Jonas Eidevall has accused Women’s Professional Leagues Ltd (WPLL), the body that runs the Women’s Super League, of “amateurish behaviour” and called for more consideration for teams competing in Europe, after it postponed Sunday’s game between Chelsea and Manchester United because of Champions League commitments.
The schedule for European fixtures has been known for a year and the possibility of three English teams reaching the group stage was a likely scenario, yet all three of Chelsea, Arsenal and Manchester City had been scheduled to play on Sunday ahead of a potential Tuesday European fixture. With Uefa unwilling to budge on their long-term scheduling, the WPLL, took the decision to postpone Manchester United’s sold-out visit to Kingsmeadow to take on Chelsea.
The move means Chelsea have a free weekend before their home game against Real Madrid on Tuesday, and a clash with Arsenal in the WSL next Saturday. Meanwhile, Arsenal play Everton on Sunday, then Bayern Munich on Wednesday, giving them an extra match before they host Sonia Bompastor’s side at the Emirates, as well as one less day to prepare following their Champions League match.
“It’s not good enough to blame it on Uefa, because everyone across Europe has had the same information for such a long time, and the only one that hasn’t acted on that information is the WSL,” said Eidevall. “Because of this amateurish behaviour, with not having a proactive plan and taking away a game from Chelsea, it now puts us into a situation where we play Sunday and we play Wednesday away against Bayern Munich – who don’t play Sunday, they play Saturday, because they have a league organisation that sees the value of getting their top teams a better position – and then we return playing Saturday against Chelsea at the Emirates. We have considerably less preparation time than our opponents, and so we are handed this sporting disadvantage in two huge games for us.”
Eidevall also questioned a “lack of clarity and transparency” over the decision making and pondered when the fixture would be rescheduled for. “For me, everything needs to be as fair as possible, that’s how we compete, not only in football, in life in general,” he said. “I have such a hard time understanding when you postpone one game and you give sporting advantages to another team [that you] still don’t have any idea of when that game is going to be played.
“Who decides when that game is going to be played? What considerations are there? Is that game even going to be played after this transfer window? Is that going to be played after the next transfer window? … what you are doing is you are changing the order that was decided before the league [kicked off].”
The manager also criticised the initial Sunday scheduling of all games of likely Champions League participants. “Of the 16 teams [competing in the Champions League group stage], 13 teams were scheduled to play on the Friday or Saturday and the three English teams were all scheduled to play on the Sunday, with each team of those having a 50% chance of playing their game on a Tuesday. That has been the information that’s been there for months,” he said.
“Does the league want the English club teams to be successful at European level? I would hope the answer to that would be yes, but the action shows differently. It shows that this is not one of their priorities to have the club teams be successful. That is very negative for English women’s football.”
Matt Beard, whose Liverpool side lost to Manchester United in the League Cup on Wednesday, echoed Eidevall’s frustrations. “I can’t believe the decision was made. I don’t understand it,” he said. “I believe if [the league] was still under the FA, it wouldn’t have been called off. It’s crazy.
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“It gave Manchester United an advantage over us on Wednesday because they don’t have to prepare for Chelsea this week. I just hope this doesn’t happen every time.”
In confirming the postponement last week, the WPLL apologised to supporters, saying: “In this instance, we have to put player welfare first and we will announce a new date for the fixture in due course. We thank the clubs and Sky Sports for their understanding as we work on a resolution.”
