Chelsea celebrate Hayes milestone in style: takeaways from Leicester thrashing

Guro Reiten is a cheat code

Just a few days after being nominated for WSL November Player of the Month, Reiten began her case for the December award just three days into the new month. Reiten collected five goal contributions alone in the first half, adding another four assists to her season tally, which now sits at 13 through the 12 matches. The Norwegian broke the deadlock in the fourth minute to begin the Blues’ goal fest with a world-class left-footed strike, and for the rest of the first 45 minutes, Reiten played creator.

Her curving ball to Kerr for the fifth and final goal of the first half was a thing of beauty, gliding past three Leicester defenders, and putting Kerr in the perfect position to find the bottom left corner. She now has two games this season with four assists, one in the WSL, and one in the Champions League. Reiten has more assists in those two matches combined this season than Kai Havertz has collected in the Premier League in 69 total games over three seasons. What Reiten is doing is unprecedented.

Her vision on top of the execution to make those kinds of passes that she is making in the final third is something this league, and possibly the women’s game has not seen at this consistent rate. With the way Reiten is playing at the moment, there seems to be no defense that she can’t crack with the swing of her left boot. She has accumulated at least one assist in four out of the last six games in all competitions for the Blues. From captaining Norway for the first time to becoming the most undroppable player in the Chelsea starting XI each time out, Reiten has had some remarkable first few months of her 2022/23 campaign both internationally and at the club level.