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We all have a tendency to take the game far too seriously – this seven-a-side tournament provided the perfect antidoteAs much as it is tempting to romanticise about Bill Shankly’s most famous quote, he was wrong. Football is not more serious than life and death, and over the years far too many of us seem to have taken the former Liverpool manager’s words a little too literally and stopped being able to enjoy football for its primary purpose: fun.Whether it is clubs writing letters of complaint because a referee – a fallible human like all 8 billion of us – has made a mistake or the rage on social media that a pundit’s opinion might be skewed towards – shock – their former club, isn’t it time we chilled out a bit?For three sun-kissed afternoons by the Thames, an end-of-season seven-a-side women’s football tournament provided the perfect antidote to the depressingly serious elements of the modern game. Forget VAR, PSR and arguing about the significance of xG, this was goals, laughs, goals, then more goals.The third edition of World Sevens Football, which involved eight English teams and was won by Chelsea after an 11-goal thriller in the final, served up what the players had craved: fun. On the pitch, flair players such as Manchester United’s Melvine Malard and Jess Park thrived in the format, showing off their stepovers and lethal finishing, and the Chelsea forward Aggie-Beever-Jones, the top scorer with eight goals, toyed with defenders.Teams also showed off meticulously prepared walk-on routines, which ranged from the hilarious to the bizarre, from Everton’s players pretending to give birth, to the Chelsea manager, Sonia Bompastor, being carried on to the pitch by her players, to the Manchester United head coach Marc Skinner’s entrance in a dressing gown. Even the referees couldn’t resist some acting.It was not to everybody’s taste, naturally. Some observers, perhaps mistaking what they were watching for the World Cup final, expressed annoyance on social media that women were not acting in a way that is good and proper. One X user, responding to a video of Aston Villa’s players dancing, wrote: “Organisers of this have genuinely set them back years.” Another X user wrote: “Unfortunately, women’s football won’t ever be taken seriously.” First football had the “celebration police”. Now we’ve got the “walk-on police”.Not only those who dislike women’s football were unhappy. The former Everton women’s manager and former Canada assistant coach Andy Spence, a respected figure in the women’s game, responded to a viral video of Everton’s players acting out a mock funeral for their on-loan full-back Hannah Blundell, by writing: “What is going on? The Women’s game has made such progress but these ‘tournaments’ and the narrative around them are threatening the integrity & hard work people have put in to make the Women’s game be accepted by a wider audience. Please stop. Embarrassing.”Everybody is entitled to their opinion and, undoubtedly, this lighthearted tournament will not be to everybody’s liking, but the event did three crucial things that women’s football needs. First, it broadened teams’ reach: one clip on Dazn’s Instagram of Beever-Jones’s amusing walk-on has been viewed more than 11 million times. Second, it brought investment into a sport crying out for cash, with $500,000 (£372,000) going to the winners. And it attracted fans, with a sold-out crowd of 3,000 attending the final on Saturday. In future, the capacity will need to be more ambitious, to make the event profitable but, given that Chelsea’s participation had been announced with 10 days’ notice, that sellout will have encouraged organisers. Jennifer Mackesy, a co-founder of World Sevens Football, said: “The response from fans in London has blown us away.”It also provided light relief to the players after a gruelling season. As Everton’s interim head coach Scott Phelan said: “The majority of it is about enjoyment and letting the players express themselves and enjoy football in its purest form.”The event is by no means perfect. Giving Chelsea and Manchester United access to the two regular changing rooms at Brentford, while the other six teams were housed in far smaller, temporary dressing rooms, because those two sides were seeded for the group stage, did not go down brilliantly with some other teams, and that will need to be addressed at future editions.As for the walk-ons, the fans embraced those as much as a half-volley into the top corner. Mackesy said: “With the joy, the walkouts and the celebrations, we are not sacrificing the quality of football on the pitch. They [the players] are hyper-focused on winning this tournament … It shows you can do both [and] let the fans experience these players in a different way.”Fans may hope to see some of the free-flowing, attacking football from this event in their 11-a-side seasons, and it is surely more enjoyable for players than sitting in a low block hoping for a draw. The technology entrepreneur Julie Uhrman, who co-founded the Los Angeles-based NWSL club Angel City, said: “There’s pressure to win an 11-a-side game, so you tighten up, and so [here] they’re being able to play more freely and we are seeing the results of that. Why would you not take that back into the 11s game and say ‘I play better when I’m free’?”

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Plenty of women watch the men’s tournament but are yet to translate fandom to the women’s game – will that change this summer?The NWSL’s 14th regular season wrapped up match week 10 of 27 over the weekend, officially commencing a month-long break to honor the terms of their collective bargaining agreement (which stipulates a week-long intermission during the season) and a pause from play for the opening phase of the men’s World Cup.So, how will the World Cup break affect the NWSL? And could it provide a boost to the league?With the first 48-team, three-country men’s tournament just eight days away, the USWNT center-back Tierna Davidson joked on a recent podcast episode: “Well listen, it’s going to affect this summer in terms of traffic. I do know that.”Beyond traffic, the NWSL announced the prolonged pause last summer due in part to expected logistical challenges in host cities. Per a league announcement: “With seven of the league’s 16 markets hosting World Cup programming, the NWSL is proactively adjusting its scheduling framework to accommodate expected stadium demands.”Before the 2026 season NWSL commissioner, Jessica Berman, acknowledged the logistical headache to Sports Business Journal, saying: “We’re making lemonade out of lemons. Obviously, it wouldn’t be our choice to not have access to our venues. It’s challenging operationally and logistically … That said, there’s an opportunity.”During the World Cup break and throughout the summer, the NWSL (which remains home to the majority of the four-time world champions’ roster, including 22 of 26 players in Emma Hayes’s most recent squad, accounting for injuries and the momentous return of the former Lyon midfielder Lindsey Heaps) hopes to capture a new audience while the eyes of the football world rest their gaze upon the US.Berman said: “Our specific focus for the 2026 season is to make sure that our games are in front of and our product are in front of people who love elite soccer, agnostic to whether it is men or women, knowing that the NWSL is the best league in the world.”Berman’s belief in the allure of women’s football for the agnostic football watcher is wise; despite historical marketing strategies that focused only on women, or at times perhaps over-emphasized the “inspire young girls” angle, research over the past decade indicates that viewership for the Women’s World Cup, and women’s sports in general, either reflects an even split by gender or can skew male.For example, a YouGov survey from the 2023 Women’s World Cup reported that men were two to three times more likely to be following the tournament than their female counterparts, depending on the country. More recently, as ESPN moved to replace its Sunday night baseball series with this year’s Women’s Sports Sundays highlighting the WNBA and NWSL, ESPN vice-president of women’s sports programming Susie Piotrkowski said in a podcast: “I think that there was a perception historically that only women were watching women’s sports. Actually, it couldn’t be more wrong.”While noting an even split in their social media engagement and historical trend of a mature male audience, Piotrkowski said: “We’re seeing growth in almost every category. Growth among women, growth among men 18 to 34.” Similarly, while male football fans can be captured by the allure of the NWSL’s entertainment this summer, plenty of women watch the men’s World Cup but have yet to translate their fandom to the NWSL.To capture the potential amid this summer’s pandemonium, the NWSL plans to resume the regular season on 3 July rather than await the grand finale 19 July. Their return to play coincides with the final gasps of the round of 32, just as the tournament starts to take a breath with less crowded match days and gaps between games. With time and interest piqued, the NWSL hopes that newly converted football enthusiasts and longtime fanatics alike will add the NWSL to their daily diet.To help pique their interest, last week the NWSL announced its official Summer of Soccer program. The initiative is highlighted by a country-wide branded bus tour that will bring enticing NWSL matches (including the 2026 Challenge Cup taking place on 26 June between the reigning champions Gotham and the reigning Shield winners Kansas City) and fan engagement activities to cities that have, or soon will have, an NWSL team. Knowing fans of the game will be caught in the summer’s groundswell beyond the 2026 hosts, the traveling NWSL exhibition plans to stop in Fifa host locations of New York, Los Angeles, Seattle and Kansas City, as well as NWSL cities such as Portland, Denver and Columbus, who’ll be the league’s 18th team in the 2028 season.With the tour scheduled to start in Columbus, the traveling NWSL show plans to stop at a fanfest, aim to be onsite for Lindsey Heaps’s debut in Denver, then traverse the west coast before finishing in the New York/New Jersey area. In New York, the NWSL is hoping to set an attendance record for women’s sports in NYC as it hosts the Queen’s Classic at Citi Field, marking the first women’s sporting event at the stadium featuring a rematch of the 2025 NWSL Championship between Gotham and the Washington Spirit. They’ll also have a presence at the World Cup final on 19 July.If you have any questions or comments about any of our newsletters please email moving.goalposts@theguardian.com.This is an extract from our free email about women’s football, Moving the Goalposts. To get the full edition, visit this page and follow the instructions. Moving the Goalposts will be sent out once a week, on Wednesdays, in the close season but will be back on Tuesdays and Thursdays from September.

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‘Right now, I’m a Manchester United player’ says strikerToone back in England camp after injury absencesElla Toone has said she will have to decide “what’s best for me” as she weighs up her long-term future with one year remaining on her Manchester United contract.The England midfielder, speaking before Friday’s crucial Women’s World Cup qualifier in Spain, was asked about her club future and implied she would hold discussions with United this summer.“I have a year left,” she said. “Obviously it’s now time to talk. I just know I have got to make a decision on what’s best for me. I’m at England right now and focusing on two big games coming up – Spain and Ukraine. Then I’ve got a summer off; I’m getting married and going on a hen do. I’m going to enjoy these things. And then I’m going to get my head screwed on, work hard in pre-season and go from there. Right now, I’m a Manchester United player.”Toone has played for United for eight years and is a lifelong fan. This season the club finished fourth in the Women’s Super League, outside the European places, and reached the League Cup final and the Champions League quarter-finals. Reflecting on their campaign, she said: “We had a very good run in the Champions League, for our first time being in it as well. We should be really proud of how far we went in that competition. Then on the other side, we want to be winning trophies, we want to be competing for the league, and I feel like there were parts of this season where we dropped points that we probably shouldn’t have, so there’s a lot to work on.”The 26-year-old is thrilled to be back to match fitness and back in the England squad, after missing the previous two international camps because of a stress fracture in a hip. The two-time European Championship winner has not played for her country since November because of the injury and missed all of United’s January, February and March fixtures before returning to the squad for the draw with Tottenham on 26 April.She said her time on the sidelines had been tough. “I’ve driven my family up the wall with not being able to play for such a long time,” she said, adding that lessons had been learned.“I’m not 18 any more and my body has been through a lot and has been through a lot of games and tournaments every other summer,” she said. “There were loads of games this season with Manchester United as we were in the Champions League for the first time. I don’t think we’ve ever played that many games in a season before. I’ve definitely learned this time around that I have to look after my body much better than I have been doing over previous years.”A draw or win against Spain in Mallorca would guarantee England qualification for next summer’s World Cup in Brazil but defeat could leave them facing a lengthy playoff process this year.

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Suzy Wrack is joined by Tom Garry, Emily Keogh and Ameé Ruszkai to discuss Manchester City’s FA Cup triumph, England’s huge qualifier against Spain and Jill Scott’s epic Sport Relief challenge.On today’s pod: Manchester City complete a historic domestic double after a commanding 4-0 win over Brighton in the Women’s FA Cup final at Wembley.The panel discuss City’s ruthless performance, Bunny Shaw’s starring role after signing a new long-term contract and whether Andrée Jeglertz’s side can now build a period of dominance with Champions League football returning next season.Meanwhile, Brighton fall short in their first major final but continue to earn plaudits for their progress under Dario Vidosic. The panel ask what they need in the summer to turn cup runs into consistent top-end WSL contention.Attention then turns to the international break as England prepare for another huge meeting with Spain in Mallorca. The panel preview the decisive World Cup qualifier, discuss Leah Williamson’s injury absence and ask whether Sarina Wiegman’s side can finish top of the group.Plus: Tom reports back from the latest World Sevens tournament, and Jill Scott joins the pod to talk about her extraordinary 400-mile Sport Relief challenge from Wembley to Sunderland.

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Club slashed team budget despite near-promotionHead coach quit after decision players called ‘cold’Plymouth Argyle have said they “did not take lightly” their decision to significantly reduce their women’s team’s budget and tell the squad via email that their contracts were not being renewed.The Guardian reported on Sunday evening that the vast majority of the squad had received a letter, via email, which began abruptly with: “Hi all. Following our end-of-season review and planning for 2026-27, we wanted to let you know that we won’t be renewing contracts for the players included in this message.”Plymouth, who compete in the third tier of the English women’s pyramid and narrowly missed out on promotion to Women’s Super League 2 in May, said in a statement on Monday evening that they “recognise concerns regarding the way this news was communicated, internally and externally, and will review this”, after the players issued a joint statement condemning the email as “cold, impersonal and lacking empathy”.Commenting publicly on the matter for the first time, Plymouth said: “The football club has had to make some very tough decisions regarding the Argyle Women’s team.“We remain committed to women’s football, and we will work on and share our visions for next season, and beyond. After a lengthy, thorough review, we made the decision that, from next season, we would need to change our approach as regards the women’s team setup. Last season, to get to a cup final and to a playoff game, was a superb achievement, but it came at a cost; a higher financial cost than we had previously thought.“Had we achieved promotion to the WSL2, with a great deal of central funding to assist us, we would have been able to continue our backing at similar levels.“However, in tier three, taking into account some of the proposed administrative changes to the governance of women’s football in this country, and in light of the financial state of the football club overall, we made the difficult decision to not renew any of the players’ contracts for next season. This was not taken lightly. It was done with a view to sustainability, and with the club’s long-term interests in mind.”As well as confirming they would remain in the Women’s National League South, the club’s statement also confirmed that the reason the former Chelsea and Manchester City goalkeeper Marie Hourihan resigned as head coach on 28 May was she had learned of this planned decrease in the budget: “We informed head coach Marie Hourihan of our decision, at which point she made the decision to step down.”Plymouth reached 4 May’s playoff decider for a place in WSL2 but lost 1-0 to Wolves, who were promoted.

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Left-back signs deal to 2029 with option for further yearIreland international grew up as a Chelsea fanChelsea have announced the signing of the left-back Katie McCabe, whose Arsenal contract expires on 1 July. The 30-year-old Republic of Ireland captain last month announced her Arsenal exit after 11 years and has signed a three-year deal with their London rivals, with the option for an additional year.McCabe was recently named in the Women’s Super League team of the season and in February added the Fifa Champions Cup to her collection of trophies at Arsenal, having also won the Champions League, FA Cup, WSL and three League Cup titles. She made 305 appearances and scored 36 goals for the club.It is understood the decision to leave Arsenal was emotional and difficult one for McCabe but that she felt the time was right for a new challenge and was impressed with the value Chelsea saw in her.McCabe, who grew up a Chelsea fan and idolised her compatriot Damien Duff, said: “It’s a new chapter in my career. This is something that I feel I’m ready for right now. I’m really excited to get going and show the Chelsea fans how ready I am to perform for the badge.“I’m so looking forward to walking out at Stamford Bridge as a home player, being around the fanbase and competing for trophies on all fronts. This club has been successful for so many years. I want to keep pushing and driving that, and for me, it’s about bringing that success back to Chelsea.”McCabe, who has 105 Ireland caps and has been their captain since 2017, said she was impressed in her conversations with the club’s head coach, Sonia Bompastor.“‘Having had talks with Sonia and the club, I really got to grips with their ambitions, how they want to drive it and the direction they want to go in,” she said.

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Plymouth chief executive calls move ‘difficult decision’Players included in email will not have contract renewedPlymouth Argyle have told the vast majority of their women’s first-team players their contracts will not be renewed this summer, the Guardian has learned, just weeks after they narrowly missed out on promotion to Women’s Super League 2.In an email sent to almost all of the senior squad, Plymouth’s chief executive, Paul Berne, explained that the “difficult decision” to let the players go reflected “the direction of the squad for next season” and went on to thank them and offer them job references.According to multiple sources, the club’s decision to let so many players go is primarily a financial one, coming amid plans to significantly reduce the women’s team’s playing budget in the summer. Plymouth were contacted for a comment in response on Sunday morning.The news follows the resignation of the team’s head coach, Marie Hourihan, on 28 May, and it is believed that the club’s budget cuts were a contributing factor towards her decision to resign. The coach was understood to be popular with the players and the supporters.Berne’s email said: “Hi all. Following our end-of-season review and planning for 2026-27, we wanted to let you know that we won’t be renewing contracts for the players included in this message.”The email went on to say the decision was “not a lack of appreciation for the effort, commitment and professionalism you’ve shown” and expressed the club’s “gratitude for the time you’ve given Argyle”, before offering support to find new opportunities and wishing the players “all the very best moving forward”.In a joint statement released on Sunday evening, Plymouth’s players said: “Following the decision from the board to significantly reduce the team’s budget, and the understandable resignation of our manager, nearly all players have been informed via an email from the club that they will be released at the end of our contracts next month.“The decision was communicated through a cold, impersonal email, providing us with no opportunity for open, honest or meaningful dialogue and preventing us from gaining clarity on the situation. We feel the staff and players who have given everything for the badge this season should have been treated with greater care, respect and empathy.”In a statement on 28 May, the former Brighton, Chelsea and Manchester City goalkeeper Hourihan said “thank you to the senior leadership of Plymouth Argyle for this opportunity” to coach the team throughout the 2025-26 season but also added: “Now is the right time for me to consolidate and consider what is next for me. This has not been a decision I have taken lightly.”Plymouth finished second in the Southern section of the FA Women’s National League this term, missing out on automatic promotion by just one point, behind the champions Watford, who were promoted. Hourihan oversaw an impressive 16 wins in 22 league fixtures, to finish above clubs including Bournemouth and the former WSL2 sides Oxford United and Lewes in the table.Finishing second saw Plymouth contest 4 May’s playoff decider against the Northern division runners-up, Wolverhampton Wanderers, who went on to secure a slender 1-0 win over Argyle in Burton, in a game in which Plymouth created several fine chances before hitting the woodwork late on.The vast majority of the squad were understood to be on one-year contracts – as is commonplace across the lower leagues in the women’s game – but it was a shock for the players to learn that they were being let go this summer. Another source close to the squad described the news as “heartbreaking” and said there was now relatively little time to find a new team.

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Striker was going to leave club before U-turn‘I’m very impressed how she handled that’The Manchester City head coach, Andrée Jeglertz, heaped praise on his side’s prolific striker Khadija Shaw for not allowing speculation about her future to hinder her performances, after she continued her fine ­goalscoring form with the opening goal at Wembley to help her side complete the Double by lifting the Women’s FA Cup.The Jamaica striker, who signed a four-year contract on Monday after previously being set to leave City this summer, has scored relentlessly in recent weeks, including the winning goal in their Cup quarter-final in April as well as the winner in their semi-final at Chelsea in May, before nodding in from an Alex Greenwood cross for the first goal in Sunday’s 4-0 victory over Brighton.“I’m very impressed how she handled that,” Jeglertz said, when asked about Shaw’s continued form amid the recent flurry of stories about her contract situation, with the 29-year-old having been heavily linked with Chelsea since March. “She has never shown any kind of mood that has affected her performance.“Of course, she is a person, like everybody else, so of course, she will know about all the writing, she knows about that, but at the same time she has been so professional all the time, always performed and always been a positive person. So, no matter what, I haven’t seen or noticed any kind of challenges for her.”Shaw performed a dramatic U-turn to stay at City after multiple sources had indicated in early May that she had decided to leave. Speaking to the Guardian after Sunday’s victory, the City defender Rebecca Knaak applauded Shaw, adding: “Massive respect to Bunny. It’s not been easy for her.“There’s been a lot of noise in the background. It’s quite hard as a player to still focus then, and that’s exactly what she did. She’s always turned up in all the games for us. She’s so important for us and I’m just incredibly happy that she’s staying, and the way she delivered, it’s exactly why we need her.”A striker of Shaw’s clinical nature is exactly what Brighton appeared to be missing, in a game where the Sussex side had a greater share of the possession and 12 efforts at goal to City’s 14, but eventually ended up on the wrong end of a heavy scoreline.Asked what his team will need to progress to the next level, the Brighton head coach Dario Vidosic, who was proud of his side’s “bravery” on the ball, said: “I’ll review the whole season and hopefully, we’ll see how we go in the summer, in terms of players that could potentially be coming to the club. We want to keep taking these steps [forward].“We can gain a lot of confidence now, not just from today, but also from the previous weeks, with what we’ve been able to do against some really, really good teams, so it fills us with a lot of confidence.“This will hurt for a little while, but hopefully we can use that motivation and that fire for next season, starting in pre-season.”Brighton were in their first Wembley final and finished seventh in the Women’s Super League.After a strong campaign where they knocked Arsenal out of the Cup, Brighton will now also want to keep hold of their top players, and Vidosic added: “To build, you need to have that core together, so they can keep working, keep learning and keep growing together.“I think it is important that we keep as many as we can together. And then we just start to bring in some other areas that we’ll look to strengthen in.“The club has started [this ­summer’s recruitment], so there are a couple [of signings] that will be hopefully be announced relatively soon. I’m sure it’ll be a fairly busy summer again.”

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A ruthless Manchester City won the Women’s FA Cup for a fourth time and completed the Double as they eventually coasted to a 4-0 win over Brighton, as Khadija Shaw celebrated signing her new contract with a Wembley goal.Shaw and her City teammates provided Brighton with a harsh lesson on the importance of taking your chances in a final, with Albion having looked the stronger side for large parts of the game but having lacked the clinical edge in the final third that the league champions demonstrated after riding out some pressure.Shaw, who had been expected to leave the club this summer on a free transfer before performing a dramatic U-turn to sign a lucrative new contract on Monday, nodded her team in front at Wembley, before Alex Greenwood’s fine free-kick, Aoba Fujino’s deflected effort and Vivianne Miedema’s angled header enabled City to lift the cup for the first time since 2020, and for the first time with spectators permitted inside the stadium for seven years, as their most recent FA Cup triumph had been staged behind closed doors.Added to their first Women’s Super League title in a decade, the victory completed a memorable season for Andrée Jeglertz and his confident team, albeit the scoreline will have confused anybody who only watched the opening half an hour.Brighton, who were playing in their first Wembley final and were seeking to win their entire club’s first major silverware, spurned good early opportunities for Fran Kirby and Kiko Seike, and City took the lead against the run of play, courtesy of the first genuine moment of quality they had produced in the match.Greenwood’s dangerous cross from the left, sent deep towards the far post, seemed to hang in the air momentarily and was perfectly placed for Shaw, who outjumped Chiamaka Nnadozie and nodded in. Brighton momentarily appealed for a foul on the goalkeeper but replays showed Shaw’s leap had been a fair one and Nnadozie had simply been beaten in the air.Greenwood’s reliable left foot was key to the second goal too, moment before the half-time whistle. Everybody in Brighton’s wall looked to be expectingthe right-footer Kerolin to take the free-kick but Greenwood caught them, and Nnadozie, by surprise as she whipped her effort into the other corner. It was the City captain’s first goal for more than two years.Shaw nearly had a second late in the game but her fierce, rising strike was touched over the bar by Nnadozie. Jade Rose then looped a volley over, from a Shaw cross, at the second phase after a corner, before Shaw was given a well-earned rest and substituted amid warm applause. She was replaced by a City fans’ favourite in Laura Coombs, who made her final appearance before retirement.With their four titles, City are the fifth most successful club in Women’s FA Cup history, behind only Chelsea, Doncaster Belles (both six titles), Southampton Women’s FC’s eight cup wins and the record 14-time winners, Arsenal. All four of City’s wins have come since 2017.