NOT JUST A SLOGAN – Everyone (including Sonia Bompastor) Watches Women’s Sports!

Every conversation with Chelsea head coach Sonia Bompastor is enjoyable, as she rarely ducks a question and always tries to expand on her thoughts and rationale. And despite employing sheep as part of her squad’s pre-season training, she is far from just following the herd herself. As Helen M Jerome discovered in their most recent exchange.

Bompastor spoke ahead of the quarter-finals of the Rugby World Cup, the start of the World Athletics Championships in Tokyo, and of course, the second weekend of WSL games – in which Chelsea beat Villa 3-1 with the bonus of a returning Sam Kerr and (it was written in the script) a trademark last-minute Kerr goal.

Sonia Bompastor is nothing if not supportive when she looks around at the world of women’s sport. She knows how hard it is for women to reach the top, how you have to raise your voice and occasionally kick up a fuss to get anything done.

She’s admitted that French attitudes and prejudice towards women playing football spurred her on. When she joined Chelsea as head coach in 2024, she even told BBC Sport: “I wanted to fight against this idea that if you were a girl you couldn’t play football.”

Bompastor has also said she loves to communicate, listen to experts in different fields, and share knowledge, saying: “It gives me a lot of satisfaction”. She likes to exchange ideas, adding that every environment she’s worked in has been part of a collective where there’s a mutual sharing of thoughts and ideas. 

Long story short, she loves learning.

So in light of London City Lionesses’ eye-catching shirt sponsorship by Togethxr boasting that “Everyone Watches Women’s Sports” (photo above, centre) and our launch of The New Women’s Sport Magazine, I was keen to know how engaged the Chelsea head coach is in the multitude of women’s sports going on right now – and what we can learn from them, and maybe the coverage too.

“Yeah, I’m a high follower of women’s sports,” she said. “I’m watching some of the games in the rugby (France edged past Ireland 18-13 in the tasty quarter-final and have a mouthwatering semifinal against England’s Red Roses on Saturday afternoon). Again, I think we need to be open to different things into the women’s game in football.”

Balance

Not that she’s rushing headlong to take on board everything from other women’s sports like rugby. “It’s nice for us to be open and to try to implement some good ideas. We need to find a balance between bringing some new ideas from other sports, but also maybe keeping what are the good things in football in the women’s game.”

For Bompastor, we are in a moment of flux, of change, and maybe progress in women’s football, but must remember to keep fun and enjoyment to the fore. “But again, I think we are in a stage where we are transitioning to better things and in that process I think it’s good to stay open and to see what can work for us as well to make the game even more enjoyable for everyone.”

On the TV coverage – which has been exceptional in the Rugby World Cup, and is often enlightening for viewers when they watch unfamiliar sports during events like the Olympics – Bompastor is more guarded. “It’s always difficult to compare the different sports because sometimes they have been played in different environments. So, yeah, let’s try to be open-minded about that and try to have different conversations with other sports, see what maybe we can bring to our game and what could bring a better product to us.”

Not everything, she reckons, will translate. “Maybe some ideas going on some other sports won’t be good ideas for football. We need to be open-minded on trying to implement things on the way we want to improve. But maybe also have a clear idea on what can work for us and what cannot.”

Change

There are obviously changes happening in real time in the way women’s football specifically is being covered and run, and Bompastor feels they get a fair shake in feeding issues back to those in charge. Being the daughter of a football referee, means she also fully grasps how fairness and change are not always easy bedfellows.

“I shared with my staff and with the league what I think are good ideas,” she says, “and maybe what we can do different.”

“What is good is the league is also really open-minded on sharing ideas around the women’s game. And I think they give the opportunity to the managers and the players to give that feedback.

Bluntly, she is always ready to listen and share and progress the women’s game, but justifiably believes that’s not her main task. “When I have the opportunity to talk about all these things, I’m always open-minded to do that in a constructive way.”

“My job,” concludes Sonia Bompastor, “is to make sure I focus on making the team perform and win games.” And looking back at her first, treble-winning season with Chelsea, it’s hard to argue with that…