The Cape Verdean Dan Burn, Keysey the actor & the Communication XI

Did my card go through?

Oh no.

Your small business depends on its internet.

So switch to Verizon Business.

And you could get LTE Business Internet starting at $39 a month when paired with Select Business Mobile Plans.

That's unlimited data for unlimited business.

There we go.

Get the internet you need at the price you want.

Verizon Business.

Starting price for LTE Business Internet: 25 megabits per second, unlimited data plan with Select Verizon Business Smartphone Plan Savings.

Terms apply.

Today we're going to conquer your EV phobia in the all-electric Toyota BZ.

I can do this.

I'm doing it.

One drive can change your mind in the all-electric BZ.

Toyota, let's go places.

New Icy Hot.

Nighttime Recovery relieves pain at nighttime while your body recovers.

Icy Hot, you're so back.

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

Is Gascoyne going to have a crack?

He is, you know.

Oh, I see!

Brilliant!

He's round the goalkeeper!

He's 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 getting him lip.

Oh, I say,

it's amazing.

He does it tame and tame, and tame again.

Break up the music!

Charge your glass!

This nation is going to dance all night!

Gyrating with the Cape Verdeans, the FIFA regulations on pitch invading animals, Thomas Tuchel and the torrent of sarcasm, trying to solve the tougher tests await dilemma, the most in-the-departure lounge England player right now, facing up to the televisual slog of World Cup 2026, ex-Barcclaysman in council recruitment roles if football clichés were films, and a long overdue assessment of Richard Keyes' acting abilities.

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 mid-week adjudication panel.

Joining me first of all is Charlie Eccleshare.

How are you doing?

I'm alright, thank you.

Charlie, the football clichés live tour in World Cup terms.

I feel like the group stage is complete.

We've topped our group and now we're into the early stages of the knockouts, which is now the last 32.

I've only just realised.

Yeah, it works perfectly for the new format of the World Cup because

there are eight matches total for the whoever goes on to win it.

And we're in an eight-show tour.

So yeah, groups are out of the way.

Serious business beginning.

The road to Glasgow.

Joining you on the midweek adjudication panel, he is back from quite a trip.

it seems.

It's Nick Miller.

How are you doing?

Very well.

Quite tired, but I'm very well.

I feel enriched.

Listener Jackson Keir writes in and says, I've got no particular observations for the pod other than it's always a joy to see Nick Miller make an appearance.

Please commend him on his Cape Verde travelogue.

Very much a deluxe version of Football Focus visiting a small Lancashire town whose non-league club has just made it into the third round of the FA Cup.

Is that the vibe you got in Cape Verde?

Yeah, sort of.

I suppose so.

In in in a kind of um, you know, small, non-traditional football or football place elevating themselves to something higher.

Do you call them Cabo Verde now?

Long discussion about this and we decided no, we shouldn't, we should just call them Cape Verde, even though that's not actually the name of the country.

More on Cape Verde very shortly but to return to the cliché's live theme, we're going to be in Birmingham tonight, Thursday night.

Doors will open at 6.30, show at 7.30.

We'll finish about 9.30 and then straight to the Victoria pub just around the corner from the old rep.

On Friday night we're in Dublin and we have hired out the whole terrace at the Comet, which is a short walk from the Helix.

Just to reiterate, there's no guest list for this after-show event or anything just come and have a beer with everyone and it would be great god knows what they're expecting to descend on the comet but they seem really nice there so i'm looking forward to it go to ticketst.football clichés.com if you are yet to purchase your ticket for the shows charlie after a um triumphant display of generic football dumb by us with doc brown at the hackney empire and a sofa someone sent me an advert for a casting call for a tv advert for the world cup you need to be between 20 and 49.

You need to be available for four days of shooting this December in London.

1,600 quid for four days just to pretend to be a football fan.

For an advert, presumably.

Suitably broad as well.

I like that.

Male or female, 20 to 49.

I mean, that's quite a range.

Doesn't suggest they've got, you know, someone particular in mind, just someone who loves footy or can pretend that they love footy.

Yeah, I mean, do you think advanced ball knowledge, Nick, would work in your favour for this role?

Or do you think you need a sort of a clean slate when it comes to the beautiful game?

There's a real danger of overthinking, isn't there?

You could really get into your own head and then where are the nachos?

Where's the dip?

Yeah.

I presume that's provided, but you know.

Yeah, yeah, I want to know what the end result of this is going to be.

But if you have signed up for it and you do get selected, let us know the process.

Right, adjudication panel time.

Cape Verde have qualified for the World Cup.

Nick, you were there.

Was it magical?

Did it feel magical?

It looked magical.

It was pretty magical.

It was absolutely joyous.

Well, I say you're joyous.

When they scored the first goal, from that point on, it was joyous.

The sort of hour previously, when they were, you know, very much struggling to break down a stubborn Eswatini defence, I was panicking, really, because if they had, if I'd, I mean, I was the main problem with this, obviously, but if I had gone all that way and they'd stuffed it up, then I had no idea what I was going to do.

What I was going to like to do.

The sort of scenes after the game, Charlie, that you would expect.

some you know joyous scenes amongst the the squad as they um boarded a bus to take them from the stadium Players gyrating uh in the windows and then just just a lovely scene as as Nick sort of scanned his phone camera across the bus, witnessing all sorts of um ecstatic moments.

And then I caught just a glimpse of Nick in the reflection of the window and just thought

real real juxtaposition of emotions there, just ecstasy and curiosity at the same time.

Yeah, no facial expression.

I didn't notice I'd done that.

The real juxtaposition was the coach who who was is a sort of slightly grizzled old figure who's

very much a local guy.

A lot of the players are from the diaspora.

But while the players are all kind of playing music and, as he says, gyrating the back of the bus, literally making it bounce, he was in the front seat, absolutely livid that someone was blocking them in.

It was another bus in front of them, and there were a bunch of people.

And he was like, he was leaning out the window, screaming at them, reaching over, pipping the horn, trying to get these people out of the way.

It was a real kind of, you know,

proper juxtaposition.

It was great.

Good to know that Road Rage cannot be usurped by the joy of reaching the World Cup for the first time as a complete underdog.

The race begins now, Charlie, for the stories amongst the Cape Verde squad and

some long reads to come, no doubt.

The obvious starting point for this is Roberto Pico-Lopez,

who plays in Ireland and has spent his entire career in Ireland, in fact.

But he is the...

He's coming to the live show Friday, isn't he?

I should certainly hope so.

He's the Cape Verdean Dan Byrne, by the way, because not only is

his nation qualified for the World Cup, he's expecting a baby at the end of this week.

I mean,

beat that, Dan Byrne.

I mean, that's the ultimate.

What a week he's had, by the way, isn't it?

I think so.

Topped off by the live show.

And he plays for Shamlock Groves, who could win the league on Friday in Queen Island as well.

Wow.

Yeah.

That

might even top Dan Byrne.

Okay, sheer ignorance from me.

I didn't realise that Friday night in Dublin coincided with a potential title win as well.

God knows what that means.

Grim reading for us.

Yeah, don't think so.

Could be good.

Could be good.

Quirkier stories abound in the international break, though, Nick.

Oliver Bailey writes in about the rat that invaded the pitch during Wales versus Belgium.

With a fascinating question, actually, you know, let's take this seriously.

He says, We've all seen games paused because there was a dog or cat on the pitch, and the Wales game was paused because there was a pretty big rat.

But I don't imagine a game would be paused if there was, say, a beetle or a cockroach.

What do you think the size threshold is?

How about a shrew or a vole?

Is it any mammal?

Can any insect ever be big enough to pause a game?

What about a bird if it stayed on the ground long enough?

How long would it be long enough?

Are there actually any guidelines about this?

I mean, the mammal aspect is probably quite crucial here, Nick.

Maybe it isn't a size thing.

Maybe it's just about sentience.

Yeah, possibly.

I would say it is slightly more about size and it's more about what can what you can sort of pick up from a normal TV angle.

Because obviously you will, you know, any TV director worth his salt will then zoom in on the,

whatever the animal is.

Usually, the goalkeeper trying to chase it off the pitch.

But yeah, I don't know.

Would a mouse be is a mouse too small?

Maybe a mouse is too small.

Probably.

Could you pick up a mouse from distance?

Yeah.

I don't know.

I mean, that's not going to interfere with the game, Charlie, a mouse.

I mean, a ball's not going to deflect off its sort of beach ball at Sunderland style.

Do you remember there was that really big grasshopper on James Rodriguez at the 2014 World Cup?

That caused a stir.

And I think there were a few of them knocking around.

And they did look massive.

Terrifying.

Yeah, and quite scary.

But weren't they weren't deep big enough i think he took a penalty scored a penalty um sort of with it very much on his person yeah completely unperturbed so i mean i don't know i don't want other fewer guidelines on this nick you're a man of the football world let us know

i don't know yeah but would you if you got like a in some parts of the world like a monitor lizard or running onto the pitch maybe that would probably stop it they're some pretty sizable those things yeah big reptiles you know i i'd say the size threshold for a reptile is probably higher than for a mammal, like a, you know, a mere gecko.

That's just going to blend in anyway, so then no one's going to see it.

But yeah, if a rat can stop a game, then you know that it's, you know, it's different rules for different species, is what I'm saying, which is bad news, really.

I think it's poor.

One thing I wondered about when I saw this rat on the pitch was whether there is a sort of going back to the kind of glory/slash insufferable days of social media in kind of the early 2010s,

whether

a rat would be too unpleasant an animal to inspire a Twitter account, the you know, the Goodison Park rat or whatever it was, or wherever the game was.

I don't think so.

I think it would have comfortably passed the qualifying criteria to get one.

But what an indictment on the just general social media fatigue, Charlie, that there isn't.

I'm not even going to bother looking, but I guarantee there won't be a parody Twitter account for a rat because no one could be asked to set up parody accounts anymore, can they?

I want login password.

Fuck that.

Dude, the parody account, yeah, it's sort of it's over now.

Maybe there's one on Blue Sky.

There's so much misinformation that it would kind of just be like, well, what are you adding here?

Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's right.

Expect lies.

Yeah, there's no taboo anymore.

Back to football, though, Nick.

Matthew Robson writes in and says, Wales went 1-0 up against Belgium, and their fans started singing, We Are Top the League.

Surely not having this for a World Cup qualifying group.

I mean, football fans need to figure this out, really.

You could just replace it with group, and that would still...

I mean, that would be cool.

It would be good to see chance tailored for whichever kind of denomination of football you're playing.

Yeah, I don't really have so much of a problem with the league.

It's just

the chant is familiar.

Everyone knows kind of the score.

It can be a little bit tricky to kind of adapt these things permutation-wise on the hoof.

So I don't know.

We are second in the league, but we're in a good position to qualify for the playoffs.

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

We're in pole position.

Yeah.

You're right with this then, Charlie.

You're right with the league in this context.

Yes, I am having this.

All right.

Sort of

speak around this kind of thing.

Ah, the old football clichés, having it, not having it, dilemma.

Right, England have sealed their passage to the World Cup 2026, the first European nation to do so, Charlie.

Apparently, though, the crushing win over Latvia to secure that passage was completely overshadowed, completely overshadowed, rendered a mere irrelevance by the abuse that Thomas Tuchel was receiving from the stands in Riga from the travelling England faithful.

So, egg on his face, Charlie.

I bet he really regrets what he said about the eggs at website.

Aside from anything else, I'm not sure I've really seen the point made that, like, isn't this exactly what he wanted?

I mean, wouldn't he be delighted that even, you know, that they were singing more loudly, singing more vociferously, and just singing generally.

So, you know, he got what he asked for.

He said he wanted more singing, you know, he wanted all of that.

So, wouldn't he just, I think he will be quite happy.

Like, everyone's kind of a winner here.

That's one way of looking at it, Nick.

That's one very rational way of looking at it, isn't it, Nick?

That's one very sort of, you know, Occam's razor way of looking at it, isn't it?

But no, no, there are alternative views on this.

The Telegraph, right?

Maybe it will all just blow over.

But there was a point being made time and time again with chants such as Thomas Tuchel, we'll sing when we want and Are We Loud Enough For You?

There was also Where Were You When We Were Shit?

Aimed at the German.

It did not feel like it was wholly in jest.

I reckon it bloody was, actually, mate.

I mean, how much more in jest could that chant be?

Exactly wholly in jest.

Well, what possible part of that could not be in jest?

It continues, Charlie.

He might also reflect on the wisdom of his criticism, and he looked a little chastened.

This is how chastened Tuchel was after the game, Charlie.

They had a reason today for my last comments, and I guess fair enough.

I got a bit of stick and I found it quite creative.

It made me smile, and this is how it has to be.

It's British humour, and I can take it.

No harm done.

This is exactly how it's supposed to play out.

There's nothing to this.

But this is, you've spoken about it before, Adam, that this kind of obsession that we journalists have with like transcribing chance, football, you know, football supporters chance.

So this is just manna from heaven because it means, you know, for a a pretty boring game that the outcome of which was decided very early on and there were very low stakes anyway it then becomes this exercise in listening really carefully to you know fan chance you know and if you think who's the kind of doyenne of writing about the english national football team it's henry winter yeah and who's the man most preoccupied with fan chance i would say it's henry winter so this is just such a kind of perfect storm that you know puts the fans at the forefront of the story.

We're kind of transcribing what they're saying.

We're working out what it means.

Again, it's like an evaluation of how sarcastic was it.

Well, I'm not sure it was wholly sarcastic.

So it's just like a perfect story from what would otherwise have been a completely dull game, or was a completely dull game from a kind of Jeopardy perspective.

God bless Henry Wincer and Nick, who's basically the Hansard of football chants, isn't it?

If it has been sung at a stadium, you can look back through his tweets and find out exactly what was sung.

By a distance, the journalist most likely to have all these kind of bound in leather volumes and in a kind of library somewhere as well.

Response from Tukal was absolutely perfect as well, particularly the,

oh well I guess it's just English humour because you know I'm I'm a German and obviously we have historically have no sense of humour at all but ha ha ha I get it.

I'm one of you.

I mean it seems too tidy a point to make Charlie but this this feels like Sven 2.0 like he's taking not giving a shit what the press say about him to a whole new level.

Like Sven Sven got to a point where he's just massively irritated by the whole thing and Tuchel will certainly have that moment because he is quite combustible, of course, as we always, always told.

But for now, just nothing is going to stick.

And it's so good.

It's so good to see them getting rattled by it.

I have to say, I'm really sorry to say.

Yeah, I don't think he does really

enter into it.

Yeah, he, I have to say, yeah, he has been.

I guess as well, because Southgate is so earnest and kind of, you know, he would always enter anything like this, he would entertain in a very serious way of a kind of like, you know, the fans have every right to express themselves.

You know, they, that's their right.

They follow us, you know, over land and sea, et cetera, et etc.

Whereas, like, which is like noble in some ways, but I really just don't think Tuchel cares in the same way.

And because he's not English, he's probably just not aware of how

he's obviously not aware of these sensitivities, or he wouldn't have waded in in the first place.

Yeah, I just don't think there's any

high stakes here whatsoever.

Um, just to cap off just how tenuous this story was, Nick, from the BBC, their report said the game was only seconds old when loud chants of Thomas Tuchel will sing when we want, as he was then subjected to a torrent of sarcasm from his own fantasy

that torrent of sarcasm is not a thing and it never will be a thing

are we gonna get into this about how how what the measurement of sarcasm is yeah we've got better things

is spot on right um but yeah sterner tests await for England.

I mean, England qualifying for a major tournament, Charlie, has now become the absolute textbook situation of tougher tests await/slash sterner tests lie ahead.

And it's got to the point now where we're so used to England cruising through qualifying that we should have found a way to bridge that gap between the cruising through qualifying and the old classic of losing to the first good team we come up against at the tournament.

How what could we insert between those two things to actually kind of, I don't know, acclimatise everybody to the idea that tougher tests will come?

I feel like the only way we could do it is like a cheeky little three-team tournament between now and now and June with a Brazilian or something.

Yeah.

We need Le Tournoir, which obviously came just before England had qualified.

But that did it perfectly.

It sort of demystified a little bit that, like, oh, you've got to play these big teams.

But on that, but I mean, what a journey because it wasn't so long ago, if you think like England qualifying for World Cup 98, that it was a kind of, well, how will they fare in France?

That's a question for another day, which is the kind of...

where you are, you know, like Cape Verde would have had that, you know, how will they do?

Well, that's not for now sort of thing.

But we're so far beyond that that, as you say, Adam, now we're at a point where when England qualifies, the, well, it doesn't really mean anything because

you know what has what's this told us nick you know you know the old kind of mentality of of tailoring your pre pre-tournament friendlies by who you're actually playing at the tournament so picking a geographically adjacent team and assuming that they're going to provide you with a similar test you know they had a they had a little tournament before euro 2004 it was iceland and japan and england in a three-team tournament and um What England should do, you know, to get themselves up to speed is basically at the very last minute, well, probably not even the last minute, because it will all be confirmed well in advance.

Pick the best two teams who haven't qualified for the World Cup and get them in a little three-team tournament against England.

And

that will be the midway point, surely.

Teams who aren't good enough to be at the World Cup but are still strong enough not to be fodder before the tournament begins.

I've solved it.

This is it.

Then we'll be ready for you, Frances.

I suppose there you have the problem of

whether these...

countries will accept it because it will just look like you're lording it over them.

Come over Italy.

You'll be have a nice little tournament.

I know we're going to the World Cup.

You've got the the rest of the summer off, so you can, you know, you'll probably need a game to keep you ticking over, won't you?

Have a nice time here while we're in America.

See you.

I hope you're invited to the reception of a wedding, but not the wedding itself.

Actually, maybe the other way around is worse.

Or neither, of course, truly.

Right.

As England now turned their attentions, Charlie, to who will be in the squad for the World Cup, I've got plenty of a kind of affectionate derision for the on-the-plane format.

We've discussed it many a time on this podcast.

But it feels like it's particularly worthwhile as an exercise, as it's ever been this time.

There's some good competition for places in midfield and attacking areas.

But to kind of explain why I think it's most relevant this time, who is the most in-the-departure lounge England player right now?

So that is not on the plane, but in the departure lounge.

So that's what the kind of fringe, the players who aren't guaranteed but could but could still make it.

I admit I've completely forgotten what in the departure lounge means.

That basically is what it means, isn't it?

Yeah, I think so.

In the reckoning, but not on the team.

Harry Kane's on the plane.

Yeah.

Yeah.

He's flying the plane, mate.

I mean, would Adam Wharton at Crystal Palace?

He feels like he, you know, a lot of people feel he should be in that squad and he might make himself...

You can't not pick him because he's been so good.

That's exactly who I had in mind.

Exactly who I had in mind.

I think he's dominating the departure lounge now, Nick.

Adam Wharton.

Who else is in there?

I don't know whether Warton's in the departure lounge because the departure lounge...

I don't know whether this is just a people are getting too kind of worked up about it, but there's this sense that, well, he's not going to pick him.

He's not going to pick him for, he can't, if he's not picked him now for the squad, he's not going to pick him for

the tournament.

Well, no, I don't think so.

But I would have thought

someone like Morgan Rogers would probably be more

because, you know, he obviously he's been in the team last few games.

He played last night, but is he playing in a position where there are other, like, more high-profile players who are you know, currently unavailable.

Cole Palmer, Drew Bellingham, of course.

Yeah.

So

he's probably, you know, he's one of those players that has a pretty good chance of getting picked, but isn't a kind of, you know, isn't a lock.

It's a good show, actually.

Yeah, in Dave's honour with him not being here, just to get a bit literally Dave about it.

I mean, it doesn't quite work as an analogy, does it?

Just because you don't go to a departure lounge unless you're sure you're getting on a plane.

You're not just sort of speculatively, I'm just going to hit the lounge and just see what flights come up.

Maybe there'll be some cancellations.

I mean, maybe some people do that.

Pre-9-11, you could go and wave someone off in the departure lounge, couldn't you?

You could go all the way there and say, Right, have a great trip.

Look after yourself.

Don't do anything else.

I don't even imagine Adam Wharton will be doing it.

All right, best of luck, boys.

Sorry not to be there.

If any of you don't fancy it, I'll come on, but got my passport in case

you do.

You do have standby.

Well, yes, I think standby would be more.

Yeah, standby's a thing.

On the bus that takes you from a plane to the airport, or vice versa.

What a place that would would be.

Who's on that?

The second choice goalkeeper, I guess.

Yeah, love this.

Right.

Now, I'm willing to place some trust in Stan Collymore here, Nick.

I can't be asked to look at the potential permutations for the World Cup draw, but he says it's unlikely, but this could happen next summer.

England could be drawn in a group with Australia, South Africa, and New Zealand.

We can't have that at a football tournament.

I don't know what I would do with that.

I don't know.

Would I watch it?

I think I'd be massively befuddled.

No, I can't.

That simply will not do.

is it's uh even though I am primarily a cricketman, that would just feel too rugby.

It would, although you yeah, you'd never obviously get that in a group in a rugby World Cup because of the how the seedings work.

But yes, it could.

They have like tri-tournaments or whatever.

Well, there's the tri-nations, yeah.

And well, now it's four-team, but you've we've replaced England replacing Argentina.

But yes, it it obviously does feel overwhelmingly rugby.

Yeah, I mean, there's there's no there's essentially no football baggage there at all, Charlie, let alone World Cup heritage in that that group.

I don't know how the pre-tournament previewers would even approach a group like that.

What would you do?

Well, there'd be a lot to go and sit in Clapham for a bit, and that's it.

There would be a lot to go at just because...

I don't know.

There are going to be so many links to England amongst those three nations, aren't there?

So it would be a bit of an open goal in many ways.

Clive Woodward's player ratings.

And Postakoglu's next summer

is wrapped up as a pundit in the studio because it doesn't feel like he's going to be busy elsewhere at the moment.

Yeah.

Yeah, I mean, this is just one of many, it's a very extreme example, but it's one of many reasons why this World Cup needs a recalibration of what people expect their World Cup experience is going to be like.

Donnie and Mui writes in, Nick, and says, The World Cup next year is going to have 27 consecutive days of football before the first rest day.

That is absurd.

I mean, it's the sort of conversation we like having on this podcast before tournaments about, you know, the televisual experience.

And as you get older, your appetite for taking 100% of it in seems to wane for all sorts of reasons.

I don't know if I've got twenty-seven consecutive days in me, mate.

I'm I don't know, I I don't know either.

Last the last World Cup, I

very poorly planned was on holiday for uh and and on holiday in somewhere where it was quite difficult to watch the games.

So I kind of it was a it was a very odd experience, it kind of broke it all up.

But yeah, twenty seven, that's that's too many, isn't it?

I mean the I know people there's always a bit of an arms race for peop for people to post the there is no football on today thing on the first kind of rest day of a tournament.

But you do kind of

you need those days a little bit, don't you?

This might be the first World Cup rest day that I'll actually enjoy, Charlie, and not feel bereft.

Like, I think we're all going to have a big sight of relief here, I think.

Yeah, I mean, in total, the World Cup goes on for like a month and then June 11th to July 19th.

So it's a good,

it's quite a lot longer than a month.

That is a lot.

That is a real endurance test.

Robert Warren speculates, Charlie, that the first Saturday of the World Cup is going to be someday.

3pm Iran versus Scotland.

6pm Cape Verde versus Bolivia.

9pm Uzbekistan versus Burkina Faso.

Midnight Jordan versus Jamaica.

3am New Zealand versus Saudi Arabia.

Jordan versus Jamaica sounds like something that would have been on Channel 5 in 1999.

Yeah.

Yeah.

What a day that will be.

Not in a bunny blue kind of way.

That won't make it in.

Probably.

I mean,

just take those games and those time slots as a speculative whole.

There's bucket loads of intrigue there, but in a footballing sense, how invested could you be?

You're dampling my enthusiasm for the World Cup already.

It's painting this as a sort of endurance test.

I'm just a very tired man right now.

That's it.

I think that's coming through quite loud and clear.

I don't think we've kind of fully.

We kind of complain about the number of teams in the World Cup for like competitive reasons or the balance of the tournament and all this stuff.

But yeah, I don't think we really have yet computed about what a...

I don't know.

I don't want to use the word slog.

But, you know, that amount of 12 hours of games, that's a lot.

Yeah, on that note, Charlie, a bellwether for international football enthusiasm is Rob Fielder on Twitter, who massively knowledgeable football, international football historian.

I trust his opinion on many things.

He says, great for Cape Verde, but I won't be staying up till 3am to watch them play Uzbekistan in Kansas.

And I think it made me think about how I really am going to sort of pinpoint my enthusiasm for all of this football in 2026.

And I think I'll watch Cape Verde's first game, and then I will gently lose interest in their World Cup fortunes as it goes along on the assumption that they will go out in the group stage.

Yeah, Yeah, I think that's fair.

I also think the time differences are going to, you do become aware of how much you really want to watch something.

Like, it's very different to something just being presented to you at a convenient time.

You're like, yeah, I'll put that on.

To stay up, you know, to kind of ruin your next day,

that's a big call that people are going to have to make.

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

For those who don't know, VPN stands for virtual private network.

It secures your connection, protecting your personal information and online activity, especially on public Wi-Fi.

A VPN can also make your phone or laptop appear as if it's in another country, which is great for accessing content while traveling.

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

It's the best discount available.

There's no risk with Nord's 30-day money-back guarantee, and the link is also in our podcast description if you need it.

We'll be back very shortly.

Running a business comes with a lot of what-ifs, But luckily, there's a simple answer to them: Shopify.

It's the commerce platform behind millions of businesses, including Thrive Cosmetics and Momofuku, and it'll help you with everything you need.

From website design and marketing to boosting sales and expanding operations, Shopify can get the job done and make your dream a reality.

Turn those what-ifs into

sign up for your $1 per month trial at shopify.com/slash special offer.

It's the Smuckers Uncrustables podcast with your host, Uncrustables.

Okay, today's guest is rough around the edges.

Please welcome Crust.

Thanks for having me.

Today's topic, he's round with soft pillowy bread.

Hey, filled with delicious PBJ.

Are you talking about yourself?

And you can take him anywhere.

Why do you invite him?

And we are out of time.

Are you really cutting me off?

Uncrustables are the best part of the sandwich.

Sorry, Crust.

This is the story of the one.

As a custodial supervisor at a high school, he knows that during cold and flu season, germs spread fast.

It's why he partners with Granger to stay fully stocked on the products and supplies he needs, from tissues to disinfectants to floor scrubbers.

Also, that he can help students, staff, and teachers stay healthy and focused.

Call 1-800-GRANGER, clickgranger.com, or just stop by.

Granger for the ones who get it done.

Oh,

Welcome back to Football Clichés.

A reminder for $5.99 a month, you can sign up for Dreamland for that money.

You'll get ad-free listening, two episodes a month of Dreamland, our exclusive new show, and all sorts of other things as well, including discounts on our upcoming merch, which will be available as soon as the tour is finished.

Charlie, the caps seem to be flying off the merch shelves at the live shows.

I had my cap-related doubts, but I've been silenced.

Oh, that's great.

I'm not a capman myself, so

hats off.

Lovely.

Didn't even set myself up for that to all of those who are and who have been buying them.

I guess cap's quite good.

It's a sort of,

I don't know, people probably feel it's like an appropriate level of clothing item to be wearing.

You know, it's not too obsessive, but it's like a nice little nod to the subtle nod, a loved podcast.

Incredible cap-wearing, incredible cap-wearing ratio in the front row at the Hackney Empire show, Nick.

Reassuring in some senses.

And were these all official football cliches TM caps?

No, no, no, these are caps of all, you know, all flavours, all various cultural references.

But yeah, it's to be expected.

Let's return to, well, domestic football, actually, now, Nick.

Rangers still scrabbling about to find a successor to Russell Martin.

Stephen Gerard pulled out of the process.

And the rumoured next favourite for the job is Kevin Muscat.

And I thought to myself, briefly, I had a quick consultation of his Wikipedia page to make sure.

And it turns out the Rangers are hiring an Australian bloke who played for South Melbourne in the 1990s, then won the A-League as a coach, and then the J-League with Yokohama F.

Maranos.

They're basically just copying somebody else's homework.

This is mad.

You can't do this.

Quite different personalities, though.

I think

it's fair to say.

I mean, Neil Warnock's phone must be kind of buzzing.

The prospect of Muscat being back in.

Seems a strange choice to me, Charlie.

He also succeeded Ange, I believe, at Melbourne Victory.

So

there is quite a lot of crossover between the two.

And then, yeah, succeeded him at Yokohama.

So he has been on that trajectory for some time.

So I guess it would make sense that as he's done well, he's just continued to kind of follow the path.

that Ange did.

I'm not suggesting, Nick, that Rangers, you know,

decision-making at the highest level might be slightly askew.

But

I do love these outbreaks of football logic where people just copy other things that have happened at other clubs.

And it happens all the time, you know, with various innovations like set-piece coaches and things like that.

And, you know, Chelsea selling their hotel to themselves, and then Villa going, oh, maybe we can do something like that as well.

It blows my mind that at the top level of football clubs, I just go, oh, yeah, I didn't realise we could do that.

Let's do that.

Yeah, I mean, I think we've all done similar things at some point.

It's like a kind of deluxe version of that thing in the 90s when Premier League teams signed to a Scandinavian and he turned out to be quite good.

So I think we probably need to get one of those in.

But it does make sense.

I mean, because you can think to yourself, well, have we just, is there like this massive untapped market that we've been overlooking?

You saw it as well.

I'm sure after like Matoma was so good at Brighton, there was then a lot of like, oh, why aren't we tapping?

You know, that's that, there must be loads of talent over there.

And ditto with Ange, there probably are people saying like, oh, are we are we a bit too insular in the types of managers we appoint?

You know, know, Australians, Americans, they tend to be kind of derided in European football.

And, you know, that's probably wrong.

Let's go and let's go and see what's out there.

Oh, fair enough.

We can't all be innovators, I guess.

Little Footballers names and things for you now.

Steve writes in, Nick, and says, I was searching for part-time jobs near me in Southwark and came across one for a crossing guard.

outside of school on a council website.

To discuss the role, you had to email Emerson Boyce.

It must be the same one.

Yeah, that's not a particularly popular name.

I once spoke to him for a piece on Spurs 9 Wigan 1

at gov.co.

We got a bit to his crossing guard stuff.

No, he's very, very nice, man.

Yeah, he must have a new job because he's not the technical director of Barbados anymore.

So maybe he's in charge of hiring lollipop ladies, which you probably can't call them anymore.

What it is well,

we used to call them lollipop ladies.

Swallowed a traffic cone.

Right.

Fascinating Reddit thread from a while ago, Charlie.

People took it upon themselves to reframe football cliches, or classic football clichés, or even newfangled ones as framed by this podcast, as films.

So, A Bit of Both, a classic Richard Curtis rom-com from 2008, says Sand Hannotizer, starring Hugh Grant and Kira Knightley as the unlikely couple from two hilariously mismatched families.

Critically panned, but had a reasonable successful run in theatres.

I mean, this is where it's going.

This is the direction it's going.

Solid?

Would you watch a film called A Bit of Both?

I can imagine sort of vaguely having it, you know, one of those like, oh, it's on, I'll watch it.

This is probably just like quite pleasant.

Washover me.

But this is an amazing thread or sort of original post by Zan Annetizer with various film options.

Very creative stuff, Nick.

Whisper It Quietly, a 2012 mystery/slash horror period piece starring Killian Murphy as a troubled writer who returned to his old countryside village following the mysterious death of his mother, played by Vanessa Redgrave.

Disappointment on opening, but it's become seen as something of a cult classic.

Whisper It Quietly is a very plausible

mystery horror film, right?

That's perfect.

Yeah, that is absolutely perfect.

He's nailed the casting there as well.

That's superb.

I won't do all of these, Charlie, but I'm going to do all the good ones.

For My Sins, originally Pour Me Pesche.

This brooding French legal drama stars Juliette Binoche as a young criminal lawyer taking on what she believes to be a routine case that spirals into nearly destroying her career.

Three hours long and has a huge audience/slash critics discrepancy on Rotten Tomatoes.

The translation of the title here, Charlie, is elite.

Well done.

This is superb.

I mean, I do think the person who put this together must have a very good knowledge of film, maybe even works in the film industry, but I would definitely recommend seeking this out on Reddit because it is superb.

For more details, the better.

I'm going to do two more.

Listen, Fair Play, Nick, a 2018 drama about a major doping cover-up in Irish rugby union, starring Sausia Ronan as the soft-spoken team doctor and whistleblower, and Brendan Gleason as the assertive coach trying to keep the scandal from breaking.

Nominated for several BAFTAs, including a directing win for Stephen Frears.

That's nice.

I did think

on the spot I was trying to think of my own, I did think, listen, exclamation mark, fair play, is like a sort of 1950s screwball comedy starring Doris Dane Rock Hudson.

Love it.

Let's stick to the 1950s because Gets the Shot Away, a 1950s Western about a legendary marksman on the run from the law in rural New Mexico in the Reconstruction era, stars Gregory Peck as a morally conflicted officer of the law, and is sometimes credited with reviving the genre as a whole before Sergio Leone came along.

This is great, who is this person?

To really fit with that, would it have like an unexpected musical number in the middle of it or something like that?

I really hope so.

Finally, Silly Machines.

Aardman Animation's attempt to branch into sci-fi in 2015, starring Eddie Izzard and Stephen Fry, who provide their voices to a group of obsolete robots cast aside in a dystopian future who band together to take down a super AI and prove that all machines have a purpose, no matter how silly.

This should have been made, regardless of its football cliché's connection.

Yeah, just incredible work.

Is this all from the same person, dude?

Yeah, this is actually Jesus.

Yeah, I didn't bother with the comments.

The original post did all the job for us.

I mean, if there's anything more mid-week adjudication panel than that, I can't think of it right now.

In an international break.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah.

The perfect storm.

But after the, frankly, rampant success of of the movement 11 from last week, which, you know, before we did it, I thought was, you know, somewhere towards the bottom of the barrel, but turned out to be an absolute triumph.

I want to move on to the communication 11.

These are various methods of

expressing yourself in and around a football pitch for a team of 11 players.

I want to start with a goalkeeper, Nick.

I want my goalkeeper to be barking, barking instructions.

And who's the biggest barker of instructions in goalkeeping history?

Peach Michael.

Big time.

The Great Dane.

Yeah.

Goalkeepers are are the primary barkers in football, right, Charlie?

Yeah, I mean, I also have bellowing instructions, which I was thinking might be more of a manager thing.

But either way, clearly, you know, that kind of Schmeichel paradigm is really important here.

Yeah, hardline assistant managers could definitely bark or bellow, no question.

But yeah,

let's give precedence to the people on the pitch.

So barking, goalkeeper is the first one.

Right back, I'm going to go slightly more figurative here, Nick.

Letting him know you're there.

Which, not a literal form of communication, but I suppose, you know, it still counts.

Yeah, yeah, yeah so this is the early reducer rather than the kind of um like you know you you're covering the winger or something like that well this is an interesting point charlie um when i was thinking about this what you know what is this you know classic scenario for letting a player know you're there is it as violent as a reducer or is it more like you know just you know kick at the heels really sort of tight oh yeah little ankle tap or treading on their toes or something like that or is it just close quarters i think it can be any of those things right there there are many ways to let a winger know you're there letting them know you're there because that it feels too subtle to be

letting him know you're absolute reducer to me so maybe it's just the early sort of pleasantries before yeah over to left back we go now charlie now the wide positions lend themselves more to communication with the linesman so i'm going to go with haranguing for left back yeah that's a good one i mean it's hard with left back there's and right back there's general just like being described as mouthy but that you know that can manifest in various different ways and like as nick says there's the the winger and fullback there is that thing of like this is maybe more of a standard league theme but it's like look when i go forward you know i'm going to to overlap a bit.

I'll let you know I'm doing it.

You need to sort of cover in for me.

So it's kind of like the, I don't know, that having that dialogue with the other person on your side.

This is like the

Stephen Manman line where he said when he moved to Real Madrid playing with Michelle Salgado, the first words in Spanish he learnt were cover me.

There you go.

Okay.

Yeah, there you are.

Into the centre of our defense we go.

I mean, really basic stuff here.

This is where talking happens, isn't it?

Lots of talking back there.

Lots of talking.

And that's primarily the responsibility of the centre half.

Over the goalkeeper, I would say.

The organising alpha centre half, I think.

That has to be you're virgin for Van Dijk's kind of thing.

I wondered about.

I had bawling out for one of these things, which feels goalkeepery.

Again, it feels Peter Schmeichel kind of screaming at his players, screaming his defence for not dealing with the corner or whatever it was.

But I suppose you could have that as you sort of marshalling central defender as well.

Oh, definitely.

I think Van Dyke's often a good proponent of this, Charlie, which is when he has to essentially do all the defending by himself and wonders where everybody is.

And then concedes a corner and has at least about seven or eight seconds to ball out his retreating midfielders for not getting back in time.

Yeah, berating.

Yeah.

Berating them as well.

And yeah, the specific acts of things like putting a name on it, the instructions of things like, don't let the ball bounce.

I think centre-backs, you know, the big things in their intra-Nick is putting their name on it.

for a header.

So yeah.

Talking of putting your head on.

That's also quite a central midfielder thing, though, as well.

Yeah, from a guy.

Like got the kind of mouthy centre mid whose name you don't stop hearing all game because they're just like they're so obsessed with putting a name on everything.

You've played Sunday League with some really annoying people, but it sounds like I think that's like a Sunday League staple, that kind of scrappy centre mid who loves putting a name on it.

I do, I feel we do feel a disadvantage in these things given at these moments, given that I haven't played Sunday League since I think I was 15.

Very much affected.

I don't imagine it's changed much, the level of communication.

I was going to use berate for my right winger because they could berate a linesman for a poor off-cycle.

So berating, what's I mean, is berating worse than haranguing?

I mean, they're pretty level.

It feels slightly more aggressive.

Like, haranguing is like more of a constant thing, but berating is a sort of short-sharp burst of abuse.

Love it.

Yeah.

Interesting.

Okay.

Charlie, more figurative again.

I want my left winger to ask questions of a fullback.

I'm not struggling for ideas, are you?

No, that's a great.

I mean, yeah, I like the more sort of abstract ones.

I just like the idea of that being taken literally, just like constantly asking him information, like, do you know what pitch this is?

Like, no, I'm just a bit confused.

Hey, getting on this is left.

Yeah.

How are you not getting off this is?

I've got more bigger picture with my central midfield, Nick.

I want my totemic central midfielder to issue rallying cries.

I mean, especially if they're the captain.

So, yeah.

Or a war cry.

Yeah, it's roaring or sort of sort of

maybe that's kind of tabloides, but it's kind of.

I don't mind it.

Yeah, it's a very much a subset of that.

What is the textbook roar?

What do players roar about in the tabloids?

England can win the World Cup, roars Harry Cannon.

Yeah,

he's gonna roar, isn't he?

It's a manager or a player saying something that's

kind of vaguely confident or geeing are.

It can only be a sort of semi-committal prediction of striving to do something, can't it?

I mean, could, say, for example, a Cape Verde Nick roar that they're not there to make up up the numbers?

That's not enough of a roar, is it?

That's an insist, I think.

Oh, right.

That's more of an insist.

They insist that they're not just there for the holiday.

Yeah, it's not enough of a roar.

We're not just here to make up the numbers.

It's not good enough.

Sentiments lift the team as well, I feel like, with their, you know, both with their gestures, but also with their talking and sometimes with their actions as well.

Passionate team, I love this.

For your sort of playmaker, midfield playmaker, I had demanding, like that you're demanding the balls for defenses or whatever.

Yes.

Well, I had a similar thing for forwards.

That thing of like, you know, kind of screaming at players to find them.

You know, this thing of like, you know, and that poor striker is not getting the service.

He's been screaming all game.

He's making the runs in behind and they're just not finding him.

I had for

we were jumping ahead in the team here, but I had for that kind of situation, quite specific, like when a striker is waiting for a cross or a through ball, imploring.

Imploring.

Yeah.

Yeah.

The ball be played through or crossed to them that has to be accompanied with the cheery honored pointy down hands of why haven't you found me in this situation that's an implore yeah yeah let's move on to our forward line um charlie big fan of uh telepathic understanding between two forwards and that that is a form of communication yeah it might not be proven but i'm

i'm all right with it they don't need to communicate verbally that's the level of understanding yeah telepathic um and i want my other striker nick to let his football do the talking actually um you know the purest form of communication in football i would say.

Absolutely.

What to do with remonstrating?

Because that is a...

You can bundle that in with the referee thing, remonstrating with the referee of decision.

But I had, very specifically, I had Morgan Gibbs White in my head remonstrating with his, because he's quite a, he looks like a real pain in the ass to be on the same team was because he's having a go at his teammates all the time.

So he's sort of remonstrating with them for not feeding him the ball, for not kind of playing the right passes and all that kind of stuff.

He's got a really remonstrative face, actually.

Now I think about it, yeah.

From from what I understand, like people don't people like him, but he is, you know, people say, well, yeah, he demands high standards of, we've got to live up to those.

Well, that's, yeah, because remonstrating obviously you often think of about a player remonstrating towards a referee or something.

But Adam, you mentioned Henri, he was also a great remonstrator.

to his teammates in the same way as Gibbs White of a kind of like, I've got extremely high standards.

How are you not matching up to them?

And related to letting his football do the talking, for some players, strikers, their numbers speak for themselves yeah so that the numbers are doing their talking they don't need to do like any talking sorry to go basically quite episode seven of football cliches back in 2020 but you never hear remonstrate outside of football can't be the last time i ever heard the word remonstrate remonstrate where you could possibly use it but

it's like you remonstrate against like a parking attendant or something like that

i've only been here five minutes i just nipped into it it's a very similar energy complaining like complaining about a parking ticket to complaining about a booking you know It's like, oh, first, you know, first offence, you know, come on.

Speaking of which, the Football Cliche's live talk was overshadowed by me receiving a penalty notice for driving through a bus gate in Brighton.

I don't know the city.

I just don't know it.

I'm also a shit driver, which doesn't help.

On remonstrating, though, I really need to make this point.

Berating haranguing seems very one-way, Nick.

Like, you're basically just pouring out all your vitriol towards a kind of a...

poor kind of recipient.

Remonstrating has an element of debate about it.

Like,

there should be a back and forth in a remonstration.

You're looking for feedback.

Yeah, it's it it's it's w it's kind of one dominated by one side.

It feels like a sort of 70-30 thing, where the the player is doing most of the remonstrating, but the the the referee or or whoever else it is has has kind of tried to justify whatever it is being remonstrated against.

But yeah, you're right.

There is a there is a an element of debate about it.

Yeah, very chatty, very mouthy team, this as a whole.

Um, I think might be one of the most annoying teams ever constructed.

Hey welders, ready to upgrade your gear and save some serious dough in the process?

The Miller Build with Blue Savings and Rebate Program has you covered.

Find amazing deals and cashback rebates on a wide range of Miller products, from welders to plasma cutters and everything in between, all backed by our three-year warranty.

Don't let this opportunity pass you by.

Take advantage of the Miller Build with Blue program now.

Visit us online or stop by your nearest Miller distributor today to start saving.

Sport Social Podcast Network, the biggest voices in sport.

Let's take a look at some of the lineup.

Tops and tails.

And he goes, all right, mate, do you want the darts?

And thing?

And I'm like, what darts?

The Anfield rap.

Off the field, Liverpool have done everything they possibly could to achieve dominance now.

The analyst inside cricket.

It was announced over the pay A system that I was out of the test for injury.

A massive cheer went up around the ground.

Probably the biggest cheer I've got in the UK.

All on Europe's biggest sport podcast network find your next favorite sport podcast search sport social podcast network and listen wherever you get your podcast sport social podcast network verified comparison at content dot sport dash social dot co dot uk forward slash comparison

and speaking of people who just won't ever shut up it's time for keys and grey corner

On Super Sunday.

A rare midweek Keys and Grey Corner.

What a treat for absolutely everyone.

But

I had to address this straight away.

Anyone who's trying to access Richard Keys' blog this week will be disappointed by one.

There is no blog this week.

He's in Mallorca, as is his want for the International Breaks.

Little caption on his Instagram post the other day, Nick, you know, as he surveyed yet another Mallorken sunset, glass of wine in hand, and he said, Real men drink rose.

Lovely.

I actually haven't seen the, not really, for some reason, not really familiar with the construction of these pictures.

Is he a picture of himself with the wine or a picture of the glass of wine with scene in the background?

Blatter.

Blatter.

Yeah, it doesn't take pictures of himself.

It's all scenery.

And, you you know, I respect his privacy.

But speaking of privacy, Charlie, anybody trying to, you know, peruse old versions of his blog were met with a dramatic message on his website.

Your connection is not private.

Attackers might be trying to steal your information from richardajkeys.com.

For example, passwords, messages, or credit cards.

Learn more about this warning.

Oh, God.

Has he been?

What's going on?

Has he forgot to, I don't know, renew his subscription to his redirection?

I don't know.

Worrying times.

Yeah.

You need to to get it back.

I mean, it needs to come back soon.

Yeah.

Maybe when he goes to write his next blog, he'll become aware of it.

Speaking of Keesy in sunnier climes,

it is astonishing that we've never really confronted this.

But I'm, you know, having said that, I never really watched this program in the first place.

But here is Richard Keese's cameo in Dream Team.

And I think it's genuinely good acting, all things considered.

Linda Block,

you're nicked.

Richard,

What are you doing here?

Same as you.

I'm here for the Champions League game.

I'm not.

Oh, come on.

Of all the pools in all the world, I find you lying by this one.

No, seriously, I'm not.

I'm on holiday.

Permanent holiday.

No more football, no more Hochester.

Which is why you're staying at Jeff Stein's villa?

How do you know I was here?

Well, actually, it's my job to know things, isn't it?

I also know where you and I can get a decent view of the sunset and some first-class champagne.

A mate of mine has got a boat in the port, and me and and you are invited for drinks.

It's very sweet of you, but I don't really see people at the moment.

I'm not the best of company.

Oh, come on, Linda, don't make me beg.

It's not a pretty sight.

No.

Okay, well, I'll just stay here in your sun until you say yes.

It takes a little moment to warm up here, Charlie, but I'm really impressed with Keezy in this scene.

I mean, I mean, cameos from known figures playing themselves in films and TV can be a very stilted affair.

It can be very wooden.

I think my favourite bit is...

Oh, come on, Linda.

Don't make me beg.

Don't make me beg.

I thought this was really well done.

I spent money.

A couple of bits are a bit less central.

A mate of mine.

Yeah, that was...

I did hear it.

Jeff Steinsvilla, who was an a...

Jeff Stein was an notorious agent for many of the Harchester players.

Also, bringing it full circle, I believe that was in Majorca.

I believe the Champions League tie where Harchester were.

And we know Keesy IRL is a big

Mallorca fan.

Yeah, I mean, he, it's also just a testament to how kind of towering a figure at Sky Keesy was in kind of the late 90s, early noughties that, you know, I don't know exactly whether he would have asked.

to do it or have been asked, but either way, you know, it was like, yeah, Keese's just everywhere.

You know, that was a Sky one program.

But yeah, a pretty accomplished

cameo.

I mean, it is, there's a bit of the early keys.

The T's are very pronounced, and I think he'd largely drop that in broadcasting, but I think he's acting, so he thinks, right, you know, diction has to be very clear here, Richard.

But other than that, it's pretty natural.

Yeah, he needs to come across as

a rather sophisticated figure here, despite playing himself in this Nick.

I don't want to go overboard about his acting ability.

You know, I've got no notion of that.

You are nominating from Oscar here.

But yeah, you know, if we were to pinpoint his level here, he'd be a really compelling soap opera baddie.

Like, there's a real kind of Richard Hillman vibe about him from Corrie.

Like, there's definitely, he could, you know, dark forces could be within here, definitely.

He could, yeah, he could murder an entire family in a, in a

soap opera.

I've confessed my knowledge of the history of soap operas is a little bit hazy.

Richard, is he one of the kind of sweeps into town, charms someone, they get married, and then it turns out he's, you know, killed someone or is embezzling or whatever?

He married Gail Platt and then eventually drove them both into a lake.

Okay.

But yeah, I think he might have killed several other people along the way with some, you know, some gloves and a glare in his eye.

This isn't the direction he was supposed to go, but yeah,

imagine a parallel Keesy career, Charlie, of soap opera stardom.

I mean, very plausible.

Yeah, well, around this time in Dream Team, there was a character called Prashant Datani played by an actor called Ramon Takaram, who I saw recently pop up in the Netflix show Chaos, which was really good.

And he was really good.

But he was playing that kind of suave out-of-towner who came in and kind of took the club over and you weren't sure, you know, what's this guy's motivations?

And yeah, I don't think Keese would have been a million miles away from being able to play, being able to play that role.

There's a funny thing as well here that he talks, you know how Gray often says things like, well, you know, you're the journalist sort of thing.

And he obviously, Keys obviously pushes that really hard.

His line about, well, it's my job to know things.

Like he, I'm sure, was pushing that line very hard at Sky at the time that he wasn't a presenter.

He was a journalist and he was a you know a getter of stories and that sort of thing.

And an extra layer of self-referencing as well Nick which I think he probably pushed for as well.

Could you just talk about me a little bit more?

Yeah.

I did.

The last clip was about a minute long and I think for about 50 seconds it was as you say surprisingly good acting,

quite a sort of fitting character, the character of Richard Keyes kind of thing.

Trying to be a suave and you know trying his luck with the the boat and the rota and the the champagne.

And then the the bit at the end where he says well I'm just I'm just going to stand in your sun and you'll have to come with me.

That just took me out of it completely.

That's the kind of actions of a petulant child rather than the sophisticate that I'm sure he wants to think of himself as.

Richard Keyes Eclipse.

On that mental image.

Thanks to you, Charlie Ecclesia.

Thank you.

Thanks to you, Nick Miller.

Thank you.

And thanks to everyone for listening.

Birmingham, we'll see you tonight.

Dublin, we'll see you tomorrow.

This podcast is part of the Sports Social Podcast Network.

I earned my degree online at Arizona State University.

I chose to get my degree at ASU because I knew that I'd get a quality education, they were recognized for excellence, and that I would be prepared for the workforce upon graduating.

To be associated with ASU,

both as a student and alum, it makes me extremely proud.

And having experienced the program, I know now that I'm set up for success.

Learn more at ASUonline.asu.edu.