Liverpool smash Spurs to reach League Cup final – Football Weekly Extra

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Hello and welcome to the Guardian Football Weekly.

Liverpool make light work of a limp Spurs side to cruise to victory at Anfield.

A 1mm deficit deficit overturned with almost unbelievable ease.

Gakpo, Salah, Sabozlai and Van Dijk do the damage against Tottenham who failed to have a shot on target.

Surely this is anti-Ange ball.

A record 15th appearance in a League Cup final for Liverpool who are still on course for the quadruple.

When will the slip for slot come?

Will it be at Wembley against Newcastle?

Still two opportunities for Ange to get that guaranteed second season trophy.

The hunt is on again this weekend when they face Aston Villa in the fourth round of the FA Cup.

We'll discuss the main bit of discourse from the women's game.

Are Chelsea ruining English football by spending money on good players?

We have news of an offer that we might be able to refuse.

Take your questions, and that's today's Guardian Football Weekly.

On the panel today, good morning, Barry.

Hi, Robin.

Good morning, Johnny Lou.

Hi, Robin.

And Lucy Ward, how are you this morning?

Hey, Rob.

Right, to the League Cup, Liverpool 4, Spurs 0.

Liverpool go through 4-1 on aggregates.

Barry, we've been talking about if Liverpool have played anyone decent yet.

I think that was answered yesterday.

Spurs sort of

lined up to defend the leads and it didn't quite go to plan.

Yeah, you asked me yesterday

what odds Liverpool were with the Buckies to go through

despite the one goal deficit, and I didn't know, but I checked afterwards and they were

three to one on, I think.

And

they went went through with absolute serene ease, which I think pretty much everyone expected them to, including by the looks of things last night at Anfield Tottenham's players, who didn't land a glove on them at all.

They'd five shots in total.

One hit the woodwork.

The other four were also more off-target.

And they'd, I think, eight touches in the Liverpool penalty area.

And it was a pretty dismal performance.

It's obviously hard to judge Tottenham because of all their injuries.

But even with these players out, they should have made a better fist of this.

I think they look beaten from the first whistle.

There were individual errors.

It was a bad team performance.

They looked exhausted.

And I'd say quite a few of them probably are.

Archie Gray, I checked.

I think that was his 31st game of this season, which for an 18-year-old is an awful lot.

He was at at right back last night,

again, playing out of position, and

sort of summed up the performance afterwards by saying we just sort of shied away from the challenge.

And they did.

It was a reasonable performance for a semi-final, second leg, in which they had a lead.

And Liverpool were more than worthy winners.

I mean, I'll leave it to someone else to praise Liverpool.

You can, of course, only beat what's in front of you, but I thought that was a splendid splendid performance from them.

So them at arguably their best, possibly their best performance this season against a Spurs team that really didn't show up.

I think the scoreline kind of flattered Spurs a bit in the end, 4-0.

Yeah, James says, does Max regret calling the little one Ange?

It is actually Willie Rushton, we should mention, but

I think he'd be all right, actually, still in Australia, even if he did had called the new one Ange.

And we should tip our hat to Troy Townsend, actually.

No shots on target.

They did actually hit the bar.

So for him, that's one.

That's one on target, isn't it?

For old TT.

Jamie Redknapp was absolutely seething on the sky coverage afterwards.

He said, I cannot get my head around not having one shot on target in the semi-final.

They were so abject.

I cannot remember a team in my lifetime go down with less of a fight than Tottenham did today.

There have been some lows, but that today, looking at that scoreline, is just horrendous.

And Carragher was also pretty scathing.

Johnny, you enjoy talking about Ange Coglu, don't you?

What would you like to say?

Well, I mean, I don't.

People think I don't like Ange because he's Australian.

Like, I don't.

It's not really that.

I don't like Ange because I think a self-respecting big club like Spurs should be defined by its own values, not by the personality of its coach,

which I think is kind of what's happened over the last season and a half.

I don't blame Spurs for losing to Liverpool.

I mean, everyone is losing to Liverpool this season.

I don't even really blame them for losing 4-0 because we saw what they were like out there.

Nobody can run.

The players that are fit can't run anymore.

Son

is,

I don't know whether he's in terminal decline or whether he is just totally empty of energy

or vigor at the moment.

Midfield keeps coughing up the ball.

Their goalkeeper is basically a kind of

like mime artist.

So I don't blame them for any of that.

But where they are now is obviously a consequence of choices that have been made at boardroom level and in the dugout over the season.

So, like, you take the injuries.

I don't know why Spurs have had so many injuries.

There are lots of theories, but

I know that when Liverpool was scouting Arnold Slot, they looked at his injury record at Fire Nord and AZ,

and it was over, I think, 90% player availability over multiple seasons, playing at high intensity.

And on that basis, not just that basis, but on that basis, they think, okay, this is the guy to sort out a squad which under Klopp, you know, did suffer from injury crises quite a lot.

I don't know if Spurs did similar diligence with Postacoglio.

I'd be kind of stunned if they did, but from seeing him, what do we know about his career?

That if you present him with two options, he will always take the bolder, more aggressive option.

That's basically how he's got where he is in selection, in tactics, in terms of his own career choices.

So he goes into this season with, I think, what everyone can see is a thin squad.

Although, you know,

if you actually go back to a lot of the fan base at the end of the transfer window last September, they think they've had a great transfer window.

Nobody's saying, oh, well,

this looks a bit thin.

The board haven't invested.

Leave you out.

Because they've signed Solanke and they've signed Odebaird and they've signed Archie.

They've spent, I think, a nine-figure sum.

But in hindsight, and that's a great thing, that's a squad that's going to be vulnerable to a big injury crisis, especially in defence, because of the demand on it.

And Ange knows this.

It's not like this squad is suddenly foisted on him.

in November and he's like, oh, I thought we had more players in this.

He knows what he's working with.

So do you try and manage the workloads?

Do you try and rotate in players that

you might rely on later?

Guys like Spence or Lanckshire or Moore, players that you may need to rely on if there's an injury crisis.

Do you take a little bit of extra care with guys like Vanderven and Romero who are coming back from injuries?

Or do you just throw them in?

You take the bold option, throw them in, hammer your first team to the point where you're throwing in players who aren't not 100% fit and just hoping it all works out.

Because it does work out for a bit.

Spurs have played some of the best football I've seen from a Spurs side in my lifetime, but it's unsustainable because it relies on like everything going right.

It relies on this perfect alignment of circumstances.

You need to win the duels.

You need to have territorial control.

Your defense needs to cover a huge amount of ground without making mistakes.

You need to finish your chances and you need everyone to stay fit.

And

the whole thing has been has been a gamble, a huge gamble.

And I think it's possible to say it might have been the right gamble at the time, that it could have worked, that it probably should have been backed, but it has also quite demonstrably failed.

And I think to argue anything else at this point is basically to ignore the evidence of form and result and our eyes.

There are, so I'm just coming back with just a couple of positives, and I'm sort of scraping around to find positives for Spurs because I mean, you sort of run out of superlatives for

Liverpool and the way they play, but Spurs started with that energy, which I think that they tend to do.

But like Johnny said,

the way he plays relies on that high energy.

They need energy, and they don't have the energy anymore because the players who

are obviously players that are injured, the ones who are playing more minutes than they should do, the kids, they're out of energy now.

You know, they've played too many games.

But it's only the second time, I think, this season that they've lost by more than one goal, Spurs.

So they're, and that's both of them were against Liverpool.

So they're always, they always stay in games, but it just sort of always tends to lean out away from them.

But

the thing for me last night is that they looked like they were waiting to get beat.

I agree with Barry there.

They don't look like they've got any confidence.

They were outclassed, as quite a lot of people are against Liverpool, but no first player got booked.

And as a fan, I'd be like, how on earth have you let that happen to you at Anfield?

But none of you get booked.

So you don't slam someone in

a challenge because you're frustrated.

You don't get into them and get the away fans going.

Nobody got booked.

And that actually says a lot about the team.

You know, you need to create something.

If you're getting beat, then

you've got to try and do something about it.

And if you can't match them talent-wise, then you stop them from playing.

And that's something that Spurs.

But yeah, I think that Liverpool are just so superior.

I think that Spurs' back four is consistently inconsistent in terms of the choices because of injuries.

You know, Archie Gray is not a right back.

He played a right back at Leeds.

He's not a centre-back.

And he got caught square on the first goal.

And as soon as the first goal went in, it was like Spurs were like, oh, hang on, this is it now.

We're going to get beat here.

So disappointing, but I don't know.

I think that he doesn't want to solve it by doing something different.

And he doesn't obviously try and solve it by doing something different.

But when they, and we've seen it, like Johnny says, when everybody's there and everybody's fit and firing, it is unbelievable how they play and they get the results.

But that is

very, very little margin for error in terms of intensity of players, how fit they are or not.

And football is not a perfect science.

That does not happen very often.

So something has to give at some point.

Yeah, I mean, it's just happened very

not enough, basically, this season, as it they've had a couple of very big results against Man City in League and Cup.

Last season, he sort of had an incredible impact when he came in at the start.

But actually, if you take sort of the second half of last season to where we are now, the results haven't been great.

We will praise Liverpool.

I want to go into that in just a minute.

But actually, something that Barry said, and you alluded to, Lucy, about Archie Gray and just the other young players, are we worried that this is really not a good situation for them in particular?

Not just playing too many games, but also out of position and not just affecting confidence, but also just, I don't know.

It's very delicate at this point, isn't it, for them?

When you play young players, it has to be the right environment for them because you want to get the best out out of them.

They have potential.

All of them have potential.

There's very little between the young players quite a lot of the time.

But it has to be the right situation and it has to be a balance.

You have to have more misters.

You have to have more experience than you do young players.

But because of circumstance,

he will play them until they get injured, basically, which is not.

One, it's not a good look.

And two, it doesn't help them.

However, having said that, all experiences are fantastic experiences if you survive them.

and you know archie grey and bergval will really benefit you know mentally going forward even if it doesn't seem so at the time but it just not quite ideal i think is the nicest way of putting it let's move on to liverpool then barry i mean johnny talked about the transfer window liverpool have done did they did zilch didn't they in the in the january transfer window did very little in the summer one and yet I mean, Slot has taken, it's been said before, taken on what Klopp did and some.

They just look, they have this air of invincibility around them at the moment.

Yeah, but they have they didn't need to do any business in the transfer window because they have at least two players for each position.

They're all good.

Connor Bradley came in last night.

He was superb.

There were so many good performances from various Liverpool players last night.

Gravin Birch was brilliant.

Salah, Nunes, Bradley, Sobaslai all excelled.

Virgil was good again.

His bit of shithousery with Rich Arlison was highly amusing.

So I just thought, you know, if it ain't broke, I suppose don't fix it.

Certainly don't fix it mid-season when bringing in another signing might upset the Apple card.

Just thought they were brilliant, but they were up against so little.

I mean,

the initial question you asked me, Robin, at the start was about Ange

slightly changing his tactics, and I didn't address it at all.

But they did set up defensively.

They had three defensive midfielders, Son and Kulasevsky, were sort of called into action to help defend.

And

was it a mid-block or a low block?

I don't really know.

I'm not sure the Spurs players even knew, but it just didn't work.

And Liverpool played through them, played around them.

They snapped into tackles.

They were passing the ball around for fun.

And Spurs just couldn't handle it at all.

So,

yeah, a really, really good performance from Liverpool, but up against.

I wonder, were they even surprised by how little Spurs offered?

Because it was so easy for them.

Someone said in the post-matches, you might even be Connor Bradley saying they were tough to break down in the first half, which was extremely generous, I think.

You know what footballers are like.

I mean, Johnny, in terms of slot and the season he's had so far, and the fact that he didn't feel the need to, he wasn't pushing for new signings and stuff.

I mean, that kind of suggests that he, I don't know,

is this right?

Would you agree with the lacking a bit of ego that perhaps we've seen from some managers?

And also, I guess, a little bit of luck because we know that Liverpool spent most of the summer trying

to buy Zuba Mendi from Reyes Sothiadad, and obviously that didn't work.

And so, Ryan Grafenberg has to step up and take up a role, and has been one of the revelations of the season for them.

And

it's a bit of a game game of patience for Liverpool, I think.

Patience, not just in terms of the way they approach the game, you know, tactically,

patience from the fans, I guess, and patience from the hierarchy when things, you know, when there have been setbacks.

It's ultimately

a numbers game.

If you look at the, I guess, equalising goal in the tie, the Gakpo goal.

And, you know, it looks like it's a little bit fortuitous.

Salah sort of dinks it with the outside of foot.

It comes through the Tottenham and it comes through to Gakpo.

But if you look at the moment that the cross comes in from Salah, there are six Liverpool players in the box.

I think about seven Tottenham defenders.

And if you create those situations again and again and again, which Liverpool are, some of them will fall from you.

I don't, you know, weirdly, I think they haven't had an elite finishing season.

I think Salah has bailed them out of a lot of games which they were dominating, but weren't quite finishing off.

And now we're seeing that just through the sheer weight of chances, the territorial control that they have, being able to pin sides back in their own half.

You know, stop talking about killing them with passes, always playing the extra pass and getting yourself into a better position.

Um, we're seeing other players now filled with confidence.

Shaboslai, who we know needs to add goals to his game, and he scored the crucial third goal.

So they're like they're just ticking.

It becomes a habit after a while, it becomes muscle memory.

I don't know if it's time to be using the Q-word, the dreaded Q-word, but

it's really hard to see what can stop them at the moment.

What's the Q word?

Sorry.

Quadruple.

Ah, right.

Okay.

Cue for quadruple.

Oh, even I knew that.

Fumble dies when someone does that.

So it's now it's officially a farmers league when that happens.

I mean, I did my wordle before because

I was ready to log on an hour early.

We were recording an hour later than usual, so I killed time by doing some household admin and doing my wordle.

I should have known the keyword.

Did you get the wordle today?

Four goals today, sadly.

Johnny Lewis just held up two to the crowd

as he was substituting.

Respect, respect, man.

Respect.

Lovely stuff.

Yeah, I just wanted to briefly mention Spurs had a player called Dante Casanova on the bench yesterday.

I feel like he could have made all the difference, and we need to see him as soon as possible.

20 years old, born in London.

Dante, I looked up the meaning of Dante from the Latin root durus, which means steadfast, enduring and everlasting, which I suspect he should be

fast-tracked straight into the spurs team.

Oh, wow.

Goodness me.

I mean, that is definitely

the parents knew exactly what they were doing there, I'll say.

So the final on Sunday, the 16th of of March, Newcastle against Liverpool.

And Johnny, you were at St James's Park to watch Newcastle's triumph.

I mean can you see them getting that elusive trophy that's eluded them for 70 years?

I really, really can actually.

I mean there is this is like a real feeling around the club that they're changing history and the history we all know about the lack of a trophy, really poor record at Wembley actually.

They've in

in cup finals, community shields, even when Spurs were playing there, they haven't haven't won.

I think they've lost each all of their last nine games at Wembley.

So there is the weight of history there.

And it's a really intriguing game because

there is this clash of styles.

Newcastle will go at them.

They will try and ride the emotional waves.

They will be physical.

They will try and get in your faces.

Arsenal just couldn't handle them.

They couldn't handle that level of aggression, I think.

naked balls out aggression.

And Liverpool, I think, are a cut above that.

They try and almost

exist on a plane above all of that.

So it'll be interesting to see if Newcastle can try and get up Liverpool's noses and how successful they are.

Because if it's just if it's 11v11,

I think Liverpool probably will just have enough.

But it's that X factor, you know, Isak on the counter-attack or, you know, the

that emotional wave that their fans will bring to Wembley.

That's the X factor in this game, I think.

Yeah, one to look forward to, definitely.

That's it for part one.

In part two, we'll get our teeth into the weekend's FA Cup ties.

Hi Pod fans of America, Max here.

Barry's here too.

Hello.

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Coach, the energy out there felt different.

What changed for the team today?

It was the new game day scratchers from the California Lottery.

Play is everything.

Those games sent the team's energy through the roof.

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Hey, a little play makes your day, and today it made the game.

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Welcome to part two of the Guardian Football Weekly.

So, again, Johnny.

The length and breadth of the country for you from Newcastle, you're going to Plymouth against Liverpool in the hopes of a giant killing?

Well, I mean,

more than expectation, I guess.

More than expectation, I guess, if only

for the story,

for the narrative.

Yeah, so I was at Newcastle on Wednesday night.

I'm going to Plymouth on Sunday.

This is now Friday morning, so I basically have about an hour at home before I have to get on another train.

But yeah, I mean,

this is one that it's got a bit of emotional resonance because

my father-in-law is from Plymouth.

He was

born in Plymouth um but is a massive Liverpool fan um so this is basically the

the him derby so uh i i wouldn't have been able to i wouldn't have been able to show my face at the family dinner if i'd if i'd turned turned this assignment down would would he be which end would he be in oh i mean he's a liverpool fan i think he just loved you know he's one of those guys he's just a lovely lovely he's not adversarial or tribal at all he would he would say he would applaud goals from both teams which which is something my dad used to do as well, which utterly horrified me.

If the opposition scored a great goal, he would stand up and applaud.

I'm like, dad, fucking sit down.

Fucking sit down.

It's not how you do it.

The Plymouth manager, Miron Muslich, he took over

I think a couple of days after they knocked Brentford out of the cup and he gave this introductory speech to the players.

It was his, you know, get to know you.

And it was, it kind of went viral but he paid tribute to to his now number two who had been in caretaker charge and and then spoke to the players and it was uh

good quite motive very motivational speech they're showing signs of life under uh mr muslich they they drew with sunderland uh at the stadium of light and then they battered west brom well last weekend now obviously they will probably lose this game it probably isn't a priority for them because it's still bottom of the championship.

But I think the Plymouth

that Liverpool will go to play are a different proposition to the one that was getting hammered on a fairly regular basis under Wayne Rooney.

I mean, Lucy, do you buy into this that obviously Plymouth,

for them, I think Barry's right, in all

reality, they are probably going to get relegated, aren't they?

But this thing about FA Cup being a distraction, I'm just not sure I buy that, you know?

Yeah, I mean, it's like I did laugh at that, that Muslims doing that talk.

He was a great talker, you know, he had me like ready to go out, and then they got battered 5-0 to Burnley, who don't even score goals, but they just draw 0-0.

He can join the iPad coaches who are like the bane of my life, iPad coaches who think that.

Well, they're multiplying, Lucy.

Every cutaway now of a...

When there's a goal conceded,

there's someone

looking into an iPad with their nose up against the screen now.

Yeah, and then ask them when was the last time you kicked a ball at any point?

And it would have been probably when they were five and a half.

Lucy, I didn't have you down as a dinosaur.

She's a proper football woman.

It's not a dinosaur, Barry.

This is

not being a dinosaur.

This is

like, you know, tell me anyway.

The amount of coaches I see in the Premier League that I know, personally know from the last sort of 10 or 15 years, and I think, how on earth are you sat on that first team?

Anyway, that's another story.

Um, yeah, Plymouth, yeah, you need to get winning.

I think that's that's the more wins that you can get, obviously difficult against Liverpool, but it's certainly um not a distraction.

Later on, against Manchester City, we had this correspondence from Nick, uh, high football weekly team.

Nick here, the guy who invited Max and some pals onto our balcony to watch the O's against Cambridge back in 2021.

Some sad news, but we're due to move out of the flat slash area next month or so, but not before the mighty city Pep and Pals visit visit this Saturday.

I'm guessing it might be a bit far for Max if you are still in Australia, but just dropping an invite all to any of the Football Weekly team who might be keen to watch a game before we hit past as new.

Max's visit has become something of a legend for us over the years, even meeting people at weddings and other social gatherings that instantly knew who we were.

Once he mentioned we lived in a football ground from Football Weekly, and it would feel very full circle to have you guys join for one of the last games we have here.

Rather than the rule of six we had at the time, we're having a big old party to celebrate.

So the more, the merrier.

And yeah, Joel has redacted this bit because they go on to try and get us to sell their flat.

Because in fact, that's breaking Guardian rules.

Speaker Weekly brought to you by Zoopra.

Yeah,

exactly.

Joel says, Barry, I've already RSBP'd on your behalf and you're bringing dessert, apparently.

So anyone up for that?

I think that's a good idea.

I might actually be able to make that.

Oh, please go.

Please.

Oh, God.

Yeah, they didn't they didn't mean you.

I read something about Richie Wellens, who is like a bit of a spiky character.

And there was a statement that he'd been left deeply embarrassed and has apologised for a stupid comment he made post-match about Spurs boss Ange Postecoglu.

Asked if injuries had any part played any part in Orient's loss.

Welling said, I'm not going to make excuses.

I'm not Ange Postakoglu.

That's what he said.

Actually, lost again.

I mean, late in Orient,

it's been

just to get this far has been quite tricky for them.

They

beat Bora Mood in the first round on penalties.

Then, I think it was in the second round,

went to extra time, and they needed their goalkeeper to score a late equalizer in the 10th minute of added time and normal time to bring it to extra time and then they beat derby county on penalties i'm not sure if i've got those in the right order but they have had it's it's been tough for them just to to earn this tie against city i mean rock city are a mess who who who knows what might happen they started the season they started the season terribly they're like um i think uh I think they're in relegation trouble for quite a lot of the season.

And over the last couple of months, I've put a real run together I noticed that their their um their captain is Darren Pratley who I I couldn't I couldn't believe was still playing Darren Pratley was um how old is he now 39 years old uh and you know obviously some of the some of the guys around and some of the some of the lone players are like half his age um so so yeah I mean there's Wellands is like a really really highly regarded coach you know obviously obviously got them up from league two has done very well I think they're I think they're sort of playoffs playoffs thereabouts this season so so in in the hunt for for promotion promotion to the the championship which would be kind of kind of incredible uh we'll lose nine nil yeah oh yeah I mean that that's kind of sort of it's a similar story to the Salford game isn't it and yeah they they're sort of still broken a bit I've just checked actually that's um a 12 15 kick off

so

will will our friend with the flat overlooking the ground be providing a a big fry up well I I think you know Max was one thing but having Barry turn up at your gaffe that is that is royalty So, I hope so.

And please go, Barry, we and report back.

We need this time.

I think I can do that.

Excellent, excellent, Nick.

You've done it now.

There's no taking it back.

No rescinding the invitation.

Birmingham played Newcastle.

Yeah, this is an interesting one.

Yeah, as producer Joel points out, Tom Brady might be just more focused on Birmingham against Newcastle or the Super Bowl on Sunday.

Maybe he'll be sort of commentating and then have a screen for the Birmingham game.

George Ellick, Ellick, actually, a friend of the pod, has tipped up Birmingham on his podcast for this one.

It was in the long shot section, I've got to say, but

potential giant cling vibes about this one potentially, Barry?

I think they'll win this.

I fancy them to win this.

I think Newcastle might be

suffering a little bit of a hangover after their midweek exertions, such as they were.

And

Birmingham are riding high at the top of League One.

They're unbeaten in 16 games.

There's a feature on them in the Athletic, which

they have big, big plans and lots of money being invested.

Their boss, Chris Davis, I think, learnt at the knee of Brendan Rodgers and Ange Postacoglu.

And

he's really getting a tune out of them.

So

I wouldn't be at all.

If I had to pick any sort of upset.

in this round, that would be it.

Wiggin against Fulham is quite an interesting one.

Fulham have re-signed Willian until the end of the season, six months after he left the club.

And we have twins Stephen and Ryan Cessignon who could face each other in this game, possibly, although haven't played a lot of games between them this season.

Lucy, you're at Manchester United against Leicester tonight.

I forgot that Roode managed a four-match unbeaten run in interim charge.

I mean, is that a better...

It must be almost a better record than Ruben Amarim at the moment.

Yeah, and he beat Leicester in it.

But that's got him the job, didn't it?

He beat them them twice, I think.

Yeah,

once in the, I think it was the League Cup, once in.

Yeah, so he knows how to beat Leicester, but then you can tell that

he knows.

So

if his Leicester side beat Manchester United, will that mean they take him back to Manchester United?

Yeah,

it's blowing my mind that it's, yeah, it's Leicester is, I mean, Leicester, the fans are really, really not happy at, you know, at Leicester.

And I just think the sort of football know-how

in recent years has changed.

I think the fans are not happy with John Rudkin, the sporting director, director of football, whatever he is.

Transfer-wise, they can't bring players in

because of PSR, etc., etc.

I think Van Istro was expecting players to be brought in in January.

And then, obviously, as the weeks led up, I think that was one of the things that convinced him to go was the fact that they could spend in January.

And I think that they all worked out together apparently in the weeks leading up that they weren't going to be able to spend.

And the Football League are waiting for them next season so that they can slam them with a points deduction as well.

So, yeah, it's not a happy ship at Leicester.

I don't necessarily think Van Disaroy was the best choice of style for the squad available, but I think it's sort of way past.

They weren't in the relegation zone when he came in.

I'm not so sure that it's all his fault.

I think it might be a collective of things going wrong.

But yeah, but Man United struggle to win at home, don't they?

So it will be quite interesting.

And again, we talk about whether it's a distraction or a game that's, you know, that neither team want, winning is quite important, I think, to both of these to start winning again because, you know, Amarin has aged about 15 years in the last few months.

dealing with it's very stressful being a manager and um you know you can sort of see that in his face johnny it's an interesting transfer window for Manchester United because, on paper, you think, well, they're severely weakened, aren't they?

But Amarim wasn't playing Rashford.

Clearly, there's a clash there.

And Anthony was pretty hopeless for Manchester United, although it looks like he's actually, again, we've said it before, thriving after getting out of Manchester.

What have you made of Ruben Amarim so far, actually?

Because I said on a previous podcast, it feels like he's trying to put his stamp on things

at a club where it's just so chaotic.

Is this going to be possible?

Yeah, I mean, I'm quite enjoying

this new tradition of a new Manager United manager coming in and immediately picking a fight with a club legend, like immediately burning his bridges with one club legend.

Like, we're going to get 2026 Kieran McKenna and Bruno Fernandez's relationship damaged beyond repair, no longer speaking to each other.

I think

he's found the job a little bit bigger than was he might have expected it to be and not just like I think he knows everyone can see what needed to happen on the pitch and he will get time to fix the issues on the pitch

it's I think it's all the stuff around it which I think he's been quite underwhelming saying things like

you know Barcus Rashford I'd rather play my three-year-old goalkeeping coach or this is the worst matching I decided in my lifetime just little unforced errors which I think he's then had to to row back on or try and contextualize that haven't really helped the mood or the kind of the emotional weather around the club and which is always going to be pretty delicate when you're not winning.

And the other side of it is it's going to probably take six or seven transfer windows for Amarim to get the squad he wants, not just to get the players he wants in, but to get rid of a lot of the players that he isn't, you know, that he doesn't see a future for.

But he's still going to have to work with a lot of these players for the next couple of years because you can't shift them.

So I think he probably does just need to be a little bit more diplomatic with players that he might not want, but you do have to kind of pretend to make them feel value because they do still need to do a job for them until, you know, 18 months, two years down the line when you can finally replace them.

Because, you know, they are, they do have these PSR worries as well now, which is why this austerity,

this big, big gym austerity has come in and they're cutting costs left, right, and centre and stripping things to the bone.

You know, they are not flush with money like they were before.

Is it kind of what he did to Rashford?

This is sort of the equivalent of someone getting sent to prison and immediately picking a fight with one of the toughest guys in the yard just to so other people will see you've sent a message.

Don't mess with me.

I don't know.

But I mean, I don't think Rashford...

is as good as his reputation perhaps suggests he is.

Barney wrote a good column to this effect earlier in the week.

His numbers aren't very, he's one goal in three-game striker who had one excellent season out of what nine or ten.

But he very rarely gets out of double figures in the league anyway.

He's not elite, but I would ask

in the last eight or nine years at Manchester United, what player has become an elite player at Manchester United?

They've signed a lot of elite players who have become non-elite players.

They've signed some good players who have stayed good.

But what player has actually fulfilled their potential?

And I think Rashford has been failed.

Nobody could argue that he's a great player at the moment and he's kind of fighting for his career.

Well, Emery won't stand for any nonsense.

Unai Emery wants his players to do exactly what he wants them to do.

So, you know, hopefully the move, the change is as good as the rest, and he's certainly been resting.

And I just talked about whether he was going to move and be close to Villa's chaining gown.

And the initial thoughts were that he wasn't.

And that trip from Manchester to, or the outskirts of Manchester, to

Birmingham every day training is probably not the best one.

So we'll see how it goes.

But I'd like to see him do well because it's always like an academy player, just carries so much on the shoulders, you know, especially when he's done so well in certain.

I think, you know, he sort of means more than just to footballers, doesn't he?

to Manchester United.

And it'd be nice to see him with a smile on his face because

you really don't see him with a smile on his face.

There's troubles in that mind.

I've seen plenty of young players with that similar sort of look, and you just want him back playing well again.

I think most people are rooting for most sort of you know empathetic, normal people, not your sort of Lee Andersons of this world.

So, Aston Villa hosts Tottenham and Brighton against Chelsea, Everton against Bournemouth, the other all-Premier League ties.

We've got Leeds against Millwall, that's a 12-15 kickoff.

Leeds against Millwall.

Wow, you need to throw another ball on in that game.

Now, I've got a friend who lives near me, and she is policing that game.

And it's just, that is the probably the West Yorkshire Police, as soon as that was pulled out of the hut, were like, oh, can we kick off at like 10am or something like that?

It's an absolute nightmare.

They have to pick up the Millwall fans from

a service further down the M1, truck them.

Honestly, logistics.

It's painful.

Yeah.

Is this their Champions League final, the police?

And then if they survive it, they'll get a tattoo like Mark Mark Clattenberg.

Yeah, that'll be like a police force or something.

Coventry against Ipswich is a bit of an interesting one.

Frank Lampard's Coventry, they're going quite well actually until

they lost to Leeds midweek.

Ipswich were knocked out by Maidstone last season when they were concentrating on promotion and obviously concentrating on not getting relegated this time.

Anyone want to

comment on any other the ties this weekend at all?

It's going on too long.

Stall Cardiff is a big one for me.

Donnie got battered last night because they're all looking forward to Palace at the weekend.

Oh, that's a good one, actually.

He got battered by Chesterfield.

They were doing well in the league, and then obviously all eyes are on the weekend, and they sort of took their eye off the ball last night and got battered by Chesterfield.

So I just think five nights of FA Cup is too much.

Friday to Tuesday, like Exeter Forest on Tuesday night.

I mean, it's not like it's it's like a

some sort of state banquet or like the the the G7 summit or something like that.

It's not that important.

Stop taking up so much real estate.

I think, well, by the time we get to Monday, Tuesday, we kind of, yeah, we've definitely moved on.

And that will do for part two.

In part three, we'll do a bit of women's football.

Hi, Pod fans of America.

Max here.

Barry's here too.

Hello.

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coach the energy out there felt different what changed for the team today it was the new game day scratches from the california lottery play is everything those games sent the the team's energy through the roof.

Are you saying it was the off-field play that made the difference on the field?

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Please play responsibly, must be 18 years or older to purchase, play, or claim.

Welcome to part three of the Guardian Football Weekly.

So are Chelsea ruining football?

This was the big talking point.

They've signed big in the transfer window, a record signing Naomi Girmer from San Diego Wave, and then on deadline day, Kira Walsh

coming in.

Yeah, there's been a lot of sort of hand-wringing about this, Lucy, hasn't there?

And especially from other clubs who are saying, you know, they single-handedly have sort of clouded the market.

Your thoughts?

Yeah, yeah, I I mean, my first thought was, oh, no.

I mean, Germa obviously is probably the best defender in the world at the moment, but Kiera Walsh, I was like, I mean, they're already how many points in front?

Seven points in front, is it?

I don't know what it is, but I don't know.

As much as, you know, little old me from women's football history wanting more money in the game, we don't want to end up like Spain where, you know, Barcelona just batter everybody in Spain mostly.

There's a few that sort of get close to them.

But Chelsea,

the thing is, if Emma Hayes had won the Champions League, which I think she had the squad to do it in recent years, but didn't, I think if she had have done that, that is the aim.

The WSL is just a side part for me.

But I don't think it helps.

I really don't think, just from, you know, I'm just putting myself, not as whatever I am now, but as an ex-women footballer, I want to see a little bit of competition.

I want to see all the teams, you know,

making sure that

they're all buying good players and there's a lot more money in it.

And then Kira Walsh appears at Chelsea, and it's like, oh, it just doesn't make it.

We want people watching it.

And when one team batters, you know, people will not sort of see that sort of jeopardy.

But if they win the Women's Champions League, which they definitely should do now, you know, I've said the last few years, Emma Hayes' squad should have won the Champions League and didn't.

They need to win it this year.

And then, you know, perhaps

it may change the the approach, but who knows?

So, Sonia Bon Pastor has yet to lose a game.

She's only drawn one.

The rest have been and wins in every competition.

I mean, Johnny, it's, I think the competitiveness is one thing, but actually, is there any reason why a lot of the other, most of the other WSL clubs at least, couldn't do a similar thing?

No, I wrote about this.

Um, I was at the Chelsea Arsenal game, and I wrote about Arsenal in these terms.

And I think, yes, the the competitive balance of women's football, that is a slightly separate issue.

issue, and I think we all want to see a little bit more balance in the game, possibly some kind of redistribution.

But I think if you're looking at

in terms of Arsenal, if you're an Arsenal fan, one of the you know 40, 50,000 that they're attracting to the Emirates, like the biggest paid-for crowds in English, uh, in English women's football, I think you know, this is one of the best supported clubs in the world, it's it's the

biggest revenue-generating women's team in the world.

And why,

why are you not

acting like it basically uh and you know there are there are no cost controls in in women's football i don't i don't think there are there are cost controls in the WSL in the way that they are there are in the Premier League so your ambition I think is limited only by whatever

controls or break you want to put on it

you know we see Newcastle investing really really heavily in their women's team and and basically smashing you know some like part-time sides from the from the northeast and making their way up in an attempt to try and get them competitive.

Because obviously, a lot of the big clubs are now also backed by a big men's club.

So, I think we are going to see like Chelsea, if the absolute perfect example of this, they are basically

reinforcing from a position of strength.

They're making a bet on the fact that, okay, we'll take the financial hit for this now because the return we're going to see on this investment, not just in terms of competitiveness on the pitch, but in terms of uh almost being able to to to to corner the market in in in in great footballers and creating something that is a product that people are going to want to attach themselves to for the next 10 20 years that that investment is going to be worth it and i do find it kind of

a little bit weird that more wsl sides certainly big big men's men's sides or sides that are backed by a big men's club aren't taking this approach because we we hear so much about the investability of women's sport as a whole that you know if you get in at this level now,

the reward will be there because it's such a great.

And I just don't see a huge number of clubs taking that long-term view.

It's not like it's a lot of money, you know, of Germa, they played, it was one million dollars.

So, you know, we talk, and I know it's a lot of money, but relatively, it isn't, you know, a lot of money.

No, I mean, look at like a wage is it's not even a weekly wage for some men's players, isn't it?

Yeah, they would put they would fork that out to a men's agent, right, without thinking.

Or, as I would say, they'd drop more running for the bus out of the pocket.

So, that is exactly.

And there's no reason why any Premier League club that

has a women's team attached to it cannot spend that sort of money.

So, when one does it, that's when it's, you know,

yes, they're leading the way.

Will others do that?

I'm not so sure.

Then you see Manchester United doing the polar opposites.

Because

Jim Ratcliffe has said, more or less said, I don't care about the women's team.

Oh, he's said that on numerous occasions.

And,

yeah, I mean, he'd do well to kind of at least just keep those views to himself.

I mean, goodness me.

He can't have any females in his family.

Oh, yeah, he probably does have females in his family, like, you know, a mother or something.

Oh, it's always daughters.

If you've got daughters, then you can be as misogynistic as you like.

That's kind of the rule, isn't it?

Yeah, I've heard a famous one this week as well,

say very similar.

But, you know, anyway, we we won't get into that.

They talked about Chelsea's growing dominance on the Women's Football Weekly podcast this week, which we highly recommend with the brilliant Faker Others and Susie Rack.

And you can listen to that every Tuesday, wherever you get your podcasts.

Well, unfortunately, we are going to have to go into a sort of very depressing story from this week.

Khadija Bunny Shaw had to withdraw from the Manchester City women's squad for their game against Arsenal last night after suffering racist and misogynistic abuse.

In a statement released by the club on Tuesday, City said: Manchester City were appalled to learn that Khadija Shaw was subjected to racist and misogynist abuse following Sunday's fixture.

Discrimination of any kind, either in stadiums or online, will not be tolerated and has absolutely no place inside or outside the game.

Bunny has decided not to share the messages publicly so as not to give the oxider publicity to the vile individuals who sent them.

The content has been shared with the authorities, an investigation will follow, and the club offers our full support to Bunny following the disgusting treatment she's received.

I mean, this is a very copy and paste statement, but Lucy, the action of her actually withdrawing, not feeling up to playing,

that is like another step, isn't it?

It's, I mean, and she, you know, you look at Bunny Shaw, how I mean, she's absolutely an unbelievable player, looks like, but, you know, that people have limits.

And, and, you know, I know what that feels like.

It's really, really unpleasant.

I get it on a weekly basis, not to that sort of level, but I get a lot of abuse on a on a weekly basis, and it's really unpleasant.

And

obviously, it was it was that awful that it stops her from playing.

And I honestly,

I don't know, I just think that the likes of X is just getting a little bit out of control, isn't it?

You know, I don't know what online social media it was, but I'm presuming it was something like that.

But when you're getting to the point where a player as good as her

is suffering that sort of abuse and then decides not to play, you know, we've got a massive problem.

I saw during the week, some scroll

was he he got a suspended jail sentence for racially abusing England's young black players who missed penalties in 2021.

So a middle-aged or not middle-aid, a white man in his 30s, had a good job, was drunk watching the game, not an excuse, you know, in vino veritas, I suppose,

when a lot of people showed their true colours.

He cried in the dock when he avoided jail.

I don't know if sending him to jail is going to do anything.

His life, you know, his reputation is trashed.

He lost his, he had a good job, which he lost.

But that's it, Barry.

Freedom of speech is not freedom of consequence.

And that's that, that you, you have to, if you're going to do that, whatever, whether you're drunk or whatever,

absolutely affects people.

I know, it affects people's lives.

It's horrific.

No, his comments were disgusting, you know.

But I'm not anyway trying to.

But it's good to see at least, you know, action was taken against him.

You know, Bonnie Shaw's already been hit by a coin thrown from the crowd in a Women's Champions League game

earlier this season.

And

it's awful that she doesn't feel able to do her job because of these RSOs.

But, you know, hopefully, she gets the

support she needs and bounces back.

I mean,

she's really good.

Yeah.

She's like

the best player, probably one of the best players in the WSL by, you know, by a distance.

I want to explore like

another aspect of this.

Maybe this feels kind of counterintuitive to you, but I think it feeds into the idea of women's football fandom and the relationship, often quite parasocial and unhealthy and toxic that a lot of fans have with players.

And this can be obviously this has very pernicious and negative effects like we're seeing now with Bonnie Shaw, but I think we see it also

when they're doing well.

I think when Bonnie Shaw is, you know, when she scores an amazing goal,

you get these

tropes like, oh, she is not human.

She is not normal.

She is, you know,

there is a kind of deification of a lot of female athletes, which I think, you know, is fine when things are going well for them, but I think creates weirdly quite dehumanizing tropes, which I think it encourages people to

stop seeing them as human beings with feelings.

And I think a lot of certainly WSL fandom can be quite

unhealthy in that respect because there is a sense of ownership, I think, from a lot of fans towards players because it's a small world and maybe you know,

they feel a sense of ownership over players, which I don't think you see in men's football to the same extent.

And Bunny Short doesn't, you know, she doesn't have a huge entourage of people doing her, her, you know, advocacy for her or, you know, or briefing the press or,

you know, managing her affairs.

You know, she's probably got a small team around her, but she doesn't have a huge industry around her.

She is just a woman trying to make her way through the game, blessed with this incredible talent, but she's also a human being.

And I think a lot of commentary and the way that people talk about women's football almost sort of discourages us from seeing that aspect of it.

Does that make sense?

Yeah, well, didn't Mary Earps have a similar thing where she was abused online by somebody who was angry that

she didn't sign an autograph or stay around to pose for a picture or something?

And Mary Earps sort of said, well, look, I did for an hour, and I'm sorry if I didn't get to you, but...

I have other things to do.

It wasn't a deliberate snob.

And more, basically, you don't own me.

We've had a similar thing with an American artist,

solo artist, a woman who had to issue a statement to her fans saying, Look, when I'm on stage performing, I'm all yours, and I will pose for pictures and sign autographs after the gig or whatever, but you don't owe me.

Please, you know, if I'm out having dinner with family or friends, or you know, kind of leave me alone.

And

I think some fans are a bit stanny and and do fail to draw the distinction that, you know, the while these players play for your team, they are not your property.

Well, I think also i in women's football, as you say, they play for your team.

But actually, I think there's quite a few fans who they don't particularly support a team.

They do it's more like they support a player, or especially since the Lioness is sort of one, it's like, oh, I I kind of follow that player.

It's more I think there's more of that in women's football than men's football.

We also had Millie Bright this week.

I think she was signing as she was signing something with someone that

someone said that you're fucking shit, you know, and you know, after they, after they sort of nearly lost the game.

Just my last question on this.

I'm not sure who else to take it.

That I think people, it's a wild west in social media, and I think it's going to be difficult for people to say they need to do more.

You say to someone that you should come off social media, it's difficult, isn't it, especially for women?

Maybe, Johnny, just because, you know, that actually can be a sort of a revenue stream can't it's kind of like could be adding their value so it's it's a tricky one oh totally especially if you're in the media especially if you have a if you have a public profile that relies on people knowing who you are that that relies on generating buzz around your work uh it can be incredibly hard and and the fact that a lot of these platforms are now not just unhealthy, not just addictive,

but openly harmful, I think poses a pretty big dilemma to a lot of people.

I've come off Twitter.

My Instagram has always been private.

I'm on Blue Sky, which is a nicer, but obviously a lot more sterile place.

But yeah, I think it's a dilemma that a lot of people are having to go through.

And obviously, these networks, when it comes to abuse, these networks can do so much more.

Law enforcement, the police talk about how tough it is to get data.

to get the platforms to respond to any kind of inquiry.

Researchers talk about how it's impossible to get any kind of reliable data from social networks on who is sending this kind of abuse.

So

if you have the data, you can profile it.

You can work out the scale of the problem, where you can target remedial

measures.

But they're just putting up a blank wall.

They're kind of pretending it doesn't happen because

they are profiting from this kind of content.

We'll end that there.

Before we go,

a bit of correspondence on the celebration police from yesterday.

Dan says, who will be the first to hire a celebrations coach?

It's got to be Arsenal or Villa, hasn't it?

I wouldn't say it's a priority for Southampton or Leicester.

Yeah,

well, that's a great question.

If the Arsenal do, and

there'll be a mural, won't they, right next to their set-piece coach near the Emirates, I'm sure.

That's all for today.

Max is back on Monday to look back on the FA Cup fourth round.

Now, a father of two.

He's told us he's keen to share his new proper football man political views.

So look forward to that.

That's me and Solly signing off for now.

But Mike,

very grateful for your help throughout the last two weeks.

Barry, thank you so much.

Thank you, Robin and Solly.

Very, very well-behaved young man.

He's had to listen to some amount of bullshit in the last two weeks.

And he hasn't batted an eyelid.

Oh, in his short three and a half months.

It's a Sign of things to come, I think.

Lucy, lovely to see you.

Yeah, and you, Rob, and Sully.

And thanks so much, Johnny.

Yeah, I can't, I don't understand how you can do this.

I mean, so basically, you've been, you've been jiggling a baby on your, on your shoulder for the last 20 minutes of this podcast while also anchoring

this podcast.

And I don't, like, I can't, I've, I have a baby on my, when I had a baby on my shoulder, I was basically...

I couldn't function.

I was putting cheese in the toaster.

And

so, like, absolutely fair play to you.

I just thought the listeners should know that, you know, what kind of feet you're pulling off here.

She's a wonder woman, Johnny.

She's always been.

Well,

oh, that's very kind.

We'll clip that up and I'll send it to a few employers who don't agree.

And we'll see how that does.

People, hire more women.

We know how to multitask.

This is the message.

Thank you so much to everyone for listening.

Our Football Weekly is produced by Joel Grove, and our executive producer is Danielle Stevens.

This is The Guardian.