Getty Images/USA Today Sports/GOALThe Women's Super League giants won this battle between champions, with young England star Aggie Beever-Jones also shining in a good pre-season debut
There was plenty going on as Chelsea, champions of England, visited Gotham, champions of the United States, for a pre-season friendly on Monday night. Be it the NWSL side's U.S. women's national team stars showing off their Olympic gold medals, tennis icon Billie Jean King participating in the ceremonial torch lighting before kick-off or the excitement around Gotham's Jess Carter and Ann-Katrin Berger coming up against their former side, it was all happening. Amid it all, though, the Blues got straight down to business as they recorded an impressive 3-1 win in their first pre-season outing.
Gotham were missing some big names for this match, particularly the five Olympic champions who watched from the stands, however they also just reached the NWSL x Liga MX Femenil Summer Cup final without those players and thus boasted not only a deep squad, but one with much better match fitness than a Chelsea side yet to play a game this summer. That didn't show in the first half though, as the Blues' first match under new head coach Sonia Bompastor began with Johanna Rytting Kaneryd breaking the deadlock after just seven minutes.
The Swedish winger quickly made it two when she combined well with Aggie Beever-Jones and then the England star got her name on the scoresheet before the half-hour mark, Rytting Kaneryd returning the favour when she released her team-mate behind the Gotham defence with a dangerous long ball.
Through an unlikely source, the NWSL champions got back into things quickly enough, with who else but Carter netting her first goal for the club when she finished a free-kick like a centre-forward, rather than a centre-back, to pull one back for the hosts against her former team. Yet, despite Hannah Hampton being forced into a strong save by Yazmeen Ryan's free-kick only a couple of minutes later, Gotham were unable to maintain real pressure on Chelsea and, as substitutions disrupted the flow of the second half, the game would peter out into a 3-1 result for the visitors thanks to that electric start.
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