (in front of 22,517 spectators at The Emirates) only for Chelsea to match the feat the following evening. They’ve overturned City twice in effect; once within the League Cup final, then again over two European legs. Next up? Barcelona.

Rotation, rotation, rotation.

Sonia Bompaster has a big squad to keep happy, and used its depth to her advantage. Nick Cushing’s tinkering on the other hand, backfired.

The returning City coach made six changes after the Champions League win, perhaps to protect that side for the second leg. Too much change lead to defeat in the league, and when Cushing restored almost the same line up for the second leg, Bompaster and Chelsea were a step ahead.

Kerolin, as mentioned, looks an astute and exciting signing, and Vivianne Miedema couldn’t be passed up on when she became available in the summer. With Mary Fowler, Bunny Shaw and Hemp to accomodate too, Cushing needs to up his ability to rotate if he’s to take City back to the heights he once had them at.