Chelsea Football Club Women: Blues rebrand drops ‘outdated and old-fashioned’ Ladies name

Chelsea Ladies have been renamed Chelsea Football Club Women, in what striker Fran Kirby called a “massive step forward” for equality.

Kirby, who plays for England as well as the club, said “ladies” was an “outdated and old-fashioned” term for professional athletes.

As well as the women’s team rebrand, Chelsea today pledged to move away from referring to their male players as their “first” team.

Kirby (below) was dubbed the “Mini Messi” by former England coach Mark Sampson after her goal in the 2-1 win over Mexico in the 2015 World Cup.

She told the Standard: “When you hear the word ‘women’ you think of power, pride and strength. It’s a step forward in the women’s game that will only help other aspects get better.

“Ladies does come across as quite old-fashioned. I think people are moving on from those terms. A lot of the girls in the team are passionate about equality and how we can speak differently compared to how we spoke a few years ago.

“It was quite frowned upon that a lady played football or did a sport. But we work so hard every day on the pitch so we feel we should be respected as the athletes and the strong, powerful women that we are.”

She said she would one day like to see the men’s team renamed Chelsea Football Club Men but added: “We can’t expect to go from zero to 100 — everything needs to be built at a small pace.” The men’s team have been closely watching their female counterparts and regularly text them messages of support, she said.

Kirby, from Reading, started playing football aged five because she wanted to hang around with her older brother James and his friends: “He stopped playing — I think he got sick of me always beating him.”

Chelsea FC Women manager Emma Hayes said the club wants to put women’s football at the “front and centre”.

This season the team clinched the double, winning the FA Women’s Super League (WSL) title and the Women’s FA Cup. They also reached the Champions League semi-final for the first time in their history.

Chelsea also did the double in 2015 and won the Spring Series in 2017.

Vice-captain Gilly Flaherty said: “This is a proud day for us as a team.

“We’re thrilled at winning the double this year, and hope that this change off the field will help us to continue to inspire young girls to get involved in football.”