WSL Opening Weekend: Chelsea's Frustration and USWNT Stars

Chelsea’s frustration, City’s relief, Arsenal’s assurance and United’s warning sign – it was an opening WSL weekend that said plenty about where a cluster of USWNT regulars stand as a new season kicks off.

Chelsea’s control, familiar regret

Chelsea had the game where they wanted it. Territory, tempo, the ball. What they didn’t have was the finish.

Aston Villa hung on, then punished them late. A 1-1 draw felt like two points tossed away rather than one earned, a reminder that dominance on the ball means little if you leave the door open. The equalizer, coming so late, stung.

Alyssa Thompson will feel that sting more than most. Handed a start, she found the spaces you want your winger to find, timing runs, popping up in pockets, stretching Villa’s back line. The movement was there. The end product wasn’t.

Chelsea need that to change. Quickly.

Year two in London arrives with a different weight for Thompson. Millie Bright, Guro Reiten and Sam Kerr are gone. With them goes a chunk of leadership and a huge portion of Chelsea’s attacking threat. Into that vacuum steps a 19-year-old who led the team with seven league goals in her debut campaign and set a clear platform to grow from.

Now the expectations sharpen. Those half-chances must become goals. Those promising positions must turn into defining moments.

The good news for Thompson: her international standing is trending the right way. On the right wing for the USWNT, she has already struck four times, making a convincing case as qualifiers loom. Her pace and directness have translated well on that stage.

The next leap is obvious. Chelsea don’t just need her to arrive in dangerous areas; they need her to decide games from them.

Coffey steps back into the fight

For Sam Coffey, the weekend wasn’t about rhythm or dominance. It was about being back.

Manchester City’s 3-1 win over Birmingham City brought three points and a solid start to their title push, but for Coffey it carried something deeper. After a knee injury cut short her previous WSL campaign and kept her out of the USWNT’s June friendlies, she finally stepped onto the pitch again in the 73rd minute, replacing Laura Blindkilde Brown.

A small window of minutes. A big step forward.

Coffey arrived from the Portland Thorns midway through last season and slowly grew into City’s midfield structure as they chased the WSL crown. That adaptation was interrupted by injury just as she was settling into life in England.

Now she has a clean slate and a clear runway.

Her return will not go unnoticed by Emma Hayes, either. Without Coffey, the USWNT lacked a trusted holding midfielder in the game against Brazil, a role that demands calm, positioning and the ability to stitch phases together. Coffey has shown she can offer that.

Getting back on the field is the start. Finding her rhythm again is what could put her right back in the center of Hayes’ plans.

Fox quietly locks things down

Some players fluctuate with form. Emily Fox rarely does.

Whether she’s in an Arsenal kit or lining up for the USWNT, her performances tend to land in that same reliable band: composed, disciplined, hard to rattle. Arsenal’s 1-0 win over Brighton & Hove Albion fit the pattern.

Fox started at outside back and helped deliver three points on opening day. Arsenal pushed their line high, compressing the pitch, hunting for turnovers and then flooding forward in transition. It’s a system that leaves defenders exposed if they switch off for even a moment.

Fox didn’t.

Since joining Arsenal in 2024, she has become a constant on both sides of the ball, choosing her moments to overlap, then snapping back into defensive shape when required. There were no wild surges, no headline-grabbing interventions. Just solid, repeatable actions that coaches build game plans around.

It wasn’t a flashy performance. That’s precisely why it mattered. Arsenal know they can lean on Fox without asking her to dominate the highlights.

Tullis-Joyce’s tough start, bigger stakes

For Phallon Tullis-Joyce, the new season’s first test escalated quickly.

She opened Manchester United’s match against London City Lionesses with a couple of early saves, settling in, reading the game. Then, in the eighth minute, a corner swung in and everything unraveled. Caught out of position, she watched Alanna Kennedy rise and head home.

United never fully recovered.

The defensive issues resurfaced late. In the 82nd minute, slack marking in the box gave Daniëlle van de Donk the space to improvise a clever finish behind her back, sealing a 2-1 defeat that exposed United’s organization and left Tullis-Joyce with a harsh opening-day report card.

This season, though, is about more than United’s back line for her.

Tullis-Joyce is in the thick of the battle for the USWNT’s No. 1 shirt. Shot-stopping alone won’t win that race. Hayes wants a goalkeeper who can play, who can handle the ball at her feet, who can calm a press with one smart pass. Tullis-Joyce’s footwork and distribution remain under the microscope.

A strong WSL campaign, with fewer positional lapses and more assurance in possession, could tilt that contest in her favor. Anything less, and she risks watching major tournaments from the bench.

For Thompson, Coffey, Fox and Tullis-Joyce, the opening weekend offered a snapshot, not a verdict. The chances missed, the minutes reclaimed, the quiet excellence, the painful mistakes — all of it feeds into one question that will hang over the months ahead:

Who turns these early-season hints into something that shapes both club seasons and the USWNT’s next chapter?