Erin Cuthbert’s late winner against City puts Chelsea a step closer to WSL title | OneFootball

If Chelsea are to complete this league season unbeaten, a feat that is now only five games away, it will have been across 45 relentless second-half minutes at the Etihad Stadium where they proved themselves worthy of accolades attributed to “invincibles”, after they produced a stirring fightback to beat Manchester City.

At the end of last season these two sides could be separated only by goal difference. After Erin Cuthbert’s late header won this contest and sent the away fans into raptures, there is a 15-point gap between Chelsea and fourth-placed City, who will feel aggrieved about one controversial first-half incident that might have altered the game’s course.

Long before Cuthbert’s winner in the 91st minute, City were understandably baffled after Jess Park curled the ball into the top corner from just outside the penalty area only to realise the referee, Kirsty Dowle, had stopped play for a free-kick, moving to blow her whistle just as Park was connecting with her shot.

“The officials admitted that they got it wrong and that they should have played on,” City’s interim head coach, Nick Cushing, said. “The frustrating thing for me is, about two or three minutes before, because we were so dangerous on the counterattack, when the whistle was blown [for a separate foul] I asked the fourth official to ask the referee to play advantage, and she said: ‘OK, I’ll pass that message on.’ Then three minutes later that happens.”

Sonia Bompastor, the Chelsea manager, said: “I can understand their frustration. If I was the City manager I would probably be in the same place. But I don’t think it changed our belief going into the second half. We created a lot in the second half, 24 shots on goal, their keeper made really great saves. We could maybe have scored more.”

A goal at that stage would have put City 2-0 up after Kerolin’s strike on 32 minutes. Instead, Chelsea survived and emerged after the break a completely different team.

The defending champions levelled as Aggie Beever-Jones met Johanna Rytting Kaneryd’s cutback and supplied a quality finish into the bottom corner. What followed over the next 15 minutes was nothing short of an onslaught from Chelsea as they raced forward relentlessly with attack after attack, and Rytting Kaneryd began to dominate the contest.

Quite how Chelsea did not score in that spell of pressure was unclear to everybody except perhaps the City goalkeeper Khiara Keating. First, she produced a terrific diving save to her left to keep out Wieke Kaptein’s effort. After Rytting Kaneryd had hit the post, Keating then did superbly well to make a low save at the feet of the same player, before stopping another close-range Kaptein shot.

Keating went on to make another top-class save low to her left to keep out a powerful Lauren James strike in the closing stages, before Chelsea’s pressure told in stoppage time as Cuthbert’s header won the game for the visitors.

Kerolin, who made a big impact last Wednesday in the Champions League quarter-final first leg against the same opponents, was a nightmare for Chelsea’s left-back Niamh Charles in the first half, repeatedly getting in behind the England international with her pace and energy.

The Brazil forward also forced Hannah Hampton into an early low save before opening the scoring with a goal that will surely make City’s end‑of‑season highlights reel. Twisting and weaving in front of a retreating Millie Bright, Kerolin eventually placed the ball through the defender’s legs and into the far corner.

Shortly afterwards, Kerolin was running straight at Bright again. This time Bright did make a challenge, fouling the 25-year-old just inside the D, and as the ball rolled straight to Park for a first-time shot Dowle brought her whistle to her lips to award a free-kick, much to the bewilderment of Park, Cushing and almost everybody inside this stadium.

The result was a second victory for Chelsea in the three consecutive games played between these sides in nine days, with the fourth in a row still to come on Thursday when Chelsea will need another comeback to overturn the two-goal deficit in the Champions League. But you can never write them off.

Header image: [Photograph: Nick Potts/PA]