Panenka-triggered goalkeepers & empty-net warm-up anxieties: The listeners' loves & hates

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Speaker 11 He's round the goal, Keeper. He's done it.

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Oh, I say!

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Speaker 13 He does it tame and tame and tame again. Break up the music! Charge a glass!

Speaker 13 This nation is going to dance all night long!

Speaker 16 Carabao Cup curiosities, Peter Crouch's streets won't forget five-aside team, Netflix's terrible football speak double bluff, post-worldy teammate reactions, the instinctive anti-Panenka moral code of the goalkeepers union, the telling eye movements of managers in post-match interviews, the anxiety of shooting into an empty goal in a warm-up, the foul-or-dive dichotomy, and a never-before-aired grievance about penalty shootout scorelines.

Speaker 16 Brought to your ears by Goal Hanger Podcasts.

Speaker 12 This is Football Clichés and your Mezza Harlan Dicks.

Speaker 12 Hello, everyone, and welcome to Football Clichés. I'm Adam Hurry, and this is the listener's Mezza Haaland Dicks for August, your niche footballing fascinations and irritations.

Speaker 15 Joining me to go through them, a bumper cast, actually, from NYC.

Speaker 7 It's Charlie Eccleshare.

Speaker 27 How you doing?

Speaker 28 Very well, thank you.

Speaker 21 Alongside you, David Walker.

Speaker 29 How are you? I'm very good.

Speaker 21 And completing a quartet on the panel today, it's his 89th cliches cap, putting him just behind Michael Owen.

Speaker 14 In England terms, it's Nick Miller.

Speaker 2 How are you doing? I'm very well.

Speaker 32 Good to have you.

Speaker 21 A great lineup of things that titillate and irritate our listeners about football today, but we've got some matters to take care of beforehand.

Speaker 14 A reminder that Clichase is going live in 2025.

Speaker 21 You can join us in Brighton, Cardiff, London, Birmingham, Dublin, and Manchester.

Speaker 34 Leeds and Glasgow sold out in October.

Speaker 21 Dublin pub plans are afoot, Dave.

Speaker 21 We need to prove that we can do it on an early autumnal Friday night in Glasnevin.

Speaker 36 We definitely can.

Speaker 37 Need to get ahead of the property.

Speaker 36 We've got a couple of options, haven't we, I think? Because we're not quite in the city centre, but there does look like there's some really good little off-the-beaten track pubs near doing the show.

Speaker 7 If everyone could have just seen Dave's reaction when I just simply sent him the fascia of a pub.

Speaker 13 Oh, that's all I sent him.

Speaker 39 And he went, oh, that's great. That's going to be pretty amazing.

Speaker 33 Mouth watering.

Speaker 40 If your mouth is watering, go to tickets.football cliches.com and join us in your city of choice.

Speaker 19 Right, let's do a little adjudication panel because it's a midweek of football and we need to address these things.

Speaker 40 A couple of Carabao Cup curiosities to take care of first.

Speaker 21 Leads were dumped out, Charlie, by Shefford Wednesday on penalties.

Speaker 44 And on the Sky Sports live blog during the shootout, Sean Longstaff had his penalty saved by Ethan Horvath to seal Leeds' exit.

Speaker 44 And the Sky Sports live blog said that Sean Longstaff forces a save from Ethan Horvath. And Warm Training 1908 says, can you force a save from a penalty?

Speaker 46 I've never even considered this before.

Speaker 10 Yeah, I mean, technically, yes, but... It goes against, you know, forcing a save does suggest you've had to work quite hard to do that.

Speaker 10 Whereas having a ball sort of plonk down for you suggests it's not, hasn't taken that much effort.

Speaker 47 I'm more worried about the scenario here, Dave.

Speaker 42 I mean, every penalty should force a save from a goalkeeper, right?

Speaker 38 In theory, yeah.

Speaker 18 But Nick, why do we even use the phrase generally anyway, forcing a save?

Speaker 49 Like, so it calls a goalkeeper into action, right?

Speaker 44 Semi-unexpectedly?

Speaker 13 Is that where the phrase is coming from?

Speaker 50 I think that's probably the crucial element to it.

Speaker 50 Just amused by the idea of a commentator say, if you miss a penalty or hit the bar or something, a commentator say, oh, you've got to make the keeper work from there.

Speaker 10 Got it to target.

Speaker 14 Just a really subtly incorrect way of looking at things.

Speaker 26 How about this though?

Speaker 52 Nick Redding played AFC Wimbledon in the carabout on Tuesday night.

Speaker 24 At half-time, Redding tweeted, we go into the break level thanks to a Liam Fraser screamer.

Speaker 44 The problem was that Redding scored first.

Speaker 27 So you can't have thanks too if you scored first and then get pegged back, can you?

Speaker 50 Again, it's, I suppose it's like technically true, but yes, nonetheless, quite ludicrous. Because all you're doing there is you're emphasizing the fact that you've thrown the lead away.
Don't do that.

Speaker 20 Yeah.

Speaker 37 I mean, incredible dressing up of the scenario, Charlie.

Speaker 10 We go into the great level amid a Liam Fraser scream.

Speaker 37 But yeah, I mean, the Carabao Cup in midweek is the source of much chaos, but it's also the source of some absolute bottom-of-the-barrel content as well.

Speaker 42 The Sun have simulated the third-round draw before it has taken place using a supercomputer.

Speaker 46 You don't need a supercomputer. What do you need a supercomputer for? To draw various teams against each other?

Speaker 36 Chat GP Graham Kelly.

Speaker 59 Complete waste of time.

Speaker 13 I don't want to explore the story any more than that.

Speaker 20 But yeah,

Speaker 51 apart from the fact that they've sort of, yeah, they've highlighted some of the ties, Charlie, and said, whoa, won't that be good?

Speaker 49 Well, yeah, maybe.

Speaker 13 What's the point?

Speaker 10 You could do that yourself with some very primitive

Speaker 10 technology that you could Google quite quickly, I imagine.

Speaker 36 Yeah, I mean, it's not exactly like the World Cup group stage, is it?

Speaker 36 Third round of the carabouts.

Speaker 27 There's no seedings, I don't think.

Speaker 2 There is seedings, maybe there is.

Speaker 58 I don't know.

Speaker 10 Well, haven't they, aren't they now localised, partly localised?

Speaker 2 Are they?

Speaker 10 And I don't think you'd get like the non-European. I don't think you'd get a European team against a European team, maybe.

Speaker 2 A team in Europe.

Speaker 27 I mean, Charlie ridings of the supercomputers rescue here, Nick.

Speaker 10 But I don't think it would be like massively complex to model that yourself. If you have, you know, a dab hand XL or something.

Speaker 27 No, I've actually started to think you do need a supercomputer for this.

Speaker 50 But the whole makes the whole exercise even more futile, actually nick now when i think about it is it just i mean not acceptable in any way for me but but but is it just international tournaments acceptance water could simulate the draws of i would say so champions league is a bit particularly now it's not in the kind of the groups champions league is just a bit too yeah i wouldn't simulate every current format you know definitely not but what's the purpose of it i mean pure content that's it yeah but there's not

Speaker 10 quite for the draw but i get the like this is the hardest draw that team x could get in a group or something like that has some value but just simulating a draw is

Speaker 10 totally random and pointless.

Speaker 36 I don't think it is totally random.

Speaker 36 I think they've completely made this up without the use of a supercomputer because they've drawn Arsenal against Wrexham. So they can talk about that being a rematch of the famous Mickey Thomas game.

Speaker 36 And it's Wrexham, so that will get clicks and whatever. And they've put Chelsea at Millwall.

Speaker 59 at the den. It is nonsense.

Speaker 10 So that's where we're heading, isn't it?

Speaker 10 We'll do fake draws and then do all the fake build-up pieces around it as well. So we'll give you a few wrecks and retrospectives based on a fake draw.
Yeah.

Speaker 62 Click fake supercomputer.

Speaker 59 Disgraceful.

Speaker 27 Let's move on.

Speaker 13 But how about this?

Speaker 63 All the way from Tasmania.

Speaker 39 Nick.

Speaker 33 This came from Grau Mirelez. Great name.
And a headline.

Speaker 14 Tasmanian Premier Jeremy Rockcliffe will need to appoint a new health minister before Parliament resumes following Jackie Petruzma's resignation from her ministerial roles due to a serious hamstring injury.

Speaker 64 Wow, sorry.

Speaker 2 Wow.

Speaker 44 I've never heard of anything like this happening in life.

Speaker 50 How serious does a hamstring injury have to be to stop you from doing things other than running?

Speaker 2 Grade three.

Speaker 13 Well,

Speaker 15 yeah, you're bang right, Charlie, because Jackie Petrusma herself has confirmed that she's completely torn one of her hamstrings.

Speaker 31 Off the bone.

Speaker 62 Yeah, may well be off the bone.

Speaker 14 No details of the incident.

Speaker 21 It's just that's what's happened.

Speaker 34 So, I mean, it sounds like she's going to be on crutches for a few weeks and a lengthy spell in rehab. So you probably will step away from your duties.

Speaker 2 But wow, the handsome isn't it?

Speaker 10 Were there like Tasmanian sort of experts, you know, like those physios like we get on Twitter who will diagnose footballers with like frame-by-frame pictures and being like, that looks to me like a grade two tear.

Speaker 10 Those tassy physios really coming to their own.

Speaker 36 I mean, the big question is, how's she going to adapt her game when she does return? to the ministerial benches. She's not going to be the same politician, is she?

Speaker 10 Another Michael Owen comparison.

Speaker 50 Exactly, yeah. It sounds like Michael Owen level to me.

Speaker 36 And she's the health minister, too.

Speaker 52 The irony of it all.

Speaker 47 It's just a mad headline.

Speaker 58 A serious hamstring injury.

Speaker 27 Hamstrings should never just be just chucked in into general life and people should know what they are.

Speaker 40 Next up, Dave, here's some run-of-the-mill social content from TNT Sports with a sort of oddly dour Peter Crouch.

Speaker 66 Peter, build your streets won't forget five-aside team.

Speaker 7 Right, so Peter Crouch has been tasked with his streets won't forget five-aside team.

Speaker 35 What sort of obscure Barclaysman Barclaysman legends is he going to put into this?

Speaker 68 Goalkeeper, Peter Schmeichel, five-aside goal. Not many goals going in there.
I'm going to have one defender,

Speaker 68 Paolo Maldini,

Speaker 68 one of the greatest defenders we've ever seen. In midfield, I'm going to go for Ronaldinho and Zidane speaks for itself, really.

Speaker 68 And then Brazilian Ronaldo up front.

Speaker 2 Oh, my God.

Speaker 46 I mean, Dave, the headline here is that Streets Won't Forget has lost all meaning now. As soon as big corporations have got hold of it, it doesn't make any sense whatsoever.

Speaker 36 Streets Won't Forget.

Speaker 59 I mean, fucking waste of time.

Speaker 61 For fuck's sake.

Speaker 47 Where's his energy as well?

Speaker 49 Why is he not into this?

Speaker 50 It's that kind of combination of corporisation of this thing and explaining to someone who doesn't know what it means, who clearly wants to be anywhere else.

Speaker 10 Charlie. I've been there, like,

Speaker 10 you know, where you ask someone a question, they clearly are answering a different question to the one you've asked.

Speaker 10 And you've got this very awkward split-second decision of like, do I stop him and tell him that's not the question I've asked?

Speaker 10 Because if I don't do it now, I can't do it because I can't get halfway through.

Speaker 28 You've only got five minutes with Peter.

Speaker 39 Exactly.

Speaker 10 They've obviously been like, fuck, he's completely misunderstood the question, but he's in now.

Speaker 2 And I guess after Schmeichel, you might be like, ah, not massively Street Smith forget. Let's see which took.
Go on.

Speaker 10 Do Limboy Primus and then we'll see you get it.

Speaker 41 Schmeichel is so not Street Smith forget.

Speaker 2 It's just unbelievable.

Speaker 7 As a side note, Dave, do you think there's a sort of new generation of people that only know Paolo Maldini for being chosen the single defender in somebody's five-aside team?

Speaker 51 Like, just he is the man.

Speaker 70 Yeah, yeah, no. That's what he exists for now, I think.
I mean, even

Speaker 36 probably like Ronaldo.

Speaker 36 You're getting into that window, aren't you? A long time since he was in his pomp.

Speaker 12 Now, really interesting item.

Speaker 26 Next, lots of people sent this in.

Speaker 67 It's from Netflix drama Hostage, starring Saran Jones as the Prime Minister.

Speaker 38 And it really evolves a couple of things that we've been talking about a lot in recent pods.

Speaker 5 Eight months ago, the Prime Minister won office with a promise to fix our NHS and social care system by gutting the military to pay for it.

Speaker 5 Now, thanks to the Right Honourable Lady, you can fit the entire British Army into Wembley Stadium

Speaker 5 and still have room for the away fans of her beloved old MFC.

Speaker 13 Now, Charlie, it would be really easy for us to say, ah, terrible script writing, They don't know Ball.

Speaker 44 Why can't they get someone like us in to fix it?

Speaker 41 But obviously the setting is the House of Commons.

Speaker 52 So maybe they are sort of thinking, well, we've got to get a politician who doesn't really know Ball either.

Speaker 58 So then the two things collide and you end up with this.

Speaker 10 I think that's pretty. That is a pretty accurate, you know, in the set would have been like, and it's been an own goal from the Prime Minister.

Speaker 10 It's that kind of level. Yeah, that works.

Speaker 14 I mean, there are two obviously glaring elements here, Nick.

Speaker 51 First up, oldham FC.

Speaker 14 so I mean I mean I mean that's borderline allowable I think but that does feel like something that a politician would say and get slightly wrong yeah yeah yeah some someone who's has asked an aide about football or something about footy so saran jones' character is the mp for oldham in this drama as well so that's hence the uh hence the reference but then dave sort of calling the oldham fans the away fans at what is famously a neutral venue unless of course spurs are back there or somebody yeah mid-stadium rebuild and they're playing the british army Army, I think, in this scenario.

Speaker 50 Famous fixture.

Speaker 10 Tough place to go.

Speaker 50 If this was politics clichés, one of my constant irritations would be that people don't get the House of Commons right in any kind of dramas.

Speaker 50 That looks not, I mean, it just looks nothing like the House of Commons.

Speaker 2 The lighting right there.

Speaker 50 And it should be such an easy thing to get right as well, because it's a kind of, we see it so often, it looks like quite an easy thing to recreate.

Speaker 50 I just don't, I don't understand why people get it so wrong.

Speaker 38 Yeah, you could 3D model it.

Speaker 2 It'd be pretty easy, wouldn't it?

Speaker 31 Yeah.

Speaker 14 But yeah, I just don't know.

Speaker 62 So I'm giving them the benefit of the doubt here, basically, and that's quite generous, but I like this theory.

Speaker 48 Finally, for the adjudication panel, this came from Rory Egan Thomas.

Speaker 37 Davy says, I'm sitting at Gatwick on my way home, and whilst looking at the flight radar app, I noticed a charter airline aircraft with the registration G-Wayer.

Speaker 2 Okay.

Speaker 67 The airline in question is a group I hadn't heard of before called Ascend Aviation.

Speaker 57 They sound like they're an airline from a Netflix drama as well.

Speaker 19 Anyway, they're operating charter flights for various tour operators during the busy summer season.

Speaker 40 Now, it could be coincidence, but on further inspection, it appears there might be other footballers' names and initials in their fleet registrations.

Speaker 14 For reference, the G is country of registration, which is in this case, United Kingdom.

Speaker 37 So that's what the G means.

Speaker 14 Okay. So they've got G-Wea.

Speaker 53 Yep.

Speaker 28 And they've also got G-Hoddle, H-O-D-L.

Speaker 67 Okay. G-Mullah.

Speaker 24 Yep. M-U-L-R.

Speaker 52 Ginola.

Speaker 2 What's going on?

Speaker 58 Really tenuous one here, Nick.

Speaker 72 G Ullit.

Speaker 2 That's good. That's really good.

Speaker 23 But then there are two mystery ones.

Speaker 28 The last two in the fleet, Charlie, which are G.

Speaker 67 Crooks and G.

Speaker 45 Lesso.

Speaker 40 So G. C.
R.

Speaker 2 E. G.
Crooks.

Speaker 49 It is.

Speaker 58 It's Graham Lessau

Speaker 54 and Garth Crookes.

Speaker 2 Crooks.

Speaker 20 Well, how have they squeezed into the equation?

Speaker 10 A mad formation on the plane.

Speaker 2 I don't know.

Speaker 14 Maybe the company is sort of based in Guernsey.

Speaker 18 Or is it Lasseaux Jersey, isn't it?

Speaker 12 Yeah, Lasseau's Jersey.

Speaker 26 So, yes, maybe that's it.

Speaker 36 A bit of a Spurs connection as well there.

Speaker 31 Three Spurs players.

Speaker 67 Oh, of course.

Speaker 20 Janola Hoddle Crooks.

Speaker 45 Hulitt Weyer is Milan.

Speaker 36 Chelsea. And Chelsea.

Speaker 20 Yeah, and Gerdmuller's just really good.

Speaker 2 So maybe that's what it is.

Speaker 10 Or the Luxembourg tennis player Gilles Milan.

Speaker 14 Oh, maybe it is that.

Speaker 27 Maybe it is. I've looked into this further.

Speaker 38 They do ferry around Premier League teams for sort of away games.

Speaker 36 They've taken Palace up to Newcastle, for example, Dave.

Speaker 26 So that might be the football connection.

Speaker 36 If you were to one day find yourself in charge of a charter airline service, I think this is the sort of thing you'd do.

Speaker 2 I think I probably would. You would, wouldn't you?

Speaker 29 Yeah, I would.

Speaker 34 So there you go.

Speaker 14 Footballers' names in plane registrations. Excellent stuff.

Speaker 33 Anyway, this episode is brought to you in association with NordVPN.

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Speaker 19 A VPN can also make your phone or laptop appear as if it's in another country, which is great for accessing content while travelling. And indeed, this came from Jacob McMaster from Down Under.

Speaker 14 He says, I was watching the Australia Cup quarter-final between Avondale FC and Brisbane City on Paramount Plus.

Speaker 14 In the 90th minute, Kian Cuba, what a lovely name that was, by the way, scored the sixth goal in a 6-2 win for Avondale with a lovely lob over the Brisbane City keeper.

Speaker 33 But it was what the commentator said following the goal that really caught me off guard.

Speaker 73 Fully deserves that goal. It's a wonderful finish.
Great ball over the top from Trotchesky. Really well well weighted.
Picked out the run perfectly. The run was timed perfectly.

Speaker 73 The finish was executed brilliantly.

Speaker 10 Well, he lifted it like an embargo over the goalkeeper there.

Speaker 51 That, flat out, Nick, is the maddest simile I've ever heard deployed in a football context.

Speaker 50 Only makes sense to journalists and politicians dealing with like arms embargoes and so on.

Speaker 10 With trade embargoes, it's quite timely.

Speaker 32 Yeah, I suppose, but I mean,

Speaker 32 is that the go-to?

Speaker 2 Are they even famously lifted? It's definitely not.

Speaker 20 Yeah, embargoes, if anything, the key thing about embargoes, David, that they're applied, not lifted.

Speaker 13 That's the headline.

Speaker 2 They just

Speaker 36 lapse, I suppose, do they?

Speaker 31 Yeah. I mean,

Speaker 3 like...

Speaker 2 Yeah, you can lift it. You're like trading embargoes.
You can lift embargoes.

Speaker 31 Yeah, I think it's

Speaker 48 the beauty of the moment. It's just absolutely mad.

Speaker 21 I think we can all agree on that.

Speaker 19 If you want to try NordVPN for yourself, go to nordvpn.com slash clichés, and our link will also give you four extra months on the two-year plan.

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Speaker 44 We'll be right back after the break with the listeners' Mezza Haaland dicks for August.

Speaker 31 See you in a bit.

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Speaker 64 He was the highest paid TV star of all time. When it started to change, it was queer.

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Speaker 64 Now, Charlie's sober. He's going to tell tell you the truth.

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Speaker 64 I think we're past that, Charlie.

Speaker 9 We're past that, yeah.

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Speaker 41 Welcome back to Football Cliches.

Speaker 7 We're taking care of the adjudication panel.

Speaker 21 Now it's time for the main event, the listeners Mezza Harland Dicks for August. Your footballing fascinations and irritations.

Speaker 24 We kick things off with this from Lev Harris.

Speaker 74 Hello chaps.

Speaker 74 My fascination is when a player scores a quote-unquote worldie and their teammate reacts by putting their hands on their head in shock and looks back to the bench whilst mouthing the word wow.

Speaker 74 The action itself is a close cousin to the classic head-in-hands moment, although that action requires the hands to be fully on top of the head with fingers interlaced whereas the worldie reaction is more tips of the fingers on the temple.

Speaker 74 Even though the reaction feels a bit pantomime, I like how in this moment the teammate is playing the part of every fan and stadium reacting in sheer disbelief as to what they've just witnessed.

Speaker 14 Charlie, what really tipped this over edge for the inclusion was the micro-analysis of the finger placement.

Speaker 60 I thought that was pure clichés.

Speaker 34 I really enjoyed that aspect of it.

Speaker 10 Yeah, very good. Yeah, these are a nice

Speaker 10 secondary thing after a great goal that you can then, you know, the reaction of the team.

Speaker 10 Like I remember Lamella scoring that Robona at the Emirates for Spurs and Regilon just goes mad and it's like, you know, it's a nice additional bit of content.

Speaker 26 Nick, Nick, I always worry that these, you know, especially in the social media age, that these reactions are a little bit confected.

Speaker 7 But then the other half of my brain likes to think that these are genuine football reactions to seeing a teammate do something that, you know, they might have done on the training ground a few times, but you've never seen them in the game.

Speaker 70 So they're natural, right? They're...

Speaker 53 They're for real.

Speaker 50 I think so. Yeah.
I mean, I'm sure I've seen people do these kind of reactions to just a bit of skill, just like a not meg or something. Yeah.

Speaker 50 Which does, which does feel a, you know, that feels a bit much. But yeah, they do feel fairly genuine.

Speaker 36 They are quite pure, I think. I think there are lots of autopilot celebrations nowadays.
The knee slide is ubiquitous and whatever.

Speaker 36 But it's so in the moment that I think it's quite hard to sort of plan it, really.

Speaker 36 I think it is genuine. I think there was a good one last season.
I think it was the second free kick that Rice scored against Real Madrid. Odegaard was standing just off to the side and he did that.

Speaker 36 He was like hands to head, like looking around. He didn't even run away initially.
He was like stood still, like, couldn't believe what had happened.

Speaker 43 That's an interesting case study, then, because that was an incredible free kick, Charlie, and sort of rightly met by a teammate whose opinion you probably respect in these situations as well, you know, with complete disbelief.

Speaker 61 So, what is, what's the base level for a worldie, and I use that phrase, you know, carefully, in this situation to elicit a hands-on head reaction from a teammate.

Speaker 10 It's not just about the quality of the goal. I do think that has that context is all important.

Speaker 10 So, like in that instance, Declan Rice, who'd who'd barely taken a free kick before for Arsenal, let alone scored one, suddenly scores two in seven minutes against Real Madrid.

Speaker 10 And that second one, if it is the second one you're talking about, Dave, right? That second one was even better. I think it was.

Speaker 36 He was definitely one of them. Yeah, but yeah,

Speaker 10 either way, it's such a mad, like, what is happening kind of reaction.

Speaker 10 You know, I think if that's David Beckham scoring that, you're not getting Roberto Carlos doing that probably in quite the same way. So there is that element of surprise.

Speaker 10 De Lamella one, it's kind of like a, that was his go-to trick, and he's only gone gone and done it in the North London Derby. Holy shit.
So I think

Speaker 10 like it needs to be spectacular and also a bit of a sort of backstory to it as well.

Speaker 23 Dave, do you think QPR would do it at 7-1 down?

Speaker 36 I don't think so.

Speaker 51 No, perhaps not.

Speaker 36 No. There is, I do, another example that comes to mind, it's not exactly hand-on-heads, but this sort of expression on your face, just like complete disbelief.

Speaker 36 I can't believe that I'm the one that's just done this and teammates like as well being happy for him was ollie watkins against netherlands in the euro semi-finals oh wow okay like watkins scores that and there's a brilliant moment where he's just sort of looking he's running to the bench and he's just sort of looking around and his mouth is wide open his eyes are ablaze and he just doesn't know what to do and then all the subs kind of run over and there's this real sort of collective sort of disbelief that this has just happened.

Speaker 7 Yeah, I mean, that's a rare one, a sort of self-disbelief, Nick.

Speaker 46 You don't get that very often.

Speaker 13 It'd be great to see a player sort of put their own hands on their heads and go, well, I just don't believe I've just done that.

Speaker 57 That would be great.

Speaker 44 But yeah, that would have to be something flukey, maybe?

Speaker 27 You'd have to back yourself in a genuine football scenario, wouldn't you?

Speaker 50 You could use that in one of those scenarios where, like, in a, did you actually mean that kind of scenario?

Speaker 36 Van Baston, maybe?

Speaker 50 Yeah, maybe, something like that. Or, like, you know, someone, some, you've got people saying, no, that was definitely a cross, but and then you're going, no, no, no, no, I meant it.

Speaker 65 Look at my reaction.

Speaker 38 Um, I think the peak level of disbelief for

Speaker 42 seeing a goal be scored in your favor was Bobby Robson when he was managing Barcelona and Ronaldo scored that goal against Coppostella which

Speaker 19 in the sands of time has become slightly slightly overrated in a weird way like it's obviously still incredible but it's also what the fuck are Compostella doing but

Speaker 42 Bobby Robson just getting up out of his bench with his head in his hands as if he's just witnessed a relative fall off a cliff or something it's like

Speaker 10 this is awful it's not believe it oh I don't know it's there's also like a proud there's sort of like a proud uncle kind of vibe that's quite sweet to it and again the context there is is so important because he's emerging as this superstar before our eyes and that's kind of like a

Speaker 50 wow like what's he gonna do next how's he doing this and there's i think there's possibly an element of that of like robson kind of going look i've been talking about how good this kid is for for ages and now he's kind of you know he keeps doing this kind of thing even he's still astounding me yeah yeah in that you know it's hard you'd be hard pressed to doubt any sincerity from bobby robson at his peak so uh maybe that's the clincher with self-disbelief i think it's more hand over the mouth.

Speaker 36 Like, you know, I can, I can, there are a few examples I can sort of vaguely picture. And they're like, On Reed, did Henri do one?

Speaker 36 You know, where it's a bit knowing, but it's sort of like, it's like, oh my god, what have I just done?

Speaker 10 I can picture that.

Speaker 2 Yeah. I'm trying to imagine.
Charlie.

Speaker 10 There's the Dennis Burkham one where he covers his mouth.

Speaker 36 Yeah, the Burkhamp one.

Speaker 10 And actually, so that was, that celebration was repeated the other day.

Speaker 10 I put to Josh Robinson the missing who scored for six Premier League clubs question that he'd given to us and there was a missing answer.

Speaker 10 Put that to him and after about an hour of sat next to him watching the tennis, after about an hour he got it and did that celebration after.

Speaker 13 It was a great question.

Speaker 58 I just know you're focusing on the job.

Speaker 2 I was.

Speaker 13 He literally, he was, he said, he was like, I'm not here.

Speaker 10 I'm still not present. I would just look over and he'd have a different player.
Premier League player on Wikipedia page checking as well. I'd be like, fuck, only five.

Speaker 2 It was amazing.

Speaker 36 Jesus Christ. And the missing player was?

Speaker 2 Andros Townsend.

Speaker 36 Wow, there you you go.

Speaker 60 Hope nobody from the Wall Street Journal is listening right now.

Speaker 17 Right.

Speaker 17 Great start from Lev Harris.

Speaker 33 Second fascination of football comes from Robert Collins.

Speaker 69 Hey guys, my MHD fascination is goalkeepers who faced with a player attempting a panenka against them during a shootout, give them a full beam roar of disapproval.

Speaker 69 The suggestion being the penalty taker has broken some kind of unwritten moral code by doing so.

Speaker 69 Just last night we got to enjoy Casper Schmeichel reprimanding reprimanding Kyra Almaty's Valerie Grummyko from his high horse as his Panenka attempt hits the bar, only for Schmeichel to concede another Panenka two attempts later.

Speaker 6 Glorious.

Speaker 39 Yes, I witnessed this live as well, Nick, and it dawned on me at the time that Caspar Schmeichel is the absolute archetype for objecting to being panenkered against, basically.

Speaker 18 Where does this come from?

Speaker 44 It must be that panenkas at one point were considered like a scoundrel's trick.

Speaker 21 And now, despite them being mainstream, that sort of pattern of behavior has persisted.

Speaker 50 Yeah, I mean, Caspar Smichel's sort of like a heritage proper football man, isn't he?

Speaker 50 But yeah, this came into being in the

Speaker 50 72 or 76. Well, in the 90s, 70s anyway.

Speaker 50 It seemed to be dormant for a long time and then kind of reappear in the 90s.

Speaker 50 Remember Dwight York scoring one, and it's always that kind of, well, you know, if you score it, then it's it's cheeky and uh disrespectful.

Speaker 50 But if you if you miss it, then you look like a complete tit. So maybe there's another as well.

Speaker 51 Well, let's deal with the crux of this matter then, Dave.

Speaker 18 Is it disrespectful?

Speaker 38 Why should it even be perceived as disrespectful by the goalkeepers union, who, as we know, have their own little sort of moral code?

Speaker 36 Yeah, and especially nowadays when there's all manner of different novel penalty techniques, the no-look penalty, that's disrespectful.

Speaker 49 You're not even looking at the goalkeeper.

Speaker 2 Well, that's

Speaker 2 disrespectful.

Speaker 50 That one where the penalty taker doesn't take a step, he steps back and just kicks it before the goalkeeper's ready.

Speaker 50 and they go that's I argue that's disrespectful because you you're not you're not sort of allowing the goalkeeper to prepare themselves.

Speaker 2 You're absolutely right.

Speaker 47 The old Mickey Quinn penalty where he used to walk back really slowly then turn around really quickly and then run.

Speaker 13 You can't do that.

Speaker 51 That's that's that's borderline unsportsmanlike Charlie actually you know I think about it.

Speaker 38 So there are at least three types of penalties more disrespectful than the panenka in theory.

Speaker 10 I think though the goalkeepers union might or some members might suggest that Kaspaschmichael is not necessarily representative of their views.

Speaker 10 I mean he he I've mentioned this before but I've never seen a goalkeeper more likely to complain after pretty much every goal he concedes. There'll be something, like, and it's, and a penalty.

Speaker 10 He'll always complain about, like, the run-up wasn't right or something in that very wide-eyed, going to the ref kind of way. I think most people just kind of accept that.

Speaker 60 That's the sort of behavior you get from being the offspring of a Streets Won't Forget football approach.

Speaker 2 Exactly.

Speaker 10 Streets Won't Forget his complaints to the ref.

Speaker 19 But you definitely still see this, Dave.

Speaker 14 And I feel like it's completely baseless. Like, if you challenged a goalkeeper to explain it, I don't think they would be able to.

Speaker 7 I don't think they would say something like, you know, it's not the done thing.

Speaker 14 You don't like to see that in football.

Speaker 35 So I think it is purely learned behavior.

Speaker 12 I think it's just in their DNA still.

Speaker 14 But surely it's going to get to the point where, because Panenkas are about as mainstream as they could possibly get now.

Speaker 55 Because if they became any more common, then

Speaker 14 people would be missing them more because goalkeepers would be more wise to it.

Speaker 70 So we're at peak Panenka, I think.

Speaker 52 So goalkeepers are just going to have to get used to it.

Speaker 32 Like, it's not that offensive.

Speaker 27 Yeah, I don't think it is.

Speaker 36 I mean, it's still not that common. Like, the sort of really slow wait for the goalkeeper to move.

Speaker 36 Maybe, maybe you're not even looking at the ball, maybe you're just looking at the goalkeeper penalty. Like, that is becoming more and more common.
It's more of an accepted, trusted technique.

Speaker 36 So, penenkas are still a bit novel, but what is becoming slightly more common in shootouts in tournaments are goalkeepers taking penalties as part of the first five. Yeah.

Speaker 36 When are we going to get a goalkeeper who does a penenka to another keeper?

Speaker 2 X2. That's what's like that.

Speaker 10 That would would be amazing.

Speaker 19 Oh my God, that would be a real schism in the goalkeepers' union that would cause.

Speaker 2 Because they always blast them, don't they?

Speaker 36 They always just absolutely hammer the ball. At some point, surely someone's going to go, you know what? I'm just going to go for it.
There must have been a goalkeeper Penenga.

Speaker 70 Oh, wow.

Speaker 26 Need to find out.

Speaker 2 Brilliant.

Speaker 14 Thank you, Robert Collins.

Speaker 21 Right, our final fascination for this month comes from Matt from Birmingham.

Speaker 22 My football fascination is the direction the managers are looking in the very split second before a post-match interview begins. Now, for me, there's three options.

Speaker 22 The first of which, which in my view is the most disrespectful, is when managers are looking right

Speaker 22 as if they're going looking further down the tunnel for something that is just more interesting than the interview they're about to do. I don't like it.

Speaker 22 The second one is when they're looking directly at the interviewer once it begins. And for me, I don't mind that.
I think that's okay.

Speaker 22 Although, I think in some circumstances it can be a little bit intimidating,

Speaker 22 sort of depending on the mood of the game, really.

Speaker 22 The third one, which I think is the correct way, is when managers are looking just slightly downwards towards the floor, and then just as the interviewer starts to speak, their head just pops up at the very last second.

Speaker 22 For me, I think that feels a little bit about

Speaker 22 right for me. But I'd be glad of your thoughts on that one.

Speaker 36 Right, Charlie, obviously, I love the granular analysis that's gone into it, but I love how he's arrived at the most acceptable place for a manager to be looking just before he's asked the first question in a post-match interview madness yeah I really like I mean I'm just very much picturing Ange who I know always like didn't give loads of eye contact with interviews but that's so him to be looking at and then the look up just at the moment of it starting the ange the ange thing so notable that um my girlfriend commented on it at one point last season i think which she wouldn't normally take interest in football but she was sitting there watching it and just sort of glanced up and she was why is he looking at the floor it's so rude

Speaker 15 Oh, it's just Anne. It's just who he is, mate.

Speaker 7 I mean, has a manager ever had the first second of their post-match interviews and analyzed more than Anne's Poster Coglu, Nick?

Speaker 38 And to what extent do you think that looking at the floor is rude?

Speaker 14 There's a bit of soul-searching about it, right?

Speaker 62 I mean, it's like looking for answers on the floor.

Speaker 50 Almost like an actor bring themselves into the scene as they look, they focus on something on the floor, look up, and then they're in the scene kind of thing. Yeah.

Speaker 50 But it is a little bit like a very mild, like naughty schoolboy being questioned about something. And it's like, don't look at the floor.
Don't look at the floor. Look at me.
Look at me. As the

Speaker 50 interviewer then sort of grills them.

Speaker 32 Dave, Nick's kind of made me realise that this probably is quite just procedural.

Speaker 51 Like it's like, and now we're on air. So it's like that first.

Speaker 36 sort of utterance of their name by the interviewer is actually the the realization they are now rolling so maybe they actually have to look up maybe there's a really boring explanation for this yeah and we only see the shot of the manager but behind the camera there's probably lots going on It's not like sometimes it might just be like two people in two people plus a cameraman in a room, but quite often they might be in the tunnel and there might be other people waiting, and there's like players might be walking past in the background.

Speaker 36 It's sort of, there is quite a lot of distractions.

Speaker 45 They're flying past the camera.

Speaker 36 But like for the interviewer, I've done a couple of post-match interviews like years ago.

Speaker 36 like just literally when there was no one else to do it and like you i i think i did claw puel in an fa cup tie once at peter at peterborough um And you sort of don't, but I didn't anyway.

Speaker 36 I don't really want them to be like staring into my soul for the whole thing.

Speaker 49 Fair enough.

Speaker 21 I'm intrigued by the first option that Matt has given here, Charlie, the looking down the tunnel

Speaker 14 option, which is basically like, I can understand this because it's footballing body language.

Speaker 44 You're essentially referencing the place where the action has happened.

Speaker 14 And you'll nod towards it as the interview goes on. It's a cousin of the thumb over the shoulder scenario that reporters love to do.

Speaker 61 So something's going to happen there.

Speaker 51 So

Speaker 33 there's definitely some sort of innate body language going on there.

Speaker 10 Maybe, yeah.

Speaker 2 So it

Speaker 10 helps them remember what happened by looking at the spot where it did.

Speaker 18 On that note, Charlie, someone sent me your Instagram story from the other day when you were on CBS previewing the US Open and you had Flushing Meadows behind you.

Speaker 47 And I thought, at what point did Charlie thumb towards the stadium?

Speaker 46 Please tell me you did it.

Speaker 10 I'm sure, I'm almost certain I did.

Speaker 10 I mean, I've been spotted doing that at other sports and venus and i'm not sure the extent to which i'm doing it knowingly or it's just complete muscle memory or like this instinct takes over you're prolific thumbsman yeah yeah yeah it's good to know good to know that you're on script anyway but i don't know i mean the looking the interviewer straight in the eyes option nick is that passive aggressive again i do think of ange And if Ange is looking at you, you've done something wrong, right?

Speaker 50 A bit too intense, really.

Speaker 50 If you're staring at the interviewer from even before they're they start talking that just that does feel quite intense and a little bit sort of alpha i suppose yeah i suppose like you know i'm in charge here son you you you with your silly little microphone imagine pep just staring you out like from half a meter away like yeah he does he does a sort of thing where he's almost he's kind of half turned away and he's almost looking at you like out the side of his eye like he's kind of like sideways look yeah yeah yeah a little bit obviously like he would rather be absolutely anywhere else other than doing this but there is a sort of i don't know slight side-eye element to his i know there are some managers been told that before will be like come on come on come on let's like let's get this done sort of thing and then you know so that's the context in which you're then going into an interview with someone who clearly is like come on i just want to get this over with um such is the lack of eye contact in various football interviews of any kinds pre-match or post-match Charlie.

Speaker 48 I often find myself just waiting for them to lock eyes.

Speaker 26 They think, are you actually going to to look at the interview at any stage?

Speaker 14 Like, are you actually going to address the idea that you're talking to another human being rather than just you know reeling off your sort of post-match sentiments and just getting away from things?

Speaker 14 I'm always quite comforted when they finally do acknowledge them with their eyes. Okay, that's it.

Speaker 37 A connection has been made.

Speaker 10 They are vaguely present for this.

Speaker 29 Yeah, it's good to hear.

Speaker 70 Um, yeah, Matt, enjoyed that one.

Speaker 31 Thank you.

Speaker 23 Right, we'll take a short break.

Speaker 40 We'll be back very shortly with the listeners' irritations.

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Speaker 31 Welcome back to Football Cliches, a reminder of Dreamland, the premium football clichés experience.

Speaker 12 For just $5.99 a month, you can sign up for ad-free listening of all of our episodes plus two episodes a month of dreamland our exclusive new show other perks as well episode six of dreamland is out this week as well so sign up in time for that dreamland football clichés dot com right we've heard your fascinations for this month it's time for irritations always the fun bit the first one comes from listener Michael Cox.

Speaker 47 Hi, Adam.

Speaker 75 My football dislike is shooting into an open goal in a pre-match warm-up situation. So what I mean by that is everyone's ready to go.
You say, let's go and have a warm-up.

Speaker 75 You dribble the ball into the pitch. There's no goalkeeper there.
You feel obliged to shoot for goal. And of course, people are watching you.
But there's no good option in this situation.

Speaker 75 You can't go for the corner because there's a danger you'll miss an open goal, look like an idiot, and have to run after the ball. That's really embarrassing.

Speaker 75 But if you just go for like a lofted shot down the middle, one it looks really visually bad and two, it kind of looks like you've bottled it.

Speaker 62 And weirdly, i find this quite a pressurized situation i hope you know what i mean charlie the flawless logic of this the incisiveness of its you know um observation has grown on me but i was so distracted in its early stages by what feels like michael cox doing an impression of somebody doing a listener's mhd

Speaker 2 hi adam

Speaker 2 but um

Speaker 10 yeah i can see that but i i think he's definitely onto something definitely and i i i end up doing yeah because you you you kind of have to look quite casual doing it.

Speaker 10 Because obviously, if you like leather the ball, it's like,

Speaker 2 what are you doing?

Speaker 13 You can't run

Speaker 2 an empty goal. Yeah.

Speaker 10 And if you just don't have... Not having a keeper there means it's very hard to have any motivation to do that.

Speaker 10 So I do end up doing a kind of like quite casual looking rolled effort, which is essentially pointless.

Speaker 36 Yeah, you're in danger of like looking a bit like Michael Owen doing the volleys at that happiness goalkeeper.

Speaker 36 You know, just smashing it in from six yards and wheeling away when there's no keeper there in the warm-up.

Speaker 50 The thing I find quite stressful about this is the level of power you have to put into it.

Speaker 50 Because I only play five-aside, and then the five-side court I play at, the wall is immediately behind the goal. If you hit it with enough force,

Speaker 50 it'll hit the wall and come back out again, can hopefully come back straight to you. But if you don't hit it with enough force, it will just stay in the goal.

Speaker 50 And with those five-aside goals, they're kind of quite awkward to get the ball out of sometimes because of the height of the crossbar.

Speaker 50 And then if you've got, as in my regular five-aside game we we often have a few kind of ringers to make up the numbers people you've never met before you obviously don't want to make a tit of yourself in front of them so you're left with quite a delicate balance to strike there you have to hit it with enough power for the ball to bounce out of you and you're not left with the awkward moment of trying to get the ball out of the goal but if you if you go if you go for if you go for too much power then obviously you you risk missing it and making yourself look like a complete idiot.

Speaker 36 I take it from this, Nick, that you often turn up five, ten minutes early and you're the first one there.

Speaker 2 with the ball. Actually, I don't know what that is.
Which is a little silly, by the way.

Speaker 41 Just to be clear, in a power league pitch with a goal to yourself is the best bit.

Speaker 2 Do not have any illusions about this.

Speaker 50 I'm notorious for being like

Speaker 50 three or four minutes late, not like massively late, but enough to be irritating. So, yeah.

Speaker 36 What do you do, Adam, then, in that scenario when you're on the pitch on your own?

Speaker 40 Okay, so yeah,

Speaker 34 Nick has perfectly outlined the dilemma I face quite a lot, which is factoring in all the things that Michael Cox has talked about here.

Speaker 62 I don't go for power.

Speaker 42 I don't go for placement.

Speaker 7 What I try and do is the crossbar challenge.

Speaker 33 So I'll go through the gates, dribble a few steps forward, and then from around about the halfway line, try and ping the ball onto the bar.

Speaker 37 Invariably, it will land just over the bar and then nestle in the back of the net.

Speaker 43 And then I'm forced to walk the lonely walk to go and get it.

Speaker 42 And everyone's just like, oh, that's annoying.

Speaker 62 The ball doesn't bounce back for us to enjoy.

Speaker 58 But then you, yeah, as Nick said, the ringer multiplier as well, having to factor up the anxiety of having your first effort on goal.

Speaker 10 and and by that point once the warm-up's really started charlie you've got someone in goal hopefully to start you know fielding a few shots to make the whole thing a little bit more realistic at that point you can start to up the ante is that fair a bit but again you don't like it depends i mean it depends on the purpose if you're obviously if you're warming up a goalkeeper that's quite like a fine line strategy as well as yeah you're cutting you are but but again that feels quite weird because you're like this is quite an unnatural thing to be trying to do to

Speaker 10 you but yeah i think even in like five side you're sort of just peppering them a shot you don't want want to be like absolutely leathering it past them.

Speaker 36 It's like in tennis when someone just smashes a winner past you and you're having a little knock-up or whatever.

Speaker 10 In the warm-up, yeah. There's one player who's like supposedly notorious for that.

Speaker 36 A professional player, you mean?

Speaker 2 Yeah.

Speaker 10 Other players have criticised it, yeah.

Speaker 36 The thing with doing it in a 11-a-side goal,

Speaker 36 I often find myself with this sort of dilemma as well. In that, as a defender, as well, it's so rare that I'll ever have a shot in a match.

Speaker 36 So I sort of, there is a bit of a novelty of me being able to just have a pop from just outside the area and like sort of take a free kick or just, you know, have a shot in the warm-up.

Speaker 36 So you do really want to go for it. So I don't really mind about missing it, but the

Speaker 36 open goal thing, when there's no keeper there, if you, as often happens, if I sort of try and bend it into the top corner, but I don't catch it right, it just sort of goes along the ground into the into the middle of the goal, you do feel really stupid.

Speaker 27 You can't really take any pleasure from it, can you?

Speaker 50 A friend of mine had a

Speaker 50 quite extreme example of this where I can't remember what the scenario was, but he was playing at Anfield and I think before the game, and

Speaker 50 he's got quite a good shot on him. And then, but there's this clip of him, someone's filming it.

Speaker 50 There's a clip of him, the person who's filming him taking the shot, and from that, it looks like he's got quite a nice contact on it, aiming into an open goal.

Speaker 50 And then the sort of camera pans and follows the ball as it sails gently, very, very far wide and into the cup.

Speaker 36 Another level, though, isn't it?

Speaker 2 Yeah. Oh, God.

Speaker 2 The pressure to find the postage stamp stamp there and yeah not not embarrass yourself um charlie during a five aside warm-up it strikes me that there's like sort of 10 of the population who are completely illiterate to the acceptable range to shoot from in a five aside warm-up people who absolutely hammer it at you from just inside the sort of d and you think what are you doing and then i in various like situations this you it's usually sort of you know fellow dads or something you don't know very well you can't say oh please don't do that mate like can you just not people just don't get it they just batter it at you because they play football every now and then.

Speaker 20 They don't realize

Speaker 56 there's an implicit distance that you're supposed to do this from.

Speaker 10 As in inside the area of a goal, you're not allowed to shoot from in the game. I mean, that's insane.

Speaker 2 Yeah, I mean,

Speaker 14 flirting with the edge of the D. I mean, you shouldn't even really be shooting from the edge of the D in the warm-up.

Speaker 70 Yeah.

Speaker 31 Really? Like, it's just like, come on.

Speaker 34 Testing the goalkeeper's reflexes.

Speaker 17 Yeah, just absolutely batch it, like, just a bouncing loose ball as well, just like half-volleying it at the goal.

Speaker 58 I'm right here.

Speaker 32 Can you just not do it?

Speaker 70 Like, that's not a warm-up.

Speaker 34 i was just like jesus man um but yeah michael cox has tapped into the anxieties of a a whole nation of five aside players there writes second irritation for this month comes from dan engrin mez at holland dick's frustration of football

Speaker 77 i

Speaker 77 i hate the

Speaker 77 cliché

Speaker 77 If it's not a foul, book them for simulation. Which is often said by the same sorts of commentators

Speaker 6 who

Speaker 77 will say it's a physical game, it's just a coming together, blah blah blah blah blah.

Speaker 77 But, you know, if he goes down and it's not a foul, it's a booking for simulation. That doesn't make sense.
That's bullshit.

Speaker 77 Stephen Warnock just did it. And it annoyed me

Speaker 77 like five seconds ago.

Speaker 6 So there we go.

Speaker 36 Adam, what what game?

Speaker 2 What game did you listen to?

Speaker 20 I was distracted by one, that, and two, the idea of an American knowing who Stephen Warnock is.

Speaker 2 I heard Harry Maguire say. So Harry Maguire as well.

Speaker 29 So authentic, that recording.

Speaker 37 Yeah.

Speaker 42 A nice evolution from someone having the waves lapping at the shore.

Speaker 42 This is a good example, Dave, of some indignant football logic, I think, sort of a complete and deliberate disregard for the inconvenient grey areas of football.

Speaker 62 So it's foul or booking for diving.

Speaker 27 I mean, it's a completely unsustainable piece of logic, isn't it, really?

Speaker 36 Yeah, and you have to be a bit careful in terms of. I don't want to sound too

Speaker 36 sort of snobbish here, but

Speaker 36 when you've played the game,

Speaker 36 like, I do find that often, like, in my friends and stuff, and people, when you, when you hear people going mad about any contact and saying that should be a foul or a booking or whatever, it is often from the people that don't really play football or haven't actually played like proper 11-aside football ever.

Speaker 36 Like they don't really get that

Speaker 36 you can clash with people. Like you can be physical and it not be a foul.

Speaker 67 Like that is part of football.

Speaker 15 These grey areas are interesting to me, Nick, because

Speaker 21 it's the sort of lightly applied logic that football is still a contact sport.

Speaker 14 And that logic is applied for not giving fouls a lot of the time. It's just like it was just a coming together in the box.

Speaker 14 Like these sort of flannelly languaged sort of ways of expressing that it wasn't really a foul.

Speaker 21 It's just a bit six of one, half a dozen of the other.

Speaker 56 And, you know, you get professional referees on broadcasts saying, nah, not for me.

Speaker 44 Just that's a bit soft.

Speaker 20 You think, that's not in the PGMOL handbook.

Speaker 2 You can't talk like that.

Speaker 58 You've got to tell us either way, like why it's not.

Speaker 7 So I think a lot of people are addicted to that kind of middle language because it feels like they can just fudge an answer.

Speaker 50 Yeah, this often feels slightly passive-aggressive as well. It's like the person isn't usually saying, well, that should be a die, a yellow coffee simulation.

Speaker 50 They're using it as a kind of proof that it was actually a foul. Right.
Well, if it wasn't a foul, then why isn't he booked him?

Speaker 10 Well, yeah, as an extension of that, I remember Robbie Keene should have won a penalty for Spurs at Stamford Bridge.

Speaker 10 I think it was, I'm pretty sure it was in the Parking the Bus game in 2004, and he ran up to the ref and said, book me then.

Speaker 2 Book me then.

Speaker 2 Yeah, if it's not a penalty, you've got to book me.

Speaker 54 Is that a trickable offence?

Speaker 49 Do you think like getting trying to ask himself,

Speaker 17 did he wave an imaginary card?

Speaker 36 The reverse Robbie Fowler.

Speaker 47 Sometimes your memory really comes up, Trumps, and that is one of the occasions.

Speaker 2 It was a great moment.

Speaker 7 David, imagine a dystopian future, a dystopian parallel universe, perhaps, where

Speaker 62 football is ruled by this dichotomy of foul or booking for diving.

Speaker 7 What a hellish existence that would be.

Speaker 37 Just be yellow cards everywhere.

Speaker 17 And players just go, yeah, I suppose so.

Speaker 14 It was one or the other, isn't it?

Speaker 36 Yeah, although, I don't know, I think you have slightly fallen into a trap there of if we were giving bookings for that or if we are giving penalties for that, then we're going to be giving, you know, 40 a game or whatever.

Speaker 2 That's way too many for the proverbial penalties per game.

Speaker 49 How many was it? I think is it 10?

Speaker 58 10 to 15?

Speaker 7 I'm giving 10 to 15 penalties a game for a little bit and then I'd then I would lose interest.

Speaker 14 But

Speaker 58 that Robbie Keenan story has completely fried me.

Speaker 20 Dan Engeren,

Speaker 57 yeah, I need to know what game is in the background there. But yeah, thank you for that.
Right.

Speaker 28 The third and final irritation from our listeners this month comes from George Gooderson.

Speaker 66 Hi guys, my niche footballing irritation is the way that penalty shootout scores are are recorded. A relatively recent example is England beating Spain in the Euro 25 final.

Speaker 66 It's recorded as 3-1, but England took five penalties and Spain took four.

Speaker 66 This seems a little bit unfair to me. I get it.
Spain couldn't come back from 3-1 down at that point, but England had the benefit of taking another penalty. It could well have been 3-2.

Speaker 66 I think a fairer way to do it would be to just say England won on penalties and leave the score aside because at the end of the day, it's a tiebreaker anyway, so it doesn't really matter what the score was.

Speaker 66 One team just prevails over the other on penalties. I think saying 3-1, 4-2, whatever it is, is just ridiculous.

Speaker 27 This has absolutely blown me away.

Speaker 52 I started listening to this thinking, okay, he's going to be going on about how penalties shootout score lines shouldn't be added to the score after 90 minutes, as is so often the case.

Speaker 14 All sorts of things, like just, or maybe the representation of the score on the screen.

Speaker 20 And then it went off in a direction I had no idea that it was going to go into.

Speaker 63 This is mental, by the way, mental.

Speaker 50 It is mental, but all it made me think of is the so in that scenario he presented where he said, well, maybe it could have been 3-2.

Speaker 50 I just... The delicious futility of someone having to take a penalty that doesn't mean anything.

Speaker 50 A consolation penalty. It's so pointless and futile that I now desperately want it to happen.

Speaker 47 This is all I want to talk about now, Dave.

Speaker 27 The scenario of a consolation penalty in a shootout where the...

Speaker 14 penalty itself would make no difference to the end result.

Speaker 2 What does the walk up to the ball look like?

Speaker 27 What kind of penalty is it?

Speaker 46 Does the goalkeeper care?

Speaker 2 What do the bottom fans doing?

Speaker 49 Are there ironic cheers when they score?

Speaker 14 A panenka in the consolation penalty.

Speaker 36 Keeper just lets it go in and just goes, all right, well done, mate.

Speaker 47 And then wheels off in celebration with his teammates because only then is he allowed to do it.

Speaker 10 This is like we sometimes get on a cliché's quiz where it's like the quiz has been wrapped up.

Speaker 3 It's like, well, do you want your last question anyway?

Speaker 47 Or like happy hunting grounds live where you've already won off with a round to spare and I still let you have a go.

Speaker 46 This is absolutely amazing.

Speaker 41 George Goodison, I'm really sorry for completely banning you here, but I just did not expect where this was going to go.

Speaker 47 It just blossomed into something beautiful.

Speaker 10 Yeah, I mean, I sometimes have a mild curiosity if I see a penalty scoreline of, oh, I wonder if that was a, you know, just how comfortable that was, because yeah, you don't know.

Speaker 10 But that's all like, that's as far as it goes for me.

Speaker 28 And, well, to be fair, Charlie.

Speaker 2 And I might check.

Speaker 29 Yeah, for someone as football literate as yourself, if you are slightly befuddled by that, then perhaps there should be a method for demonstrating that the other team had a penalty left.

Speaker 55 You know what I mean?

Speaker 37 I mean, the way the sort of tennis sort of denotes a tie break, you know, it tells you exactly how many points they did get in that tie break to win it.

Speaker 58 You know, so something like that, would that help? Yeah.

Speaker 44 Yeah.

Speaker 10 I mean, but again, I was thinking like with tennis, it would be like you've won the set, but go and have your serve as well to see if it's a 6-4 set, even though I've won it 6-3.

Speaker 10 Just so we're clear, because 6-3 could be two breaks, it could be one. So at least that way we know.

Speaker 36 Stat padding as well. Yeah.

Speaker 2 It's like, you don't need to do it.

Speaker 36 But does anyone ever really look at the scoreline of a penalty shootout? Do you ever actually pay any attention to that?

Speaker 10 Only in the moment I might. Like, there are some curiosities.
I remember very vividly, I think it was 95 at the Cup, there was a 2-0 score. There was a 2-0 score in a penalty shootout.

Speaker 10 And I remember being like, that is mad. Like, what has happened there? So I would like to check how that went down.

Speaker 56 Yes, that is.

Speaker 10 I generally know.

Speaker 14 2-0 is a completely unacceptable penalty shootout scoreline, Nick.

Speaker 23 What's your favourite?

Speaker 50 I actually can't remember what the exact scoreline was, but the 1986 European Cup final was Barcelona against Stauberkares was famously terrible.

Speaker 50 I don't think Barcelona scored any of their penalties. I can't remember how many Stouse scored.
Hang on. If I think there was a way to find this out.
Yeah, go ahead.

Speaker 27 Go ahead.

Speaker 50 Ah, it was 2-0.

Speaker 37 So there you go. Another salary.

Speaker 10 There you go.

Speaker 27 There you go.

Speaker 50 But the first four penalties were missed. Two on each team, and then Stow scored their next two, and Barcelona missed.

Speaker 66 That is dreadful.

Speaker 2 That's actually dreadful.

Speaker 51 Dreadful pursuit out, both in essence and in delivery.

Speaker 16 Dave, I'm keen on a 4-3.

Speaker 2 I don't really mind.

Speaker 14 Don't really care who goes first or second in this scenario, because, as you say, I'm not really going to look into it, but a 4-3 looks right.

Speaker 15 Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 36 Yeah. I mean, I don't really care, to be honest, but

Speaker 36 I was just trying to... I'm not doing this.

Speaker 30 No. Can we...

Speaker 2 I don't care.

Speaker 2 Can you get a 4-2? Is that possible?

Speaker 10 Yeah, you can get a 4-2. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 36 I'll have a 4-2 then. I like a 4-2.

Speaker 49 Charlie, do you know what?

Speaker 52 I don't mind a 13-12.

Speaker 67 Sure.

Speaker 41 I'll take a double, double figures.

Speaker 33 I'm all for it every now and then, but it should only happen in like an England under-21 tournament game or something like that.

Speaker 14 Nothing major.

Speaker 48 Not like a Champions League final.

Speaker 10 I remember South Korea in the 2002 World Cup beat Spain 5-3 and that looking again like, is that possible?

Speaker 2 possible?

Speaker 2 Fair play. That is a bit weird.

Speaker 10 And I can't really remember one since.

Speaker 23 Right,

Speaker 39 we can't posit one more penalty shootout scoreline.

Speaker 14 That is enough.

Speaker 7 Brilliant stuff from our listeners this month.

Speaker 14 Thank you for everyone who got in touch.

Speaker 35 Thanks to you, Nick Miller. Thank you.

Speaker 46 Thanks to you, Charlie Eccleshaire.

Speaker 28 Thank you. Thanks to you, Dave Walker.

Speaker 16 Thank you. Thanks to everyone for listening.
We'll be back on Tuesday.

Speaker 67 See you then.

Speaker 75 This podcast is part of the Sport Social Podcast Network.