Chelsea return to Wembley for their seventh Women’s FA Cup final in 11 years, having won five of them before, but for United States forward Catarina Macario it will be the first time she steps out at London’s iconic stadium.
Macario, 25, is no stranger to high-stakes matches or major stages. She lifted the UEFA Women’s Champions League trophy with Lyon in 2021-22 and earned a third Olympic medal at the Tokyo 2020 Games, but has never played at Wembley as she missed out on both England vs. USWNT games held there due to injury.
Indeed, while Macario signed with Chelsea in the summer of 2023, her debut was delayed nearly eight months due to an ACL injury that required a long recovery. Since her return, she has landed two Women’s Super League (WSL) titles and a League Cup, but is now chasing a domestic treble to crown Sonia Bompastor’s debut season in England.
Standing in the way are defending champions Manchester United, appearing in their third-straight FA Cup final and eager to settle some old scores, but Chelsea will be heavy favorites. All five of their FA Cup wins have come at Wembley, after the women’s final moved there permanently from the 2014-15 season, and they have only lost a final there once before, to Arsenal in 2015-16.
“I’ve watched the team play there many times, even when I wasn’t playing for Chelsea, and I’ve heard that it is a very big occasion,” Macario tells ESPN. “Playing at Wembley is something that every player dreams about. I think the FA Cup final just makes it that much more special.
“We’re just happy to be back there and, for myself personally, I’m just trying to think that it’s just another game, but I’ll definitely be soaking in all those moments: the atmosphere, the stadium, and thinking about all the legends that have been there before. Hopefully we can create another piece of history.”
“It hasn’t been the smoothest transition back into playing because, after having been out for so long, other things come about, different little niggles, and it’s hard to pick up form in general, especially in the middle of season,” she adds. “But thankfully, I feel like I’ve finally been able to be on the pitch consistently since January or so, which has been a big achievement. I think now it is just about building and trying to not only be consistent, but also be consistently performing. At a club like Chelsea, you need to be performing at the highest level.”
Indeed, the forward admits that there is still another level to her game that she has yet to reach since her return.
Before her injury, Macario had garnered attention for her goal-scoring ability, netting 29 goals in 46 games during her two seasons in France (she was absent for the 2022-23 season). She has netted just six league goals in 18 games this season, most of which have come in appearances off the bench, but is willing to put in the hard yards to improve her game for next season and return to her peak.
“I’ve definitely learned not to take being on the pitch for granted,” she adds. “Some days can be a little bit harder than other days, especially when we have so much pressure and expectation. It’s not always childlike enjoyment, but it’s something that, when those days are especially hard, I try and think to myself that I’m grateful to be out there, grateful to be doing the thing that I love most. I just try to embrace every moment.
“We’ve been working so hard this whole season, every single day. To be able to finish it off at Wembley would be absolutely perfect; it is what we do this for.”
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Few players know previous Chelsea manager Emma Hayes and the incoming Bompastor better than Macario, having played under both. With Hayes as her new national-team manager and the French coach following her path from former club Lyon, her assessment of her boss is spot-on: professional, intense and “a force to be reckoned with.”
It would be a remarkable achievement for Bompastor to win a domestic treble in her first season, especially after the 8-2 aggregate humiliation inflicted by Barcelona in the semifinals of the Champions League, but Chelsea have an insatiable appetite for winning.
“It’s so hard to follow up from Emma,” Macario says. “But I think the whole team have done such a tremendous job in adapting to that, to new players, to new staff. We have a tremendous unbeaten record, so if you look at it from that point, then yeah, it’s unbelievable really.
“We’re never satisfied with just winning the league and whatnot; we definitely want to push for more, and push for more in Europe especially.
“I think it’s going to take some time for us to learn from that [the defeat to Barcelona] and being consistently dominant through the first and second half of the season in the Champions League. What we want the most is to win everything. So yeah, we’re happy with the season, but definitely not satisfied.”
