Emma Hayes said she doesn’t “have another drop to give” after bowing out as Chelsea manager with a fifth Women’s Super League title in a row, while Manchester City’s Gareth Taylor felt his team would have deserved to be champions.
Hayes spoke passionately and emotionally after her side won the league on goal difference with a 6-0 win at Manchester United, her final game before she leaves to take over the US women’s national team in time for the Olympics. “I’d say it’s taken its toll, rather than changed me,” she said of her 12 years at the club. “I categorically cannot carry on. So, I am absolutely leaving at the right time. I don’t have another drop to give it.”
Hayes said of the triumph: “I can’t say it’s my most enjoyable [title], but it’s definitely been the toughest without doubt, and for that reason probably the sweetest. I’m just so relieved it’s over.”
Hayes was thrust to the forefront of celebrations at Old Trafford, but that is where she is least comfortable; she found it “cringey” she said. “I’m British, listen, if I wasn’t a football manager, where I had to do a press conference every three days, I’m that person in the social group that sits in the corner. I’m not someone who is front and centre in my life. I don’t live like that. So I find some of this job really, really hard because I just want a quiet life and that’s what I’m most looking forward to, being out of the British media … being in a situation where I’m only having to do this and games every six to eight weeks.”
Taylor, meanwhile, thinks his side were the “most consistent team” and backed them to bounce back, after conceding two late goals in the defeat by Arsenal on 5 May handed the initiative back to Chelsea. “Nothing against the other teams, and my congratulations go to Chelsea, but I felt we deserved it with the way we played,” he said. “You don’t always get what you deserve and that’s normal. Football is a tough profession … and that’s part of it. You dust yourself down and you go again.”
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The Manchester City manager was left ruing missed opportunities at Aston Villa on the day but also the injury problems that have affected his side. “The performance was good at times,” he said. “With 31 attempts, we certainly had the chance to take care of our business regardless of what was happening elsewhere.
“We brought one player in [Jill Roord] and we lost her in January,” he reflected. “She’s world class … losing Bunny [Khadija Shaw] three games ago was really tough. When you look at that game today, when you look at Arsenal, when you look at Bristol City, you think Bunny’s going to score a lot of goals in those games.”
