Yes the ref had a bad day and this, despite any opinion of woman's football, is an FA Cup final. I did point out she didn't give a clear Birmingham goal, this isn't a 'Chelsea' view. As CFCTEL said, the ref was indecisive over the "quick" free kick. I've played enough football and you can read the other players and you read the ref. You can almost tell when a quick free kick is coming and you can tell when the ref wants to organise things. If you are "professional" about it you make sure one of your team isn't ten yards, forcing the ref to send you back and give everyone time to organise. With this particular kick it looked like the ref was going to organise the kick and the Chelsea girls switched off at that part thinking they had time. They judged the ref wrongly, but this was in the main down to the ref not being clear. The very next free kick the ref could not do enough to let everyone know what she was doing. Never did anyone's actions look more guiltier. She knew she'd made a ricket and in time honoured referee tradition she over compensated after a big clanger (means you don't have to apologise you know). Of course I was disappointed, but I'd like to think I'd always give credit for any team's achievement and not be completely partisan, and in this match I felt we woz robbed.
I've got a lot of sympathy with this view because most refs allow the 'professional' approach of not going back ten yards and so force themselves into having to 'organise' the wall which effectively helps the offending side by making the free kick less valuable. If all the refs did what the one on Saturday did then the game would be more free flowing and exciting, but it was a bit hard on your defence as this is not consistently applied. The laws as they stand basically encourage cheating as there is rarely any sanction applied for standing over the ball. The solution in my mind is the Rugby Union one, when you can take a kick as soon as you like, and if anyone intentionally gets in the way within ten yards then you get a new kick ten yards on: I think this would have to be a penalty kick if the original offence was within ten yards of the area. Incidentally she had to deal with the next free kick differently, because she was giving out a yellow card. She therefore quite rightly informed both sides that there had to be a whistled restart. I didn't see the whole match so missed the ungiven penalty and offside goal so can't comment on those.
you can change your statement to the "blatant penalty" and the "on-side goal" without fear of repercussion!
