Keira Walsh: Sonia Bompastor gets the best out of me
An exclusive interview with Walsh on coping with losses, working with Sonia Bompastor and fighting for trophies this season
No one likes losing. It’s human nature.
If you’re an elite athlete, the feeling of defeat is especially deep and painful, and it’s even harder to take when it’s been 585 days of not losing.
When English women’s football juggernaut Chelsea’s 34-game unbeaten run came to an end in December, questions were instantly asked of the squad and their manager, Sonia Bompastor.
The reality is that Chelsea’s remarkable run, which dated back to May 2024, had to end at some point, but no one expected it to be at the hands of Women’s Super League strugglers Everton.
“It’s not easy. I think for a team like Chelsea as well, we’re not used to losing, so I think it probably makes it even more emphasised”, says Keira Walsh, speaking exclusively to The Cutback ahead of Sunday’s Subway League Cup final. “But as a professional, I’ve lost games before, it’s more how you bounce back and how you attack the next fixture, and how you look at the rest of the season”.
Sunday’s game provides the perfect opportunity for Chelsea as they face Manchester United at Ashton Gate in the first chance for silverware this season.
Walsh has won the Champions League, two European Championships, and every English domestic honour there is, but losing still makes her “angry”, and it’s the back-to-back defeats to Arsenal and Manchester City at the start of this year that added more concern for fans. Those results put Chelsea nine points behind league leaders City and out of the title race for the first time in seven seasons.
“It’s not about feeling sorry for ourselves and dwelling on that”, adds Walsh, “maybe the league’s gone but I think it’s looking at the things we can win and at the bigger picture. I think playing two top teams [Arsenal and Manchester City] back to back isn’t easy. I think if you lose to one in January and one in October, it looks slightly different. Obviously, we were a bit gutted, but it’s not the end of our season.”
Chelsea fans will tell you that the concerns around the Blues’ season started long before those poor results. Bompastor’s side have not been performing at their best for some time, and the alarm was raised further when Paul Green, the long-serving head of women’s football at Chelsea, departed last month.
Green was Emma Hayes’s right-hand man and oversaw a period at Chelsea where the club won every single domestic honour, several times over.
During that period, Chelsea Women were immune to the wider noise and chaos that surrounded the men’s side of the club.
