Aggie Beever-Jones: Chelsea Women

When manager Emma Hayes announced that she would leave Chelsea Women at the end of the 2023/24 WSL season, following 11 years at the helm and 15 trophies won (to date), there was a great deal of sadness but also a recognition that the USWNT job that she would be taking up did not come along every day and that it was something that she could not turn down.

The news of her departure has given Chelsea fresh impetus to perform each week as they try to hand their departing coach the perfect leaving present, with a seventh WSL title and a Champions League crown (the latter of which has eluded Hayes at Kingsmeadow so far) among the list of targets that the club want to accomplish. However, to succeed in all four competitions that they are competing in, squad depth and rotation will be vital, and that is something that Hayes understands well and has always done, with her continually adding new players to her team as she tries to ensure that she can keep players fresh during the entirety of the campaign.

It is not only players from outside the club that have enabled her to do that, though, with there also being academy products involved in the first team and one player who has made her way through the age groups and who has established herself as a first-team regular is Aggie Beever-Jones. The forward has always been slated for a successful career at the top of the game but had to be patient as she was sent out on loan to Bristol City Women and Everton Women during the last two campaigns, with Hayes feeling that she needed minutes and had further development to make before she could become a Chelsea regular.

This season, though, everything has come together for her, and it has been clear that those experiences have aided her improvement; her early performances for her parent club have led many to label her as a star in the making. With that in mind, this tactical analysis will take a closer look at Beever-Jones’ game, identifying why she has been such a good fit for Chelsea’s tactics and highlighting how the WSL’s defending champions have benefitted from having her on the field. The scout report will also detail her versatility and will explain why that will be vital as her career goes on.

Fitting into the Chelsea system

When watching Chelsea play under Hayes, there are two critical tactical concepts that are always in force and which never alter from game to game, and any player who wants to experience longevity in her squad needs to understand those and embrace them in their entirety.

The first is the need for constant movement around the field, with Chelsea’s players never being given fixed positions to occupy and instead encouraged to continuously rotate with each other as they look to cover as much of the pitch as possible.

When watching Aggie Beever-Jones play, it is clear from the outset that this is something that she really thrives at, with her capable of playing in wide areas but also through the middle. This situation highlights the danger that makes her to opposing defensive lines, with her initially positioned on the nearside wing before cutting inside as part of a seamless rotation with summer signing Sjoeke Nüsken.

As a result, she is now in the central channel and is in a position to have a shot at goal, and it is clear to see how she is gesturing to Scotland playmaker Erin Cuthbert to give her the ball and to allow her to test her luck. On this occasion, though, Cuthbert opts not to pass to her and instead spreads the play towards the other side of the pitch, where Sweden winger Johanna Rytting Kaneryd is waiting, but the point still stands that Beever-Jones had given her an option through her movement.

It is also worth noting that Beever-Jones could, at this point, have either started to drift back towards her original position or remonstrated with Cuthbert about her not being used when she was available. Still, she doesn’t do either of those things and instead turns to run between Leicester City Women duo Aileen Whelan and Sophie Howard to head Rytting Kaneryd’s early cross into the back of the net.

Therefore, her confidence in knowing when she is in the correct position to receive the ball is clear to see, but so is her ability to play the long game and always look at the next phase of each attack to keep Chelsea in the ascendency.

It is this that has led to Beever-Jones finding the net on five occasions already this season, but what has also helped her to be so dangerous when inside the final third is her aforementioned versatility, with this graphic indicating how her goals have all come from different areas and angles of the pitch.

In short, she is far from being a one-dimensional attacker. She is, instead, someone who can adapt to different situations and who again works well with teammates to ensure that Chelsea are always on the front foot. That has helped her become a regular at her parent club, which has led to Hayes putting so much faith in her when she needs someone to have a late impact on matches.

The other vital tactical concept in Hayes’ philosophy is the constant need for width, with so much of what Chelsea do well coming from their ability to stretch opponents out through positioning players close to the sidelines. In most cases, this has been what Beever-Jones or Rytting Kaneryd has been tasked with, with both predominantly deployed on the right side of the field and asked to stay wide in order to prevent opposing sides from narrowing up.

This does perhaps go against what has already been mentioned, in that both players are not cutting inside and rotating with their teammates, but the key point that it shows is that Chelsea have the ability to tweak their game plan when required and that both Beever-Jones and Rytting Kaneryd are central to that being possible.

The match against Everton was one in which this more rigid game plan was clear to see, and it is Beever-Jones, in this case, on the field and maintaining the width. By doing so, she has forced Republic of Ireland wing-back Heather Payne to stay away from the ball, too, which is the crucial thing as that then allows Fran Kirby to progress it forward without being under pressure and allows Lauren James to cut inside the field and to get into her preferred central spaces.

James’ movement has been a particularly wide-ranging debate, with some feeling that she needs to stay wider and then cut inside the pitch with sharp changes of direction, whilst others feel that she should start more centrally given that that is where she has been at her best for club and country. Whichever of those arguments is correct, though, there is little doubt that she would not have the option to do either here without Beever-Jones playing her part in giving her the chance to move infield, and that is, therefore, another sign of how the academy product has been a good fit for Chelsea’s tactics and is why she is rated so highly by so many.

Creating space

That ability to be so effective and influential without the ball is arguably the most essential trait in Aggie Beever-Jones’ game, with her goal threat apparent whenever she is in the right areas but that ability to know when to focus on allowing others to work their magic and to not get involved herself something that not every forward has in their locker.

This situation once again highlights how strong she is at this aspect of the game, with Chelsea once again attacking up the field but this time being closed down by Liverpool Women, who have got players back and who don’t tend to leave as much territory open behind them as Everton do. As a result, all three of Grace Fisk, Gemma Bonner and Taylor Hinds are in a position to win the ball here and have naturally moved towards James as she is the one who has the ball.

However, Beever-Jones has realised this and has taken up a position early on the outside of the attack, with her aim solely being to draw the Liverpool players’ attention away from the ball and towards her. In effect, she wants to stretch them out across the pitch and leave James with as little resistance in her way as possible. It has the desired effect here as both Fisk and Hinds slow down and stay close to her, meaning that James now only needs to negotiate the obstacle that Bonner has provided, with her quick movement proving instrumental in allowing her to get past the experienced former Chelsea, Manchester City Women and Racing Louisville defender.

Beever-Jones doesn’t only stretch the pitch out horizontally, though and is capable of doing it vertically, too, with there being several examples as the season has gone on of her making runs up the field in order to take opponents away from the ball and to give her teammates more space and time to move it around in behind her.

This was especially noticeable in the match against West Ham United Women, with Rehanne Skinner’s side setting up in a back five when out of possession, and so Chelsea needed to find a way to create gaps in order to have a chance of breaking them down. It was something that they struggled to do on the whole until Beever-Jones came on for star Australia striker Sam Kerr, with her pace instantly giving West Ham new problems and forcing them to abandon the compact and organised shape that had largely kept Hayes’ side at bay up until then.

The impact that had is shown here, with West Ham now lacking any organisation and trying to stay tight to Beever-Jones whilst also keeping an eye on the ball, and the runs that the young English forward made constantly put these doubts into their minds. As a result, Chelsea could start connecting with each other more and progressing the ball further up the field with more urgency, with Nüsken and former Germany teammate Melanie Leupolz combining here to do just that.

This helped them over the line against West Ham in the end. There is no doubt that Beever-Jones had a significant impact on the match — and with it being her first appearance of the season — it clearly demonstrated to the rest of the team how effective she can be for them as they strive to successfully defend their WSL title.

This is not to say, though, that Beever-Jones is simply seen by Chelsea as a player who can score goals at critical moments and who can create space for others because there have been plenty of occasions when she has played a significant role in building their attacks and on getting the ball into advanced areas of the field. This graphic illustrates that point by indicating the number of passes she has made during the campaign so far.

However, whilst the number is essential, a crucial point to take from this is that they have all come from different locations around the pitch, as that again highlights her versatility and ability to operate in different channels and thirds for her team. Given that many of these passes have found their intended target, with Beever-Jones’ passing accuracy for the season so far standing at an impressive 72%, there is no doubt that she is just as influential on the ball for her team as she is when without it, and this is again why she will continue to be a key player for Chelsea during the remainder of the campaign.

Options in possession

When looking at the points made in this analysis as a whole, the key theme that has connected them has been Aggie Beever-Jones’ ability to create options, with everything that she does on the pitch being carried out with the idea of being as unpredictable as possible in mind.

However, she creates different options, the first of which is individual options whenever she has the ball in promising situations. Here, she is once again moving up the field. She has Payne for company, and what is key here is that the Everton player has no idea what Beever-Jones will look to do at this point, with her able to keep the ball on her outside foot and then look to cross it into the middle or to pull it back onto her left foot, which would present a perfect opportunity to cut inside the wing-back and to try her luck.

Keeping her cards close to her chest in this manner has allowed Beever-Jones to flourish this season, with so many opponents unable to cut off all of the potential eventualities. On this occasion, Payne overruns her opponent and allows her to take the second of those options, with her shot finding the back of the net. Therefore, continually having different ways to test opponents whenever she has the ball is something else that must be considered when looking at why she has been so effective this season.

However, creating options can mean other things, too, and another type that Beever-Jones gives Chelsea is tactical options. To explain, Chelsea are under pressure at this point due to Canada full-back Ashley Lawrence being closed down by New Zealand right-back CJ Bott, who has been joined at the top of the field by Josie Green to ensure that Leicester initially had the advantage.

However, both players have failed to notice that Beever-Jones is in the vicinity and has read the danger well. The way she gets back to end the threat here is fundamental, as it ensures that Chelsea don’t concede a chance and allow Leicester to launch an attack from close range. She has already made five interceptions this season, so her ability to help out when her team are under pressure, as well as when they are on the attack, has been evident as the season has gone on.

The fact that Chelsea play with wing-backs most of the time and, therefore, require players who can attack and defend with equal quality again shows why Beever-Jones has become a key piece in the Chelsea jigsaw during the ongoing campaign and an integral part of Hayes’ squad. The key point to note here, though, is that she would be a good player to have in this wing-back role as well as in the forward line, which is where the idea of giving Chelsea tactical options and different ways to set the team up is highlighted.

This is not a one-off either, with her defensive territory map indicating that she has frequently looked to get back into these deeper areas of the pitch and to assist her teammates whenever they are at risk of conceding chances. The fact that she has won 60% of her defensive duels (three out of seven attempted) means that, yet again, she does have an effect when tracking back and engaging with opponents.

Therefore, regardless of what position of the field she is in, she will always work hard for the good of the team, and that in itself will always appeal to Hayes and will keep Beever-Jones at the forefront of her mind, and it is this that means that she will play many more times before the season is out, both in matches when Chelsea are on top and in those that they are under significant pressure in.

Conclusion

In conclusion, this tactical analysis has looked in detail at Chelsea Women forward Aggie Beever-Jones, providing an assessment of her first few games as a full member of her parent club’s senior squad and showing why she has been so influential on the field for them to date.

Throughout the analysis, what has become clear is how much Beever-Jones does around the field, with her capability to defend and attack, create space involving herself in build-up phases, and play in different areas of the pitch. Her tactical versatility and overall quality have been evident to so many, and it has led fans to call for her to be included in Sarina Wiegman’s England squad of late, especially given the national team’s recent struggles in front of goal.

Wiegman has mentioned in media comments how impressed she has been with Beever-Jones’ start to the season and that she is on her radar, but she has so far resisted those calls and has instead given the Chelsea player opportunities in the U23 team as she continues to hone her craft. This is in itself a sign of belief in her future potential, though, given that the Dutchwoman re-established the U23 team as a way of giving those on the cusp of the senior squad chances to train at the international level and to ensure that, when the time came, they were not as daunted by the prospect of playing at the highest level.

For now, Beever-Jones will only want to focus on continuing to perform week on week, but the calls for her to be given a place in the England senior squad will increase if she maintains her form. For that reason, 2024 will be a big year for her, and it would not be a surprise to see her at least training with Wiegman’s squad before the season is out.