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Fran Kirby and Sam Kerr inspire Chelsea to ruthless win over Servette

PA Sport Staff
·2-min read

Fran Kirby and Sam Kerr each scored twice as Chelsea produced a first-half blitz en route to thrashing Servette 7-0 in Geneva in their third Women’s Champions League group match.

Following the 1-0 Women’s Super League win at Aston Villa on Saturday, boss Emma Hayes had said in the build-up to this contest that she wanted Chelsea to be “more relentless after the first goal”.

She subsequently saw her team, last season’s Champions League runners-up, deliver in emphatic fashion, with Melanie Leupolz’s eighth-minute strike to open the scoring being added to five times in the first half.

Three of those came in a flurry between the 16th and 20th minutes, starting with Kirby, who had hit the bar at 0-0, firing past Ines Pereira having been teed up by Kerr.

Two minutes later Kerr got on the scoresheet herself with a close-range finish from Leupolz’s cut-back, and the Australian then swiftly netted again for 4-0, prodding in following a lofted ball from Kirby.

There was only brief respite for Servette – Champions League debutants last season and beaten 3-0 by Juventus and 5-0 by Wolfsburg in their opening two games of this campaign – before the visitors scored another, with Kirby dinking in number five in the 26th minute.

Jessie Fleming then struck past Pereira from a tight angle to make it 6-0 with seven minutes of normal time to go before the break.

Reiten added Chelsea's seventh
Reiten added Chelsea’s seventh (Salvatore Di Nolfi/Keystone via AP)

Five minutes into the second half the advantage was extended further as Kerr sent the ball across the box, Kirby left it and Guro Reiten side-footed in.

While further goals looked more than likely at that point, the closest Chelsea got to an eighth was Drew Spence rattling the bar with a shot in the 64th minute, shortly before Hayes brought on Maren Mjelde for her long-awaited return to action after injury.

Chelsea now have seven points from three Group A games, having previously drawn 3-3 with Wolfsburg and then won 2-1 at Juventus. Their next match in the pool is against Servette at Kingsmeadow a week on Thursday.