WSL: Hemp and Greenwood returns lift Manchester City, Crystal Palace go down | OneFootball

There was a major boost for England and Manchester City as Lauren Hemp and Alex Greenwood both returned to action for the first time in 2025 following serious knee injuries in City’s 1-0 Women’s Super League win at Leicester.

With both players coming on as second-half substitutes, winger Hemp quickly provided an assist to set up Jess Park’s winning goal with 20 minutes remaining. Hemp had been sidelined since November, while Greenwood had been ruled out since December; both will hope to go to Switzerland in July for the Euros.

The result kept Manchester City’s slim chances of qualifying for Europe alive. Arsenal’s top-three finish would have been secured if City had failed to win, while Manchester United’s would have also been guaranteed if City had lost. Instead, Nick Cushing’s team moved to win four points of third-placed United, who host Chelsea on Wednesday in their game in hand, before next weekend’s crucial Manchester derby.

Nikita Parris’s 93rd-minute winner gave Brighton a 3-2 victory away at Everton that moved the Sussex club up to fifth in the table. Liverpool and Tottenham played out an entertaining 2-2 draw, which extended Spurs’ winless run to nine matches in all competitions. The Norway striker Sophie Román Haug scored twice for Liverpool, ending her seven-month wait for a goal.

At the foot of the table, Crystal Palace have been relegated after just one season in the top-flight after a humiliating 7-1 loss to West Ham.Leif Smerud’s side knew they had to win all of their final three league fixtures to have any chance of survival but West Ham’s in-form Germany youth international striker, Shekiera Martinez, crushed their faint hopes by scoring four times, including a first-half hat-trick. Emma Harries also scored twice for the visitors after Viviane Asseyi had got on the scoresheet, with Katie Stengel providing Palace’s goal from the penalty spot.Palace have won just two of their 20 WSL matches this season, and have found the gap in class between the Championship and the top tier to be simply too wide. The battle to replace them in the WSL next term will go down to next Sunday’s final day of the campaign, after both the top two sides draw 1-1 in the penultimate set of fixtures.

With second-placed Birmingham drawing away at Newcastle, the leaders London City Lionesses missed the chance to clinch promotion as they were held to a 1-1 draw at home to Durham. That ensured that the top two will now face a head-to-head decider in their season finale at St Andrew’s next time out.Dropping down from the Championship to tier three are Sheffield United, whose relegation was confirmed when their 3-2 home loss to Southampton was followed up by a 4-0 victory over Blackburn Rovers for relegation rivals Portsmouth.There were celebrations for the third-tier Northern and Southern division champions, Nottingham Forest and Ipswich Town, after both clinched their titles and promotion to the Championship. There are two teams being promoted to the Championship despite only one going down in the other direction, because of Reading’s late withdrawal from the second tier last summer.

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