CFCW special: Advantage Arsenal, WSL struggles, stadium uncertainty & upheaval behind the scenes
Straight Outta Cobham: The Athletic FC's Chelsea show
The Athletic
4.9 • 871 Ratings
🗓️ 25 March 2026
⏱️ 51 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Losing isn't exclusive to the men's team at the moment...
Matt Davies-Adams has a new-look starting line-up - with The Athletic's Charlotte Harpur and Michael Cox joining forces with SOC's own Cerys Jones for a closer look at all things CFCW hot off the back of Chelsea's 3-1 defeat by Arsenal in the first leg of their Champions League quarter-final.
We look at the big talking points from the match in rainy north London - before pondering whether the Blues can turn things around in the return leg back at Stamford Bridge next Wednesday. How damaging would it be if Sonia Bompastor's side got knocked out at this stage and then also failed to qualify for the competition next season?
Plus, we shine the spotlight on what's going on behind the scenes at the club - with news of big departures on and off the pitch, recruitment uncertainty, questions over the best stadium to play at moving forward - and whether the new model the club is operating under as a whole will have a detrimental impact on CFCW.
We're taking a short international break of our own - but we'll be back next Thursday to look back on the 2nd leg contest - and a look ahead to the visit of Port Vale for the men's side in the FA Cup.
HOST: Matt Davies-Adams
WITH: Cerys Jones, Charlotte Harpur & Cerys Jones
PRODUCER: Lucy Oliva
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | The Athletic F.C. |
| 0:03.3 | It's straight out to Cobham, a show about Chelsea FC from the Athletic. |
| 0:18.9 | Coming up, it's a CFCW special as we take a deep dive on the women's team. |
| 0:24.1 | Marginly more competent than a pair of Romanian referees. |
| 0:27.1 | This is straight out of Cobb. |
| 0:31.2 | And it's a different kind of show for us today. |
| 0:34.2 | As I say, we're focusing on the women's team. |
| 0:36.6 | So we've got a much changed lineup to |
| 0:38.8 | do that. One regular who's got to start today is Kerris Jones. How are you doing Kerris? |
| 0:43.4 | I'm good. Thank you. We got Charlotte Harper with us as well. Charlotte, you were at the |
| 0:47.3 | Emirates on Tuesday night. Did you have a nice time? You stay dry. Stay dry. I couldn't have |
| 0:53.7 | had a nicer time sat next to Michael Cox. |
| 0:56.3 | Who's also with us? Michael, how are you? Yeah, very well. Thank you. Yeah, enjoyed the game yesterday. |
| 1:02.5 | I thought it was quite a good first leg and looking forward to the second one at Stanford Bridge as well. |
| 1:07.9 | Yeah, Wednesday night of next week for that one. Right now, listener, as you will know, |
| 1:12.8 | and Kerris knows we always like to kick off with our premature adjudications where we make a mad |
| 1:17.9 | or maybe a fairly routine prediction about something that's going to happen in the world of |
| 1:22.4 | Chelsea Football Club. You can go to sacpredicts.com to track how we're doing with these caris as the veteran i'm |
| 1:29.1 | going to let you have the first go at this this is the first time anyone at the company's ever |
| 1:34.1 | described me as a veteran um i will say lauren james is going to score again in the second leg but also |
| 1:41.0 | as soon as her brother reese from injury, she will get injured. |
| 1:50.7 | Wow, okay, with one hand you give and with the other, he take away. Charlotte, have you got one for me? I'm going to say Chelsea come back with three goals next week and then Arsenal, |
... |
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