Sam Kerr’s early header gave Chelsea a 3-1 win at Leicester, securing qualification for next season’s Women’s Champions League and making him the Australian Blues’ all-time top scorer in the WSL.
Kerr, who reportedly left the club this summer to join NWSL expansion team Denver Summit, gave Chelsea the perfect start at the King Power Stadium, nodding home his 64th goal after 13 minutes from Niamh Charles’ cross.
“This is a huge achievement for me. It will probably be gone in 10 years when I retire!” she said later BBC Sports. “Every goal is really important to me and to achieve it at a big club like Chelsea is really special.”
If she travels to west London, the Blues will not be short of another source of goals with Lauren James adding Chelsea’s second and third goals in real style before half-time.
The England winger first took a touch 20 yards out before firing a wonderful strike past a helpless Katie Keane, before hitting the underside of the crossbar with an unstoppable free-kick inside the D six minutes later.
“Two steps, not bad, right?” she was joking BBC Sports About her candidacy. “I was looking for where the keeper was and it was pretty close. Some people thought I wasn’t going to go over, but the keeper gave me the other side and I went into the top corner.”
The game felt like a repeat of Leicester’s 7-0 thrashing of Arsenal on Wednesday. Before the end of the game, Lucy Bronze’s blind backpass was blocked by Shannon O’Brien, who defeated Livia Peng with a clever finish.
Despite that strike, Sonia Bompastor still felt comfortable enough with the scoreline to have withdrawn both James and Erin Cuthbert at half-time, but she may have wondered if she had gone too early when the Foxes pulled out of the trap at the break.
But this proved to be only a short-lived worry for the Blues. Because the bottom-ranked host failed to seriously test Peng again. That’s because the away side ran out comfortable winners to cement a place in the top three and Champions League football next season.
More to follow…
