Glove-spitting goalkeepers & edge-of-the-D drama at five-a-side: The listeners' loves & hates

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Is Gascoyne going to have a crack? He is, you know. Oh, I say!

Brilliant!

But jeez!

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

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 your glass!

This nation is going to dance all night long!

Footballing barrels you can stare down, players whose names sound like they're being booed, goalkeeping glove spitters, the gantry wobbling knights under the lights, the do's and don'ts when it comes to the layout of seven goal thrillers on scores apps, the flimsy logic of but they still had 11 internationals out there, the unsatisfying spectacle of waiting for a ball to reach the edge of the D in five aside, and a long overdue look at the most pointless form of youth football in the United Kingdom.

Brought to your ears by Goal Hanger Podcasts, this is Football Clichés and your Mezza Haaland Dicks.

Hello everyone and welcome to Football Clichés. I'm Adam Hurry.
This is the listeners Mezza Haaland Dicks for December. Joining me to go through them is Charlie Ecoucher.
How are you doing?

Very well, thank you. And David Walker, how are things? Things are good.
Christmas is fast approaching.

This is our Christmas schedule for clichés. We'll have the best of 2025 for you next week.

Then the adjudication panel returns in or around Tuesday, the 30th of December, to take in the festive action. And then we'll be back to regular business on Tuesday, January the 6th.

Dreamlanders, you'll be getting your second December episode as well, of course. On Christmas, the Football Clichés Christmas quiz live in aid of shelter on the 28th of December.

We're going to be live streaming from 8 p.m. and you can join in interactively in our multiple choice quiz with a chance to win £250

and all the profits will go to shelter. Just go to football cliches.com slash Xmas.
I've really enjoyed putting this quiz together.

But the extra consideration, Dave, of the multiple choice aspect really does sharpen the quiz writing brain because it's a real art form,

making a question hard, but not completely ruining it with a multiple choice question. The other three need to be plausible, but you also don't want it to be impossible.
I think so.

I really enjoy the multiple choice element, though, because it means you can go for sort of no question is going to be impossible because there are always options there.

So it does really open up your horizons. And the fun is in coming up with comparable options is fun.
But it should never be a shot in the dark.

That's the annoying thing. One, you don't want the question to be a shot in the dark.
You just, you know, click any answer.

At the same time, you don't want to reveal your psychology of putting the answers together either. It's an absolute mindfield, multiple choice, but I've been enjoying it.
It's a great quiz.

Join us on the 28th of December. It's going to be class.
Right. Right, before we get on to the main event, it's adjudication panel time and it's a great one.
First up, it's going for midfield runner.

It's deliberate Barry Davis from commentator Rod Studd at the Darts as Simon Whitlock goes for a 170 checkout.

For

the set.

You've got to go for it, Simon. Come on.
Don't worry about the scoreline. Just go for it.

Go for it, man. Is he going to have a pop?

He is, you know. 111!

We were denied the payoffs! I'm really annoyed by that.

Yeah, that's a real shame. Would he have gone for the OIC? I just think he would have done.
He's a knowledgeable commentator. I would have put it past him.
Yeah, you've got to follow through.

If you've done the setup, you've got to deliver. But yeah, tremendous.
People will also know that from our theme tune as well. So, yeah, tremendous start.

Spretzatura writes in next, Charlie. It says, on Sky Sports News the other day, he saw that Livingston was staring down the barrel of 14 games without a win.
That's a very specific barrel.

I'm not very happy with it.

Well, not just that, but also, surely there would have been a barrel before that that they were staring down.

Yeah, I'm, I, I may have mentioned this before, I really like doing this with ludicrously specific things in normal, in regular life.

So Lizzie will say to me, like, oh, how long is it going to take to get there? And I'll say, like, yeah, according to Google Maps, we're staring down the barrel of about 27 minutes.

And obviously, it gets completely ignored, but I really enjoy doing it because it's totally ridiculous.

Yeah, I know. Well, she's, let yeah she's sort of learning to filter it out.
But yeah for a sear for a serious outlet I probably wouldn't be doing it.

I mean let's take issue with the main issue here Dave. It is a very specific barrel.
Why introduce the barrel now after 14? Why has the threshold been met at that point?

Well we don't know whether they've whether the barrel has been updated game by game. Continuous barrel.

When do you think you would for a kind of mid-ranking team when do you think it becomes a barrel situation? Six games without a win?

Three is no well, oh, yeah, okay, so it's games without a win, uh, you know, for a generic team.

Yeah, eight, you think it's that meant you don't think you know, all sixes is already sort of like six is quite bad.

That's quite a lot. Six is carrying down the barrel of six.
Yeah, okay, I'll allow it. Yeah, I think, yeah, the barrel shouldn't be unattainable.

Yeah, it should be, it should be an accessible thing, the barrel. I agree.
Right, Sam Schacht writes in next day. He says, it's really bothering me in the Real Madrid Man City game.

Referee Clement Turpin keeps brandishing his yellow cards with the white portion of the card that he writes on facing out.

I don't mind referees writing on the card, but I don't want to see that part when the card is issued to a player. I think this didn't quite make listeners' MHD, but I do get it.

Yeah, that's a weird thing, isn't it? We shouldn't see that. It ruins the aesthetics of the yellow card for a start, Charlie.
Yeah, too much for a peek behind the curtain.

I don't want to see the admin. I don't want to see the admin.
I mean, I didn't even realise.

You see it every now and then, Dave. I didn't really realise that referees still sort of document the players' names on the card.
Exactly. And I sort of like the fact that they do that.

That, you know, there's that, there's just no better way of doing it, I guess. You need to pay portrayal.
Because you can't just rely on a fourth official to go, oh, I think it was in his direction.

Not sure. Yeah, yeah, it's got to be.
But you could have like a could have a spotter.

They've all got radios, haven't they? So they could say, all right, I'm booking John Stones here. That's true.
They could just do that. We don't want Stockley Park to take on any more burden, do we?

Yeah, yeah, that's true. Yeah, it could all be done by radio these days.

Thinking about it, actually, if they are writing down like the players that are getting booked or sent off or whatever on the little card, that'd be like a nice item of memorabilia, surely, for like a really famous game.

The Battle of Branwell Lane with all the with all the names on the card. Surely that's a good

point. Yeah.
Are they allowed to sell them sort of Tildsley style? What's their handwriting to be like? If you've ever had to

sign anything without anything to support the back of it, your handwriting goes to shit. And in a small space as well, probably with a tiny pencil, it's going to be unreadable.

Player, come here, give me a back. Yes.
Turn around. That's going to lean on you as well.

It's the only way. It's a really good way to find support.
Anyway,

this was interesting from Freddie Parkinson.

Very rarely see this thing sort of done in real time, Charlie. He says, is John Duran streets won't forget? I feel like he's forgotten already, but I know the streets won't.

I think he actually might be. He's really out of sight, out of mind for me.
Yeah, it's a weird one given he's so young and so early in his career. I don't know to be suggesting that.

Because we don't know what's to come. I mean, he's 22.

He'll be back, right?

Is that fair to say? Maybe.

I think he will, yeah. Surely.
But he has a really...

Let's assume he doesn't ever come back, Dave, and does just keep playing in obscure leagues, which is unlikely, but still. His body of work in the Premier League is very streets won't forgettie.

Like, you know, it has a kind of Carbony-esque kind of set of goals to enjoy. Yeah, a couple of spectacular goals.
Some really hard shots as well. You know, he was kind of...
That was his thing.

Yeah, I mean,

he definitely is

in the right kind of ballpark. Yeah.
There you go. It's good to see these things unraveling in real time.
Right, hot on the heels of the new edition the other day. It's another gets the shot away.

Let's recap the phenomenon, please. Fiderico Kiel gets the shot away.
He skates into the zone. Drop pass for Petter.
Gets the shot away.

Blakes it on its way.

Holding here for just one breath, send the heels back. Press the mat away.

And Bethel flicks this away.

High in the air. To the the turn 12 section.
And he had a red ball in the way.

Formula one added the other day.

But can this be added to the family? It came from Peter McLeod, his UCL Philosophy post-grad ace, Manny Campion Dye, buzzing in on University Challenge, and voice overman Roger Tilling does the rest.

Let's start the question. Fingers on buzzes.

Though not used in English until the early 18th century writings of Joseph Rafson and John Toland, what term denoting the belief that a supreme deity and nature are one and the same is most commonly associated with the 17th century works of Baruch Spinoza?

You see all campion by monism? Don't I'm afraid you lose five points.

It's nearly, it's not quite there, is it? I don't think. He sounded like Jeremy Vine actually, didn't he? Gabby die.
Gabby die on the light.

I'm pleased though, because this vindicates I once was, so there were two double-barreled surnames in that little clip we've just seen, and there are always double-barreled surnames on University Challenge.

and i was once interviewing troy archibald henville which i just thought that surname was such a university challenge surname and throughout it i just kept hearing archibald henville as he was about to speak

oh good yeah i don't know what happened to the voiceoverman there but yeah um yeah

dave i agree with you we should keep the bar high for inclusion in this it's not going in just yet oh what a gift from the gods this was um i feel like charlie i've got to the point where i can map out richard keyes' week his sort of average week when he's going to dip in and out of certain activities and the blog on the monday obviously And then he gets stuck into his broadcasting duties perhaps midweek and then certainly at the weekend.

But he's got a lot of spare time in between. And what he likes to do is just share random clips from his breakfast TV days.
Stuff he's just unearthed or found in a loft somewhere.

It's like a trophy he got. And he tweeted out a clip this week.
October 1987, the morning after the great storm. Who is that young man?

The power failed at TV AMHQ, so Anne and I decamped to Thames TV. She was a top operator.
The best. I took this from a documentary about breakfast TV.
It was a good watch, but not accurate.

They never are.

How can you squeeze so much into one thing?

Not even using up his character limit, I don't think. There's one staple missing here, and that is the taking credit for the person he's praising's career.

He doesn't do that. Like, I would, if to tick all the boxes there, I think that's the only thing missing.
But has he so presumably he's been watching this documentary or something

and has sort of taken to X to talk about it, which again though is very sort of mapping out his week.

Like he'll do in the way that he'll share a really ragged screenshot of like the Daily Mail on his iPad. Like you know

you just you just know the sort of rhythms and contours of his week. Yeah.

Maybe, Dave, the reason why Anne Diamond doesn't have the credit stolen from her and given to Keys for her career trajectory is because she was a top operator, which is which is the highest keys honor, isn't it?

It's the knighthood knighthood of Richard Keysdom. Yeah, yeah, very much so.

There's not that many in. Well, I suppose there are actually quite a few people that he considers to be top operators,

to be honest.

Often a top, obviously not in this case, but often a top bloke and a top operator. Right.

I think that's like the kind of absolute gold standard. She was a great bloke.

I'm surprised that actually, another thing he could have fit in with his recollection of the Great Storm, I'm surprised he didn't get in a little dig at Michael Fish. Yeah, yeah.

Was he a top operator? I guess not after that. Could Weatherman be operators? Was Ann Diamond an operator in any way? I suppose.

Actually, if you're doing live TV, Dave, that is technically top operator sort of domain. Yeah, and especially at this time, like, that's probably when they really did have to come into their own.

I mean, that, yeah, obviously. Adversity, yeah.
Yeah, exactly. I love the idea of him sort of, I told Michael Fish, I warned him about the storm, and he ignored me.
I was right.

I was right, that was right. He never lived it down.
A mere gust. Right.
But yeah, that came very soon after Keese's superb blog on Monday. Like genuinely superb way to finish his year.

So he kicks off by telling us the story of Len Shackleton's autobiography, which has the infamous page, blank page of the average director's knowledge of football.

Thinks we didn't know about it, but we do.

And then

we're straight into the big story, the thing that dominates his every thought, Celtic Football Club, which gets almost the whole piece. Charlie.

So all about Celtic Football Club and the shambles he thinks is going on there. But he refuses to name their new manager, Wilfred Nonce, which is an incredible move, but such a keysy thing to do.

It's very deliberate, surely. Oh, 100%, yeah.
It might be as well while he's sort of brainstorming his nickname for him.

You know, he doesn't want to go too soon with it, so he leaves himself a bit of room to go.

And we are very mid-workshop with his nickname for Wilfred Noncy, aren't we, Dave?

He's gone for when they stood Martin O'Neill down and replaced him with a cross between Inspector Clousseau and Russell Martin.

He then goes on to use Clousseau six more times instead of this guy's name.

The amazing thing with Clouseau's nickname is that was what Wenger was nicknamed, whatever it was, you know, when he first came to England nearly 30 years ago.

And even at that point, it felt like a little bit of a sort of like

slightly dated heart. Oh, yeah, he definitely would have done.
But do you know what I mean? Even that, it was like, it was considered a slightly dated reference. That's 30 years ago.

What's he getting at? Just the french thing like what is that it is literally that it like well

wasn't a bumbling figure was he i think he was was he yeah yeah i think he's that's what he was thinking of

yeah

clouso was the pig panther right yeah of course he was yeah

and that's why yeah venge got it as a sort of because he was sort of clumsy maybe i do need need the education thank you keesy but yeah so poirot was a top operator yeah he really was consistently and a top bloke i think agatha christie um but he'd have been a miss marple man Sure.

Okay, yeah, yeah, sure, right.

Some little passages of this have great impact, Dave. In fact, it went horribly wrong in all three matches.
Cluso is now scrambling around talking absolute bollocks.

And Celtic are right back where they were after sacking Rogers. It's a shambles.
Who is Cluso anyway? When I heard he'd got a job, I messaged a friend in the States and asked about him.

I got a one-word answer back. I'll let you work out what it might have been.
A clue is, it wasn't flattering.

But then there's an amazingly uncharacteristic bit of self-reflection when Keesy says, okay, it wasn't the most exhaustive research.

He would never normally acknowledge that.

Although he doesn't say, but the answer told me all I needed to know.

Small sample size, but yes, he is crap.

Oh, dear. Then he moves on to Scott Parker.
I don't want to be too unkind to Scott Parker, but he's another one. Listen to him closely and you hear him say everything the manuals preach.

He always sounds like a today coach and tries to look like one as well. My advice would be don't.
Relax, Scott. Take a leaf out of O'Neill's book.

Stop talking technical nonsense and have a little more understanding of what you are and where you are. Standing on a touchline in a variety of Tom Brown clothing isn't a good look.

It was a really bad idea this weekend to wear a 2,000-pound brown cardigan in the pissing rain. Our city were getting pumped again to make seven straight defeats.

Pumped

again.

On fire. Wow.
It's a great block. That's the only bit that I do think I could see in kind of mainstream media calling Parker out for, you know, that will be in the sacking Cardigans.

But, you know, he alienated some fans and colleagues even with his insistence on wearing expensive clothing in the rain. It's just amazing.

And then, yeah, just a classic kind of top-heavy Keysy blog as well, Dave. Like 80% of it dedicated to Celtic.
Then a bit on Parker.

And then it's Top Mark Sunderland, Salah's Future, Calvert Lewin, on fire. PT for Everton they couldn't win at Chelsea.
All they need is a centre-forward.

And then How West Hen must be missing the Moise Days. Be careful what you wish for.
See you later.

News in brief, page 312 on CPAC.

This is genuinely possibly

in the pantheon. It's got everything.

Absolutely everything. Yeah.

One day we should just rank all of his blogs in one fell swoop. Brilliant.
Dreamland. Yeah, what a dreamland episode that would be.
If you don't sign up for that, you never will.

Right, that's the adjudication panel taken care of. We'll be back very shortly with the listeners, Mezzet Harland Dix.

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Oh, look at that!

That is wonderful!

Welcome back to Football Cliches. This is the listeners, Meza Harlan Dix.
On Dreamland, by the way, we're recording the last Dreamo of the year soon.

Thanks to everyone who's signed up since we launched.

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Right, listeners, Mezert Harland, Dicks, lovely selection to end the year.

Let's kick off the fascinations with Josh Morris. A fascination of mine is when fans chant a player's name as so long as part of their name resembles the ooh sound.

An example being Sunderland goalkeeper Robin Roofs, who himself has admitted that he had to learn that Sunderland fans were not in fact booing him.

I assume this is an ironic ploy of course on the boo sound given that I had never heard Chelsea fans chant check when Pettichek could make a save as an example.

Of course an example I guess is also Liverpool chanting Iboo for Ibu Canate despite there being several syllables in the sermon they could choose.

Charlie, I mean this is a noted phenomenon in English for now.

It feels inevitable that any player with a double O or any kind of elongated vowel sound in the middle of the name is going to get the booing sound treatment for their first chant because it doesn't require any work shopping, does it?

It's just straight in there and it has immediate impact for them. Yeah, my first memory of this is Rudvan Istelroy, the United fans doing it with him.

And it was either him or someone, I think it may have been a player subsequent to him who did initially think they were being booed and was quite confused by it.

It may have been him because it was quite early on. I mean, for me, that's like, that was the start of the phenomenon.
I'm sure there were players before, but that really, that really caught on.

big one at the moment is is Bellingham as well oh really

yeah when he came off the bench against uh Serbia last month there was yeah everyone was doing the old dude and I was sitting next to Ali uh Maxwell at the time and I'll embarrass him slightly here he turned to me and went are they booing him

wow that's an inc wow yeah easy to get fooled I guess and um I mean the problem I have with it Charlie is that it's not a very celebratory tone it lends cult status potentially to the player themselves because you're just picking up on a minor detail about them, their name, nothing else about them, really.

But I think it lends itself better to massive players. I'll give you an example, Robert Hooth, who I'm sure got that treatment at Chelsea and Leicester.
So whoof, but it helps because he's massive.

He's a lumbering giant. He's a big lad.
Yeah. And I think, you know, you can't just give it to any player.
I suppose a goalkeeper, that would help.

It sort of implies that they're formidable. Also, because that was around the same time as the Ruvanistro one started, the Hoof thing would start.

Whenever a player would go line, there'd be the hoof, which then made the hoof thing kind of have that double meaning. Hooth probably has hoofed it for a few days.
Exactly. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But this was a big thing. Last year at Wimbledon, Djokovic was playing Holger Runa.
Oh, right. The crowd were all doing the Runa thing.
Oh, no.

And he went, he got really angry in his post-match interview and was like, they were booing me. And the interviewer was going like,

Runa himself. No, to Djokovic.
The interviewer said to Djokovic in his post-match. That's what I was going to say.
That's even funnier, actually, actually.

And he was like, I think the interviewer said, said,

I don't think they were. I think they were just doing like the runaway.
And he was like, no, no, no. I know what I heard.
It became this massive thing.

And he was claiming that some of them were almost using it as a kind of veil, you know, to hide behind, to be said, like, you know, to have plausible deniability of like, no, no, I was just saying runa.

I wasn't booing you at all. But yeah, it became this massive thing.
That would take all the sting out of the boo if you were booing, because then you'd just be saying I wasn't doing it.

So there's no point. You can't just, you can't just boo someone, then explain it away.
Otherwise, there's no point. Well,

whatever the point, it absolutely rattled him. Yeah, well, yeah, in a roundabout way.
Dangerously close to Simpson's territory there, Adam.

Genuine, but at the time, at the time,

there was a lot of the this is a natural case of I was saying boo earned. Yes, I am aware of the reference.
I will not be indulging it.

Let's pick up on the case study that Josh Morris cited. Sutherland goalkeeper Robin Rufs.
Here's his penalty save versus Brentford. What can Robin Roofs produce here? Shader saved by Roos.

Brilliantly done! Beaten away!

And Brentford denied by the brilliant Robin Roofs. This is a great case study for the Juxtaposition Day because they're booing Kevin Shader as he tries to take the penalty to put him off.

Then Roofs saves it, and then they boo out his name as well, which is just proves the point.

And then he was on record as saying when he first heard it, he thought they were booing him, which I think feel like is a stretch, to be honest. Like, why would you think that?

Why would you think that on your debut? Yeah, I mean, has it become sort of default now?

any player with those vowels in their name does feel like that um like i i think it suits goalkeepers quite well actually

because you know they don't have any

for a goal scorer it feels a bit too you know your main emotion is just just you know chanting screaming the big moment but for a penalty save it's quite nice to mark it with something like that i think you can bathe in the you can bathe in the aftermath of a penalty save as the game goes on charlie which is why that this chant lends itself really nicely but i guess for a strike if it was a striker if if they go close with the shot, then I guess you could do it.

But yeah, you couldn't do it if they score because they'll be able to do it.

Well, no, you can, because you get the second wave, because you get the, you do your celebrating, then it goes quiet, and then there's the whole, you know,

that's like a great moment to do it in response to. Yeah.

But yeah, yeah, but he is pronounced Robin Goofs, by the way, Dave.

So if Sunderland fans were to go pure literal with the pronunciation, it would just sound like they're all spitting on him from the stand behind,

gobbing on the goalkeeper. More on that in a moment.

On booing, by the way saw this tweet alejandro garnacho being booed in random ass venues why do you as a cardiff fan dislike him i i am slightly fascinated by players who just attract booing and then fans who will know that they're being booed and therefore continue to boo them and there's an element of a backstory about garnacho because he because he kind of he didn't force his way out of man united but he basically he pushed for a move and that seems to be the lowest possible benchmark for being booed in english football if fans have an inkling that you might be a bit troublesome in any way even though it doesn't affect them whatsoever that's a boo.

Yeah, I mean, what? Do you think that's what this was linked to?

I don't know. What else could he? Well, often the player will get booed.
I don't know. I didn't watch last night, but often it'll be because they'll do something early on.

Or there'll just be a sense that, you know, they're going down easily. Yeah, they're going down easily or they're whenging to the ref or something.
And then it just develops and snowballs.

Or maybe, I mean, he scored, didn't he? Maybe just that he scored and the way he celebrates. You know, sometimes the way the player celebrates can sort of wind people up.
Yeah.

But yeah, Wingers, sort of luxury players, are probably bound to get that sort of treatment, I think.

Especially in a game like this, where they were probably, where you're playing a lower league team, you're probably getting a bit of rough treatment. And you're perceived to have, you know, milked it.

Hey, good football loose side, Cardiff, by the way. But yeah, speaking of gobbing on goalkeepers from a distance, so this takes us on to Ed Barker with our second fascination.

My fascination, and I guess irritation, is the phenomenon of goalkeepers gobbing into their gloves.

I can understand why, once upon a time, with the old school leather ones, it might have been necessary, but it still happens.

And I refuse to believe that modern goalie gloves require this additional gobbing. Also, at the weekend, I was particularly amused.

I think it was in a Serie A game where a goalkeeper went up at the last minute for a corner, and before the corner came in, he gobbed into his gloves as if to somehow prepare for it.

Is it so hardwired into goalkeepers that they have to do it? I'm fascinated to know your thoughts. That is a great little bit at the end.

It must, quite literally, no, well, not literally, it must surely be hard-coded into goalkeepers, charlie to sort of steady themselves for a moment but spitting in your gloves you're going up for a corner is superb i think that's the proof yeah that's that's that's so good that it's just a kind of habit or almost like a superstition or try and give them a bit of luck or fire them up in some way i mean purchase wise you know i've been in a situation where i'm wearing brand new goalkeeper gloves and i've stepped in between the sticks and i've spat on them and i'm telling you you feel impregnable you know that when that ball comes to you it's sticking it's such a weird thing it's it is definitely the sort of thing that you would see people copying without they don't even know why they're doing it, but you just it's something that the pros do, so I'll do it.

But I wonder whether in the manufacturing process, does anyone test the gloves to see how they react?

Can they handle the spit? Goalkeepers all seem to have all sorts of substances behind their goal at the moment, Charlie.

You see Vaseline, for example, but they can't be using that on their gloves, can they? The last thing you want on your gloves. Don't make your gloves slippery.

Yeah, wouldn't that be like he's got vaseline on his gloves?

Goalkeepers use Vaseline on their gloves for a temporary grip boost, apparently, especially in wet conditions, by creating a tacky layer or repelling the water. So it makes them.

So yeah, goalkeepers do put Vaseline on their gloves. I mean, what's allowed?

You know, are there going to be limits placed? You know, if it was too beneficial. You know, if you're putting glue on your gloves,

you're stuck to the post.

Looking out of the wall. You can't get back up off the floor.

So hard to get up off the floor.

Like cartoon strength glue in your world.

Super glue.

It's right at the top of the hierarchy of learned goalkeeper behaviour, Charlie.

Because, as I said, whenever I've sort of stepped into goalkeeping duties, I immediately become a goalkeeper and must act like one. So it's studs against the post.

It's pretending to know how to move, you know, move a wall at a free kick to where they should be, even though you've got fucking no idea. And it's spitting into your gloves.
It's all of those things.

Writing notes, putting them on your water bottle for the opposition penalty taker, that sort of thing.

would that rattle someone at sunday league dave if you had a penalty shootout and the opposition cocky but had a water bottle with something written on it it would rattle you'd be a great laugh well i guess they could have come down and seen you in a previous round in a cup competition or something someone forwarded on the whatsapp videos from your last penalty shootout that you put in the whimblesdale channel yeah yeah exactly

a rat

but yes yeah it's it is absolutely muscle memory and learned behaviour no doubt thanks Ed Barker right the third and final fascination for 2025 from our listeners comes from the first listeners MHD contributor since Michael Cox to have their own Wikipedia page.

It's Philip Crawford.

My niche fascination of football is when the TV gantry or the makeshift scaffolding that supports the camera wobbles so much that the zoomed in images of players or fans celebrating give you that visceral feeling of being there.

It makes the whole ground and your living room tremble. It adds an almost physical dimension to your otherwise purely visual and auditory experience of watching a game at home.

The obvious, glorious example is Stan Collingmore's winner in Liverpool's 4-3 win against Newcastle at Anfield in 1996.

Keegan slumped over those advertising hoardings, is, I think, as famous as it is, partly because of the images bobbing up and down as they do.

My guess is the best other examples might come from non-league home FA Cup ties against top-ranked opposition teams when those those wobbly TV gantries are built for the occasion. Love this, Dave.

Great phenomenon. Great case study to use as the example of it.

He's spot on, isn't he, Philip Crowther? You know what? Now he said I can immediately picture it and identify it, but I don't know if I had noticed it previously without it being pointed out to me.

But yeah, of course it does. Of course it wobbles.
It's one of the lower key bits of iconography for a big night of football. So it certainly seems to be an evening thing, Charlie.
Yeah.

A big night of football when the camera's shaking because the stadium is just rocking. And don't let the camera wobble in the daytime.

It just can't. It can't.
It doesn't have not enough drawing. It legally can't.

Yeah, I think. I mean, I'm trying to think.
I mean, like Goodison, would it have happened there? It feels quite. If you have a rickety old ground, that's going to help even more.

You're going to have even extra shakage. The last derby at Goodison, when Talkowski scored in the last minute, wasn't it shaking then? Am I imagining it? I'm sure it was remarked upon at the time.

I'm sure Fletch is in the aftermath of the goal. Sort of, this place is shaking, Maca.

Credit to the cameramen in these situations, Charlie, because they're zooming in pretty hard on either a manager in the sort of far-side dugout or probably, you know, a sort of a notable figure up in the stands.

And that's a big zoom to do. And then the rattle and shake of the stadium is just going to make their job even harder.
It's like zooming in on a sniper rifle on Xbox or something.

It's like, you've got to have a steady hand for this. So all credits to the cameramen in this situation.
This is pro stuff. Yeah, and just watching that, Collie Moore.
It is very cool when it happens.

You know, you're witnessing something special. How dramatic is the shake? Because Keegan is slumped over the audience.
Yeah, it is shaking quite a bit. I mean,

it's actually better in a way when Collymore is running away in celebration. Wow.
But then, yeah, he gets Keegan is... You think it's sort of settled and then it kind of picks up again.

There you go. A word on our correspondent, Dave, Philip Crowther.
His Wikipedia page says, he is a British, German, Luxembourgish, American journalist, notable for being a polyglot.

He has publicly spoken in fluent French, Spanish, Portuguese, English, German, and Luxembourgish. Incredible.
Wow. Wish we'd had it in Luxembourgish.
That would have been Clark. Listen, fair play.

That is a listen fair play. Yeah.
We should do in the next quiz have a Luxembourgish voiceover as a tribute to him. Definitely.
It's him and Alex Aljo.

They're the real polyglots of football out there. An extra tangent on this, though, Charlie.
Luxembourgish sounds like a ridiculous name for a language.

It sounds like someone didn't know what the language is called in Luxembourg and just went,

he was speaking Luxembourgish to me. I had no idea what he was saying.

100%. 100% sounds made up.
Luxembourgian would be Luxembourgeois, maybe, something like that. But Luxembourgish, you can't have that.
You can't have it. It doesn't work.

So, have a little think about that, Philip Crowther. But thanks for getting in touch.
We'll be back very shortly with our final three listeners' irritations of 2025.

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That is wonderful!

Welcome back to the listeners' Mezza Harlan Dicks. The first listener's irritation for December comes from Joe Gallagher.
I'm sure this irritation is shared by other listeners.

Let me set the scene for you. There's been a high-scoring game that you haven't been able to watch, and the score line is something like 3-3 or 4-3.

So you want to know the score, you open up your score app of choice. For me, that's Skysport Scores.

And you want to see who scored the goals, but crucially, also you want to know the sequence of the goals because obviously that's crucial to the narrative, and you don't know the narrative.

And what you're met with is a sort of jumbled mess of goal scorers and the minutes that they scored in. And for some reason, I find that really hard to, at a glance, figure out who scored first.

And then did that team go 2-0 up or did the opposition equalize first? And there are some complicating factors that make this even harder.

So firstly, if one player has scored multiple goals, their goals are listed sequentially in brackets. So then you get lulled into thinking that these goals were scored back to back.

But then you look at the next goal scorer and their goal was sandwiched between the brace. I don't think there's an elegant solution to this.
It's just annoying.

Now, Dave, there are so many ways of consulting the scores these days that this has become a real pertinent issue because so many different places do this in a completely different way.

But if we start with the kind of standard layout, so if you were consulting a website or CFACs or something like that, so the classic way of doing things.

In the situation that Joe suggests, a 3-3 or a 4-3, you do kind of quickly want to know what the flow of the goals were.

And if you're presented in a standard way, it's an excruciating length of time for you to work that out, isn't it?

Yeah, BBC Sports still do that with the scores at the top and the goal scorers underneath. Yeah, minutes in brackets.
Yeah, it does take you a little time, a little time to work it out.

I've had my own score app, Woes, this season. The one I was using before, there was an update, and all of a sudden, everything changed.

For some, I don't know how I can't work out how to get it back to the right order. It's like it's not showing me the Premier League and Championship games at the top.
I've got a scroll view on.

It was Sofa Score is the one I was using. So now I've gone over to FOTMO, which is a bit better.
And they're...

For real connoisseur's choice of FOTMO. Sofa Score sounds too tinpot to me just as a name.
Never used it. Even though Sophoscore uses Opta, I believe.
Is that right? But you're right.

It's quite like it. Yeah, it's pretty detailed, but you're right.

It does sound a bit pony. It is a bit of a Wild West, though, right? You know, to go back to the original point.
Like, there is no standard format. Everyone does it a little bit differently.
Yeah.

I mean, so take a 4-3, Charlie. You're looking at a 4-3 game as a neutral.
What layout of goals are you hoping for? What flow of goals

is going to impress you the most and make you think, what a game. And what is the least satisfying order of goals in a 4-3? The least satisfying order in a 4-3.
Yeah. How unsatisfying can it be?

Yeah, but I mean, the two Liverpool Newcastle 4-3s are a good example of that. Like for me, and that's why I think the Manu Bournemouth game the other day was so good.

Basically, you want the lead changing hands as many times as possible.

That's what makes a game really interesting and really fun. That's when you're entering proper kind of vintage territory.
And that first Liverpool Newcastle absolutely did that.

In fact, I think it did that in the perfect way with both teams being ahead twice. I did expect Charlie to say that he wanted the lead to change hands, Dave, and I accept that.

But I mean, that's a dream world scenario, really, because, you know, that would take a lot of ebbing and flowing in the game. I would settle.

I would settle for a team just being constantly pegged back.

I think there's something beautiful about, you know, a 1-0-1-1-2-1-2-2, and then constantly being pegged back and then finally either winning it at the end or letting it slip, which is even funnier.

But I would almost put that still in the changing hands category, sorry, to be clear.

Like, yes, the way I've described it before is ideal, but I mean what you're describing is way better than a kind of linear 3-0, 3-3-4-3 or 4-0, 4-3.

At least with what you're describing, it's sort of

yeah, that's what so that first of all Newcastle is the kind of apogee of it, and then you've got the the second, which was a 3-0 to 3-3 and then 4-3, which is obviously great, but it was nowhere near as good because it was just like far fewer swings.

Do you want red cars amongst it? This is the next problem I was going to raise. I'm a live scoreman, app-wise.
Always have been. I'm very, very loyal.
I'm very unlikely to ever switch.

But, you know, I've looked back at Manchester United Bournemouth on Monday night on live score. And if I was looking at that afresh, I would be annoyed by substitutions getting in the way.

I don't need those in my main summary. What are you doing there? Players on and off.
Cough, get out of the way. Don't need you.
I think subs can be useful if it's a timeline situation.

You want to kind of see the flow of the match and what's happening. But that is different.
That's different. It's a separate section.
Yeah, the main score thing. Yeah, your goals aren't red cards.

You need red cards. Other than that, you just want goals.
I use Sky Sports, and it's, I mean, I'm not an FPL fella.

True,

that's what it's for, isn't it? Well, yeah, I was going to say, I think it probably is so people can get that information.

One thing that annoys me about subs is when there are certain apps that have team graphics and you're looking back at a match, it's not clear whether a player has been subbed on or subbed off.

So, is it their finishing 11 11 and not their starting 11? Is that what you mean? Yeah, yeah. Exactly.
What do you want? What do you prefer? Sure, you'd be so confused to see

the 11 that finished the game. Yeah, I want starting 11 with a red arrow next to a player who went off.
Yeah, and then I will consult who came on to replace them. I'm all right with that.

That's what you want. The final but crucial question on this, Charlie.

In the classic styling, which is just the goals listed essentially chronologically as they've gone in and no other detail on two sides of the screen, so team A, team B.

If a player has scored a brace or a hat-trick or even more, do you want their goals listed on separate lines with their name repeated or do you want their goals in brackets after their name i'm more used to the latter where you've got both than enhances the sort of

feet doesn't it yeah a little bit and i'm just used like that to me is what i'm more used to so

people look mad

if it was like harry kane's name four times in a on underneath the score would look

impressive i but if you want the goals chronologically that's what you're gonna have to have if you want pure chronology you don't want it interrupted if they haven't scored those goals back to back, the brackets are going to fuck things up, Dave.

Yeah, but I just think it would look mad. Again, depending on the format.
It's a story within a story, if you open the brackets, isn't it? If it's a timeline thing, again, it's fine.

But if it's just the classic goal scorers underneath the score, you have to use the brackets. Yeah, okay.
It is a classic way of expressing it. I'm all right with that.

Anyway, good that we got to December the 17th for Charlie to get Apogee in on the Football T-Jack podcast in 2025. Never too late, guys.
Right.

Second listener's irritation comes from Gabriel Blythehouse.

My niche irritation is a phrase banded around by pundits, incredibly lazy device they use for demonstrating the strength and depth of squads. And that is, that's 11 internationals out there.

I heard it recently, Danny Murphy describing Man City's loss to Lebacus in the Champions League and saying, yeah, yeah, he rested players, but it shouldn't matter.

They've got 11 internationals out there. Yeah, so what?

It's not impressive.

It comes from a time, clearly, when having international players in your team meant something. In the 1990s, you probably had like 80% of your squad was British players.

So if all of your starting lineup are internationals, they're starting for England. That's pretty impressive.
But I've looked at an example.

Sheffield Wednesday, bottom of the cut adrift in the championship. 14 full internationals in their squad.
plus various youth internationals. That includes Bailey Cadamatri, four caps for Jamaica.

Well done. I mean, it's trivial, but this stuff needs to be called out.
He's absolutely dismantled that, hasn't he, Charlie? Absolutely dismantled it as a concept. No, Gabriel's spot on it.

And this is exactly the kind of thing that annoys me because it's such crap analysis that's sort of masquerading as insight.

And like, you'll hear it both from pundits, which is less understandable because you'll hear it from managers as well.

Yeah, because they'll, you know, it'll be put to a, you know, League One manager has just upset one of the big boys or, you know, just a Premier League team. And it will be, you know,

of course, they weren't at full strength. Listen, that's 11 internationals out there.

So it's like, you know, and in that case, fair enough, you want to talk about your achievement. But yeah, the idea that it being 11 internationals insulates you from making 11 changes or whatever.

It just doesn't. And like, yeah, no one's suggesting that Man City's second string is like a bunch of pub players.

Like, obviously, we know they're all really good players, but yeah, being international, it's such a mere thing. It's like,

you know, well, you know, it's like saying, you know, these it's the only, it's it's even worse than saying, you know, these players all cost a lot of money in a way that, again, Man City squad players, yes, they will have cost a lot of money.

That's just a reality. I tried to think what you feel about sort of, yeah, the totting up of transfer fees of respective benches in an FA Cup David and Goliath tie.
It's inelegant.

I mean, it's ramming the point home that doesn't need to be rammed home, I guess.

But Gabriel's kind of growing fury here, but I really enjoyed pinpointing the moment when he really got fired up about this. I've got 11 internationals out there.
Yes, so what?

That's not impressive. Is that a pen or a pair of glasses? I can't figure it out.
Something's been put down in anger there.

Do you know what?

He almost nearly goes Fergie on Jamaica and Japan there.

For Jamaica. Poor old Bailey Kadamatri.
It's not his fault, mate. That's true.
For a previous four caps, I'm sure. Yeah, a great example at the end there, to be honest.

It kind of really does help his point. But the fact that he chose Danny Murphy for this, Dave, is very good.
It's such a Danny Murphy thing to say.

Pundits really do like sticking in the boot against a team who have underachieved, especially if it's one of the big boys. I get that impulse.

Danny Murphy, I suspect, has that extra sneer to him when it comes to this sort of thing, and he would definitely unfurl they had 11 internationals still out there, definitely.

That Danny Murphy thing, there's such an impulse, and I get it because you never want to denigrate a team's achievement, especially when they've performed a victory against the odds.

But you'll hear it as well with things like, and listen, I know they were missing a few players, but I think they would have beaten them anyway today.

And it's like, maybe, but undoubtedly, the fact that they were missing both centre-backs or, you know, both their central midfielders was a contributing factor.

Like, we can acknowledge these things without saying it's the only reason. Like, yes, the other team still had to play really well, but you'll hear that sort of thing quite often from pundits.

Dave, there's potentially a kind of bigger picture aspect to this. You know, Gabriel's very flippant about, you know, oh, we play for this country so what? Which, you know, which is fine.

But it's the assumption that being a full international for any country lends you a certain ability to deal with any situation.

And we know that there is no such thing anymore, really, as making the step up to international level. You know, you watch an England game and they're playing against Macedonia or something.

Those are easier opponents than they probably face in their day-to-day football existence.

So it is a lazy observation to make because, you know, a full international in many cases is no more capable than any other average player in the Premier League.

Yeah, and you can be, you know, some of it's down to luck.

Like if you happen to represent a nation that it's easier to get into their squad than if, or if as opposed to, you know, you might be England's...

Before Juan Bissaka switched his allegiance to DR Congo, which he has done, you know, he wouldn't have been classed as a full international.

He has played for England age groups, but not good enough to get in. You know, there's too many other right-backs around him to get into the England squad.

But then he's probably better than a lot of the players who've played for their countries wherever they are.

Danny Murphy's sort of checking out if any players have switched allegiances just to make sure they might be able to shoehorn them into a, you know, potential FA Cup upset later on down the line.

Yeah. Yeah, good to have this finally focused on.
And also also good to have a listener's MHD contributor whose name sounds like a national trust place, Gabriel Blythe House.

Dave, would you prefer to get married next year at Blythe House or Dewsbury Hall?

Can I say neither? A bit both? Blythe House sounds a bit World War II to me. Yes, Blythe House.
We were stationed at Blythe House, actually. Captain Keys.
Anyway,

right, the final listeners. You can't stop doing Keysy voice today, can you? No, I've done it a lot today, and I'm all for it.
Might do it at Christmas, actually. See what the family say.

All right, final listener's irritation of 2025 comes from Sam Hartford.

My minor football irritation comes from fighter side, and it's when your teammate has a shot, goalkeeper parries it to essentially present you with an open goal.

But in waiting for the ball to come out of the D and totally readjust all the momentum that you've gained by running towards the goal, you end up kind of doing a sort of side foot stab.

Somebody's already come through the back of you in this time, and it's a relatively comfortable save for the now repositioned goalkeeper.

One of of those that just time and time again looks guilt-edge, feels guilt-edge, but always ends up going wrong. Dave, I haven't thought about this in ages and it brought me out in an itch.

The sensation of waiting for that ball which has lost all the momentum it had from the original shot, whether it hit the wall, the goalkeeper or whatever, and it's simply bobbling, trundling to the edge of what feels like an absolutely colossal D.

During those few seconds that it's trundling there, you look at the D and you go, why is it so massive? What a waste of real estate this is for the game of football.

And then it gets to the edge, and as Sam quite rightly explains, it then becomes a very inelegant situation for both defender and attacker. Yeah, it's really, really annoying.

It does seem to take an age. I can remember one of my earliest football memories was

I think it was I was playing in like a five-aside tournament. I think probably for like beavers or cubs or something.

And I remember being in this exact scenario, but didn't have the patience to wait for the ball to come out. And I stuck my foot in and dragged the ball out.

And then I was like, I was confused as to why I was penalised for this, for this obviously. My hell must have broken loose after that.

I mean, if you're playing Charlie in an unpoliced five-aside game, that is, you know, like workmates or something like that, and you basically have to referee it yourselves.

In that situation, there's absolutely no way that the entire defending team are not going to appeal for the ball being, of having been struck inside the area on the rebound.

I mean, but with justification, because obviously you're going to appeal for it, because every marginal decision is going to get appealed for, but it's a test of human patience to not touch that ball before it gets out of the D for the attacker.

And many people will fail it. It's, it's a, it's, it's essentially a game of chicken, isn't it? Yeah, I feel as well.

There are times, even when you kind of lift your foot back because it takes so long.

You've got enough time to kind of do that, and you're sort of just waiting for it to come, and then you can kind of move your foot towards the ball.

But that is also one of the hardest things to enforce, like whether you've got an actual referee or not, like whether you've gone in.

It's a real fucker. Where do you stand on that? How harsh or strict do you think you should be in a friend? This is a friendly game of five aside.

It could be a work then, could you be mates or whatever? There's no referee. I think there should be an assumption of guilt, honestly.

Because people get really annoyed sometimes about a goal that's been scored that's right on the line and they'll claim that it's in, I think, sort of, unless it's really blatant.

I think edge cases should be the benefit of the doubt should be.

The goal should be good.

I mean, there are so many variables at play here, like who you're playing with, what the stakes are, what the score is.

The game just grinds to a halt if you haven't got a ref with this situation. It's like it was in, it was in, and there's just no way, there's no recourse to essentially any evidence.

The goalkeeper has quite a good view, don't they? I don't know. There's depth.
There's deception.

Maybe, but they're probably going to be the closest to it, other than the person who's doing it, and they can't be trusted. Although, obviously, there will be a like,

I promise you. I know it might have looked it, but it was, I wasn't in.

If I was refing this game, I would just assume that the attacker was trigger happy and took the shot too early, and it was definitely in.

But yeah, to the detriment of the spectacle, clearly uh but there'll be other goals it's five aside everything will be fine i want to pick up on i want to pick on you mentioning cubs and beavers football dave such an underappreciated form of football cubs because i had a cubs team i played for them like twice and it's like you've got your sunday team that's that's your bread and butter that's your main thing your sunday team They play in the best league and there's essentially a transfer system.

It's a meritocracy. You're playing for the best team that you could find or could have.
Yeah, properly organized, yeah. Yeah.

Then there's your school team, which, you know, which is a fairly irregular concept across the country like my school team barely existed we play we must play about four games it was it was an absolute ramshackle team but it shouldn't have been because it should have been the best players from all the all the Sunday teams in the catchment area of the school so you had a potentially great team but no one could be asked because it's school we didn't really have a kit and other schools were better and it's like well fuck that so school's secondary and then you've got cubs which is a fucking mental what is cubs what is it yeah i'm trying to remember though why do they need a football team i'm trying to remember the but was it when we played cubs was it not internal?

Were you playing against other... I'm trying to remember what they're called.

The Jamboree.

Other branches? Yeah, other Cubs. Other branches, yeah.

Would you play against them?

You wouldn't just have internal games? Yeah, you would, yeah. So you would play other branches.
Yeah, I think

the one I can remember, it was a tournament against other... Must have been against other branches, yeah, because there weren't, I don't think there would have been enough.

We never played football internally because it was all

that we went to.

Yeah, but we were all just in the hall dissing pissing about.

What's the demand for Cubs football?

I made you haven't got like 11-year-olds out there trying to say the schedule's rough. It's sucked enough.

Someone's got to step in. I know on TV have got to have their saying everything, but

we're getting played. This will ruin us for the rest of our lives.
This is your cutting career short. Getting feedback involved.
He can't cancel the Cub World Cup.

Robert Baden Powell will be turning in his grave.

The BBC are only covering it from Salford. But the jurisdiction of it all was very strange to me, Dave.
I distinctly remember. Very strange to me, Dave.

I distinctly remember our designated school team manager, who was just a PE teacher,

threatening us, saying, I can stop you playing for your Sunday teams if you don't turn up for school football. Like an international manager or something.
I've got no jurisdiction over my Sunday, son.

Get out of that. You've got to have proof that you're really injured from your Sunday league.
You've got to release your players five days before a Sunday game or something like that.

But you've got district and county. What the fuck are they? I think district is school and county is your club.
I've got no idea. I got picked for districts.

I was like, I don't know if this is good or not. I've got no idea.

Too many forms of football. I do remember that you said, Dave, you just be in a hall pissing about, but I remember it was quite football.

Like, we would just play a lot of football because I remember justifying it when I joined. I think it probably was Cubs because it does sound a bit dweeby.

And I was like, yeah, but it's just an excuse to go and play football once a week sort of thing.

You play football with a big tennis ball, which is funny. Exactly.

Yeah, yeah, which is great. Those balls are brilliant.

And I think I was telling the, like, I think that was what it was. And, you know, I didn't get any of the badges or any of that stuff.
What a tangent this has been, by the way.

Listeners, if you, if, if you or your offspring are have or are playing Cubs football, let us know what the layout is. What's the format?

Yeah, exactly. Who are the best cub team in the country? And why do they exist? There's nowhere to go.
And are you getting badges for it? Yeah, you probably would do, I guess.

Listen, I know they've got a weakened team, but they had 11 Cubs out there today.

and an arkela as well. Yeah, let's, but let's not exclude the brownies and the rainbows or whatever they're called as well.
Absolutely, listen, they play football as well.

11 experienced cubs out there, um,

utterly superb. I'm in tears, which is always a good way to end a football clichés episode.
Thanks to you, Charlie Eccleshare, thank you, thanks to you, David Walker.

Thank you, thanks to everyone for listening. We'll be back on Tuesday with the best of football clichés 2025.
See you then.

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You'll explore our curated selection of diamonds and gemstones while learning key characteristics to help you make a confident, informed decision.

Choose from our signature styles or opt for a fully custom design crafted around you.

Visit yadavjewelry.com and book your appointment today at our new Union Square showroom and mention podcast for an exclusive discount.

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