Sam Kerr, superstar striker for Chelsea and the Australia women’s national soccer team, became the latest player to suffer an ACL injury, with her club making the announcement of the injury on Sunday.

Kerr sustained the injury during the team’s warm weather training camp in Morocco. She is expected to be sidelined “for an extended period,” the Australian national team announced, along with noting that she had ruptured her ACL – which was more than what Chelsea’s announcement had said. Kerr captains the Australian national team, which made it all the way to the semi-finals of last summer’s World Cup.

She has been ruled out of the remainder of the Women’s Super League season and Australia’s AFC Women’s Olympic Qualifiers Round 3 series in February. It’s also likely that she will miss this summer’s Olympics if the Matildas qualify.

“Considering how hard Sam has worked over the past six months to return to play, this news is a devastating blow for everyone,” Australia coach Tony Gustavsson said in a statement.

“With her ability to lead by example, Sam’s guidance and influence on the team is significant and, as a result, this will be an incredible loss for the national team. Our focus now is on ensuring she has all the support she wants and needs to navigate recovery and rehab.”

Since joining Chelsea in 2019, Kerr has scored 99 goals in 128 matches while helping the club to four WSL titles, three FA Cups, two Women’s League Cups and the Women’s Community Shield. She’s also won two WSL Golden Boots during that time frame and was runner-up for the 2023 Ballon d’Or.

She joins a long list of women’s soccer players to have suffered ACL injuries, which includes Chelsea teammate Catarina Macario. Macario, who ruptured her ACL in June of 2022, has yet to return to play.

Other WSL players to have ruptured their ACLs include Arsenal’s Beth Mead, Leah Williamson and Vivianne Miedema, who all missed the World Cup. Canada forward Janine Beckie also missed the World Cup with an ACL injury. Since 2021, at least 87 players from eight of the world’s top women’s soccer leagues have torn ACLs, according to reporting from the Washington Post.

Kerr will be “assessed by a specialist” in the following days before beginning rehabilitation with Chelsea’s medical team.

When Mia Fishel scored the opening goal in her Chelsea debut, it felt like a Hollywood beginning. Fishel has been in the U.S. women’s national team conversation for months, she’s representative of a new wealth of club options for women’s soccer players in the U.S., and she is now proving herself on one of the biggest clubs in the world.

Fishel is a known goal-scorer. She can make connective passes and probing runs in behind the defense, and she can use her height to gain advantage in the air in front of her opponent’s goal. None of those assets are new now that she’s at Chelsea, but with a Women’s Super League contract and a first cap for the USWNT behind her, she appears to have unlocked another level in her game.

Even though she’s just 22 years old, Fishel’s ascension to international prominence has been a long time coming. She’s already played professionally in two leagues after a stellar college career at UCLA, and she has become a fan favorite among U.S. fans. But she’s also taken a path less traveled in the women’s soccer landscape, and it’s taken some time for decision-makers to catch up.

Drafted by her former UCLA coach, Amanda Cromwell, to the Orlando Pride in 2022, Fishel instead opted to join UANL Tigres in Liga MX Femenil. Liga MX Femenil began play in 2017 and has been rising in stature since its inception, but at the time was considered a developing league compared to the NWSL. Fishel dominated in Mexico, becoming the Liga MX Femenil’s top scorer with 47 goals in 64 games and the first foreign player to win the league’s Golden Boot. She won two league titles with Tigres and continued to develop as a young scorer, before making the leap to Chelsea.

“What I did was historic,” she told Goal.com in 2022. “You don’t see U.S. players coming to Mexico. This hasn’t been done yet. The rate at which the league has been growing was very appealing. They’ve only been here for five years or so, and the global media recognition, the passionate fans, playing in [large] stadiums, you just don’t get that in the U.S.”

Fishel’s jump to Liga MX Femenil was prescient, as other well-known internationals begin to follow suit. Spain star and World Cup champion Jenni Hermoso now plays for CF Pachuca, and former France national team player Kheira Hamraoui currently plays for Club America. Fishel’s decision to sign with Chelsea is perhaps an indication that the world of women’s soccer is bending toward the European game, but she’ll long be remembered as a trailblazer in choosing her own path.

Fishel landed at Chelsea this season as an expected backup to Australian superstar Sam Kerr, who missed the team’s WSL opening win over Tottenham on Sunday due to rest.

“For the team to be better, I needed to come in to help Sam Kerr when she doesn’t need to be in the game. That [means] a big role,” Fishel told the Evening Standard prior to the season’s start.

In some ways, it’s poetic that Fishel has joined a Chelsea team headlined by Kerr, whose journey to this point has parallels to that of her understudy.

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Sam Kerr has led Chelesa to four straight Women's Super League titles since joining the team in 2020. (Harriet Lander - Chelsea FC/Getty Images)

Nowadays, it feels like Kerr was always destined to be beloved in London, a trophy winner many times over and a top scorer in a league that grows in prowess with each passing year. But when Kerr officially joined Chelsea at the end of 2019, questions plagued the forward who started her career in Australia and North America, winning the NWSL Golden Boot more than once but failing to walk away from the NWSL with a Shield or a championship win.

Assumptions about athleticism trumping technical ability and how she would fit in with the biggest stars in Europe pervaded the conversations about Kerr. The answer, of course, was that she did just fine, finding an immediate foothold in Emma Hayes’ lineup and now considered one of the best players in the world.

For Fishel, that push for acceptance was delayed when former USWNT head coach Vlatko Andonovski declined to bring her into senior team camp in the run-up to the 2023 World Cup. While it’s impossible to know how a player would have performed within an unfamiliar environment, Andonovski’s decision was even more baffling because Fishel seems like exactly the type of player who would have thrived in his system.

Fishel has the ability to play target forward, and her first goal for Chelsea came courtesy of a towering header. But she can also slip back into the attacking midfield, and her ability to contribute to build-up play is the type of skill set Andonovski seemed to want out of Chelsea teammate Catarina Macario and U.S. veteran Alex Morgan. When it became clear that Macario would miss the World Cup due to injury, Andonovski’s stubbornness toward Fishel felt more like coaching dysfunction than objective evaluation of what she could possibly bring to the team.

After the USWNT parted ways with Andonovski following a disappointing World Cup result, Fishel was one of the first players brought into the fold for their September friendlies, earning her first cap in Megan Rapinoe’s final match. While the U.S. won’t have a new permanent manager until December, Fishel’s call-up could be perceived as a quick direction shift from Andonovski’s vision, rewarding the patience of a player who has done everything possible to earn an opportunity.

The next question for Fishel is how many minutes she’ll get for Chelsea consistently once Kerr returns to the starting lineup, but in just one appearance, she’s made herself difficult to drop. As long as she keeps performing at the highest levels, her time on the periphery of the USWNT should finally be over.

Claire Watkins is a Staff Writer at Just Women’s Sports. Follow her on Twitter @ScoutRipley.

Mia Fishel’s first game with Chelsea got off to an impactful start.

Fishel, who signed with the legendary English club in August from Liga MX, made her debut — in the starting lineup — for Sunday’s match against Tottenham. Then, in the 28th minute, she made her presence felt.

The forward headed in a cross from about 10 yards out, giving Chelsea the opening goal in the Women’s Super League contest on the opening day of competition for the 2023-24 season.

Fishel screamed in celebration and was mobbed by her teammates as the Chelsea fans erupted. Chelsea went on to take a 2-1 victory.

Fishel, 22, signed with Chelsea after a successful run with Tigres UANL of Liga MX Femenil, the highest division of women’s soccer in Mexico.

She had long been a mainstay on the U.S. youth national team and made her debut for the senior team during the Sept. 24 friendly match against South Africa. Fishel entered in the 65th minute of what turned into a 2-0 victory for the USWNT.

American forward Mia Fishel is set to join Chelsea, marking the latest high-profile move for the Women’s Super League club this offseason.

The two sides are finalizing contract details, according to The Athletic, and Chelsea reportedly paid a $260,000 transfer fee for the Tigres star.

That figure is among the highest transfer fees in the world. Chelsea paid over £250,000 for Denmark forward Pernille Harder in 2020 — considered a record in women’s soccer a the time — and over £200,000 for England star Lauren James in 2021.

Fishel will join Chelsea from Tigres in Liga MX Femenil, after forgoing the NWSL to sign with the club in 2022. The UCLA product was drafted fifth overall by the Orlando Pride in the 2022 draft. At the time, Fisihel said she thought she deserved “to be in a place where I would be appreciated and seen.”

“What I did was historic,” the 22-year-old told GOAL last year. “You don’t see U.S. players coming to Mexico. The rate at which the league has been growing was also very appealing. They’ve only been here for five years or so and the global media recognition, the passionate fans, playing in [large] stadiums, you just don’t get that in the U.S.”

With Tigres in 2022, Fishel scored 17 goals in 17 games to win the league’s Golden Boot award while also capturing a championship with the team. Despite her success as a rookie in Mexico, Fishel has yet to get a look from USWNT head coach Vlatko Andonovski as the team prepares to kick off the 2023 World Cup.

“Mia is a very good young player, we are very familiar with her qualities,” Andonovski said in January. “But as of right now, after looking at everything, we decided the forwards that we have in camp are going to give us the best chance to be successful.”

The coach added that where Fishel plays has nothing to do with her chances of making the U.S. roster.

“It doesn’t matter where she plays,” Andonovski said. “It matters what she does, but also what she does in comparison with the other players that she is competing with for spots.

“We analyze every goal she scores, the difficulty of the goals, the players that are around compared to the players we have up. We try and see how they will fit on the team that we have. I have to say that there are other Americans that have scored as many or close to as many goals in the same league or even outside of the league.”

Fishel’s move to Chelsea would put her in direct competition for playing time with superstar Sam Kerr. But she’ll have the opportunity to play alongside world-class players like fellow American Catarina Macario and Fran Kirby, and against some of the world’s best in both the WSL and Champions League.

Catarina Macario has a “strong chance” of leaving Olympique Lyonnais this summer, ATA Football reported Monday.

The U.S. women’s national team star joined the French club in 2021 on a 2.5-year deal, which will expire in summer 2023. Several top European clubs have expressed interest in signing the 23-year-old midfielder, including Spain’s FC Barcelona and Germany’s FC Bayern Munich.

Contract talks with Lyon were put on pause as U.S. businessman John Textor took ownership, ATA Football reported, but the team plans to make its own bid to retain the star.

Macario helped lead Lyon to the Champions League title in May, scoring nine goals throughout the competition and one in the final against Barcelona. But she was sidelined by an ACL tear in June in a league match that held no stakes — Lyon already had clinched the Division 1 Féminine title.

As a result of the injury, she missed the USWNT’s Concacaf W Championship title run, and the team missed her during a three-match losing streak late in the year. She is slated to return in February, coach Vlatko Andonovski said in October.

“Obviously, if I can start playing some games and be 100 percent for the Champions League at the end of March,” that would be the best-case scenario, Macario said in October. “I would like to start ramping it up in February and March and just go from there and hope for the best.”

North Carolina Courage star Debinha could leave the NWSL this offseason to sign with a European club, ATA Football reported Monday.

The 31-year-old forward has played for the Courage since 2017. She was nominated for league MVP this year after scoring 12 goals in 18 matches, third-most in the NWSL, including a hat trick on Sept. 24.

But the Brazilian enters the offseason as a free agent.

Debinha has garnered interest from Women’s Super League club Arsenal, who is looking for a boost after ACL injuries to Beth Mead and Vivianne Miedema depleted the Gunners’ forward line, ATA Football reported.

Arsenal isn’t the only team looking to add Debinha, who helped lead Brazil to its fourth straight Copa América Femenina title in July. European powers Manchester United, Barcelona and Paris Saint-Germain also are interested, as are several NWSL clubs, ATA Football reported.

Debinha spent the early years of her career with Brazilian clubs, though she played for Norway’s Avaldsnes IL from 2013-15 and then for China’s Dalian Quanjian in 2016 before she joined the NWSL in 2017.

She won NWSL titles with the Courage in 2018 and 2019, and she was named the MVP of the championship match in 2019. She was named MVP of the preseason Challenge Cup tournament in 2021 and 2022.

Vivianne Miedema has ruptured her ACL, she announced Monday, adding her name to the growing list of top-tier players who have torn knee ligaments.

“Absolutely gutted to share I’ve ruptured my ACL in our last game against Lyon,” Miedema wrote. “It was one of those moments where I knew straight away.”

The striker, who stars for Arsenal and for the Dutch women’s national team, did not provide a firm timeline for her recovery. But she said it would be “a long time” before she would return to the pitch, and she ruled herself out for the 2023 World Cup.

“I won’t be able to help my team anymore this season, no World Cup, surgery and rehab for a long time,” she continued. “I won’t be telling you I’ll come back stronger or that I’m looking forward to spend the next however many months in the gym.

“It will be tough with plenty of difficult days (plenty of crying, which we’ve had a lot of already), but sadly enough it’s part of football.”

Arsenal said in a statement that Miedema will undergo surgery “in the coming days.”

“[She] will unfortunately be ruled out for an extended period of time. A more detailed timescale will be established once the operation is complete,” the Women’s Super League club said. “Everyone at Arsenal wishes Viv well in her recovery and will be providing her with all the support she needs to return to action as soon as possible.”

Miedema joins her girlfriend and Arsenal teammate Beth Mead on the ACL injury list. Miedema suffered her injury last Thursday during Arsenal’s Champions League match against Lyon and had to be stretchered off the field.

With the Dutch star’s injury, 25 percent of the 2022 Ballon d’Or Féminin nominees are sidelined with ACL injuries, including winner Alexia Putellas. The USWNT has also been hit hard by ACL injuries, with both Catarina Macario and Christen Press sidelined.

Miedema is one of the top strikers in the game, having scored 78 goals in 97 league appearances for Arsenal.

She just recently made her return to the field after taking a break in November. Upon her return, she went on a tear, scoring four goals in four games to help Arsenal to second place in the Women’s Super League standings.

Miedema has been vocal in criticizing the packed playing calendar as a contributing factor in the recent rash of injuries. On Saturday, FIFA announced that it will be adding even more to the women’s calendar, introducing a women’s Club World Cup in 2025.

Vivianne Miedema is on a hot streak, scoring four times in four games to help move Arsenal into second place in the Women’s Super League standings.

In Sunday’s game against Aston Villa, Miedema scored the team’s second goal in a 4-1 win. Arsenal has 24 points on the season, three behind first-place Chelsea.

The Dutch forward also helped Arsenal beat Juventus last Wednesday, scoring the lone goal of the game. That victory moved Arsenal into first place in Group C of the Champions League standings and one win closer to the knockout rounds of the WCL.

Miedema credits her recent barrage to the extended break she took from the sport in November, which included a trip to Australia. Before her sojourn, she had lost her starting spot to teammate Frida Maanum and hadn’t scored in six appearances.

Since her return, the 26-year-old has been vocal about the need for rest — for herself and for all athletes.

Last Tuesday, Miedema spoke once again about her recovery from COVID-19, which kept her out of several matches at this summer’s Euros tournament and in bed for 10 days with a high fever. She returned for the Netherlands’ final game, playing the full 120 minutes.

After the Euros, training for the WSL season began almost immediately. For Miedema, the schedule meant little rest or recovery.

She spent the beginning of the season “almost on autopilot,” she said, before missing the October international window with an illness.

“I just didn’t feel mentally and physically ready to actually play,” she said ahead of Arsenal’s game against Juventus. “I think you could see that in the way that I was playing. I didn’t enjoy my football at that moment. And I think the moment you start not enjoying it, and start waking up in the morning not wanting to go in, I think that’s the moment that you need to make a switch.”

While in Australia, Miedema was able to get herself fit – something she had been unable to do ahead of the season as she recovered from her bout with COVID-19, she said. The game has once again become “easy” for her, she added.

“I feel physically a lot fitter now, and you have seen that in the recent games,” she said.

Miedema hopes that, by prioritizing her health, she can help encourage other players to take breaks. The recent women’s soccer schedule has not allowed for much time off. And an increase in player injuries – particularly torn ACLs – has been a point of concern for many.

Miedema called the injuries a “worrying pattern” in a column for Dutch newspaper AD. Both Leah Williamson and Rafaelle Souza have just returned from injuries for Arsenal.

Meanwhile, Miedema said in her column that her Arsenal teammate and partner Beth Mead likely will miss next summer’s World Cup for England with a torn ACL. Others who have suffered torn ACLs in 2022 include Alexia Putellas, Christen Press and Catarina Macario.

An increase in the number of international windows, leaving club teams with a limited number of players, also has increased player workloads, Miedema said. Women’s national teams have six international windows, while men’s teams play just four.

“As a player you want to play in the big tournaments, the biggest difference is we have more international windows than the men have,” Miedema said. “We also play the Olympics with our A team instead of the U23s. I think that’s something FIFA and UEFA need to start looking at.

“In women’s football, we also don’t have the same sorts of numbers within a squad. Man City’s men’s team probably has 22, 23 full-time, amazing players. This year, I think we’ve got 18,19 players that are capable of being in the squad for us.”

Arsenal manager Jonas Eidevall also has spoken about the issue.

“There is always the balance between freshness and having continuity in the training and playing,” he said in November. “We need to strike that balance.”

The rise in popularity of the women’s game has also shed light on the lack of depth in the player pool. More needs to be done to develop talent and increasing the number of “very good football players,” Eidevall said, including the development of better player academies.

“We cannot only focus on the top of the pyramid,” he continued. “We can have more players that are able to play more games and have a better foundation when they step up to be a professional to handle the demands.”

Women’s soccer continues to break records, with Women’s Super League attendance up 200% compared to last season, per the English Football Association.

A record-breaking total of 47,367 people turned out to watch Arsenal beat Tottenham Hotspur in September. That game was played at Emirates Stadium, building on an exciting summer for the women’s game in which England won its first Euros title.

The UEFA Women’s Euro tournament broke records as well, with 87,192 fans showing up to Wembley Stadium to watch the final.

On the heels of the tournament, the FA saw the opportunity to bring the WSL to new audiences, said Kelly Simmons, the FA director of the women’s professional game.

“The Lionesses’ victory propelled the women’s game in this country to new levels, and it was important for us to capture and capitalize on that momentum,” she said in a statement.

“It has often been said that a successful women’s England team will help generate interest in the domestic game,” she continued. “This is certainly true, and I have been really overwhelmed by the response we have seen from fans — new and old — in the first half of the season.”

Nearly 300,000 fans have showed up to games across the league, according to Simmons.

“This just highlights how much appetite there is for world-class women’s league football,” she said. “We are currently averaging almost 6,000 fans a week in the Barclays Women’s Super League as we go into the final league fixtures of 2022 — which is up over 200% on this time last year.”

Arsenal, Manchester United and Chelsea have all played in their men’s team stadiums this season to large crowds. But second-tier Women’s Championship has also seen increased attendance, up 85 percent over last year.

Chelsea leads the WSL with 24 points through nine matches.

Australian surfer Stephanie Gilmore made history Thursday with a record-breaking eighth world surfing title.

Her last title came in 2018, but she finally surpassed previous record-holder Layne Beachley at the World Surf League finals in California. Beachley congratulated Gilmore, calling her a “f–king legend” in a comment on an Instagram post by surfing magazine Tracks.

Gilmore made her debut in 2007, becoming the only surfer to win a world title in her debut season. Her 33 WSL event wins are the most of any woman surfer.

This year, though, didn’t get off to a strong start for the Australian. The 34-year-old missed the season opener with COVID-19 and earned just one event win throughout the year, and she entered the Rip Curl WSL Finals ranked fifth.

“I really feel like this year emotionally was one of the toughest years,” Gilmore told Olympics.com. “Mentally I had to dig deep on a much gnarlier level than I’ve ever had to before.”

In her opening heat Thursday, Gilmore trailed against world No. 4 Brisa Hennessy but secured the ride she needed to win with less than a minute to go.

She won three heats in a row and then faced defending world champion Carissa Moore in a final surf-off.

Moore had won the previous two titles and entered the finals with the most regular season points after finishing second three times this season, third twice and winning one event.

“Carissa is really the world champ to me this year,” Gilmore said. “She’s had the best season ever. I’m so honored to surf against her in this final.”

Moore was quick to congratulate Gilmore on her title, calling her “the GREATEST of all time!” in an Instagram post.

“An honor to surf against you always,” she wrote. “Congratulations on your 8th title! Wow! 8X!!! Holy moly. Five X 35 min heats in one day with all the pressure and win or die situations…it’s all yours undoubtedly.”

Gilmore appreciated the support she received from Moore and from others after her record-breaking win.

“I had so many of the women on the tour come up to me after this event,” Gilmore said, “and they just all said to me how inspired they were by the fact that I didn’t have the best year, but I was still able to pull through with an incredible, incredible performance in the last event to make it happen and be a world champion. And that made all of them realize that, hey, we can do this.”

She called that moment “really rewarding.”

“I just felt so happy that I was able to give them that confidence because they’re all such incredible athletes and we’re all progressing the sport together,” she said. “And if I can help push that along, not only in my own actions, but to inspire my peers to do the same thing, then job done.”

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(Mark Rightmire/MediaNews Group/Orange County Register via Getty Images)