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Dominance of Bompastor's invincibles begins to erode the scale of their achievement
The Guardian
|May 19, 2025
Our name is Sonia Bompastor. Your Chelsea team are winning 3-0 in the FA Cup final and about to cap a 30-game unbeaten domestic season with a league, cup and league cup treble.
Wembley is a sea of triumphant blue flags. Manchester United, shuffling and straggling around the pitch, look like the victims of some macabre reality television endurance challenge that will later be censured by Ofcom.
What is your next move? Well, if you're Bompastor, your next move is to make a triple substitution in the 93rd minute. On come Guro Reiten, Sjoeke Nüsken, Johanna Rytting Kaneryd. Just to see things out. Just the 198 international caps, 14 league titles and 26 major trophies, casually hauled off the bench in injury time of a won cup final. And for Chelsea this really was the most insouciant flex: the victory lap before the victory lap, the £50 tip you give the waiter just because you can.
The scoreline made it look comfortable for Chelsea in the end. Which to be fair it was, in the end. And also in the beginning, and the middle. And, to be fair, from the moment Aggie Beever-Jones headed in the winner against Liverpool five weeks ago. And certainly from the moment Serena Williams took her seat in the royal box alongside her Chelsea co-owning husband. No disrespect to Jason Wilcox - OK, a little disrespect to Jason Wilcox - but it's hard for United to compete with that calibre of A-list stardust.
This story is from the May 19, 2025 edition of The Guardian.
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