Chelsea, Manchester United join World Sevens Football's third edition
World Sevens Football will stage its third edition at Brentford's Gtech Community Stadium from 28 to 30 May 2026, bringing eight women's clubs into a three-day event with a reduced $1.5m prize pot. The format again keeps the matches short and compact, with each team guaranteed between three and five games.
London hosts the third edition
The competition is a seven-a-side professional women's football event in a grand slam series, and the London stop comes after Bayern Munich won the inaugural tournament in May 2025 in Estoril, Portugal, and San Diego Wave won the next one in December 2025 in Fort Lauderdale, US. Manchester United, which played in the first edition, is back for the third.
Teams will play on grass pitches half the size of the usual 11-a-side field, with each match lasting 30 minutes across two 15-minute halves. The eight clubs are split into two groups for round-robin play over the first two days, with the top two in each group moving on to the semi-finals.
Chelsea, Everton and Group 1
Group 1 brings together Chelsea, Everton, Leicester City and London City Lionesses. Group 2 is Aston Villa, Manchester United, Tottenham Hotspur and West Ham United, leaving the knockout places open to only half the field after the opening phase.
Squads can carry up to 14 players, and unlimited rolling substitutions are allowed. That setup gives clubs room to manage the short matches and the compressed schedule, but it also means the opening group games carry immediate weight because only the top two from each section advance.
$1.5m prize pot
The prize pool has been cut from the $5m used in previous events to $1.5m for this edition. The winner will take $500,000 and the runners-up will receive $250,000, while teams finishing in the top four split their prize money evenly, with half contractually bound for competing players and staff and the rest left to the club.
Jennifer Mackesy, who co-founded World Sevens Football with Justin Fishkin, also holds a minority stake in Chelsea Women. With Chelsea in the draw and Manchester United back in the field, the London event carries a familiar set of clubs but a smaller purse and a tighter path to the final.
