Chelsea FCW’s Emma Hayes named BBC WSL Manager of the Season

Football may be on pause or, in some cases, cancelled, but that doesn’t mean we can’t still talk about and remember the season that was. In terms of the WSL season that was, no club looked more dominant from first-kick to pandemic-forced suspension than Chelsea FCW.

While there’s still a sliver of hope that Chelsea can get back on the pitch in official 2019-20 season capacity and finish what’s been started — being a typhoon of goals hell-bent on securing the Treble — individual honors will do for now.

First up, Emma Hayes, the chief motivator of that mighty blue wave, has claimed BBC WSL Manager of the Season. It really couldn’t have been anyone else. I’m sure some names are two and three, but only by default. Logic and reality made the decision simple.

Hayes was most recently in the news as a candidate for the Lionesses job that Phil Neville will be vacating soon-ish (though not soon enough). For us, that is a bit scary, as Hayes has been Chelsea manager since 2012 and a rare opportunity to make an upward move from Kingsmeadow has just opened up. However, and thankfully, Hayes herself stated that she is happy at Chelsea, in part because her ambitions — to win everything of course, but more specifically the Champions League — match Chelsea’s, in both words and investment.

At any rate, what Hayes has done this season deserves to be lauded. Chelsea currently sit second with three points from a game-in-hand being the only thing keeping us from first. We’ve already collected the season’s first trophy, the League Cup, by beating Arsenal (last year’s league Champions) for the third consecutive meeting. And we remained unbeaten in the league with only three draws, scoring 47 goals while only conceding 11.

It’s hard to look into the future and make any solid declarations, but before play was halted it would’ve been unwise to bet against Chelsea claiming the Treble. While we await the slow trickle toward safety and then normalcy (assuming that’s the order), we’ll just have to remember the good times, and be thankful for them.