Hayes sparks civil war by telling relationships with teammates are inappropriate

Chelsea Women's star Jess Carter has liked a string of social media posts that called her manager Emma Hayes 'beyond bonkers' after the 47-year-old coach criticised player-to-player relationships within women's football teams.

On Thursday, Hayes, who will leave the club at the end of the season, stated she believes that both player-to-player and player-to-coach relationships are 'inappropriate' despite there being several within her own team.

Carter, 26, is going out with her team-mate Ann-Katrin Berger, 33, with the pair having initially met while playing for Birmingham City in 2016 before reuniting in Chelsea three years later where they established their relationship.

Mail Sport understands there is at least one other player-to-player relationship within the Chelsea squad.

Hayes' comments came on the eve of their crunch Women's Super League match against Arsenal on Friday, which could see the Gunners leapfrog the Blues and go top of the table with a victory. Carter is currently her only fit centre back.

But her views sparked a reaction among some online, with Carter liking several posts on X (formerly Twitter) criticising her manager's opinion.

Journalist Beth Fisher wrote: 'Beyond bonkers to bring player-to-player relationships into this conversation in my opinion.'

She also liked a Tweet that said: 'You don’t have to justify what Emma said by the way, it’s a flawed answer no matter how you spin it. There’s a fundamental difference between player-player and player-coach relationships and that’s imbalance of power. She could’ve said anything but that.'

'Anyone aligning coach x player relationships with player x player relationships is fundamentally misunderstanding the power imbalances at play,' reporter Jessy Parker Humprhreys wrote. She added: 'Anyway if I seriously thought player x player relationships were inappropriate, I probably wouldn't have signed the well known girlfriend of my club captain for a world-record fee.'

While Carter and Berger's relationship was initially platonic, they shared an undeniable chemistry and went on a date before their relationship blossomed. The German goalkeeper has also had to overcome two bouts of thyroid cancer since the pair got together - remarkably returning to play for Chelsea just a month for after announcing her cancer had returned in 2022.

Hayes is one of several managers to speak out against player-to-coach relationships this weekend, with Aston Villa manager Carla Ward stating that they 'cross the line'.

Leicester manager Willie Kirk was suspended last week over an alleged relationship with a player in his squad. In February, Sheffield United sacked their Women's team manager Jonathan Morgan after it emerged he had a relationship with a player while at a previous club.

When asked in her press conference on the subject of player-to-coach relationships on Thursday, Hayes said player-to-player partnerships also came with 'challenges'.

‘I think player-coach relationships are inappropriate, player-to-player relationships are inappropriate,' the 47-year-old said.

‘But we have to look at it in the context of where the game has come from and say 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.

‘And that’s why I’ve always been an advocate of making sure clubs have minimum standards, whether it’s code of conduct, player safeguarding, whether it’s player welfare.'

When asked specifically on player relationships, she added: 'I think it’s about just challenges it poses.

‘One player is in the team, one’s not in the team. One might be in the last year of their contract, one might not be. One might be competing in a position with someone else, you don’t need me to spell that out, it presents challenges.

‘I think we all know those of us who have been in the women’s game for a long period of time, those things have been happening in dressing rooms. I think longer term it would be ideal, in an ideal world, where you don’t have to deal with that.

‘It’s quite challenging for coaching teams to have to deal with it. You talk about it from a hierarchal perspective, it doesn’t mean it doesn’t present challenges, it does, I think you have to work an awful lot on how to manage those challenges in the locker room because they are far from ideal.

‘Listen, we’re dealing with human beings, and every office place has different challenges to deal with, that’s one of the challenges I have to deal with in my job, it’s the same things you have to deal with at work, I guess, it’s just I have to manage it and like I said it presents challenges.

‘We do talk about it internally, I think long term, in an ideal world, it’s something we didn’t have to.’