For many followers of women’s football, a Women’s Super League without Emma Hayes is somewhat unthinkable. Hayes has been a fixture at Chelsea, she has lived and breathed Chelsea, she has been Chelsea for 11 years and has been a key part of the rise of the women’s game in England, synonymous with its growth and success.
Her exit, not announced by her but by a club statement, perhaps pre-empting the news being leaked, was a shock. “Chelsea FC can today confirm that highly decorated Chelsea Women’s manager Emma Hayes OBE will depart the club at the end of the season to pursue a new opportunity outside of the WSL and club football,” it said.
The timing of the announcement was also a shock, but somehow unsurprising. For many, the end of the Hayes era at Chelsea has been a matter of when, rather than if. Hayes has won it all at the club, six league titles, five FA Cups, two League Cups, including a domestic treble in 2021, a Spring Series title and Community Shield. The only club trophy to elude her while manager of Chelsea, is the Champions League. She came close to European success in the 2020-21 season, reaching the final only for a humbling 4-0 defeat by Barcelona, conceding all four goals in 36 minutes, to demonstrate just how big the gap still was between Chelsea and the world’s best. Many had quietly wondered whether Hayes would exit had they won that match. Instead, I felt like a whole new level had opened up for her to complete, one that would take longer than a year.
So, while the timing of announcing Hayes’s exit is a shock, coming mid-season – the statement hurried out after a 6-0 defeat of Aston Villa and only shortly after the players and staff had been told – her decision to move on isn’t.
The 47-year-old has built and then maintained Chelsea’s formidable dominance of English football while passing huge personal milestones, many extremely difficult. In 2018 she was told she had lost one of the twins she was carrying shortly after a game against Arsenal, not telling the players until after her team had faced, and beaten, the Gunners in the FA Cup final a month later in May. She then gave birth to son Harry later that month. In 2022, Chelsea were without Hayes for a number of weeks after she took time out to undergo and recover from an emergency hysterectomy as part of her battle with endometriosis. And this year she has suffered the loss of her father, Sid, who she was extremely close to. Add the fall of Roman Abramovich and Chelsea takeover into the mix, including the exit of Bruce Buck, a staunch ally and champion of the women’s team, and life at Chelsea has changed too.
It is natural, at critical junctures in life, to reassess your priorities and those that have spent any time with Hayes understand that balancing the demands of motherhood with club management has been a struggle. It is rare that an interview passes without mention of Harry, who resents football because it takes his mum away, whose third birthday came the day after the Champions League final heartache and whose care is shared with family who step in to help on matchdays and away days.
Before that final she spoke of the support she gets: “I wouldn’t be in this job if it wasn’t for my family. My family are the ones who allow me to go to work every day because they help with childcare. Every parent knows how hard it is to juggle work and juggle your kids.
“My mum walked into the house on Monday and said: ‘I’m just letting you know, this is the plan for Harry on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.’ I’m sitting there thinking: ‘what am I going to do? I don’t want to ask’ and she took it right off my hands. My family’s support is what has allowed me to do my job. This, and remaining present, are things I’ve learnt from ageing and understanding that this won’t be for ever. And I will enjoy every minute of it.”
That is perhaps what makes international management so attractive to Hayes. She thrives off pressure and always wants more of it. Few jobs in women’s football offer a step up from Chelsea, which is perhaps why she is so regularly linked with all manner of managerial jobs in the men’s game. The US women’s national team job is arguably the pinnacle of management in women’s football, offering that new challenge, a chance for even greater success on even bigger stages, pay equality, but also, critically for Hayes at this stage of her career, the chance for a more normal day-to-day with her son. Let’s be real, international management is no nine to five, and the pressures of managing the four-time world champions is intense, but in between international breaks, major tournaments and following players at their clubs, there is time for the school run, play dates, trips out and nights in, in a way that club management, with regular training sessions and, in Chelsea’s case, games three times-a-week doesn’t allow.
Time away from the game and having a holistic approach to her management is important to Hayes. She has spoken regularly about it, including after last year’s defeat of Arsenal which put them within touching distance of the title. “I believe we always give the most amount of time off – the girls tell me this, anyway,” she said. “We start the latest; when it comes to the winter break, I usually give the most time off; when we’ve done well, I usually reward that with the right days off. Apparently, I’m quite generous. I think recovery is important here [points to her head], not just in the legs. We need to breathe and be human beings and not just football managers and football players all the time.”
That is Hayes’ approach to her players and now she is applying it more liberally to herself. If it made her players indomitable, imagine what her managerial reign with likely destination the US women’s national team could look like.
Talking points
Bristol get their first WSL win: After a tough start to the season, newly promoted Bristol City bagged their first win in a 3-2 victory away against West Ham. Despite going 1-0 down after a penalty, the Robins fought their way back with defender Brooke Aspin scoring the winning header in the second half. The video of the visitors celebrating in the rain is a heartwarming watch.
Pomigliano threat: The Italian top-flight Serie A Femminile was thrown into disarray after the club Pomigliano announced on Saturday it was withdrawing from the league with “immediate effect”, just six games into the season, following a contentious penalty decision which saw it losing to Sampdoria. In a statement, published by Tuttosport, the club criticised the organisation of the league and the officials. “Fighting against every type of opponent makes defence pointless,” it said. They withdrew their threat on Wednesday “in the hope that the unwritten rules of sporting loyalty will be respected and maintained over time”.
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