The Carabao springboard, more musical commentary & the most Richard Keys-sounding tweet of all time

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I'm sorry, you can sit there and look and play with all your silly machines as much as you like.

Is Gas going on to have a crack?

He is, you know.

Oh, I think.

Brilliant!

Jeez!

He's round the goal, KB!

Done it!

Absolutely incredible!

He launched himself six feet into the crowd and Kung Fu kicked a supporter who was eye without a shadow of a doubt giving him lip.

Oh, I say!

It's amazing!

He does it tame and tame and tame again.

Break up the music!

Charge a glass!

This nation is going to dance all night!

Please donate 5p to your local referee to solve the new scourge of English football.

Just how springboardy was Newcastle's Carabao Cup triumph?

Gary Neville stealing Peter Drury's lines.

Is Dan Byrne having football's ultimate what a week he's having?

Sunday goals in the Bundesliga, some beautiful commentary vibrato, Thomas Tuchel sincerely speaking very well to the England press pack, a huge moment for generic match balls in the film industry, and Richard Keyes vs.

Cheltenham.

Brought to your ears by Goal Hanger Podcasts.

This is Football Clichés.

Hello, everyone, and welcome to Football Clichés.

I'm Adam Hurry.

This is the adjudication panel.

I'm joined by Charlie Eccleshare and David Walker.

How you doing?

Very well.

Yeah, good.

Weren't expecting that way.

Right, before we get on to matters, someone has explained something that we were talking about last week, the mini controversy over the wall at the free kick between Manchester United and Arsenal at Old Trafford.

H2G2 researcher says a very silly but mathematically sound way to tell if you are 10 yards from a football.

If you're 10 yards away from a football and 5 foot 10 tall, the distance from the ball to your eyes is 9.31 meters.

If you hold something at arm's length, it's normally about 75cm away from you, based on that height.

If you multiply the diameter of a football 22cm by 0.75 meters, you get around 18mm.

So a football at 10 yards away on the ground looks the same size as something 18mm held at arm's length.

So a 5p piece is 18mm.

So if you're a referee and you wanted to check, hold a 5p piece up at arm's length and if it doesn't cover cover the football, you're too close.

If it only just covers the football, you're about right.

If it's bigger than the football, you're too far away.

I hope this helps all referees out there.

Charlie, this is great.

Wow.

Will we see a sudden rush of referees bringing coins onto the, well, I guess they've got a coin, haven't they, for the flip?

You can just keep it.

A 5P feels inadequate for the flip, though, doesn't it?

It really does.

But great to have a use for the 5P because, I mean,

it's a good coin.

It's a dying breed.

Yeah, because they're new-ish.

They're usually pretty shiny when you get one.

But when are you using a 5P?

Now you can.

Take up refereeing.

Right.

Where better to start the adjudication panel than events at Wembley on Sunday afternoon?

The Carabao Cup final.

Newcastle ending a wait for the major trophy, the length of which the UK's media outlets simply couldn't reach a consensus on.

I have no idea how long their drought was.

Anybody?

There are two, aren't there?

Because there's any sort of any competition and then there's a domestic competition.

Right.

And there's a kind of Wembley drought.

So yeah, that there there are a few ones.

They won the Intercity Fairs Cup, didn't they?

Which is like, you know, no one really knows what that is, I don't think, anymore.

So I guess that was the confusion.

Whatever the longest, I guess, for headline purposes.

But Charlie, where does this Carabao Cup Final triumph rank amongst the most springboardiest League Cup final victories of the modern era?

It felt very springboardy.

You know, the League Cup final is already considered something of a springboard for its winners, but this felt particularly so?

I don't know.

I think it was so like just an amazing thing in and of itself that that to me was more the thing.

It didn't feel like necessarily it has to be a springboard.

I mean, I think it's just said as a reflex, but if, say, like Chelsea had won it, then I think you'd say, you know, under Maresca, you know, he's come in, he's building something, and it was a springboard for Mourinho, of course, you know, it definitely can be for them.

I'm not sure so much, like,

yeah, I'm not sure so much for this Newcastle team because it feels like this is almost the culmination of a journey for them under under Eddie Howe.

Oh, okay.

It's my sense, anyway.

So it's not the start of something new then?

Not sure it is.

I mean, there was some talk about it being a springboard on the broadcast yesterday.

And there was one bit which

I was up in arms when it was Shay Given was talking about this

being a potential springboard.

And it could have been a springboard for them two years ago.

Yeah.

And sort of making the point, you know, look, managers go on, they win this, and they use it as a springboard.

Ten Hag won it two years ago.

It didn't work out for him.

It didn't work for him, was it?

Well, in actual fact, I remember looking at this a few years ago.

It's been the opposite of a springboard and there was a thing I saw that I worked out that the manager who'd won it was sacked before the next League Cup final for something like six years in a row or six out of seven.

Do you remember like Michael Loudrup at Swansea?

He was gone.

There were lots of them.

It really didn't make any difference.

Like it was just kind of a moment.

We've achieved the objective of saying the word springboard as many times as we could in the space of two minutes there, but good to bust the myth at least.

But you mentioned Mourinho there, Charlie.

Like, before Mourinho won the League Cup against Liverpool in that game, was it ever talked about as being a springboard?

I think that was the original springboard moment, and all of them have harked back to that since.

Yeah, that's the one that's always cited.

I mean, if you think that the previous year it was won by Middlesbrough against Bolton in that complete sort of like random,

you know, that was never, although I guess it nearly was a springboard because they nearly won the UEFA Cup, didn't they, a couple of years later?

I'm going to google it middlesbrough carling cup 2004 springboard if there's one result that's it you're ruined

i mean that there obviously will be but yeah

retrospectively it might have been declared a springboard yeah yeah exactly for their uefa cup right um no no hint of springboard back in the day so you're saved but yeah i think you might 2005 might well be the springboard for um carabao cup springboarding lots of headlines today dave about you try telling these fans that that the Carabao Cup doesn't matter.

This was a slam dunk for the you try telling these fans.

And there are still elements of the Carabao Cup that suggest it's not being taken super seriously.

Can you tell me, or could you hazard a guess at the last Carabelle Cup final to feature both managers wearing a shirt and tie?

It's become a very track-suited affair.

There's probably ones more recent, but I definitely think Big Sam and Steve McLean would have been in shirt and tie for that final.

I reckon they would have been.

Yeah, they're sort of respecting it

as Englishmen.

Trying to think of.

Do you know the answer, Adam?

I do.

I'm now looking at Aladys and McLaren 2004, to be honest.

Oh, so it was likely before then?

McLaren was in track suit.

Allodice was in gentie.

I can tell you it was after that.

Oh,

like the United Wiggin one, Fergie and Paul Jewell, but then he doesn't feel particularly...

Mourinho and Rafa?

No, it's more recent than that.

I can tell you it was 2016, Jürgen Klopp and Manuel Pellegrini.

Wow, Jürgen Klopp in a suit.

Well, Pellegrini was always a suitman anyway, so there was never any sense of him sort of dressing down.

But yeah,

Klopp was wearing a shirt, a tie, a jumper over the top, sort of Guardiola style, early Guardiola era style, and then a very nice coat over the top.

So I'm allowing that.

The tie is the crucial thing.

Jacket, optional.

But

the last, you know, mutually tied Carabao Cup final.

Disappointing.

Charlie, I mean, what does this say about football culturally?

Well,

it's evolving.

Sartorially speaking.

We could just chuck Charlie anything and he'll answer it.

No, not this time.

Anyway, right.

Next up, this came from Paulie Walnuts on Reddit.

And I've got a sneaky supposition.

I thought this at the time.

Did Gary Neville read Peter Drury's line by mistake here?

It's the boy from Fly.

A Wembley goal for the first time in a Jordan generation.

Oh, it's black and white Bedlam.

Nobody out-bedlams Peter Drury, Charlie.

Black and white Bedlam.

Yeah,

because there's Barovian Bedlam, isn't there?

At Wembley.

Yeah.

He's bedlamed quite a few times, Peter Drury.

But yeah, it's just like doing a reading, Dave.

You say, oh, no, sorry, that's your line, isn't it?

Sorry.

Well, look, you spend enough time with him.

You're going to pick up some habits, aren't you?

I guess.

Yeah, that's true.

It was this final last year, wasn't it?

It was the blue billion-pound bottle jobs from.

That's true.

Yeah.

A tribute to that.

Yeah, he's picking up a line or two.

Right.

Many pointed out, including Lammy Pie on Reddit, Dave, that this could be the ultimate example of what a week he's having for Dan Byrne winning your first, or getting your first England call-up and scoring in a cup final.

Could that be the most what a week he's having possible?

If he scores for england oh wow that will that will really really top it off won't it that's excessive i think that's that's too much you can't have that that would be

a week's ad wouldn't it charlie yeah we talked about i think at the time didn't we it was because with the world cup because the last world cup was sort of mid-season as well that was an absolute that was so ripe for you know what a what a what a week he's having or capping the sort of perfect week with it with a goal our reddit users dave were were mulling over what kind of combination of things make up a what a week he's having.

And they decided that it should be something on pitch and then something personal off-pitch, combining together to make their holistic existence going really well.

Nick Ribb says, often used when the player scores after becoming a father for the first time.

The Sunday League version for me was when I scored after completing on my flat.

That is a big moment.

What a week I've had because you'd only be able to declare it for yourself at Sunday League.

Nobody else would know.

What week he's having, boys.

fresh from completing on his flat.

I think, yeah, so yeah, having a kid, Charlie, ideally your first one, and scoring in a big game, I think those two that could rival Dan Burns' week.

Yeah, I saw a thing recently, I think it was on, I can't remember, it was like Sky Sports highlights, and it was like birthday boy Ishmaela Saab scores double or something.

I was like, does that meet the threshold?

Like, that's you know, his birthday's coming.

It's a bit trivial, isn't it?

Is that how relevant is that?

I'm not sure.

I guess a great day for him.

I'm just not, yeah.

Maybe you can, you can, you can have the day, but yeah, you can't have your birthday just appearing in a week and saying, what a week it's been for me.

No, not really.

Great party on Friday, and then on Sunday, bagged a couple.

Landmark, maybe.

I don't know.

Right, let's move over to the Champions League.

Some action from last week.

This is the start of the second half of extra time in the Champions League between Atletico Madrid and Real Madrid.

And

we've heard this phrase so often, but

let's hear a hat-trick of it, in fact.

Braheen Diaz has come on in this second half,

scored the goal, which seems a long time ago now, that puts Madrid in front in the Bernabeu.

Yeah, the Connor Gallagher goal seems a long time ago, doesn't it?

Vinessia's junior penalty feels a long time ago.

The Russian dolls of this phrase here, Johnny, but the one right in the middle of Connor Gallagher's goal feeling a long time ago, it was literally 105 minutes before.

So in the cliché'd use of that, it basically is actually quite a long time ago.

Fair play.

Yeah,

it is.

I mean, it's longer than you'd sort of naturally expect for that.

I still think it's sort of okay.

It's not that long.

I think that one is, I think that's an acceptable usage of it.

Extra time quite crucial to the kind of formula here, Dave, because it adds that extra layer of things that happened a long time ago in a narrative sense in this game.

Yeah, but would it work better if it was a 3-2 or something and there'd been lots of incident since it was still 1-0.

Yeah.

Yeah, Piers M93 says surely a goal being scored 105 minutes ago is objectively a long time ago.

But then Charlie, they threw the goal in the first leg into the mix, which was a week earlier.

I mean, a week is a long time in football.

You can't start doing that.

I mean,

yeah, that does feel like a long time ago.

Loads has happened in the time since then.

Yeah, too much time being juggled there.

Let's stay in Europe.

This next one came from Brad Jones, Dave.

It's from the highlights of Bay Munich's 1-1 draw Union Berlin on Saturday.

Kevin Hatchard and Stefan Freund on comms.

Come loose here and the shot was hit really firmly by Upamikano.

That would have been a bit of a collector's item if that had flown into the top here.

The Sunday goal on Saturday

from Upomikano.

A Sunday goal.

What's a Sunday goal?

I mean, it just sounds like a a phrase that they would use in Germany.

I thought, I wonder what that means.

So I got in touch with Kevin.

And I thought, so is Sunday goal a thing in Germany?

And he says, yeah, it's like a worldy, the sort of thing you would try a million times and it never comes off.

But for some reason, it always happens during the Sunday morning kickaround.

So a Sunday goal.

But it was great to see the phrases colliding, Charlie.

You had collector's item, and then the other guy said, actually, no, it's more of a Sunday goal, actually.

Yeah, yeah.

So would they say it would normally be in German compound?

And he's just trying to get a chance to go to the middle.

Sontag Tour, I assume, yeah, yeah, maybe it must be.

But I googled Sontag Tour and there was no reference to it, so God knows what's going on.

Hmm, maybe we've been hoodwinked, but I don't know.

I've got Kevin Hatchard's number.

Have you got Stefan Freund's number?

Probably, yeah,

it's probably there somewhere.

Speaking of German phrases, it's not really a German phrase, but it was something from Tuchel's press conference the other day, which I really, I really enjoyed.

It's like one of those phrases that's familiar to us, but they, you know, Europeans maybe just change it slightly.

He was asked the question about, he was asked a question about how England were going to cope with the heat in America, in the World Cup.

And he sort of laughed and went,

can we cross the bridge when we get to the river?

Which I actually think is more elegant than we'll cross that bridge when we get to it.

Yeah, yeah, a little bit less less conversational, like really laying out the scenario you have in front of you.

Some people might not have heard it before.

Make it clear to them.

Yeah.

Fine.

Right, I heard this during Leicester vs.

Manchester United on Sunday evening.

Here's Don Goodman on the drought-ending Rasmus Hoyland.

22 hours.

He waited for that one.

Well, he strikes me as the kind of striker

he's scoring bursts.

That's what he'll be hoping for.

Charlie, this just seems like something you can just say about a player and did not have to back it up whatsoever.

He feels like he could be quite streaky.

A confidence player.

Yes.

It's funny, I remember, did you ever find, and I don't know this still answers, but we were watching the boxing at uni, and boxing always brings out, you know, people who all of us know nothing about it, but you speak with a lot of authority.

It's kind of like at the Olympics.

And my friend, who's a big one for that sort of thing, was talking about, he was talking about Floyd Mayweather, who's like thinking is he's a real confidence fighter.

I was just like, that is, in my head, I was like, I'm really not sure he is.

And that's such like a vague thing that you can sort of say about...

kind of anyone.

And this is sort of the equivalent of that of a strike like, yeah, he's a real confidence striker, isn't he?

Have you got a nickname for him like Contrary and Sam?

Not known.

Don't have a contrary not a contrary sam equivalent but um yeah he he he was a big one for kind of bullshitting i mean as we all are i mean you you often hear dave about sort of pundits talking about strikers being streaky based on some evidence that they sort of held up but announcing a player could be streaky it just seems quite flimsy to me it's like well what's that based on it's because he's gone a long time without a goal is that it yeah i sort of do think he does have the a little bit of the air of being a sort of confidence player but maybe maybe that just is because he's quite young and he's been a bit beleaguered of late.

And he took that goal really nicely.

I remember Theo Walcott was a classic of that.

He'd always be described as a real confidence player.

The weird thing about him was that he wasn't.

He was just incredibly inconsistent and he could be really out of form and then go through on goal and look like Thierry Henry.

Or he could have scored two in a game, go through on goal and absolutely sky one.

Like it really, I don't think it was to do with confidence.

It was just a kind of thing that was said because he was quite erratic with his finishing.

I think you're spot on.

I think inconsistency just gets melded into this kind of I can see into their mind kind of thing.

It makes it look far more sophisticated to call them a confidence player.

Going to end part one with this from Fraser Clark.

He says he was watching Charlotte versus Cincinnati in MLS and around the 14-minute mark, Cincinnati had a chance to which the commentator said this.

A bander quick trigger himself.

Kaleo makes the save the angle on the follow-up all the way across.

And Denke couldn't get an outstretched toe to it.

Back and forth we go.

I don't think I've ever heard outstretched toe before.

An outstretched toe.

Don't gonna make any difference.

It's inside the boot.

One toe, get your whole foot if anything.

Yeah, Fraser asks, Dave, surely outstretched is reserved for legs only.

Can a toe be outstretched?

In fact, can any other body parts be outstretched?

An outstretched neck?

An outstretched arm.

Yeah.

I suppose for a goalkeeper.

You talk about outstretched hand, don't you?

Outstretched hand?

I'm sure you hear that.

Surely the arm is being stretched at full stretch.

The body and then the arm, but I don't think I've ever heard stretched hand.

For a goalkeeper, presumably.

An outstretched hand, yeah.

I'm seeing.

An outstretched hand.

You'd better imagine that.

Must be you.

You spread your fingers.

If only Gazar had outstretched his toe.

That is a great example.

Right then, that's the end of part one.

We'll be back very shortly.

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That is wonderful!

Welcome back to Football Cliches.

This is the adjudication panel.

This came from Matt on Reddit.

It's superb.

Wolves vs.

Everton the other week and recent clichés quiz dark artsman Chris Wise on commentary.

Serappy arts, just wide at the post.

Lovely little vibrato, wasn't it?

Yeah.

Yeah.

All of it gets shot away.

I look forward to asking him who the subs were for Wolves in this game in a future quiz.

Yeah,

I was pleased by this vibrato.

I didn't think it was strong enough to put in the clichés pod on its own, but then someone else sent me this.

Joe Joe Harbisher sent this in from BBC Radio 5 Live, Palace vs.

Millwall.

Chris Wise also on duty for this.

Munoz into the box for Palace and Ketier, and the shot held well.

This is definitely his thing.

So the only responsible thing to do at this point is put them together and see what it sounds like.

Serapi art!

Sinquetia!

Wonderfully musical.

What a voice.

The singing commentator.

Yeah, nice.

Sounds like he's got some pipes.

Yeah.

Vibrato, Chris Wise.

Love it.

Right, a quick footballer's names in things for you.

This came from excellent Piglet on Reddit.

Just what has the first ever Italians play in the Premier League been up to since then?

Back in 2018, I invited Andrea Salenzi to host the show for a bit.

And while she was hosting, she made a three-part series we called The Single Lady's Guide to Sperm Shopping, or the Sperm Series for short.

Busy guy.

I look forward to the interview with him.

Just

using up his wages from Nottingham Forest, very wisely indeed.

Now, you mentioned Thomas Tuchel earlier on, Dave, and he eventually in his first press conference faced the inevitable question about the national anthem, a topic that plagued Lee Carsley's caretaker reign and threatens to overshadow Thomas Tuchel's right from the very start.

But his response was incredible.

He says, I will earn the right with results, with building a group, with doing my job properly, by creating a feeling where maybe even you guys in the media say at some point, now it's time that you sing it.

It feels like you properly earned it and you're a proper English guy now.

This is a strategy I'd never considered to tackle this absurd question.

And it's perfect because one, it kicks this kind of fairly pathetic can all the way down the road.

And two, it passes the responsibility back over to the England press back to make the decision for him, which is great because now everyone will realise how ridiculous it is.

You can declare it on the podcast, Dave.

When will?

I mean, what is going to be

how many wins?

Okay, at what point did Sven earn the right?

Do you reckon?

Like, after beating Germany?

Was that enough?

I guess so.

That's

the first thing to our hearts.

Surely he could have done after that.

Yeah.

Did his accent start to slip?

Did it get a bit more English?

I don't know.

Maybe.

But yeah, I guess you just know it when you see it.

There's not a threshold.

Maybe.

So obviously not these two games coming up next week.

And then

there's some in June.

I don't think those, but then there'll be a big break until the next lot in the start of next season in September.

I mean, maybe that's the time to go with it.

Did Capello ever?

Like, did by qualifying for the World Cup and getting us back after not qualifying for the Euros, was that enough?

But he was never really taken to the nation's house.

I would suggest he never met Tuchel's kind of vague threshold here.

But seriously, Charlie, I think this is a genius move from Tuchel.

He's had a lot of time to think about it, clearly, and he's gone with this.

Great news.

Maybe more managers will do it with sort of contentious issues.

Be like, look, if you're so worried about it, you decide.

Yeah.

I'll give it to you guys.

I love it.

I love it.

But who's going to actually say that then

in the press conference?

We'll see.

Tom's got me cross.

Won't it be one of those awkward things like, oh man, you know, you've been in our 10 years and we just wanted to show you a little token of appreciation.

Someone will kind of like side laugh at the end of the press conference.

A framed sort of print of the lyrics.

Citizenship test, who knows?

Tuchel also addressed the burning issue, Dave, of how he's been consuming his Premier League football, criticised in some quarters for not attending enough games.

And he said that, yeah, don't worry.

I also watch it from home in Germany.

On the Premier League weekends where I don't go, I watch a minimum of five matches live on a wide-angle screen.

Incredible detail.

He's gone to, it's like Eddie Howe saying he digitised all his training sessions.

Yeah, it's great.

And it was funny watching Tukul deal with that question.

Similar to the anthem stuff, like he's very happy to get into it.

And

it does feel like he's rising above it quite well.

Yeah.

He is, but this is all such fodder, isn't it?

For if and when it goes wrong, you know, the too much time in Munich, the not being in enough games, the national anthem, it's just so perfect for things that we have no real idea of how important they are, but they're good sticks to beat him with.

But you're absolutely right, but he's treating it with just the right amount of disdain as well.

He's not making anyone feel stupid for asking the questions, he's just batting them away really politely.

I love his style so far.

But he hasn't had results.

Like, that's the thing, it's one thing doing it now.

You know, if results go badly, then this stuff becomes incredibly important.

Yeah, that's true.

Lots of conjecture about his first England squad.

And um, uh, Jason Burton, The Telegraph, his piece was headlined, Tuchel abandons future by backing Dad's Army to deliver instant glory.

Mark Ridley says, What's the threshold in terms of numbers and ages of players that are required to be labelled England's Dad's Army squad?

This is nowhere close, surely.

I mean, Dan Byrne is in the graphic that they've used.

That's his first call-up.

It doesn't matter if he's 32, that doesn't count.

And the other two are Henderson and Kyle Walker, right?

I mean, they're the only ones

sort of in deep into their sort of into their mid-30s.

He's called up Miles Lewis Skelly on the other end.

The trouble with the Dad's Army sort of analogy, Charlie, is that the whole point of Dad's Army was that they were really inexperienced.

Didn't know what they were doing.

It is a great question.

I'm trying to think of what is the kind of definitive Dad's Army football team or squad.

We've never seen enough, have we?

Yeah,

but it does get thrown around.

I'm trying to think that there must have been a famous Premier League team that was a bit Dad's Army-ish and had lots of old players in.

Or an international have we have England had one before particularly where we were playing sort of lots of over-the-hill players?

In 2010, went back to some experienced heads, didn't he?

Like, brought back Carragh

Carragher and Heskey and

you can see that.

Players being brought back out from the cold.

So that only enhances the fact that they're old and

seemingly over-the-hill in England terms.

Might add to the dad's army nature.

France did that, didn't they?

When they got to the World Cup 2006 final, they brought back Zidane Chiram

and one other kind of legendary player, all of whom had quit and then actually decided, nah, fuck it, we'll play the World Cup.

Right.

What if they got the same accusation?

What if there's a Dad's Army equivalent in France?

Now, this next bit, wow.

It came from Henry Robert Shaw.

Here is Doncaster Rovers manager Grant McCann reacting to his side's 1-1 draw crew with an interview to BBC Radio.

You know, you're hoping, you're hoping them decisions go your way, and people say about swings and roundabouts, but I think we're on a lot of swings at the minute rather than roundabouts.

So

it just seems like nothing goes our way on those moments at this moment in time.

That's definitely not how swings and roundabouts work.

Unless I've been living a complete lie for the last four decades of my life, Charlie.

Swings are just as good as roundabouts in this equation, right?

They're not better than the other.

They're one and the same.

What's the equivalent expression he's looking for there?

I don't know.

I just think swings are better than roundabouts.

Swings good.

Yeah, swings bad.

Roundabout's good.

Well, I suppose.

Sounds like snakes and ladders or something.

Yeah.

Swings are more up and down, aren't they?

The roundabout is just, you know, you're at the same level.

Do you know what?

I was preparing to sort of dissect this for its for its absurdity on this podcast, Charlie, and I thought to myself, actually, what is the, what is it trying to evoke?

Swings and roundabouts?

We kind of know, we know how to use it.

We just don't know what it's evoking.

Oh, it is a weird expression.

And I remember, as ever, the first time I heard it, thinking, like,

what does that mean?

And what, and then finding out, and and then I was like, why does it mean that?

And are people just misusing it?

Because it is quite an odd expression.

The dictionary, Dave, says it's used to say that two choices or situations are basically the same because they have an equal number of advantages and disadvantages.

So they're pretty balanced and they all come out in the wash.

I'm going to start using this from now on.

That's it.

Swings.

Don't want them.

Roundabouts, definitely.

On the other way around, playing out.

Swings are better than roundabouts, I think, aren't they?

All day long.

All day long, yeah.

Dizzy.

Swings are great.

Sort it out, Grant McCann.

I was actually in a playground yesterday with my mate and his kids, and yeah, they were all about the swings.

Yeah.

I didn't want to know about the roundabouts.

One going a roundabout max.

You're not going back to it.

No chance.

Seesaw?

Not sure.

Maybe once.

Yeah, swings are the go-to.

Swings you can be on for bloody ages.

Right, should we go?

Right, final one for part two.

This came from Joe Dawson.

Leicester City tweeting during the game against Manchester United.

Wilfred Indeedee in the engine room.

And Joe Dawson says, can you be in the engine room as opposed to actually being the engine room?

I've never conceived of the idea, Charlie, of the midfielders being the engine room.

Surely they're just in it.

Yeah, I think they are in it.

Virtual situation.

Yeah, you talk about them being in the engine room.

Yeah.

They're not the engine room themselves.

Yeah, spot on.

They're in the engine room.

Shoveling the coal into the furnace, doing the hard work.

So the engine room is just the area, right?

The sort of theatre of war.

Just the environment that they occupy.

Yeah, um, but yeah, sorry, Joe, definitely not that.

Um, right, that's the end of part two.

We'll be back very shortly.

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Oh,

welcome back to football clichés this is the adjudication panel and a reminder that you can get in touch at football cliches at gmail.com you can dm me on twitter or instagram or get in touch and involved on our reddit page which has hit 23 000 users which has brought us level with skoda peugeot and mercedes um we passed rolls royce ages ago as well dave so um we're right up there with the giants of the automotive industry.

Water polo, Justin Bieber, surprisingly.

I had to double check it.

That was the number one page, and it is.

So, wow.

Aberdeen, Bruce Lee, food allergies, lions, mountains, and Florence and the Machine.

Charlie, this is great.

Aberdeen and Justin Bieber have as many

around the same number as each other.

Justin Bieber, clearly not a Redditsman.

He's not getting involved in the comments, is he?

Let's make it.

Right, there we go.

right great developments you'll be delighted to know in the generic football world i spotted this on linkedin the other day um a guy called will brookwell has taken it upon himself to design a new football for the purposes of tv programs adverts so that it can be used without you know brand considerations having to pay money and any thoughts that sort of thing so so the days of black and white

hexagon footballs dave are over that's it will brookwell has developed um what he has called the shoot ball, the antidote to fake and unusable unbranded football.

It's been developed in three colorways as well.

And what do you think about it?

You're looking at it now.

Does it look sort of authentically generic to you?

So it's got like the classic paneling, but it's kind of like blue, wavy blue lines all over it, a couple of like triangles laid on top of each other at an angle.

But it look it looks quite

well I would if you if you just showed me that picture and you said, who makes this ball?

It looks a bit like a modern mitre.

Okay.

The sort of ball you see in the Football League or the League Cup.

So it's passing your eye test straight away, isn't it?

Yeah, it also does look a little bit like the cheapest ball you'd find in Sports Direct.

Fair enough.

That might be where the bar is set, Charlie, for this sort of thing.

But some technical details for you.

It's thermally bonded.

You will be so glad to know because that's crucial to the authenticity.

It's available in electric blue, infra-red and white noise they've nailed the color schemes as well so it's all adding up this is a great development yeah good on him i mean we've talked about this haven't we how irritating it is the kind of inauthentic elements of football on film so yeah let's pout the people we need to do a kind of small talk equivalent i can't wait to see the first tv slash film production that it appears in and just how much that will be elevated by having the shoot ball involved Next, this came via Jerway Sinclair.

Here's Gordon Ramsey being interviewed by Instagram merchant Isaac Likes on the London food scene.

And he saved some particularly footballing praise for the end.

Ramsey, what is the best neighborhood in London?

Tootin, Balham, Wandsworth.

That's where I first started working for Marco.

Best restaurants.

Oh man.

And give me as many as you want.

Shea Bruce.

Mountain in Soho, Tim Carner.

I had to see Indian foods at the top of the chain with potentially three-star Michelin.

It's just a joy.

Trinity in Clapham, Alan Byte.

The guy is the real deal.

First in, last out, every day.

That's the least I expect from a chef.

I know that's what I was going to say this for.

Yeah.

I mean, we're very sorry.

The chef's actually left early today, so we've only got these dishes available.

You never see him out on the past, do you?

There you go.

Right.

Next one came from Kimono Dragon amid the Canadian elections.

And the BBC were doing some Vox pops saying we've been getting some reaction to Mark Carney's new cabinet from voters across the political spectrum.

James Summowick is a Liberal supporter from Quebec.

He told the BBC World Services OS programme that while an unconventional choice, he thinks Carney is a generational talent.

That's absurd.

I don't like generational talent at all anyway, Charlie, but I'm not having it for world leaders.

It's quite funny as well because I think you'd expect to hear that about a kind of young and kind of prodigiously gifted politician.

You know, like Barack Obama, maybe when he was emerging, I can sort of imagine, you know, his oratory is generational because it's so exciting.

It's quite funny to talk about it.

Mark Carney's 60s.

He's been around around the block.

He's Dan Byrne.

Yeah.

Dad's army over in Canada.

He was governor of the Bank of England, wasn't he?

So he's had two high-profile political jobs in two different countries.

I don't know.

I think he could be.

Knows a thing or two about that sort of thing.

Now, a great weekend for the XYZ headline format, but who did it better?

Lewis Hamilton has started the season at Ferrari, his new team.

The Athletic Charlie went for Lewis Hamilton's first week at Ferrari.

Loubertin Boots, a dream fulfilled, and a proud mum.

The Times, inside Lewis Hamilton's first weeks at Ferrari, mountain hikes, oat milk lattes, and proud mum pics.

And the Telegraph, Lewis Hamilton's new life at Ferrari, vegan pizza, Italian lessons, and living in a motor home.

Yeah, so to pick these apart, I think the athletic one is slightly different.

It doesn't like the Times and Telegraph are the absolute archetypes because they've got a food tangible things, they've got an activity,

and then they've got a kind of slightly vague, we're running out of steam third one.

So, like, living in a motor home

is just quite factual,

I suppose.

Proud Mumpics is maybe a bit more conceptual, but yeah, so I think the pizza, although actually, the fact that mountain hikes is a better one, I think, than Italian.

That's an exercise regime and you want it, don't you?

Yeah, because that's more of

an activity.

But like, both have food, which is key.

So, yeah, I think Times Telegraph, a pretty textbook.

The Athletic One feels

a little more feature-y than kind of like a dream fulfilled and a proud mum.

Those aren't your classic kind of things.

Yeah, they're not picking up the serious details.

What have the boots got to do with anything?

Nobody knows.

You've got to read the piece to find out.

Subscribe.

Yeah, no, the boots are perfect because, yeah, they're sort of like, yeah, what's that about?

Right then.

We thought Keys and Grey Corner was a long-forgotten concept.

It roared back last week and it's back again.

Little duo for you for Keys and Gray.

First one came from Dave Martin, Pop Master, with Ken Bruce on Thursday.

so on the line to us now is Andy Gray from the Isle of Sheppey.

Hello, Andy.

Hello, Ken.

You're right.

Yeah, I'm good.

How are you?

It's a simple pleasure, isn't it?

It's nice to see

Ken Bruce popping up in Keys and Grey Corner.

Yeah, what a crossover.

Yeah, just no hint that he might have recognised the name at all.

Anyway, but yeah, great to hear the name.

And now, here we go.

James Hines, Charlie, sent me a tweet from a fuming punter after the chaotic starts to some of the races at Cheltenham last week now it was a brilliant tweet in its own right but there was something so keesy about it so I didn't want to just read it out I stuck it in the AI turned it into Keese's voice and here it is Richard Keys complaining about the starters at Cheltenham sick to death of this this

incompetent buffoon

ruining so many races where he shouldn't be in charge of a hamster

let

the equine thoroughbred.

It's cleasy perfection.

That is superb.

It's perfect.

God, the AI, how it got the like breathiness

to sort of express indignation.

Amazing.

I used some very recent keys for that.

Okay, yeah.

And

there are some sliders that you can use on the AI thing, and

you can make the style exaggerated.

So I pushed it right up.

But the only thing is,

there's no button you can press today for it to linger on certain words, which is quite annoying.

Buffoon.

Tremendous.

There he is.

Really brought it to life.

But this isn't Keys and Grey related, but it is related to horse racing.

Finally today, at Cheltenham, this came from Trevor Mack on Reddit.

Horse racing enthusiast Michael Harris tweeted,

horses will not always perform at their optimum, and when they don't, they are unfairly crucified on X, such is the nature of this platform.

I just feel that Caldwell Potter, Bob Ollinger, and Factor File have silenced a few today and will be having a wry smile in their stables tonight.

Imagine a horse doing a wry smile.

Could a horse get its hoof up to its mouth and do the old shush, shushing thing?

Oh, God.

People take horse racing so seriously that this is incredible.

A little wry smile in their stables before.

My god.

A raised eyebrow or two.

Shushing.

Shushing the punters.

Anyway, thanks to you, Charlie Eccleshare.

Thank you very much.

Thanks to you, Dave Walker.

Thank you.

Thanks to everyone for listening.

We'll be back on Thursday.

See you then.

This podcast is part of the Sports Social Podcast Network.

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