More teams, huge signings, bigger stages and plenty of reasons to start watching. Here's Milly's guide to this exciting new WSL season.

The WSL is back, and this feels like a particularly good season to start watching. The league has expanded, three clubs have come up, some of the biggest names in the game have arrived in England and clubs are making increasingly serious bets on where women's football is heading.

You do not need to know every player or have watched the league for years. Pick a team, a player or even a creator you like, start there and let the rest follow.

(WSL on BBC)

First, the basics

The 2026/27 Barclays Women's Super League is the biggest version of the competition yet. It has expanded from 12 to 14 clubs, so every team now plays 26 league matches. The top three qualify for the UEFA Women's Champions League, while the new structure also adds more jeopardy at the bottom of the table, with 2 teams up for relegation.

The season started on Friday 4 September with London City Lionesses hosting Manchester United. Every WSL match will be available live across Sky Sports, the BBC or YouTube, which means following the league is easier than it has ever been.

The teams you should know

Manchester City – enter the season as defending champions after ending Chelsea's six-season title run and winning their first WSL title in a decade. They have kept Bunny Shaw too, so there are no complicated predictions here: City should be right in the middle of the title race again.

(Image: Manchester City Women)

Chelsea – remain the benchmark for sustained success. Eight WSL titles tells you most of what you need to know. This season also marks a big shift off the pitch, with all 13 league home games being played at Stamford Bridge for the first time.

Arsenal – the only English club to have won the Women's Champions League, lifting it in 2007 and again in 2025. Their fanbase has become a story in its own right too. Arsenal played all 11 WSL home matches at the Emirates in 2025/26 and drew 371,886 supporters in total - an average of 33,808. All 13 home league games will be there again this season.

Manchester United – an interesting one to watch. They averaged 6,178 across their 11 WSL home games last season, with 24,983 attending the Manchester derby at Old Trafford. Their Arsenal game at Leigh Sports Village drew 8,665, a WSL record for the venue. There is clearly an audience there - the question is, how consistently United can turn that interest into bigger matchdays.

Attendance sources: Women's Football Data Centre, 2025/26 club attendance analysis.

Three promoted clubs, three very different stories

Birmingham City – return as WSL2 champions after four seasons outside the top flight. They are one of the league's original clubs, FA Cup winners in 2012 and former Champions League semi-finalists. There is history here, but this version of Birmingham feels much more focused on what comes next.

(Image: Birmingham City Women)

Crystal Palace – have bounced straight back after relegation in 2024/25. Their season changed completely under Jo Potter, with a late run carrying them into the second automatic promotion place. They have also added last season's WSL2 Golden Boot winner Lexi Lloyd-Smith, which makes them immediately more interesting going forward.

Charlton Athletic – might have the best story of the three. Almost two decades after the club's women's side was disbanded, Charlton are back in the top flight after beating Leicester City on penalties in the new promotion/relegation play-off.

Four players I would make time to watch

Khadija 'Bunny' Shaw – Manchester City – The obvious one, but for good reason. Shaw scored 21 league goals last season, won a third consecutive Golden Boot, and was named WSL Player of the Season. She is the player every defence knows it has to stop, and most still cannot.

Alexia Putellas – London City Lionesses – This is the signing that changes how people look at London City. A two-time Ballon d'Or winner and World Cup champion moving from Barcelona to the WSL is a proper statement. Her debut season in England is already one of the biggest storylines to follow.

Georgia Stanway – Arsenal – Back in England after four years with Bayern Munich, Stanway gives Arsenal bite, experience, and a huge amount of personality in midfield. Arsenal were already close last season. She could be the sort of signing that changes the feel of the title race.

(Instagram: @stanwaygeorgia)

Jess Park – Manchester United – Park looked completely at home in her first season at United, making the WSL Team of the Season after producing 11 combined goals and assists. She plays with the sort of directness that makes you look up when she gets the ball.

Rising stars to get to know early

Layla Drury – Manchester United – At 17, Drury is already United Women's youngest-ever player and goalscorer. She made five WSL appearances last season and signed her first professional contract in July. There is a long way to go, obviously, but she is exactly the kind of player worth following before everyone knows the name.

Smilla Holmberg – Arsenal – The Swedish full-back only arrived in January but made an immediate impact, with two goals and four assists in the second half of the season. She is 19, aggressive going forward, and now has a full WSL campaign ahead of her.

Sacha Lewis – Manchester City – City's 18-year-old academy full-back has just signed her first professional deal after becoming a regular around the first-team setup. With the extra demands of a 26-game league season and European football, this could be the year she starts getting meaningful senior minutes.

(Instagram: @sacha.lewis_)

Lexi Lloyd-Smith – Crystal Palace – A slightly different kind of 'rising star' at 23, but she deserves the label after winning the WSL2 Golden Boot with 11 goals last season. She now gets a first proper chance to demonstrate her finishing at WSL level with Palace.

Who to follow

Some of the best people covering the women's game sit somewhere between journalism, broadcasting, podcasting and creator culture. That mix is part of what makes the coverage feel so accessible.

Upfront – A very easy starting point if you want one weekly podcast that keeps you on top of the WSL, Champions League and Lionesses. Chloe Morgan and Rachel O'Sullivan combine proper analysis with the kind of conversation you would actually have with a friend after a game.

Emily Herbert – A particularly good follow if you are interested in how football journalism actually works. Emily is a commentator and sports journalist working across outlets, including BBC Radio 5 Live, Sky Sports and TNT Sports. Her social content gives you a look behind the scenes at reporting, commentary, press conferences and matchdays.

(Instagram: @emilykateherbert)

Girls on the Ball – Rachel O'Sullivan and Sophie Downey have been covering women's football since 2012 and have built the sort of credibility you only get by actually turning up, travelling and watching a lot of football. Great for fixtures, analysis, interviews and on-the-ground coverage.

Counter Pressed – Flo Lloyd-Hughes and friends offer a more opinionated, funny and slightly chaotic way into the women's game. It is still properly informed, but it never feels like homework.

Nancy Baker – Worth following if you want women's sport beyond just football. Her content moves between football, rugby, fashion, and culture, with matchday access and fan-first explainers that make the sport feel accessible rather than over-serious.

The investment is starting to look very real

One of the biggest changes around the WSL is that clubs are increasingly putting serious infrastructure behind the words about growth.

• Manchester City have opened a £10 million purpose-built first-team facility for their women's side.

• Arsenal will play all 13 home league games at the Emirates again.

• Chelsea are moving every WSL home match to Stamford Bridge for the first time.

• Brighton have gone even further, unveiling plans for a 10,000-capacity purpose-built women's stadium next to the Amex, with a reported cost of around £75-80 million and a target opening of 2030/31.

These investments are long-term bets on demand, fan experience and the idea that women's teams should have environments designed around them rather than simply borrowing whatever space is available.

So, who is actually watching?

Dentsu Sports Analytics' Decoding 360 research gives a useful picture of the WSL fanbase. It is more balanced by gender than some people might assume, and it is particularly strong among people in their twenties, thirties and early forties.

The standout for me is the 25-44 audience. Combined, that is 57% of WSL fans in the Decoding 360 data. For brands, that is a meaningful group of consumers building relationships with clubs, players, media and sponsors, while the league is still shaping what its commercial culture looks like.

There is another useful point here too: women's football is not living in a separate bubble from the rest of sport. The Women's Sport Trust's 2026 More Than a Moment visibility report found that 55% of BWSL viewers also watched the Premier League, up from 43% in 2023/24. This is important as it suggests the league is increasingly becoming part of people's normal sports diet rather than something they only turn to for major women's events.

The same Women's Sport Trust report found that Sky Sports viewing hours for the first 11 gameweeks of the 2025/26 BWSL season were up 30% year on year. More games were available, of course, but people were also spending more time with the coverage. The opportunity now is to turn that increased availability into a habit that lasts across the whole season.

Source: Women's Sport Trust, More Than a Moment / 2025 Visibility Report, published 2026. Broadcast data: BARB.

 

My dark horse: Birmingham City

I am going with Birmingham to cause a stir this season. Not because I think they are about to gatecrash among top teams, but because they feel like the promoted club with the clearest opportunity to build something bigger than a survival story.

They are a founding WSL club, FA Cup winners and former Champions League semi-finalists. They came back up as WSL2 champions, and the wider club has been through a major ownership and investment reset under Knighthead. There is also a useful sense of a circle closing: a club with genuine women's football history trying to establish itself at the top level again.

For brands, that can be more interesting than attaching yourself to a finished success story. There is room to become part of the rebuild, help shape the matchday or community experience and grow alongside the team if they get the next few years right.

Why brands should be paying attention

Talking about women’s football as a future opportunity undersells where the game is today. The audience is already there, clubs are investing and broadcasters are giving it more airtime, with UK TV coverage rising 76% to 697 hours in 2025/26 compared with the previous season (WST Visibility Report 2026). The more useful question is what brands can add to it now.

There is still genuine room to do something distinctive. Matchday experiences, community programmes, player-led storytelling, creator partnerships and digital content can all make sense, but only if they improve the experience for fans rather than treating the league as another place to put a logo.

The brands that do well will probably be the ones that understand the culture forming around the WSL and contribute to it early. That means paying attention to the supporters, the creators, the new stadium behaviours and the stories that exist beyond the biggest clubs.

That is what makes 2026/27 worth watching. The league is bigger, the infrastructure is stronger and the storylines are easy to get into. If you have never properly followed the WSL before, this is a very good place to start.

Pick a team. Pick a player. Follow a couple of people who make the game fun. There is a 26-game season to work out the rest.