Juventus strike back and has Arne Slot been tested yet? – Football Weekly Extra podcast

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Hello, and welcome to the Guardian Football Weekly.

And after Tuesday's flat night in the Champions League, yesterday was great.

A wonderful night at Villa Park, Azunai Emery's men beat Bayern Munich.

John Durant again off the bench, scoring brilliantly as Manuel Noya skied off towards the halfway line.

His opposite number, Emi Martinez, in one of those Emi Martinez performances.

The holders were in Madrid, lose at Lille, Athletia hammered by Benfica, and Juve, a goal and a man down in Leipzig, come back to win.

Liverpool gets tested by Bologna, but Mo Sala bends one into the top corner.

Then there's a Premier League weekend to look forward to.

Sunday looks good with Crisis Tenha going to Villa and the Battle of the High Lines at Brighton, while Liverpool Arsenal and no wins in two Manchester City all have pleasant-looking fixtures.

We'll do all that, answer your questions, and that's today's Guardian Football Weekly.

Dan says a pure vibes panel, this, whatever that means, but bringing all the vibes.

Barry Glengani, welcome.

Hello.

Hello, Nikki Bandini.

I'm afraid I'm bringing sore throat vibes, so I hope I'm not too scratchy.

But other than that, up for the last time.

Lil Sivverton, hello.

Good morning, Max.

Let's start at Villa Park then.

So the first Champions League slash European Cup game at Villa Park since the 2nd of March 1983.

What a noise.

At the same scoreline, of course, as everybody mentioned a million times as the 1982 European Cup final, where Villa beat Bayern 1-0.

We talked yesterday, Barry, about flat games and Arsenal PSG not being that exciting.

And obviously, because Villa haven't been at this

in this competition for so long, you just sensed that it mattered so much to that crowd, the excitement of it.

You know, if I was UEFA...

I'd be like, God, we needed this noise tonight.

And we needed this result and a few others across the evening as well.

Yeah, it was a real exciting evening's entertainment compared to the the previous one and I wouldn't necessarily say that UAFord you know needed this atmosphere because atmospheres and grounds in other countries are much more vibrant than than the ones you get in England for whatever reason

but at Phillip Park it was there was a real sense of occasion here and apart from the the ticket price thing which we've already covered extensively uh the club seemed to do everything right.

You know, the night before the game, they had a function for the 1982 winners who were available to attend, and they were all invited to the game.

They remembered the recently departed Gary Shaw on the front of the match programme and on the back, where he was included as part of the squad, match day squad.

That was a nice touch.

And then the game itself, I think maybe because of that sense of occasion you know you had the the tfo at one end and all that i think possibly because of that sense of occasion it looked for a while like the players were playing the occasion rather than the match and it looked like they might be overwhelmed a bit uh but that all stopped when pautor is uh scored the goal was ruled out but it seemed to jolt the players and sort of look we we can do this we we're the equal of this team and uh they went on to win and i i think they deserve to win they rolled their luck well i wouldn't say the luck a little bit emi martinez was brilliant he made some terrific saves to to make sure they won the three points i think you know emery got tactically spot on and a terrific goal by john duran yeah yes shaka says at what point is the player too good to start i mean it's it's such a brilliant goal isn't it nikki for so many reasons like to be so ready so quickly i don't know how many touches he'd had to have the time to look up or maybe just, I mean, I think he did look up, but even to know that Noya likes to come out and then to execute it.

It's just so brilliant.

Yeah, well, it's becoming so consistent.

It's almost ridiculous now.

What is it?

The four winning goals off the bench, five goals in total in nine games played.

And that's not counting.

He scored in the last round, didn't he?

It was just loud.

He's certainly got the self-confidence right now.

And I think one of the things that was interesting in those post-game comments from Emi Martinez was he said, well, we talked about Noya being off his line.

We talked about this.

So it doesn't come out of nowhere.

It's all planning.

And I think that's why you go back to Unai Emery and the work that he's done there being so, so extraordinary.

But Duran, I don't know what else

to say.

He's just got that absolute belief that when he takes a swing at something at the moment, it's going to end up in the net.

Yeah, and Lars, I suppose, it's interesting in the sense that he has Keats coming off the bench and how football is changing slightly to this idea of you know finishers rather than substitutes.

It definitely feels that vibe.

You know, okay, Emery said, look, they can play together, but in games like this against big teams, he will start Ollie Watkins and bring Duran on and maybe occasionally the other way around, but that's what he'll do.

Yeah, and I think Emery's being a bit clever there.

I think if he says they can play together, then suddenly that becomes a whole thing.

Whereas I'd be surprised if he starts the both of them at the same time too many games during the seasons.

I just think with Duran,

he's clearly like because that goal, maybe that's just a Johan Duran doing John Duran things.

He does seem to like shoot first and ask questions later, but at the same time, it's kind of everyone knows

Neuer likes to come off his line and stand a little bit.

You know, that is something he, I think, Emery said after the game that they talked about before, that like you, you want to take a shot early in that situation if you can.

So maybe it's hard to gauge from the outside whether that's John Duran being John Duran doing John Duran things, things or if that's him actually taking things on board and being very tactically clever and

absolutely can be both and and I think it's interesting with him if we get John McGinn famously described him last season as being a little nuts and and and I think but described him as occasional sometimes he can be a nightmare to have in your team

which is quite a thing for a teammate to say but he's also this season said that he's like he's changed it's like the the pennies dropped over the summer that he's more focused uh that he seems to have grown up a little bit.

Yeah, and just he has that,

it's almost like, and this is going to sound like a diss, but he does seem to have like this sort of almost Nicholas Bentner-esque level of confidence and of just sort of not letting anything affect him.

He keeps taking shots from positions where like a sane player would not

attempt a shot, but then they tend to go in occasionally.

And this sort of I do think having that absolutely bulletproof

borderline delusional self-confidence can all can be a plus for a striker like we're not necessarily always looking for our footballers to be the most well-adjusted human beings we're looking for them to score a lot of goals and and for him being

looking like he's so sure of himself and so unaffected by everything that's a that's a huge quality he did that he did that sort of that yeah and celebration you know the one where you don't smile you don't re-celebrate it's like yeah yeah i did that of course i did but i saw him grinning as he was running back to the the halfway line so he knows he knows that was special and you you mentioned it already barry but at the other end right you say noia's mistake like costbine in this game martinez again like he and he wasn't actually that annoying i mean he did get clamped for no reason but like but like

when it's sort of the team you're supporting i guess i was supporting villa last night in this game he's he is feels like the box office goalkeeper i can't think of another one who i'm sort of more

I don't know if I don't know if like delighted to see is the right I don't know what the right verb is actually or if that is that a verb or I can't remember what it is.

Whatever it is.

What's the right word?

It's the right adjective.

I don't know how I feel, but like I'm compelled to watch him.

Yeah, he's having a great season.

He made some really good saves last night.

Claude won away a long-range Michael Elise shot.

Yeah, sorry, Muciala shot after he'd been played in behind at a Harry Kane header.

Sort of spring to mind.

I think he's got himself in a pickle.

He's got himself quite a long ban from

international football for, I think, more lewdness in it

in his celebration.

So

he'll have a couple of weeks off over the international break.

I think

I reckon he's got three or four games

from FIFA.

I'm not sure exactly what I did, but I think it might have been another suggestive pose with a trophy or something.

This one's.

So anyway, whatever it is, he's going to have a nice holiday.

Good luck to him.

Yeah, he is box office, you know, he's great fun.

If your team is playing against him, you're going to hate him.

If Villa fans would very much be of the opinion, well, he's a dick, but he's our dick.

But so good.

It just makes saves.

And he sort of makes them look kind of regulation where actually they are like super impressive.

Yes, Lars?

Yeah, I did find the game almost kind of hard to analyze in terms of the usual thing where you do, you look at what happened and you try to assess who you thought were the better team and then you blahde-blah because on the one hand if you if you look at the numbers like Aston Villa had five shots to buy in Munich 17 in the game and Emi Martinez was the man of the match I thought by some margin and I don't not a huge fan of like single game expected goals I haven't looked at the XG but I imagine it's kind of heavily skewed and in Bayern's favor but the other side of that is that you know they did have a goal disallowed Aston Villa which doesn't turn up in the stats And also, there were so many situations where, like, they, they hit it early and behind, and, like, Upamaikanu was in real trouble.

Like, he picked up one booking for a tactical foul and could have had one more.

And you always felt that Bayern kind of lacked a little bit of flow.

I think, like, not starting Sana and Musiala was kind of, hmm, that's a decision.

And, uh, and they never looked as sharp as they can do.

And

I just feel like kind of dealt with it really well.

And you sense that they were, even though they created less and had to have their goalkeeper do a lot of things, they looked dangerous when they did do things.

It felt like, as well, like Aston Villa's best phase, even though Bayern had some chance to write at the end, was the last phase of the game, the last part of it.

And it felt like that was, again, talking about the things Emery said and the things he clearly prepared his team to do.

It felt like that was deliberate.

Maybe the first part of that game, they knew they were going to play that slightly more passive game, but you still had Ollie Watkins getting on Ufa Makano's back shoulder and

making the possibility of scoring something from there.

I don't think anyone said it yet.

I'm sorry if they didn't, I missed it.

But

42,

the end of a, was it 41 games unbeaten?

So this is a 42nd in the group stages for Bayern and it's Emery at either end of it.

So it's Emery with BSG at one end of it and it's Emery with Aston Miller at the other end of it.

I do think, because we're talking about all the players, but I do think...

I don't think any Villa fans missing it.

I think we definitely need to stress what an incredible job he's doing there.

Yeah, amazing.

Yeah.

The job he's done at Villa really puts Eric Ten Hag's constant bleating about needing more time and about injuries into context.

Look at what Emery has done at Villa in just under two years.

He had three players out with crucial injuries last year.

He doesn't complain about injuries.

He just gets on with it.

And I'd love to know what Eric Ten Hag makes of, you know, looking at that because it's not helping him.

No.

Well, I guess we'll find out Sunday, right?

They play each other and and that will be fascinating to see i mean fiona says on on sort of villas march she says six years ago today steve brutes villain manager had a cabbage thrown at him by an aggrieved fan today they've beaten by munich in the champions league has there ever been a more influential vegetable to have impacted football or changed the fortunes of a team it is extraordinary like what they sort of what they've gone through even in recent like how quickly you're right how quickly emery has turned around it just shows any team can do that right and and actually you know he's playing we've talked last about Morgan Rodgers, like quite a lot, and he looks like a fantastic prospect, doesn't he?

You know, Jaden Filogini, who was playing at Hull last season, comes in and has another great game, you know, and Emery is working, obviously, with a great talented squad, but not like a crazy expensive one.

Yeah, and I, when they let Musa Diabi go to the Saudi league in the summer, I was thinking, huh, okay, because he wasn't amazing every week for them last season, but he played a lot, and

he's a good player, and Leon Bailey picks up a fair number of little injuries and stuff.

And I thought, maybe they're a little bit short in these sort of creative areas.

But then, of course, yeah, Roger is having this sort of breakthrough moment.

And Philogene being very useful in this game.

I wonder sometimes with Emery if he almost prefers to work with guys like this, if he almost does better work with players who are not the biggest names around.

Because, I mean, infamously, all the talk, like I have, spoiler alert, I have never been in an Unai Emery team meeting, but

all you hear from players who have says that he's very detail focused yeah the video analysis can go on forever

maybe like for some of these superstars who are sort of maybe they think they're above some of this stuff and above all the detail work and just kind of want to get on with it and play football so it's maybe it's not a coincidence that his best work as a manager has been done at Aston Villa here now, at Villareal before that, at Sevilla, you'd say, to an extent at Valencia.

Whereas when he was at PSG and when he was at Arsenal, it was not as successful.

I do think, again, it's a sort of horses for courses thing, and it seems to just be a perfect fit with the manager and the club there.

Well, saying Jacob Ramsey limped off,

and Amadou Nano as well

had a bit of an injury, so that might affect them this weekend.

Let's do Liverpool, who beat Bologna 2-0.

Mozowski says, is Mo Salah in the same class as Ayan Robin or Andros Townsend for an inside forward, cutting in on his left foot?

I I mean, it's such a wonderful goal bearing, but I wonder if Salah doesn't count in that debate because he can also go the other way.

And that seems like I'm not saying, well, I am saying that Robin and Townsend either can't or don't.

Yeah, I mean, the note I've written down is Salah scores a Salah goal.

And he also provided an assist for the opening goal.

And I'm going to say, and I'll probably get Pelters from Liverpool fans for this, apart from scoring a goal and creating a goal, he didn't really play very well.

And I suppose it's a measure of just how good Morcella is that even on a bad night, he can be the difference between two sides.

This was, I've got to say, it was a reasonably straightforward win for Liverpool, but they

weren't great.

They were quite sloppy.

There were a couple of notable mistakes from Trent Alexander Arnold and Dominic Sabozlai that almost cost them.

Bologna had some good chances, and this obviously is a

shadow of the bologna side that did so well last season and nikki can tell us about that but um i'm going to stop talking now because i'm about to start a coughing fit well perfect well nikki tell us about that well before i do i just wanted to come in on the slot salah thing because there was a funny quote from him after a game on sky italia uh he was uh asked if you have you come to love Mo Salah and he started saying, I've always loved him.

Then he stops and says, well, no, I always appreciated him.

I love my wife, which I thought was a very uh

specific clarification from armist lot that's a very dutch moment isn't it just been making sure making sure we

no ambiguity here yeah bologna i i think baz has has has covered the the the the overarching story there which is yes in the summer tiago motto obviously left to join juventus the manager who was so influential who taken them to to fifth place which they hadn't been a top five side in in more than half a century so it was a huge deal to get them into the top five and then uh joshua zerckse who's their best striker goes and joins manchester united ricato calafiori goes to arsenal in the meantime louis ferguson taught cruciate ligaments in april he's still not back so this is a shadow of the team it was uh last season and it was interesting actually that for this game um Vincenzo Italiano, who's managing them now, opted to start Toystalinga up front instead of Castro, who's been scoring goals for them since signing in the summer to start up front.

Bono de Linga, scored in home and away against Liverpool, I think, in Europe last season.

So that choice had some logic to it.

And of course, he did put the ball in the net in this game, but was offside.

So yes, Bologna are still working out who they are.

Italiano, when he took over, was giving interviews saying, look, me and Motto were quite similar.

And they are in some ways.

They both want to have the ball.

They both like possession football.

But Italiano's style is definitely more aggressive in the press and definitely more direct in possession, looks for those balls in behind.

And it might get better, but so far I would say it hasn't quite clicked to the level that they would want it to.

And there's this slight echo in what's happening so far at Bologna of what happened to Italiano's sides at Fiorentina, which is they'd play some good football but not score goals at the end of it.

And certainly that's how it felt last night, because I didn't think they were bad last night at all.

I thought that Liverpool deserved to score the first goal, but after going 1-0 up, I thought Bologna had a good period of the game where I thought they had the better of it and just weren't able to convert that into anything.

I have to say, sorry, Vincenzo Italiano sounds like a very fast show

Italian football manager.

You can imagine him managing Julio Giordio.

Well, Vincenzo Italiano literally is Vincent Italian, and of course, Domenico Dedesco is Dominic German,

which is even better because, of course, Italian name, but was working in Germany.

Sean Liverpool, Lars.

I mean, I guess we're still at this stage where, you know, Bologna's tested them, but they have yet to face anybody to really test them this season.

Like they're doing what they should be doing.

And that's not to criticise Slot.

Like, it's to just say

we need to see them against, we need to see Slots Liverpool against an Arsenal, a Man City, et cetera, et cetera.

You know, one of the European big guns.

It's a funny one because I've watched most of these games they've played so far, but I find myself spending very little time thinking about Arnislos Liverpool.

They're just kind of ticking along nicely and winning games you'd expect them to win mostly.

With some apologies to Milan, I guess Milan away is still a scalp of some sort in European football.

But yeah, I guess the challenge is coming up now because the fixture list turns in a big way.

They do have Palace at the weekend, which apologies to Palace.

I was at Everton to see them at the weekend.

I think Liverpool should be fine there.

But after that, it's Chelsea, Abbey Leipzig away, Arsenal away, and then Brighton in the the League Cup and Brighton in the League, and then Leverkus in the Nasten Villa.

So it's about to turn pretty interesting.

That is a run.

But this is where the fixture list can be

such a strange thing.

Because if you'd have started with those, that would not have been fun for Arnest Lott, having just taken an hour after Joe and Klopf.

But now you've had a couple of months of slightly more winnable games, I guess, that they have...

that they have won and they deserve credit for that.

But that allows them to build up a bit of confidence, to build up a bit of momentum,

which they can take with them into this run.

But I think we'll learn a lot more about Liverpool in the coming weeks.

You say they've got to go to Leipzig.

Juve did go to Leipzig, and Nikki, like a brilliant, this is a brilliant game.

There's just so many great goals and great moments.

And that sort of amazing moment where, you know, Di Gregorio gets a straight red for that tiny little tap outside the box.

The resulting free kick is,

you know, Douglas Luis, who's just come on.

His first action is to handle the ball to wear penalty.

Leipzig score the penalty and you think, okay, well, that game is done.

And you may somehow come back and win.

Yeah, which feels like it's one of those games that I think it, I can't tell if I'm getting a bit just swept up in it because it was really entertaining, or if it's one of those moments, you know what I mean, where a team defines itself a bit, where it says, okay, we're serious this time.

Because I found Juventus entertaining to watch this season.

The games have been a mixed bag.

He's had three 0-0s in the league as well.

It hasn't all been end-to-end stuff.

And in fact, the defining characteristic of of Tialo Motta's time that you enter so far is that they haven't conceded a league goal.

They've been really tight at the back, but you can see something's happening.

They're trying to play this different style of football.

They're trying to bring in those same fluid schemes that you saw at Bologna last season.

And you're seeing a lot of young players involved, which is exciting.

But again, the beginning of this game, they weren't all there.

Not everything was clicking.

It's not like everything you looked across the pitch and thought, okay, this has all come together.

But it was just the mindset of

having that player sent off going to one down and then not just going for wow we've managed to equalize and let's cling on but no we're going for the win and and motto spoke about that afterwards when the the the interviewer said did you think about going for the rule i said no we go under the win under any circumstances and of course it's it's kind of easy to do that in this monster group stage right now where you don't necessarily worry too much if you do lose the game and and you have those opportunities but i don't know it felt like the way the players were on the pitch the fact that dusan flovic who's been a shadow of the player he was at fiorentina for such a long time takes on this commanding role and scores two in quite different ways i thought quite brilliant goals and then consei sauer scores a wonder goal to to to cap it off i really thought there was something about the energy something about the the feeling in the air and and maybe again it's it's partly just having watched the team last season under allegri where it was so devoid of energy for so much of the time.

But it feels like there's something happening there.

There's something about Juventus signing and using more young players and trying to play attacking football.

And as you maybe suggested in the chat, maybe becoming likable, question mark.

I'm not emotionally prepared for this.

This is too much.

They're certainly interesting to watch.

I want to watch them.

This is too much of a mental rejig for me.

Like Juventus being a fun and likable team.

I'm not.

It's not PSG, Lars, right?

It's, you know, let's.

who are doing the same thing they're just not successful at it right now but that's also it's I don't know it's all a mess uh Consta Sau's winning goal this in this game was really lovely individual goal but it's quite interesting he dribbled around um

the the leipsig defender david rom

who had been booked about two minutes previously so he couldn't block him he couldn't bring him down and that's more or less why consta sau was given this uh free passage towards the goal.

But it was a great strike.

But even after that, Arby Leipzig had a couple of good chances

to equalize and blew them.

So, but yeah, it was really entertaining.

And actually, their opening goal, like on the counter, I think it was Apenda who sort of ran through, I think, and then fed it to Sesco.

And Sesco just manages to get a touch on it and then hammers it in off the bar, down, you know, bar down, top of the net.

Exactly what you want.

But yeah, brilliant game.

Let's just round off the other Italian side playing Atalanta, who won three and a Shaktar.

Adam Ola Luckman, impressive again, Nikki.

Has he upped tools again?

Did he down the

point?

He did in the summer.

In the summer, he definitely was looking for his move.

PSG was strongly linked for a long time and it didn't happen.

And he didn't start the first few games of the season.

It's a big deal.

It's a big deal that he's back and he was...

brilliant again

in this game.

Of course, he's on the ballon d'Or long list isn't he and i i don't think he's going to win it but i i do think he's one of those players who imagine imagine if

he won the ballon d'oeuvre because i was i was thinking is scoring a hat-trick in the europa league final enough to get you on the ballon d'oor list like you know but it wasn't like he just did that max it wasn't like he took the season off and showed up in the final he's

no fair i think he's a slightly underestimated footballer and i think he felt like he was going to get estimated I suppose this summer and he's still maybe got that chip on his shoulder but he's he's a really he's a really exciting footballer I think he is um still despite that Europa League final perhaps not recognized for how well he's he's done at Atlanta all right well that'll do for part one part two we'll begin with a bad day for Madrid

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Welcome to part two of the Guardian Football Weekly.

We'll do athletic getting hammered by Ben Figure in a second, but before that, the holders, Real Madrid, lost 1-0 at Lille.

Lars, how momentous is this?

Is it one of those it's hard to tell because this is a 36-team league, nobody knows what's happening?

There's an element of that, but it is

I kind of bracket it in my mind in the same category as Villa beating Bayern in the sense that, above all, it's an incredible night for the fans and for the people who care about the club and I think you know that that that should matter I think one of the sort of big functions of the of football is to make people happy occasionally and when it successfully does that I think that's a that's the thing to be celebrated and it was some similarities in the game as well in that Real Madrid like Bayern had more chances in the game and the Lil goalkeeper Chevalier had to pull up some pretty great saves as the game went on but you still didn't feel that Real Madrid really hit top gear here and the game didn't seem to really flow for them.

And

Lil put on a pretty stubborn show of resistance and got the win.

It was a great night for them.

Yeah.

And Mike says, I suppose the Real Madrid result is where the jeopardy arises in this format.

Before, they'd have a home fixture to reverse the ground lost to Lil.

Now they've lost ground to everyone.

They're still probably okay, but the next match suddenly has a significance it didn't previously have.

Do you feel that, Baz, with Bayern and with Real Madrid?

You know, you lose one of these games and then suddenly you're not quite behind the eight ball.

You can see the colours, but you are slightly snookered.

So you have to, like,

shoot down on it to swerve around the eight ball.

A swerve or maybe a jump shot.

Yeah, a little swerve, yeah.

Yeah.

And remember, Max, don't put your pint on the rail of the table.

I did.

Because

actions have consequences and you don't want to see an angry baz.

You're bore.

It wasn't me.

Look, I don't think either of those teams would be panicking even remotely.

This was a wonderful night for Lil.

You can see how much it meant for the players, for their supporters.

Real Madrid have got out of far-stickier situations in this

in Europe.

I mean,

it seems to be every season.

So maybe if they lose their next four games, it might be time to start having a bit of a minor panic.

Without wanting to hammer the snooker slash pool analogy, Lars.

I think when Sid was last on, we were talking about Real Madrid being a bit like a, you know, a sloping snooker table because all their players want to play wide left attacking.

And I don't, you know, I haven't followed a lot of Real Madrid so far this season.

Are they all there?

I mean, Mbappe only came off the bench here.

He didn't do a whole lot.

How is it sort of?

Yeah, this is the thing.

They didn't start Mbappe for this one.

And I guess the idea was that we'll try this and we'll try to let Vinicius play sort of roughly where he wants to play.

And then when they weren't getting the goal they needed, they brought on Mbappe.

But then he didn't do a ton.

So that imbalance still exists.

I think there's also question marks whether I suppose it's Kamavinga they're hoping we'll take up the sort of the conductor's baton from

Tony Krose, and that's maybe not quite happening yet.

Certainly the reports were and from what I could see, I was doing my usual sort of Alfred in the Beth Cave trying to watch every screen in the world at the same time thing last night.

But from what I could tell, it wasn't quite happening for them.

Do you feel like Kamavinga's such a different player to Cross?

I mean, obviously obviously, you can't find another Cross, but he's not that.

He's not that guy.

He hasn't been, but he kind of was when he first broke through as a teenager.

He was more of a central midfielder who would try to dictate stuff, but then he's almost been turned into.

Anyway, he's had a different journey at Real Madrid because obviously Croz was there.

And it was disappointing that Mbappe came on and just kind of didn't do anything.

And this is taking...

Yeah, it's certainly something there's a lot for Carolo Anchilotti to ponder.

But in the case of this competition, it'll be fine, right?

Because by the time you have a lot of time to get it right, by the time the games that really matter come along, a bit more worried about the league.

I mean, with Barcelona going as well as they are, they maybe can't afford to drop too many points.

So they're in more of a rush to get it right.

One thing I am finding with this new tournament format is before you would know the groups, whereas now you have to memorize like everyone's fixture list, and that's not possible.

So I keep having to look up who they're playing.

And actually, I was going to write this off as, ah, it doesn't matter.

But you know what?

Realm Madrid.

They've got Dortmund at home in the next one.

Given the amount of trouble that Stuttgart caused them, maybe, maybe.

And then they've got AC Milan at home.

I mean, that, I don't know, maybe they'll be better then.

We'll see, Nikki.

And then Liverpool away, Atalanta away.

So that's not a super easy run of, yeah, those are four tricky games.

Then you finish up with Salzburg and Brest, but of course, Brest have started really well.

So I don't know, man.

Maybe,

maybe this isn't such an obvious.

I mean, I say this now, being a glass half-full kind of guy.

I I mean, in a couple of weeks, we might feel differently about it.

But on paper, that's not super easy.

That's a really tough draw.

And the last one is

his breast as well, who've won both their games so far.

So it would almost feel like there's more jeopardy if they hadn't also seeded.

the playoff round.

If it was, if you finish ninth, you might play 10th.

That would be exciting, right?

Then you really, and what if it was, or if it was a one-off game in that playoff round, then you'd have a real sense of like, oh, this could go wrong.

The problem is, you think, well, if you finish ninth, you'll play someone from the bottom half of it.

You'll probably play someone who only got,

I mean, it could be, I think, 12 points certainly is almost certainly going to be enough to get you in there.

It could be someone who scraped through.

And then you just think, well, they'll be all right.

And then, and then they're in the knockouts like everyone else.

No, that's a very good point, actually.

I mean, worth mentioning Jonathan David kicking his penalty incredibly hard.

And I'm a big fan of anybody, you know, I don't mind a stutter and a little side foot, but I prefer Kevin Pressman, Julian Dix, Dean Saunders,

hammer the thing.

Benfica for Athletic 0.

Athletic only conceded three in eight, and then they let in four in this game, Lars.

Is this totally unexpected?

What happened here?

It's a little bit unexpected.

I think we know that Benfica

are not an easy team, but then again, Benfica have sold some good players this summer and,

you know, have are not on paper the force they've been in the last couple of years.

I think with Atletico, they've not they've had some troubles in Europe in the last couple of seasons.

Simeona seems to, like, I went through a spell of Kip backing them.

I said, ooh, they could be interesting to win the Champions League, and then

completely misguided because

that has coincided with the spell on them not really getting it right in Europe.

And this was obviously a disappointing performance in so many ways.

To me, it's still hard to pull this apart from what you talked about with the group stage because I feel a little bit like

it feels less consequential to lose.

And so once you start letting it get away from you, do you a bit just go, oh, it's got away from us?

We'll save our energy for the next one.

Once it's 2-0,

whereas in a six-game group, maybe it feels more like, no, we really need to win this.

We want to finish top.

We want to avoid those bad draws in the next round.

Yeah, it's not something I'd say to assume

you gain in the dressing room, I think.

But no, I take the point.

It was just because it was a penalty and there was another penalty at the end.

It felt like you didn't see that desperate hunger to win or to salvage a draw that you might have seen in in previous years although toner gallagher did look very sweaty so he definitely had been doing a lot of running around in this game uh dinamo zagreb two monaco two pitch looks like a sort of league one in november vibes it was totally waterlogged um but um dinamo took the lead uh brilliant second goal from martin battarina he batarina it in

from the edge of the box and then Monaco came back late on.

There was a goal line clearance from a man with a big bandage on.

Forgive me, I don't know who it was.

And I thought, okay, Zagreb have won this.

Because they got hammered in the first game, didn't they, Lars?

But then Monaco got a penalty and

got a draw.

And what a penalty it was.

I think that's actually worth looking up.

That was a penalty.

For the ages, that might be too strong, but it was an aesthetically pleasing penalty.

Battarina, slightly funny name aside, is a 21-year-old number 10 who looks like he's the next sort of Croatian guy who's going to go somewhere and be really good.

Oh, really?

Yeah.

He was great.

Because it was so wet, I thought, wow, to pick the ball off the turf and kick it that large apart was difficult.

Talk, people who haven't seen the penalty, why was it so aesthetically pleasing?

Because he did a sort of a run-up was slightly, it was quite angled, and then he hit it really hard.

So the run-up suggested he was going to do something odd and then he just bashed it.

So it was kind of like, oh, yeah, that's that's a penalty.

Jerona Fire Nord.

Barry, any thoughts?

Jerona 2, Fire Nord 3.

This was really entertaining.

You have to feel a little bit sorry for Girona.

It's their first ever time in the Champions League.

This was their first home game.

They have conceded four goals in this competition so far in two games, and three of them have been home goals.

There was the one in the first game, which was Gazaningas.

The one he let through

his hands and legs at the near post.

Who was that against?

PSG, wasn't it?

Last minute.

PSG.

Yeah, in added time.

The winner last night was kind of similar.

David Hansko crossed from the left and Ladislav Kretsy sticks out a leg, somehow squeezes it between the post and his and Gazaninga.

You know, so it wasn't last minute.

I think there was still 10 minutes left when that went in.

But it was a real topsy turn of a game.

Both teams missed penalties.

Donny Vander Beek scored a goal.

I must confess I wasn't aware he was at Girona.

See also Arnold Danjouma, who I thought was a Bournemouth player.

Maybe he still is.

I don't know if he's on loan or not.

And then

Brian Hill is at Girona as well.

So it was quite a reunion of never quite hacked it in the Premier League old boys.

But massively entertaining game.

Girona were a little bit unlucky and Feynman were delighted to win it.

And Girona, even after scoring that late home goal, they had a

good chance to steal a point and brilliant save by the Fine Ord keeper, Wellen Mutter or whatever his name is.

Yeah.

Arnold Danjuma is on loan from Villarreal.

Villarreal is?

Yes.

They signed him.

Am I imagining?

Did he at some point play for Bournemouth?

They signed him from Bournemouth in 2021.

Oh, right.

He, after that, he did go on loan to Spurs for a tiny bit because he was going to go to to Everton and Spurs nicked him.

And then Everton had their way and got him for a bit.

And you could be forgiven for thinking he was almost always a Bournemouth player during that time, but yeah, he wasn't.

I like this.

When I go shopping, I tend to head straight for the yellow sticker aisle just because it's like I struggle to make up my mind about what I want for dinner and stuff.

And if there's something nice in the yellow sticker aisle, that's like a good starting point for a meal.

That seems to be what you're on are doing with the transfer.

It's the

Premier League yellow sticker aisle.

You You know, this Donny Van de Beek is almost passed the self-identify.

It's probably

still good if you're getting it.

If you could get him in the freezer straight away,

exactly right.

Speaking of which, Daly Blynn, there he is.

And Club Brueger won 1-0

at Sturm Gratz.

A lovely goal from Christos Solis.

I had a feeling before a ball was kicked yesterday that that was the game that will be last

in our roundup.

And lo and behold, there we go.

It would have been a brave choice to lead with it.

Let's be frank.

So, all that means that Dortmund are top, breast are second, seven teams are 100% record, eight teams have no points.

Young boys currently in 36th.

That's not fair to qualify for the Champions League and just be in such an ignominious position in a league table, so far down it that people are scrolling for pages before you get there.

I think think that's one of the

pluses of this new format, or will be that no one will want to suffer the ignominy of finishing 36.

So, even teams with nothing to play for still have not finishing 36 to play for.

That's a good point.

Europa League tonight spurs away to French Varros and Manchester United go to Porto in one of those enormous games for Eric Tenhar.

Porto lost, didn't they, in the last one to Bodo Glimpt?

To Bodo Glint.

That's it, Lars.

Oh, it was great.

I really watched it because I was thinking of you.

A good team, weren't they?

Yeah, they're great.

And I just looked up where they were fucking miles away.

Really far north.

I mean,

we've never spoken about this before.

Did you know the turf is artificial?

Yeah, oh, don't tell me.

But I'd never actually chatted.

After Jose Marina's Roma couple of days, 6-1 or something.

They did, yeah.

They did.

Was that

because Mourinho had a couple of visits to Bodo, and and one of them, he went to sign like autographs with some local boys, and then someone threw a snowball at him, and he sort of went, didn't he went away?

You would live off that in Boda for years.

You're the man.

You know, in like 50 years, he'll be sat in a pub going, yeah, I'm the guy that threw the snowball at Jose Mourinho.

Quick question, Lars.

Your Norwegian team, you said when they in the second division, they had a chance to go up or something.

You told me something that was vaguely interesting.

What happened?

Well, yeah, Brienne.

Brienne.

Well, yeah, because you and Charlie Baker on the radio started going on about what your teams were up to.

And I said, well, you know what, Brienne, my hometown team, also Aling Holland's first club,

are fighting for promotion from the second tier in Norway.

Would be the first time they've gotten to the top tier since 2003, I believe.

They had a very important game at the weekend against the team called Moss,

and they won.

So that's very exciting for me, for Aling Holland.

And not to mention

my 96-year-old grandmother, who, you know, it would be nice for her to see them in the top division again.

Come on, Granny Lars.

She still goes.

Goes to every game.

Every game.

Yeah.

Oh, yeah.

That's great.

That's amazing.

Especially, you know, I don't know.

How cold is it in Bruno?

My dad sort of gave up Cambridge United.

Pretty cold, yeah.

Just to wrap up good.

As a fair weather fan, in the literal sense, my dad was just like, if it's cold, I'm not going.

I don't care how well the team are doing.

It's cold now.

So good on Granny Lars.

All right, that'll do it for part two.

We'll do a Premier League preview in part three.

Hi, Pod fans of America.

Max here, Barry's here, too.

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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.

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

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

That's all for now.

Coach, one more question.

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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.

In the championship last night, two goals for alleged inverted commas biter Militin Osmajic in Preston's 3-0 win over Watford, Stokebeak Portsmouth 6-1.

So Premier League games then.

I mean Sunday looks fun, doesn't it, Barry?

Because you've got Villaman United, Chelsea Forest, and Brighton Spur, the Battle of the High Lines, Brighton Spurs.

But so much of the news this week, apart from the Champions League, has been Eric Ten Haark.

He got the vote of confidence the other day, didn't he?

It seems mad.

I mean, it just seems like you talked about, you know, the camera cutting to a million sort of high-performance Inios types, you know, all trying to look as stern as possible.

But they're still backing him.

I don't know about that.

Talk is cheese, Max.

True.

And

the vote of confidence is labelled the dreaded vote of confidence for a reason.

think it is a matter of when, not if Eric Tenhag gets his cards and it could be Monday morning if the next two games don't go so well for him.

You have pointed out on regular occasions that he,

just when he's on the abyss, he does just enough to claw his way back.

But

even if they do get a couple of half decent results here,

I would say if they lose badly against Villa, I will be astonished if they don't pull the trigger.

You know, it's international break coming up.

It's an ideal time to clean the stables to an extent, or at least hand the broom for the stables to a new Hercules.

And

yeah, it's a matter of time.

I said before the season started, I would be astonished if he's still there at Christmas.

I will still be astonished if he's still there at Christmas.

And I mean, you've very

rightly pointed out the sort of unfavorable comparison between him and Unai Emery at Aston Villa.

But I also, I was at Old Trafford on Sunday, and I had like a very high seat in the main stand.

So it it was like having tactics cam almost for the whole game.

And from that perspective, I just thought the difference between Spurs and United was so stark.

Whatever you think of like the sanity or otherwise of Tottenham's tactics under Arch Postakoglu, there was one team that knows exactly what they're supposed to be doing.

The players knew where to stand.

They know where the ball's supposed to go.

They have a structure.

They know what the plan is.

And Eric Tinhawk's been there.

It's his third season, and United have got none of that.

It's just chaos.

Players have no idea what they're supposed to be doing.

Or at least it's not manifesting onto the field in any meaningful way.

And whatever extenuating circumstances there are with the squad building all the stuff, like that's at some point, you've got to show something, I think, from the coach's perspective there.

And there's just nothing

by the way, Bruno Fernandes.

I don't think we mentioned it.

Yeah, we did.

We mentioned it yesterday.

I don't think it should have been a red card in the first place, but when you have the ref

did give it, then VAR backed him, and then another panel overturned the panel who have the power to overturn it but didn't.

It's, you know, we're going a bit through the looking glass here, aren't we?

Yeah, I mean, we did talk about that in part three yesterday.

At least I know when you zone out.

Oh, it did podcast.

All right, sorry.

I think someone sent in a question.

Literally exactly what you just said, pretty much.

No, that's okay.

What about Brighton Spurs, Nikki?

I mean,

it is fascinating to see how

who's attacking, like, who's defending in this game?

I don't know.

Yeah, Brighton have been brilliant to watch this season, haven't they?

And Spurs, obviously,

Spurs are Spurs under Ange.

They're going to play the way they're going to play.

I think the answer is no one's going to be defending in this game and everyone's going to be attacking.

Yeah, but you can't both play a high line at the same time.

Well, you can.

You'd both be in the middle of the pitch.

It'll be like the Large Hadron Collider of football.

We're just kind of squeezing these particles against each other and seeing what happens.

It'll sort of look like a rugby match.

Maybe the world will end.

Maybe when they push the blind, when the whistle goes, the teams kind of slam into each other with such a great force that they actually end the world.

On a more serious note, who does the defending?

I think the big difference is against Chelsea, Brighton had Adam Webster and Lewis Dunk trying to keep this crazy high line.

There's no Mickey Vandervent in there just kind of swooping up and eating up the ground to rescue the situation when things go wrong city of home to Fulham Nikki they haven't won in two I mean it doesn't feel like

I know but that's

it I mean I don't know how often does that happen I suppose once a season they have a little blip I mean look they were against Arsenal and Newcastle away that's not that you know they're not terrible results but it always feels strange you know this rodery-less rudderless ship do you give Fulham you sort of think Fulham however well they're playing it's just I can't even envisage it.

You know, you can envisage Brentford doing it, but you just can't with Fulham.

Three draws in five games across all competitions, Max.

It's a crisis.

I don't know.

Of course, it's all true what's been said already.

Roderie not being there is a damage, but you look at how they handled European Away Trip midweek.

Of course, Fulham are a better team than Slovak and Bratislava.

I would guess I don't watch a lot of Slovak and Bratislava outside of this game, to be truthful.

So

I should probably qualify that statement and not make assumptions.

But it's...

I think you're safe and not.

But

it's still Gundagan, it's still Haaland, it's still Foden.

Their entire second 11 is probably still stronger on paper than Fulham's first 11, so it's still Man City.

How excited, Nick, are you about Arsenal starting to look really quite good?

Obviously, Aaron Ramsdale back.

If I could have a penny for the words point to prove being said between now and that game, I'd have, I reckon, 50p probably.

But

it'll be interesting to see him there, but Arsenal look really good, don't they?

I think it's been a bit of a strange start, hasn't it, for Arsenal in that there's been a couple of games they haven't won, but then you look at the fixtures they've already crossed off the list and it includes Tottenham away, Man City away and Aston Villa away and you think, well, actually,

you don't need to be top right now.

You've got all those games done.

And in theory, the next bit

should be at least a tiny bit easier than that.

But of course, it's not always how football works.

It's really, really fun.

Having lived through and loved, by the way, the long Arsenwenger tenure, it's just really fun.

being the team that's mean now.

It's fun watching us be the team that has got that nasty edge to it, that is physically imposing, that does score goals at set pieces instead of being the one that gets bullied at set pieces.

I know that there's going to be things about this team that from other fans' perspectives probably is deeply unlikable.

But as a fan, to have different versions of good to watch in your lifetime and it's completely a spoiled experience because both of those teams are very good in different ways.

It's certainly fun.

Just to say that Southampton have like of all the teams that have gone up just look the most out of their depth so far.

And Russell Martin was, I believe he was the front runner in the sack race with the Bookmakers, has been overtaken by Eric Jan Hag, who made a late burst into the lead of that particular thing.

But yeah,

you'd think Arsenal would do this pretty easily, no?

Any other fix just take your eye, Baz?

Everton Newcastle is quite interesting because Everton won last weekend, first win of the season.

Will they kick on from that against the side who

haven't played well this season, but put in their best performance of the season last weekend?

But Newcastle aren't aren't good away from home, so

I think Everton could win this one.

I'm down to the last three in a game of last man standing.

Oh, how exciting!

What's on the line?

So, I'm I can't pick Liverpool, Arsenal, Man City,

or Villa.

So, every single fixture, I'm just tearing my hair out.

I think Chelsea basically, I mean, Forrester playing well, my main options are

Chelsea, Everton,

Brentford.

One of those three, really, are the realistic choice.

And I can't decide between them.

Forrest

actually have a quite

high probability rating against Chelsea, but I'm going to go for a home team.

So

it'll be one of Chelsea,

Everton, or Brentford.

I don't know which.

I don't trust West Ham to beat Ipswich.

So I'm thinking you might want to burn off Chelsea this week because they've got Liverpool away next week and you definitely don't want them there.

So if you progress from

I just want to stay in.

But that's what I'm saying.

Each week is irrelevant.

I am taking each game as it comes, Larry.

On France Kafka and Kai Havertz lookalikes.

Michael says, hi, Max and Kai.

I think you missed an open goal of a joke when Philippe compared Kai Havertz to France Kafka.

Arteta wanted a Kafka lookalike because he trusts Der Protesse.

That's too strong for me.

I don't know enough about Kafka.

I'll be really honest.

I desperately Googled a Kafka quote and I got one.

No, he does trust the process, yeah.

Immediately.

So

I should do at least, you know, GCSE philosophy for the pod, just so I can keep up.

While we're on the subject of look-alikes, is that I'm sure the unbelievable similarity between Meset Urza and Enzo Ferrari has already been covered already sometime.

Absolutely otherworldly.

Yeah, no, that is a very good one.

And Ollie says, Dear Max and Barry, love the pod.

I've been planning for several months to get Barry to give one of his unique wedding wishes for my mate Andrew and his wife to be Lorna ahead of their wedding this weekend.

But it seems my plans have been scuppered.

If Barry is now monetizing the wedding shout-outs, perhaps another of the more kind-hearted members of the pod could wish Andrew and Lorna the best.

Barry, are you happy to, or would you like to delegate to Nikki or Lars for Andrew and Lorna and their happy day today?

We have no information on them.

I know that you like a bit more information.

I can't.

It's a lazy request.

No information furnished um give me something to work with at least you know did lorna ever throw up in the back seat the best man's car uh

does andrew will he be sleeping in sharing a bed with the best man the night before the wedding you know i need material but uh all the best andrew and lorna Yeah, that's all we can do, but we wish you a very happy life together.

That'll do for today.

Thanks, everybody.

Thank you, Lars.

Thank you, Max.

Thanks, Nikki.

Thanks.

Thanks, Baz.

Thank you.

Football Weekly is produced by Silas Gray.

Our executive producer is Phil Maynard.

We'll be back on Monday.

This is The Guardian.