‘There’s only one Super League’: Chelsea boss Emma Hayes pleased with collapse of breakaway competition
Chelsea manager Emma Hayes has declared there's "only one Super League" in the wake of European football's failed attempt to get a new breakaway competition off the ground.
A dozen of the men's game's biggest clubs had hoped to form their own tournament that they hoped would rival Uefa's Champions League.
But Hayes, whose team are top of the Women's Super League and on course to defend their title, is pleased that the proposal for the closed-shop competition has fallen flat.
"I love the Champions League and competing in this competition," she said on the eve of her side's semi-final first-leg against Bayern Munich on Sunday. "There’s only one Super :eague, and it’s the one we play in.
“I’m glad that the outcome has happened, the right thing has happened. I’m a merit-based person. I always say I trust my club and the people that run the club. I’m just grateful that we are the only Super League.”
Hayes' side have been in the last four of the Champions League twice previously, losing to eventual champions Lyon in 2019 and Wolfsburg in 2018.
Asked if the season would be a failure if her team did not go on to win the tournament this time, Hayes added: "Failure is a really strong word. I'd call it a disappointment, not a failure, a failure is not being in the position.
"So to be in with a shot of competing for a Champions League final is what you prepare for. We have a 50/50 chance of making it, I'll take those odds.
"If you'd have offered them up at the beginning of the season, if you'd have offered up being in the position we are, top of the league, winning the Continental Cup, I'd have taken it.
"There're top teams here, so to be where we are - I feel privileged. You don't take anything for granted because when you play in the European game, because it's so different, sizing each other up takes a game.
"You cannot win the tie in the first leg, but you can definitely lose your way out of it. We've got to remember those things that got us here."
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