The time is ripe to challenge the established order. Change is afoot among the top teams in the Champions League, which gets under way on Wednesday night with the first round of qualifying. For any club with ambitions of toppling the stalwarts Lyon and Barcelona, who have won 11 titles (eight and three respectively), this could be the season to do it.
The task is still huge, the mountain maintains its nausea-inducing height, but with different guides leading those teams, their routes to the top may not be quite as straightforward.
Lyon and Barcelona have had managerial changes this summer, with Joe Montemurro taking over from Sonia Bompastor in France and Jonatan Giráldez leaving the Catalan capital after being recruited by Michelle Kang for Washington Spirit and being replaced by his assistant Pere Romeu. Last season’s other semi-finalists have also changed managers, with Bompastor replacing Emma Hayes at Chelsea and Fabrice Abriel taking over at Paris Saint-Germain after the departure of Jocelyn Prêcheur to the Kang-owned London City Lionesses.
Does this mean the trophy is up for grabs? Can top teams keep winning while undergoing managerial change? Do clubs with great stability at the top have a better chance of European glory? Maybe. Maybe. Maybe.
“I hope so,” said Montemurro when asked by the Guardian this summer whether Giráldez’s exit opened the competition up for other sides. “The Champions League is synonymous with Lyon. It’s synonymous with who they are and what they stand for: the powerhouse of Europe. It’s just belief. It really is. I think it’s always an internal mentality, an internal belief that drives that ability to want to do more. Week out, with every game, whether we’re playing a local team, whether we’re playing a top team, that has to be a non-negotiable because the best teams just do it automatically every week.”
Managerial stability may be the slimmest of advantages, and outweighed by many other factors, but any glint of weakness in any of the European giants will be pounced on. Hope, after all, is a powerful thing.
For Arsenal, the road to the final is a very long one. They play Rangers on Wednesday night at Boreham Wood in a qualifying round one semi-final, hoping to earn a place in Sunday’s final against Atlético Madrid or Rosenborg and then progress to the two-leg second qualifying round, from which the winners qualify for the group stage. Given Arsenal fell at the first hurdle last year, beating Linköping before losing to Paris FC on penalties to go out in qualifying round one, it is perhaps premature for England’s only European champions (2007) to think too far ahead.
The same can be said for Manchester City, who did not qualify for last season’s tournament and failed to get past qualifying round one in 2022-23 or round two in 2021-22. They enter in qualifying round two this season.
And yet, given how little is required to have a big impact in women’s football in these early developmental stages, nothing is inconceivable.
The Arsenal manager, Jonas Eidevall, said on Tuesday he believed his team could go “all the way” in the Champions League. “My focus is on this mini tournament here,” he said of qualifying round one. “We as a team have potential to go all the way in Europe – that’s how much I believe in our capabilities. We have a tough opponent with Rangers and that will take all our focus and attention.”
The defender Leah Williamson said: “We’ve obviously underperformed. There’s been a number of teams at the top that try to take trophies off each other. I don’t think we’ve been that far away. I feel we’re getting closer. I enjoy the way we play. It does need to go up, but I don’t think we’re too far away. I think last year was a hurtful situation. We were left to regret that for the rest of the year.”
after newsletter promotion
City’s 1-0 loss to PSG in a pre-season friendly in Perth showed where they are at when competing with top European sides.
“We know we have to do the difficult part, putting the ball in the back of the net, but I thought our play was outstanding,” said their manager, Gareth Taylor. “From the goalkeeper all the way up to the final third we were top class. They’re a very good team but we completely dominated. Some of the football we played was top and we can take heart from that.”
Hayes left Chelsea’s squad in a strong position after 12 years but Bompastor must imprint her football without it affecting results. Fortunately for Chelsea, who go straight into the group stage, in Bompastor they have a manager who has won the Champions League as a player and manager.
“I think we have all the infrastructure to win it,” she said. “We have to work really hard to make sure we get there. I can’t wait to start this competition as it’s a really special one. We are looking to build a squad able to perform at every stage of the season because we have so many games. It’s a new era with new faces in the squad.”
The hope is there, the ambition is there, now the performances have to be there.