Chelsea become first WSL club to launch fertility and maternity support for players

Chelsea have established themselves as pioneers in women's football once again, this time moving beyond on-pitch innovation to reshape how elite clubs support their female athletes' personal lives. The Blues have now become the first team in the Women's Super League to introduce comprehensive fertility and maternity policies, enabling their players to pursue motherhood on their own terms without sacrificing their careers.

The club's commitment to women's health extends back further than many realise. Chelsea made history in February 2020 when manager Emma Hayes introduced menstrual cycle tracking across the squad—a first for any professional football club globally—to understand how hormonal fluctuations influence athletic performance. This latest announcement represents the natural evolution of that groundbreaking approach.

Working in partnership with Fertility Plus, one of London's leading fertility clinics, Chelsea has established a Player Value in Kind Fund accessible to all squad members. The fund covers egg freezing, IVF treatment, cervical screening, contraceptive options, and counselling alongside educational workshops designed to empower players with knowledge about their reproductive choices.

The support is entirely voluntary. Players can engage with the resources in whatever way suits their individual circumstances, with full backing from the club's medical and coaching staff.

Chelsea's Player Maternity Policy, officially announced on 18 September 2026, extends far beyond basic leave entitlements. The framework includes fully paid maternity leave, tailored pregnancy and post-partum recovery programmes, dedicated return-to-play medical oversight, private scanning and delivery options, ongoing post-natal care, subsidised childcare arrangements, and financial assistance for a partner or nanny to accompany players to away matches for up to twelve months following their competitive return.

Head coach Sonia Bompastor, speaking exclusively to Sky Sports, articulated the philosophy underpinning these changes.

As a club, it's always been really important for us to support our players the best way possible. We want to be a club who always supports the players to have more knowledge around different opportunities... it's more for them to be able to make a choice and a decision about what they want for them.

Bompastor emphasised that no two players' journeys are identical.

Every player is different, every individual is different, they have a different journey and you can make a choice based on what you know and what is available for you. You don't have to choose anymore between your professional career and your personal life being a mum. Now, both are possible.

Carly Telford, the club's former goalkeeper and current commercial manager for the women's team, has been instrumental in developing the partnership with Fertility Plus. Her insider perspective—combining lived experience as a professional athlete with her current role—shaped a collaboration that goes well beyond surface-level support.

Speaking exclusively to Sky Sports, Telford explained her vision:

I've seen first-hand the kind of experiences that women, girls and athletes have when it comes to making choices around fertility and I wanted us to be a leading club in that. I wanted to find someone that understood us as athletes first, but also understood us as women and what that comes with.

Rather than settling for a narrow offering, Telford pushed for comprehensive care.

I wanted to find a fertility clinic that offered more than just egg freezing and more than just optional things, but to give choices around hormones, endometriosis, cycle tracking, testing - something all-encompassing around the female body. Then what the players do with that is completely up to the individual.

Telford stressed the broader significance of treating players as whole people.

It brings comfort and a thought process that we as a club are looking at them differently and are treating them as people as well as footballers. They will give their whole bodies to this club for the amount of time they're with us and it's an extra option for them to think about themselves.

She believes this approach should become standard across professional women's sport.

It's an important thing to have that every club should be looking at, the league should be looking at, the FA should be looking at in terms of making sure that women have a choice when it comes to their whole body and what that looks like during and after their careers.

Bompastor's own journey shaped her commitment

Bompastor's personal experience as a mother of four—with partner and Chelsea assistant coach Camille Abily—informs her determination to give her players options she did not have. During her own playing career, the landscape looked vastly different.

When I reflect on my own story and experience, I didn't really have the choice. I wanted to have a really good career as a player and I decided to carry on and to finish maybe a little bit earlier than what I should have done because I also wanted to become a mum and have a family.

The constraints she faced were both practical and psychological.

With the knowledge I had in that moment and everything that was available for me, I thought it was almost the only way for me to do that, because when we talk about becoming a mum when you are still an athlete, there are lot of questions to answer. It's about the pregnancy, but also everything after that. How can you look after your kid when you are an athlete and you play at the highest level? All these things were really difficult questions for me and I didn't have all the answers.

Now, she sees her role differently.

Now, to have a club who is able to support the players, bringing them the knowledge, allowing them to talk about that subject is really important for us and giving them different opportunities to become a mum when they decide to. I'm really proud to be the head coach at Chelsea and to offer that opportunity to the players.

How players have responded

While no Chelsea players have publicly stated their intention to use the new resources—a privacy that should remain inviolable—early feedback has been overwhelmingly positive. Telford, who maintains close friendships with squad members from her playing days, consulted informally with several athletes before the official announcement.

We touched base with some of the players and I'm lucky enough to be friends with a lot of them, so I leant on a few of them just to see what they felt about what this would look like for them. A lot of the feedback was 'this would be really good, keep us across it'.

Once the Fertility Plus partnership became imminent, the club's leadership group was briefed and subsequently informed the full squad.

As soon as we knew the deal with Fertility Plus deal was close, we informed the leadership group who then informed the team and since then, we've had a lot of good feedback. The players are feeling very comfortable with it and then how they act upon that based on their own individual needs.

Confidentiality remains paramount.

Any information will confidentially be shared amongst the doctors at Fertility Plus and the doctors within the club and it will stay like that.

Chelsea's experience with pregnant players in recent years informed the development of these policies. Midfielder Melanie Leupolz gave birth in 2022 and successfully returned to competitive football for the club. Goalkeeper Zecira Musovic relocated to Sweden in June 2025 ahead of giving birth later that year. More recently, former Blues captain Millie Bright announced her pregnancy after retiring from playing earlier in 2026.

These cases prompted reflection within the organisation about how the club could better serve players at different career stages.

The 30-plus-year-olds are probably the last group of women that have had to maybe put those things on hold,

How fertility and maternity support work together

The two programmes function in tandem, offering players a holistic approach to reproductive health and family-building. Whether a player wishes to explore fertility options, manage gynaecological health, or prepare for pregnancy and return to play, the infrastructure now exists to support each pathway.

Bompastor reflected on the reality of combining elite sport with motherhood.

Having a family is something no one can teach you. You just learn to be a mum when you have your first child and even if someone is trying to tell you how you have to deal with the situation, you only learn when you have a baby.

She highlighted the value of peer learning and structured support.

Having the opportunity to have platforms where you have information you can share with different people who already experienced that is already a big thing. Also, giving the support to players after having a baby. They need that because when you are a high-level athlete and you become a mum, those are two full-time jobs and you need that support to be able to do both at your best level.

All these elements are really important for the players to have, but also for them to know there are different opportunities and they are available for them.

A blueprint for women's health beyond football

While the policies are player-focused, Telford hopes Chelsea's prominence in global sport can catalyse broader cultural change around women's health. The club's platform and brand recognition position it to influence thinking across business, sport, and society.

We want to be followed for the things we're doing around the team that have a wider impact when it comes to women in general and that's the impact that our sport has. We're very lucky to play one of the most popular sports in the world and be part of one of the biggest clubs and biggest brands. If we can make businesses, other football clubs and other sports think differently around their women, that is what we want to do.

Telford's vision extends beyond the pitch.

As women, we need to take more control of ourselves and have more viewership of what our bodies are doing, what they look like during womanhood and how that changes in terms of genetics, lifestyle, all these things that impact our bodies. And it's not just the athletes. They take a bigger toll on their bodies because of what they do, but general womanhood and what that looks like for us, that is the thing that I wanted to echo outside of football.

She reflected on knowledge she wished she had possessed during her own career.

I would have loved to have known more about my body for lots of different reasons while I was playing - how I get the best out of it as an athlete, what it's like during menstruation, what it's like in terms of longevity of my cycle and fertility and what that looks like moving forward, the options I then have during my career and what it looks like later on in life and in my career. Now they have that, I am really proud of it.

Her closing sentiment carries weight for the sport's future.

I do hope this sparks a big conversation around what that looks like, not just for the future of women's sport, but for the future of women in general.