The WSL returned form the winter break for the first action of 2022 over the weekend, with a shock result dominating the headlines.
Covid-19 claimed three of the weekend’s fixtures, with Friday night’s London derby between Chelsea and Tottenham, Everton’s trip to Aston Villa on Saturday and West Ham vs Manchester United on Sunday evening all postponed.
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Here’s a roundup of the games that were still able to go ahead…
Manchester City avoided a potential banana skin to move just four points off the Champions League places, starting 2022 with a bang as they put six goals past a usually resilient Brighton.
All six came in the second half of the game, with an own goal from centre-back Victoria Williams opening the floodgates. It was 4-0 only 10 minutes into the second half thanks to further strikes from Lauren Hemp, Georgia Stanway and Laura Coombs. Summer signings Hayley Raso and Vicy Losada later made it five and then six.
It was a third straight WSL defeat for the Seagulls, who have now slipped out of the top half thanks to he defeat and others results.
Birmingham pulled off the shock of the result against Arsenal, with the previously win-less Blues inflicting a first WSL defeat of the season on the league leaders.
Before Christmas, Birmingham had lost a fourth straight league game that gave Leicester their first ever WSL points. The visit of Arsenal therefore looked like a guaranteed away win.
But the Gunners haven’t been at their best since early November and were stunned by an early Libby Smith goal. Veatriki Sarri then had Birmingham in dreamland when she made it 2-0 shortly before half-time, with Arsenal managing no response and mustering only two shots on target.
Reading have climbed into the top half after a third successive WSL win and sixth in a row without defeat, putting a poor start to the season back in September way behind them.
Natasha Dowie scored the only goal of the game at the Madejski Stadium in the 11th minutes. It proved to be enough for the victory, which will have come as a relief for the veteran striker as she also missed a penalty later in the second half.
The defeat combined with Birmingham’s shock win pushed Leicester back to the foot of the table.
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