How Bompastor used Chelsea's preseason to assist transfer on from Hayes period

play

Bompastor: ‘Small particulars’ separate Chelsea from UWCL glory

Chelsea supervisor Sonia Bompastor discusses Chelsea’s probabilities of success in a contest she gained as a participant and supervisor, the UEFA Ladies’s Champions League.

WASHINGTON — For the primary time in 12 years, Chelsea enter a Women’s Super League (WSL) season below a special supervisor. When the legendary Emma Hayes introduced in November that it will be her final yr with the membership, as she was taking on the USWNT job in the summertime, the soccer world was left in shock.

Hayes’ title is synonymous with success. She constructed an empire at Chelsea, profitable 16 trophies, together with 5 back-to-back WSL titles — the final of which got here on the finish of her closing season. However, very similar to Manchester United’s and Arsenal’s males needed to discover replacements for Sir Alex Ferguson and Arsene Wenger, the Blues had been left looking for a candidate to step into what’s finally an unimaginable job.

After an exhaustive search, Chelsea introduced that former Lyon participant and supervisor Sonia Bompastor was their selection. Her credentials are impeccable: throughout a four-year reign at Lyon, she led the group to seven trophies, together with the 2021-22 UEFA Women’s Champions League title. That was the one prize that had all the time eluded Hayes as a supervisor, although she did win it when it was referred to as the UEFA Ladies’s Cup as assistant first-team coach at Arsenal in 2007.

It was a sign of intent that Chelsea weren’t keen to surrender their place on the high of English soccer simply but. However now, with Bompastor on the helm and the brand new season quick approaching, the membership are coming into an important transition part. The squad, type of play and group dynamics are evolving from the Hayes period into what’s going to quickly be unmistakably Bompastor’s Chelsea.

After ESPN joined the membership on their tour of the U.S. this summer season, which took in video games in opposition to WSL rivals Arsenal and NWSL aspect NJ/NY Gotham, we take a look at how expectations stay sky-high and what followers can anticipate from Bompastor now her journey in London has begun.

Crafting a squad

Bompastor inherited a squad brimming with world-class expertise — gamers accustomed to profitable constantly. But she wasted no time in reshaping the group. Identified for her nous in nurturing younger expertise throughout her tenure at Lyon’s academy, she focused rising stars who’re able to make their mark.

Certainly, following an analogous technique to that of their free-spending males’s group, Chelsea welcomed a wave of up-and-coming prospects to inject recent power and ambition into an already stacked squad together with Sandy Baltimore (24), Oriane Jean-François (23), Julia Bartel (20), Louna Ribadeira (20) and Maelys Mpomé (21).

“For me it is actually necessary to have a giant squad in numbers and high quality as a result of now we have lots of video games this season and I do know each single participant will not be capable of play each single sport,” Bompastor informed ESPN.

“There are lots of video games and a lot of the squad are internationals as properly, so that they have so many video games to play. It is actually necessary to have the younger gamers. And for me, coming from Lyon, I used to be the pinnacle of the academy for the ladies’s division, and I actually prefer to work with the younger gamers.”

Chelsea boast a squad of 30 gamers, with an extra seven younger prospects out on mortgage, and Hayes had already began eager about the long run earlier than she left by signing children like Wieke Kaptein (19), Maika Hamano (20) and Alejandra Bernabe (22). So, with solely 25 squad spots obtainable attributable to WSL rules, the battle for beginning positions and even locations on the bench guarantees to be fierce.

Bompastor additionally inherited a crop of promising academy graduates — together with Lexi Potter, Cerys Brown, Charlotte Wardlaw, and Lucy Watson — however one title has already surged into the highlight: Aggie Beever-Jones. At 21, the ahead is trying ahead to staking her declare for a beginning spot up entrance, in opposition to elite internationals like Australia’s Sam Kerr and the USWNT’s Catarina Macario.

“I have been in that place and finished it myself, so I understand how necessary it is to go on that pitch and be capable of categorical your self and have the arrogance,” Beever-Jones stated. “And I believe it is credit score to Chelsea for constructing that philosophy of ‘everybody right here, is nice sufficient to play Chelsea’ and with the ability to go on the pitch at any time and present their efficiency.”

Bonding off the pitch

In an effort to fast-track group cohesion, Chelsea’s workers and gamers took half in a team-building journey at Go Ape earlier than jetting off on tour to spend time in New Jersey, Manhattan and Washington, D.C. And whereas it was nice that success arrived on the pitch — by means of a 3-1 victory over Gotham and a decent 1-0 win in opposition to Arsenal — it was additionally necessary in fostering very important connections off it.

“That is a very powerful second for me; to have this chance to get to know every participant, every member of workers,” Bompastor says. “You spend a lot time collectively being on a visit and I believe that is one of the simplest ways to study every individual.

“It is also one thing actually particular, as a result of we’re travelling with the group, nearly all of the gamers and the workers, and that is a option to get the chance to know one another fairly properly. We’re nonetheless engaged on the pitch, but additionally outdoors the pitch, and we simply felt like coming to the U.S. was a great way to organize for the season within the great way.”

The journey wasn’t all about soccer, although. Off the pitch, the gamers bonded by means of a sequence of distinctive experiences — from ringing the New York Inventory Alternate opening bell to testing their creativity in a drawing problem on the Nationwide Portrait Gallery. They participated in a bagel-making workshop, crafted friendship bracelets to reward to followers, visited Instances Sq. and even caught the opening New York Liberty WNBA sport. These moments, stuffed with shared laughter and connection, had been invaluable in solidifying group spirit earlier than the grind of the season arrives.

“I believe if you come away, you are feeling such as you’re on a bit vacation,” membership captain Millie Bright informed ESPN. “I believe additionally if you’re in a special place, you may expertise new issues and also you begin to see just like the partitions come down and gamers begin to settle.

“We’re going be those within the powerful moments counting on each other — whether or not that is participant to participant, workers to participant — so it is so necessary that we construct these relationships and everybody’s tremendous comfy.”

Aligning motivations

play

Vibrant: Bompastor period is ‘recent slate’ for Chelsea

Millie Vibrant discusses Chelsea’s philosophy below new supervisor Sonia Bompastor as they aim UWCL glory.

Whereas group bonding was a key focus throughout preseason, there was a deeper mission at play for Bompastor: guaranteeing that everybody, from workers to gamers, was aligned on the membership’s ambitions and her imaginative and prescient for the group. Preseason, for her, was not nearly health or ways however about laying the groundwork and making an attempt to embed her philosophy early.

“My focus is all the time on my job, ensuring the gamers perceive the excessive expectation, the ambition of the membership, ensuring they perceive the way in which I need to play,” she stated. “I believe [preseason] can also be a second the place you may work on the cohesion and the dynamic of your group, your squad, so that is one thing actually necessary for me being new as a supervisor.”

Successful each sport and competing for silverware is predicted at a membership like Chelsea, however for Bompastor, it is equally very important that the group embodies her type of play.

“I believe the primary few weeks I will likely be observing,” she added. “That is a part of the job, and I will likely be additionally serving to everybody to go for our targets. We’ve got excessive expectations, and we’re already bold, so I simply need to ensure this time is an efficient time for me to look at all the pieces, to make the nice selections, to verify we go in the proper course.

“It is how I can ensure my gamers perceive my sport mannequin. Additionally, the type I need to play on the sector. After I say excessive [expectations], it isn’t about me, however it’s concerning the gamers, how they’ll perceive what I am anticipating from them.”

The early days of Bompastor’s reign are essential for setting the tone and constructing a basis of belief and readability that can drive Chelsea’s pursuit of success all through the season. The brand new boss will hope she will construct upon Hayes’ legacy, but additionally needs to create her personal. And she or he is busy making ready her squad to just do that this season.