Chelsea manager Emma Hayes called relationships amongst players on the same team “inappropriate” on Thursday due to the challenges that come with managing such relationships.
She also acknowledged, however, that “we’re dealing with human beings.”
The comments came after Hayes was asked about player safeguards following reports in British media that Leicester women’s manager Willie Kirk is being investigated for a player-coach relationship.
"We have to have safeguarding, make sure that's it's accessible for each and every club to protect players," Hayes said. "Player-coach relationships, they're inappropriate, player-to-player relationships are inappropriate.
"But we have to look at it in the context of where the game has come from and say, 'Look, we're in a professional era now' where the expectations in place for players and coaches is such that all of our focus and attention has got to be on having the top standards."
Hayes noted that relationships between players can be difficult to navigate for a coach.
"One player's in the team, one's not in the team, one might be in the last year of their contract, one might not be," Hayes said. "We all know, those of us that have been in the women's game for a long period of time, those things have been happening in dressing rooms. Longer term, it would be ideal ... where you don't have to deal with that.
"We're dealing with human beings. We do talk about it internally."
It’s also important to consider the historical context of the women’s game, with Hayes saying that it can be challenging to move to a more professional game.
"Women's football as we know has been a very amateur game for a long period of time, so -- and I say this around player-to-player relationships as well -- there's challenges that we're moving to a point where we should be moving past those places," Hayes said.
