Advantage Manchester City in the title race? – Football Weekly

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Hello, and welcome to the Guardian Football Weekly.

And in the end, Manchester City won the league again.

A pivotal week in the title race.

We all expected wins for the three of them, but after a straightforward victory for City, Liverpool and Arsenal both lost.

It's unfathomable that there was only one goal at Anfield, but it wasn't just Liverpool who created chances.

Palace were excellent all over the pitch.

It ends a miserable week for Jürgen Klopp, held by United, defeated by Atalanta.

And now this.

That opened the door for Arsenal, but they couldn't capitalise.

Aston Villa, really impressive.

Leaving it late, but scoring twice to test the seams of Mikel Arteta's trousers as he slumped into the deepest of squats on the touchline.

A brilliant weekend for Villa's top four ambitions as Spurs deflated at Newcastle.

Mickey Van der Ven sliding around on his backside as Eddie Howe did a number on and elsewhere.

Manchester United get lucky in getting a point at Bournemouth.

Forrest should have got more than a point at home to Wolves while Bernie's goalkeeper goes full Enkelman at Turf Moor.

We'll do all that.

Ask if you've ever spent £76 million on something you already own.

Congratulate Bayer Leverkusen.

Answer your questions.

And that's today's Guardian Football Weekly.

On the panel today, Barney Ronnie, welcome.

Hello.

Hello, Barry Glenn Denning.

Hello, Max Rushton.

And Peter says, not a question, just very pleased to see the return of Philippe O'Claire.

We're all pleased.

Bon journe sava, Philippe.

Sava, Max, je s tre content we au si.

Exactly.

Nathan says, is this season turning into a lazy rom-com movie?

Man City, look like they'll run away with the title before two other guys turn up and make the title think twice before the title has a change of heart and runs back to City in the most expected outcome.

I mean, I sort of think, Barry, Man City can never be the romantic interest in a.

They're not the goodies, are they?

In a rom-com, are they?

They're not Hugh grant in all of this are they no no they're the slightly immoral um

you know hedge fund guy who who doesn't i don't know work in a coffee shop or a bookshop um

who who the guy from the coffee shop or the bookshop steals the woman from um

and and but in a charming way uh

I mean,

where are we starting, Max?

I reckon we start at and we start sort of chronologically on Sunday.

So City beat Luton 5-1.

We'll get to that in a bit, but we'll start at Anfield, where, you know, as I said in the intro, it culminates a really bad week.

Held by United, where they should have smashed him in that first half.

Terrible defeat to Atalanta, where Atalanta were brilliant.

And now this.

How, Barry, do you explain it?

It's difficult to explain.

I think in the context of a one-off, you could put this down as a freakishly

bad and unlucky day at the office for Liverpool.

But in the context of how often they've gone behind this season and their two other performances last week, you could probably argue it's been coming and it was a thoroughly deserved defeat.

And obviously, we're going straight in on Liverpool.

This was a brilliant performance from Crystal Palace, who at times had to ride their luck, but that's expected when you're a sort of mid-to-lower end team playing away at Anfield.

And it was a superb team performance

by Palace with a lot of standout individual performances.

Joack Manderson, Tariq Mitchell, Ebericie Yeze, Adam Wharton, Nathaniel Klein, Matteta, Michael Elise.

I think I've named nearly everyone here.

Apologies to whoever I've left out.

To Joel Ward, of course.

Well, yeah, he didn't actually start, but he did come on, as did Andrea Ayu.

They were brilliant, absolutely brilliant.

And I love Dean Henderson's.

Jordan Ayu, just to be sure.

Sorry, Jordan.

I really enjoyed Dean Henderson's comment afterwards.

I was watching again a match of the day.

He was asked what he made of the second half or how long it felt like.

And he said, I felt like I was out there for about a year and I didn't think it was ever going to end.

But I suppose Liverpool lost because too many of their...

former players once again didn't deliver and

players you wouldn't normally expect to mistake make mistakes did make mistakes and and that allowed you know Palace could have won by more and probably should have lost but but they held on to win by by that goal yeah I mean Philippe is sort of ludicrous that this game only had one goal in it when you think of like Robertson's goal line clearance Henderson saves from Diaz and Unez those blocks from Mitchell and Klein Jones is missed that Allison saved from Mateta I was just sort of I find it hard to analyse.

I was just more like

there should be more goals than this.

Yeah, there should be, but you find it hard to analyze but it was a reminder that football is primarily chaos and that was a magnificent example of chaos um

very different from what we saw um at the emirates later on at which barney was um but the one thing is that i i i'm i've read a lot of um incredibly uh critical uh comments about uh liverpool's performance as if almost as if they were operating in a vacuum and i'm not trying to find excuses or apologies for them, but they just lost a football game to a very good side on the back end of a pretty traumatizing defeat at home in a European competition, having played most of the season on one leg because they've had so many injuries and to key players,

and they've lost a football game.

And that's it.

That's all that happened.

They have, prior to that, what they've done was pretty miraculous, I think.

They've already won a trophy as well which everybody's already forgotten and i think we are placing the expectations so high

because of the abnormality of manchester city's performances both in terms of quality but also in terms of how many of their games they win that we have completely wrong expectations from the others they just lost a football game.

That's all there was to it.

And they should have won it, to be absolutely honest.

I mean, the finishing was not exactly the best, but some of the goalkeeping and some of the defending was simply magnificent, exactly like Aston Villa's defending and goalkeeping was magnificent at the Emirates.

Why do we want to see further than that is what I wonder?

Well, it's because our vision has been totally deformed by the Manchester City prism.

We see football through the city prism and that's wrong.

And that was my tuppence worth of wisdom for Monday morning.

It was very wise.

Barney,

do you agree with that?

Are you stuck in the Man City prison?

We've used the words villains and deformed so far to describe this wonderful team from the north of England.

I'm going to use nice words because

maybe there's a situation where Liverpool end up winning the league by one goal and Andrew Robinson's clearance off the line is...

I like narratives.

There's a moment of exorcising the ghosts of Stephen Gerard's slip by Virgil Van Dyke.

Maybe that's what's really happening here.

But I mean, Philippe is right.

I went across Europe last week watching Champions League quarterfinals, and I also went to Arsenal yesterday.

So that's sort of five of those eight teams who are supposedly the best in Europe.

And even though City conceded three goals to Real Madrid, I have to say,

they were just so much more orderly and

organised and in control than anyone else.

They are by far the best team in Europe, even though often they're playing basically with 10 men.

And also, if you look at their team, it's not really full of superstars or superstars who came to the club as superstars.

So while I have all the, you know, it's a strange team, you can have ambivalent feelings about things.

I mean, obviously there are financial charges.

People feel that City is more of a kind of cool project than a really exciting team.

The feat of coaching to make them that good really is extraordinary and Philly's right they've just they've distorted the whole league.

Liverpool are trying to rebuild the team with players who are not as good as the players they just aren't they're not as good as Mane and Ferminho up front.

It's just they're just not as good.

The Midfield's not as good.

Van Dijk's older didn't have Trent Alexander Arnold at the back.

And they've got 71 points and if Man City didn't exist, they'd be level on points to the top of the table.

But this team is so astonishingly good.

They're only two points clear, but it feels like the league is over now.

It's amazing how good they are, but they're also evil villains trying to con Kate Beckinsale into getting into bed with them when they don't really care about her.

As we will find out in an overheard phone call later on, when she realises that actually Colin Firth, despite struggling with life generally, is a really good guy.

And they're also, they deform our vision of their horrible prism.

I mean, it's good to have villains and heroes, isn't it?

And that's the narrative, I suppose.

Beckinsale was the perfect pick there, Barney.

I'd like to say.

You go Beckensale or Rachel Weiss, but I think Beckinsale was absolutely ideal.

Mark says, can we just not all agree that the problem with Liverpool is Nunes?

If he could make the wrong decision, he would.

If he can miss an easy chance, he will.

Everyone's waiting for him to come good.

But if Ollie Watkins had been playing instead of him, liverpool would have won the league by now do we all want to just not agree on that barry feels harsh to single him out he has had over 100 shots this season scored 10 goals which is an amazing return but i feel like it's not just him in that liverpool side who are missing chances

no but he does miss quite a few depends what you want from football i want to be entertained i find him very entertaining because I never know what's going to happen when the ball comes his way and he can you know make me my jaw drop with an act of brilliance or make me burst out laughing.

Um, so I have no problem with Darwin Nunes, but

he does have a reputation for being this sort of comically slapstick figure.

I don't know whether he'll come good or not.

He's you know, play he's an important part of the front three of one of the best teams in the world.

So I've got to say he's doing all right so far for youngster.

But,

yeah, I think think if,

you know, put Erling Haaland in that Liverpool or Arsenal team,

and they would be top of the league.

And we've already dismissed him as a flat track bully in recent pods, obviously.

There's a lot of blame to go around for yesterday's defeat.

Quite a few players didn't perform.

Mo Salah didn't have a particularly good game.

Louis Tees didn't have a good game.

Alexis McAllister, by his own very, very high standards, was kind of poor.

But again, it was a brilliant performance by palace and i think their goal was

uh i don't want to go all ethan pinnock on it but i that's one of the goals of the season for me it was like a little rondo down it by the corner flag with four or five liverpool players chasing the ball and not able to get a touch on it yeah i wondered 21 passes i wonder if palace ever completed 21 passes under roy i mean maybe that's unfair on roy but like for that and it to end in a goal i did think liverpool let them play a bit.

Although I do love Adam Wharton, he's sort of my new favourite player in the Premier League.

Philippe, you wanted to come in?

Yeah, because

as a non-paid-up member of the Darwin Nunez fan club,

I am extremely,

I'm not shocked, I'm disappointed at all the comments coming his way because we bemoan the fact that professional footballers tend to be identikit, tend to be coached out of anything that resembles spontaneity.

And here we have a player who is gloriously,

he's still the stone the statue has to be carved from, and he will always be that stone.

And that's why I love him.

It's a beautiful stone to watch.

It's got loads of wrong angles and, well, which the bowl bounces from, obviously, at times, but it can also be thrilling.

He's a magnificent footballer.

It's just Darwin Nunez.

Just, you know,

I've been taken to Darby saying Rabio is Rabio is Rabbio, but that was not very positive.

But when I say Nunez is Nunez is Nunez, for me, that's great.

I love him.

Also,

I mean, he misses.

You mentioned Erling Haaland, who also misses a lot of big chances.

And I'm not sure that he would totally transform Liverpool's season in that way.

But Haaland misses chances that other people make for him,

whereas Nunez misses a lot of chances that he makes himself.

He has incredible, he's really involved in the game, and he has the reason people like him is he's six foot four, really quick, incredible athlete, never stops, absolutely relentless, brilliant mentality.

And so, there's a feeling that there's something there that could just be irresistible.

But there was a period in the game yesterday where he lost the ball three times, won the ball back three times in about three seconds.

And you think, well, he's just playing his own game there.

But his degree of involvement means that he will miss a lot.

I remember Thierry Omri saying when you, he, there was a moment in his earliest career where he realized to score, you just need to go absolutely cold in that moment.

It's just that all the tension leave your body just for that microsecond.

And then he just started to score.

Can't someone just say to Darwin Nunes, you just need to go cold, let all the tension go, and then

he'll be a 40-a-season man.

By the way, Nikki Banduni is with us on Thursday to do more Atalanta chat, whether Atalanta go on and win, which we expect them to do, or Liverpool stage a ridiculous comeback.

I mean, worth saying that Philippe and I are, we run the Charles de Catalera fan club, and he was so good in that game.

There was a minute's silence and field ahead of the game to mark 35 years since the Hillsborough disaster when 97 people were unlawfully killed attending a football match.

The anniversary is today.

David Conn has written an excellent piece in the paper, which we will link to in the show notes.

So Liverpool missed the chance.

It meant Arsenal.

It was a great opportunity for them and they lost 2-0 at home to Aston Villa.

Barney, you were there.

How was it?

Yeah, it was okay.

I mean, Villa were really good.

From an Arsenal point of view, not great, but Villa

did a really good job on them.

And teams, I think,

are learning a little from the way Champions League like Porto, for example, played against Arsenal, where you know they're going to start really quickly and you have to get through that opening 15-20 minutes.

You have to not get freaked out by the stuff at corners.

You know,

it's not actually that varied what they do, although it has been highly effective.

And playing on the break is a better plan than trying to sort of go high and engage in the game there.

So, Villa kind of did that.

And by the last, I'll say the last second half, they really dominated.

John McGinn was fantastic.

And it was a really good performance.

And they had a really big away contingent there.

And the fans, it was just a brilliant moment.

The players went over to them at the end, and it was what the young people would call limbs.

And it's a really good performance.

And I was really pleased for Emery, who you know is a really good manager.

But Arsenal just kind of unraveled.

It was entropy.

The game began with all those tongues of fire on the side of the pitch, with Michael Alteta talking about aggression over the PA.

He really wants to get this feeling of something special happening.

We are more intense than you.

That's how Arsenal will win the league.

But

it peaked then and left.

And I was surprised by the empty seats.

I know it's a gut punch to lose two goals right at the end, but they've had a really good season.

It has been good.

It's not over.

You know, they're only two points behind.

And the stadium was half empty at the end.

And I felt disappointed for the players in that respect.

And also, it's still there to be won.

Like, don't make everyone feel that it's lost.

People are really susceptible to being told things.

And that seemed like a kind of your manifesting losing the league as Eventoni would probably say.

It was very disappointing.

The big players didn't Saka, we say he's tired, he just didn't play that well and

Villa were too good on the day.

Did you leave early Philippe?

So that goal went in, burnt your season ticket?

No,

but

it's happened a couple of times, but it is much rarer now than it used to be the case, used to be the rule.

And one of the reasons for that is that anybody who's tried to go home after an Arsenal game knows that it can be a little bit on the tricky side given the fact that Drayton Park is closed, that Holloway Road is closed and then so you've got Finsbury Park and Arsenal and it takes hours and so if you've got anything to do afterwards now forget about it.

I find you very very harsh Mr.

Roney.

I must say, the first half Arsenal played was absolutely magnificent.

The fact that they didn't score didn't mean they didn't play great football.

They played great football and were in front of a team that played magnificent defensive football

with Diego Carlos was absolutely immense.

I had to check afterwards.

You know, he's never been selected for Brazil.

It's like every Brazilian has been selected for Brazil at some point, except Diego Carlos, who was man of the match against Arsenal.

But

the

first 45 minutes of Martin Odegaard were amongst the best he's played in an Arsenal shirt.

It was absolutely stupendous.

Yeah, I have to say, Ed Aaron's agreed with you.

He was sitting next to me and he agreed with you.

I mean, I guess I just am used to seeing.

Oddegaard often plays very well in the first half.

He's the leader of that start.

It's deliberate, isn't it?

Yeah.

And he was really good.

I was writing a sidebar about him because I thought they're going to win and Odegaard's going to be the key player at that point.

But then I threw that away in the second half.

Yeah, maybe that is a bit harsh, but

it went the way Viller expected.

Manchester City could change six players from the starting lineup against Real Madrid.

Arsenal could

change three, and that was that.

And some of the players who are there are clearly, at the end, in terms of physically, if they're physical abilities, they're not the players they were like six months ago.

For a simple reason is that Mikel Arteta, what he's asking from his players is crazy.

He's asking far more in terms of pressing than Manchester City, for example, is asking.

They don't work the same same way.

They're much more aggressive, Arsenal.

Yeah, do you think, because mentality is really hard to quantify as it's hard to judge, and you wonder with Arsenal, you know,

just as happened last season, you know, the Bayern game, they didn't look, they just didn't look the same defensively, same again.

Or is it A, tiredness, and B, a bit like you said about Palace Philippe?

We forget that Bayern Munich and Aster Villa are literally packed with elite footballers who are really good at this stuff.

No, but we do forget the fact that, yes, you've got a player, for example, you knew that Emi Martinez was going to have a great game.

And he pulls this astonishing save with his right foot when Trossart thinks he scored.

And you go through the line.

I think Konza as well had a terrific game.

So central defensive pairing of great quality.

And it's all the more admirable from Villa that they're missing quite a few players who had been essential in getting to that position where they can hope and should qualify for the Champions League.

But Leon Bailey was on the bench.

And you think, Leon Bailey, really?

He's been one of their players of the season, but he could be on the bench.

That's still there.

He's got a really good squad, assembled a very good squad.

And also, what you saw was the perfect Una Emery We performance, which we have seen at Sevilla, which we had seen.

at Villa Real, which unfortunately we didn't see very often at Arsenal, but which we are seeing with

Aston Villa.

And you could honestly say that in terms of attacking football and defensive football, Villa have produced two of the performances of the season.

In terms of attacking football against Manchester City, when they won, that was absolutely, at times, sublime football.

And defensively, when they played the perfect game.

So, you know, hats off again.

Let's look at things the way they are.

Arsenal are knackered.

They've got a game against Bayern Munich, which is absolutely huge coming.

Some of their players are running out of steam and they lost against a tremendously good team which deserves all the plaudits and the lovely adjectives that people will send their way.

Barry you suggested on Thursday's pod that Una Emery is possibly not as petty as you.

He did look like he enjoyed this game.

I think he did enjoy it.

There was no non-celebration celebration when the second goal went in.

Or was it the first or both?

But yeah,

he was thrilled and so was Emi Martinez.

And why not?

There was another interesting thing in this game.

I think Arsenal pioneered the set piece coach jumping up whenever there's a corner, defensive or attacking, and now also a free kick into the box.

He will jump up and Michael Arteta will pop back down like they're like the men in a cuckoo clock because only one person is allowed to be coaching in the D.

And he will turn up and he crouches down.

No one's looking at him, no one cares but the there's this kind of voodoo aspect that he is now affecting the game this but what happened in this game is Villa's own set piece specialist has begun jumping up I think there may be something in the set piece coach community where if one if your counterpart is jumping up and you're not then what's going on like what if the superstition also what if they score and you don't and and it's great

it's really good because villa's set piece coach is a kind of um he's he's like a sort of data hippie.

He's got really long hair.

Oh, is he the long hair guy?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

He's like in the

darkness or something.

Yes, he looks good, though.

He's got really good energy and intensity.

And he's now yelling onto the pitch at the players.

He's yelling at John McGinn saying stuff.

But Emery didn't sit down.

Emery was not willing to, he was still the kind of the out, the silver back in the in the rectangle.

So he didn't sit down.

And it was technically a breach of touchline coaching regulations.

Right.

It's like the sketch in

the round in Whose Line Is It Anyway, where

one of them has to be sitting down, one of them has to be standing up, and one of them has to be lying down at all times.

That's what you should have: assistant manager, manager, and set piece manager.

But there are other specialists.

I don't understand why the goalkeeping coach isn't leaping up every time there's a shot.

Because if he's not doing that, how can he expect the goalkeeper to have any chance of saving it?

He could be on a kind of pulley where you just catapult him out from the bench area whenever there's a shot.

Throw in coaches.

What about the fitness coach towards the end?

Where's he?

There's a friend of mine who I met yesterday who coaches the under-tens and under-nines of a

quite well-known South London football team.

And he was showing me his bag of tricks.

He's got like a tactics board, magnets, these extensive player notes.

Every kid has to have an ID card.

you have to match the child with the id card before play can start it's remarkable like this is an under nine level yesterday uh they were playing a game and one of the parents on the touchline the ref had to just pause the game and go over to him and say but could you please stop shouting so aggressively at these these small children who are trying to enjoy a game of football and the man was like i'm not being fucking aggressive.

It was a real eye-opener for you know, someone like me.

I don't have kids, I've never been

the last game of kids' football I was at, I was playing, yeah, and he scored a header.

Good God, yeah, well, I mean, on sort of over coaching, I we um before a game when I was playing for an over 40s team back in London, the the the the gaffer sent a video of Chelsea's press saying, I'd like the front three, I'd like you to do this, and you're like, Literally, Igor's a carpet fitter.

He's coming off a 10-hour shift.

He might not make kickoff.

Like, you know,

he can't be Rain Sterling here.

Anyway, look, City won 5-1 against Luton.

Kavanosty saying, Has Pep been gaslighting the rest of the Premier League all along?

Rodri got his rests.

Pep made six changes.

I actually thought Luton did okay in this game, Barry, for sort of quite a long time, but it was all very inevitable.

37 shots in this match for City, the most in a Premier League game since March of 2015 yeah um i mean

philippe talks about arsenal being knackered and looting there is a team that's knackered uh decimated by injury i don't think they had a fit centre back

and they've lost 5-1

i always anytime i talk about looting i feel like i'm patronizing them but i i thought they were pretty good in that game until it all went south after about an hour.

I think there were only 1-0 down down after an hour.

Yeah, 60 second minute was the second.

Yeah, yeah.

I thought they did under the circumstances and given the opposition, I thought they did all right.

And I'm glad they didn't get absolutely humiliated or monstered.

They gave a pretty decent account of themselves in a game absolutely nobody expected them to get anything from other than a pretty routine hiding.

Yeah, just a couple of things about that game.

One of them is purely football, is the Ross Barclay goal, which I think was very poignant in some ways because it was a reminder of the kind of player he could have been.

And you think he's never been that player, really, except at moments.

But he's been brilliant this season.

He's been brilliant and kind of reinvented this season, don't you think?

Oh, he's had a great season, absolutely.

He's had a great season.

But, you know, you have to remember what, for example, what Roberto Martinez was saying about Ross Barkley.

He was supposed to be Jack Grealish plus Jude Bellingham plus Phil Foden together, you know, and he never quite, maybe it was people were expecting too much of him, but that goal was of the highest quality.

I mean, the way the this very quick double touch, left foot, right foot was absolutely superb.

And the other thing is that I don't know if you've noticed, it was also the case at St.

James Park, so I'm giving you the ball for part two here.

It was also the case, have you noticed the new advertising boards that we are seeing in the Premier League?

It's pretty high, the city one, isn't it?

It's like above head high.

Okay, There are now two.

There are now two, one which looks on top of each other.

And you know why that is?

It's not just that they can advertise for more people.

It's also that they can do so-called virtual advertising, which means that the advertising you will see in other countries won't be the same as you see in Britain.

It's a big subject

and one which I hope we will get back to because it's something which is gaining ground.

I think it started in Germany and it's now coming to England.

Michael says, is now a good time to mention the elephant in the room?

As soon as cities start running around with the league, if they do, Barney, the 115 charges will come up.

And

I don't know if this is the right, when is the good time to say when will they ever

when will this ever happen?

Yeah, I don't think it's a mystery that it's not been heard yet.

They've denied the charges, so you have to then go into a question of proof on 115 charges although many of those replicate themselves 115

many of them

can be either proven or unraveled I suspect with the same decision on a point of fact they're not all completely separate but that that's why it's taking so long it's not weird you have to get this right and there's a process of discovery and sharing documents and blah blah blah so I there's not they're not deliberately holding the charges back the problem I think is that the sums of money and the idea of right and wrong, it's a set of rules essentially written by some accountants

in football, which outside of football do not seem important to people.

And I have a fear that this thing is a bit bigger than football and that's how it will be judged.

Also,

we're already changing the rules around it and there's a sense that things are going to relax in this area, which kind of paves the way for somehow whitewashing and retrospectively saying, Well, was it that?

I don't know.

I don't feel, I think there are some people who would like this to be rigidly observed and heard, and others who don't.

And also, just say, I was watching that game, I was trying to think of something worse than starting playing a football match.

It's about two minutes in, and Erling Haaland overhead kicks the ball straight into your face.

It goes into the, it's an own goal.

Oh, sorry, mate, that's an own goal.

You scored an own goal.

Yeah, because Erling Harland just smashed the ball.

Of all the people in the world the most acrobatic massive six foot five has smashed the ball into your face now you've got to play 90 minutes having done that and it it's not going to get any better and so that it struck me that football is a it's truly the beautiful game yeah that'll do for part one part two will begin with newcastle hammering spurs

HiPod fans of America, Max here.

Barry's here too.

Hello.

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Remarkable, a brand name and an adjective, man.

Yeah, it's their most portable paper tablet yet.

It holds all your notes, to-dos, and documents, but it's smaller than a paperback and an incredible 0.26 inches thin, so it slips easily into a bag or jacket pocket.

Perfect for working professionals whose jobs take them out of the office, like maybe a football journalist, Barry.

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A proper football journalist, mate.

Exactly.

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Welcome to part two of the Guardian Football Weekly.

Simon says, I asked a while ago whether I was delusional to think a fully fit Spurs would be top of the league.

Just an update on this.

Yes, I was.

Career We Go says, Has Vandervent's pace been the most mentioned player's attribute in the Premier League this season?

I think it might have been.

It didn't really help him much in this game, Barry.

He was almost too fast for two goals and then too slow for another one as Newcastle hammered Tottenham.

I did mention in my minute-by-minute report on this game that if anything, Clive, he's too quick

because he was sent sliding into the car park twice for Newcastle's first two goals and then looked like he was running in Treaco when Alexander Isaac gave him the slip to score the third.

So it was a personal nightmare for old Mickey there, who's had a really good season so far, but that was quite the wake-up call for him and

uh an uncharacteristically well not totally uncharacteristically i suppose but a collective shocker for spurs who i thought would win this game comfortably i keep thinking newcastle cannot go on winning games given the number of players they have out and they keep defying my expectations and i think eddie how

As good as Angie is, Eddie Howe really had his number in this game and the way he approached it, accompanied by just so many mistakes by various Spurs players.

Newcastle were thoroughly deserving winners and could have won by more because I think they hit the woodwork twice.

Barney Spurs are probably ahead of where they should be.

But as Bat says, Eddie Howe got this right with a makeshift defence.

You know, Gary O'Neill has sort of outdone Ange a couple of times this season.

There is a slight sense that maybe this sort of do plan A better

isn't everything you need to be as successful.

I mean, I don't know if that's fair or if we'd sort of judging.

Yeah, I I don't know.

I suppose ahead of where they should be.

I mean they're well they're fifth.

Um they've got quite a big stadium, some good players.

I don't know.

Where should they be at this stage?

They've been in the Premier League for quite a long time.

Yes, that's true.

Given how bad Chelsea and Manchester United have been this season, you maybe they should be a bit higher up the table, I would say.

Well, ahead of

Liverpool,

say or

they're thereabouts, I think.

They're pretty good.

I think it's good that the Premier League is quite difficult, um, and that Ange has this style and it's quite hard to just sort of walk through.

I mean, what I like about the Premier League is it is, I do trust it in that other managers will look at what you're doing and react to it within the space of a few weeks.

And it's difficult, you know, it's a really high level, and possibly he's got stuff to learn as well,

as well as being kind of exciting and a breath of fresh air and all that.

But they have had some games like this where

they do seem to slightly collapse.

The thing with Van der Wenn is

he's sort of got, he's, I think he's quite physically mature.

He still has kind of a child's body, if you can say that, of a six foot, four inch, massive guy who's really fast.

When you see him in the flesh, he doesn't really look like the the other footballers so much um philippe was talking about um you know but all of aston villa's cent halves actually are enormous they've got vast muscles um you were in the stadium weren't you the the um it was incredible watching them and van der Venn is very slender he's like a sort of young sapling and possibly that that will change it was a moment where that kind of appeared I think he's a really good player and yeah they're heading towards a place.

Is that the feeling among Spurs fans that they've overachieved this season?

I'm surprised.

I don't know.

I think the feeling might be because they started the first 10 games, they won eight and drew two, your expectations change very quickly, don't they?

And so there is a feeling.

And also,

when they started to stutter, it was because they, you know, they lost Van der Venn, they lost Madison,

a couple of other things, you know, big players were injured, and then they lost.

Basuma and Saar to Afcon.

And they sort of think, well, now everyone's back.

Now Spurs will kick on.

They had that great win at Villa.

And you're right.

I mean, it's, you you know, it's not unlike the point we're making about Arsenal.

These teams are good, but they just didn't.

I don't know what you thought, Philippe.

They just really didn't show up.

And Newcastle, you know.

But this could have been a totally different game, Max, if your pal Tim O'Verner had scored either or both of the exceptionally easy chances.

I think the first is a difficult chance.

It is if he heads it.

That's maybe it.

I mean, I did think actually what he should do there is.

control it and just lay it off.

I can't remember if it was Son or Madison who was just there.

Like, like that, he definitely doesn't go ice cold, right?

He definitely doesn't.

If anything,

he just boils over as soon as the ball comes near him.

Am I wrong, Max?

But if you if you watch the game and you sort of stop the videotape, or actually, you know, I'm showing my age here, uh, at 20 minutes, you think, well, Spurns have been all over Newcastle.

They should be ahead in that game.

And I think it's just that they didn't make the most of their period of dominance.

And then Newcastle, very cleverly, and with an absolute exceptional Alexander Isak,

made the difference.

I mean,

it's one thing I really wanted to point out.

I mean, he's got a really rare quality in this kind of,

in this, as a center forward and one who is expected to use space because they're very quick in transition and they love to counter.

He stays on side.

He's absolutely, his unerring sense of where he should be on the pitch in relation to the last defender.

And actually both goals, if you look at them, are a demonstration of how you do it.

The first one is actually, he checks his run because he knows if I do anything more, I'm going to be offside.

And he checks it just enough to be on side, to go on goal and then put Miki Vander Venn on his posterior

and be the keeper.

And the second one, obviously, is the position where he starts from, which makes all the difference, but is truly exceptional.

And

what you wonder, because there are loads of noises about Newcastle having problems

being within the framework of the FF, the financial fair play rules in England and being obliged to sell players probably next summer so that they can compensate for the overspend of the previous seasons.

And I'm sure I meet Alexander Isak today.

My goodness, there will be quite a few clubs on him.

He's got 17 in 24.

Like, it's not 17 and played every game.

17-24 is some record, isn't it?

Dan Byrne celebrated after the first Isak goal by signing love to the fans, by signing it in

sign language.

Newcastle, sponsored by the Royal National Institute of the Deaf, on the front of their shirts, were wearing special, some fans were wearing special sensory shirts.

It's a really nice initiative.

And

lots of us talked about it before the game.

And you were like, well, I mean, I didn't want Newcastle to win, but you know, you hope they score so the fans get here.

You think, wow, you know, it really worked.

It was a good day for, you know, for those fans.

They're still owned by PIF, though.

Well, this is true, isn't it?

And that's actually shows the complexity of all this, that you can have good things happening in bad places, right?

Exactly.

I totally agree.

But that was, it was wonderful to to see those fans enjoying it.

To the vitality, Barry, Bournemouth 2, Man United 2.

You're on the minute by minute.

Another game where Manchester United were really lucky to get anything out of a game.

I feel like that sort of happened so many times that, like, really, Man United should be even worse.

Yeah,

they were second best in this game for long periods, probably most of the game.

I think Bournemouth fans feel fairly hard done by quite a few refereeing decisions that went against them.

Probably the most egregious was the least high-profile.

There was a clear foul on Dominic Solanke by, I think, Willie Camboala in the build-up to Fernandez's first goal.

And then the penalty for handball, I suppose that's fair enough, although,

you know.

Yeah, that's how I feel about it.

That wasn't the noise I would make.

Yeah.

And the free kick or the penalty that was overturned.

I don't know whether that was the right decision to overturn it or not.

But

yeah,

Bournemouth should have won this game.

They missed several chances.

They played very well and Manchester United got away with it again.

And

while Andy Irreola was critical of the referee after the game without going off on one like a big mad one,

I think...

Bournemouth probably need to look at themselves.

Why didn't we put this game beyond Manchester United

by by half-time because they could have

manchester united have conceded 241 shots in the last 10 games which is a big number and um it's starting to lose all meaning says producer joey and i can't really imagine 240 with so many shots they've conceded 565 this season uh the second most in the whole of the premier league barney which is so extraordinary Yeah,

I find it, I've always found it quite interesting.

It doesn't seem to be changing that Manchester United's kind of period of problems, the problems with the club, are expressed on the pitch in terms, always in terms of these bits of space appearing.

It's like there's a hole in the centre of the team that's been there for at least 10 years.

And they've never quite, they can't seem to plug this gap, this kind of the heart of the team is absence.

And for a while, you know, they played...

two holding midfielders in there to try and they bought Casimira and again against Bournemouth there are sudden pockets of space that just appear in the heart of the team.

And it's like this performative metaphor for everything about this club that's been kind of hollowed out and turned into a kind of marketing cash exhibit that the hole will literally show on the pitch.

I guess it's related to if you have

it's related to the fact that they have some quite slow defenders that they just can't get off the books.

So if you sign Harry Maguire for 90 million, that's a structural problem that is then reflected tactically in your team because Harry Maguire is always playing deep.

It doesn't fit the the style you want to play, it doesn't fit your goalkeeper.

And tactical problems express the structural problems wrong with the club.

But it always seems to come out in the fact that there is this hole at the heart of Manchester United, and they just can't close the space.

And the Clivet goal is extraordinary.

There's just this massive gap there with Diego Dalot standing there saying, oh, oh, yeah.

And I feel very, very sorry for

Cambwala, who looks like a good player, seems athletic and keen.

And he's been really, you know, he had a really tough afternoon, and it must be a pretty tough place to learn to play football in.

Yeah, I mean, although his fall was his sort of slip when Solanke went through, at least would have made Mickey Van der Wen feel a little bit better.

You know, just sort of players sort of just sort of catapulting themselves to the floor.

Virgil got in on the acting on Sundays.

He did.

Yeah, he did.

Solidarity.

The Defenders' Union is not as much as often spoken about, is it?

Yes, Billy.

Just a word about Dominique Solanke, because

he's very much a late bloomer.

I mean, I remember what people were saying about him when he was part of the under-20 World Cup winning team back in 2017.

And then he got nowhere, and then

he went to Bournemouth, and he made the decision, obviously, to stay in Bournemouth.

And he's being rewarded for that at the age of 27.

We suddenly see the Dominique Dominique Solenke, whom we thought we were going to see much earlier.

So well done to him for persevering.

And I do hope it's a shape of things to come as he's concerned, that he can have many, many other years of success as he's having this time.

Wanning them appearance so far in 2017.

So, you know, you never know.

So I feel he's behind Watkins and Tony in the who isn't going to play any minutes.

But there'll be lots of talk about him before the score.

But he seems closer to Kane as a player.

Don't you think he seems to be quite good at dropping deep and doing that kind of stuff.

He also seems like a really nice bloke.

I'd quite like to hang out with him.

If you had to go on a long bus journey and you were sitting next to him, although Legroom might be in it, he was a big guy, isn't he?

So, like, you'd want to be in a big coach.

Yeah, but he'd be very, he'd be courteous and respectful.

He wouldn't man spread.

You don't think Dominic Solanke would man spread next to you.

Can you say the same about Ivan Tony?

You're next to him on a National Express going to Edinburgh.

I'm not sure.

How are you enjoying that?

I'm having it.

I think it's okay.

I think he's got quite a nice voice, hasn't he, Ivan Tony?

Yes, and yeah, he's pretty, yeah, he'd be a good conversationalist, I think.

That's true.

But he would, he'd, your personal space, you think, would be impactful.

I think a lot of the conversation would be about him as well.

Well, maybe.

Yeah.

You think he wouldn't ask any questions?

Come on, Ivan Tony.

I think it'd be more of a...

Yeah.

How did you get into journalism, Barney?

You know, that's what you want from Ivan Tony, and you're not getting it, aren't you?

It would take him four and a half hours to say that.

I have a feeling Ivan Tony really doesn't care how Barony got into it.

No, but that's not the point, isn't it?

When you're small talk on a bus,

you know, you're asking quickly.

No, I don't care either, but I would ask Barney if we had four and a half hours.

Maybe I wouldn't.

We just talk about people we

don't care about anything that anyone has said on this podcast, not just today,

including yourself, yeah.

Me, absolutely, to the fore.

Not just today, but ever.

And yet, I'm still here, um, sort of on the face of it, kind of engaged and really, you know, giving good content to all the lonely middle-aged men in the headphones.

Gonacho was taking off at halftime, and when asked after the game, it was injury-related, Ten Hag said no.

Gonacho then liked a couple of social media posts that criticised the decision.

I mean, Ten Hag can't let another winger rot in the reserves, can he?

Just because can't be

run out of the reserves, it should be full of unless they've all gone now.

I can't remember, but but did Namadiallo, he

liked or commented on something about it, was that YouTube guy

who

accused Ten Hag of throwing the young players under the bus.

I don't think Gamet Yellow's contributed enough in even in terms of you mean Mark Goldbridge.

Yes, that's the guy.

Your colleague, your radio colleague, Mark Goldbridge.

Yes, the very man.

He

so I don't think Gamet, I'm a big fan of his.

He was brilliant at Sunderland last season on loan, but I don't think he's been even on the pitch enough to start liking comments in which he might be tacitly being criticised.

Some people who don't listen to the radio might think that you do a show with Mark Goldbridge now, Barry.

We'd be clear that on the same station, but do different.

I forgot.

Is this still we still recording?

I thought we were in the break.

I think it's still part of it.

But, you know, that doesn't matter.

Anyway, that'll do for part two.

We'll do the rest of the games in part three.

Hi, Pod fans of America.

Max here.

Barry's here too.

Hello.

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Perfect for working professionals whose jobs take them out of the office, like maybe a football journalist, Barry.

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A proper football journalist, man.

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Welcome to part three of the Guardian Football Weekly.

Let's rattle through the relegation because wasn't sort of a seminal day at the bottom of the table necessarily.

Nottingham Forest drew 2-2 with Wolves.

They'll feel bad as that

they should have got all three points.

They should have.

I think even Gary O'Neill felt they should have got all three points.

Nuno certainly did.

And yeah, I found it difficult.

In my head, Nuno, someone mentioned this last week, and in my head, Nuno is still Wolves manager and always will be.

So it was a kind of weird vibe off this game.

But Forrest had nine shots to Wolves, four.

Wolves, according to O'Neill, only had 12 fit senior players to choose from.

And

I think they

very much got away with this one.

But Forrest's inability to defend set pieces continues to be their undoing.

And I don't know much about football coaching, but I would imagine learning how teaching players how to defend set pieces should be probably one of the easier things to do on the training pitch.

Yeah, their set piece coach is not jumping up to show where he is, is he?

No, he's

walking around with a bag over his head.

Actually, they don't think

he is hiding in a laundry basket.

I don't know who

it was on Match of the Day who sort of highlighted the corner where Kunha scored the second goal and just focused on Chris Wood.

And it did look very much like someone had just sat on the joystick and he just run.

He just ran, not looking at the ball, just ran sort of vaguely.

It was vaguely towards the ball, but it could have been in any direction.

Kunya's first goal was wonderful, actually.

You know, the chance had gone and then he recreated it, didn't he?

Look, Forest play Everton this Sunday and the PSR appeals derby, which is an absolutely massive game, isn't it?

Bernie won Brighton one, and Murich's own goal,

which he does get his studs on, Barney, so I suppose it is his own goal.

But he made a mistake last week.

And I know and

you just sort of think, oh, it's just desperately sad.

It's more forlorn when they've just got enough time to dive into the goal, but make no but

it still goes in.

Yeah, it's um it's a lot of goals that come from stuff like that these days.

I mean, sometimes if you just I I gave in to just watching those highlights on on Google rather than Match of the Day some time ago.

And there was one weekend where almost almost it was just a a scroll of bloopers at the back.

I mean, because so much of the game is played there these days, there's so much

football is spent watching goalies doing Croy turns and defenders doing that kind of matador stuff.

I mean,

not for me, really.

I know it's a phase, but I quite like to see football played not where you're like craning your head towards the goal 80 yards from where one team's trying to score.

I find it texturally just not my favourite kind of football.

But there's that thing about not passing back to the goalkeeper so that the ball will run into the net if he misses it, which seems a very basic thing that you do in Sunday league.

And I know maybe that's gone out the window, what with the need to build from the back.

But are you saying you've just got to get it launched, Barney?

Are you part of that?

Are you saying just passing

just to foot the other side of the post and that's just a corner?

I mean, it will happen.

People make mistakes all the time.

Even us.

Yeah, Craig Bellamy on Media Duty says it's not his mistake.

It's our mistake, which is very generous.

It's how we play he's scored goals for us doing what he does i mean he hasn't also has not scored goals but you take the point i have a feeling that isn't what craig bellamy probably said in the dressing room once he'd finished his media treaties let me finish the quote he says you might find it an issue but honestly don't we believe in this way of football it might be naive i have a three-year-old girl who still believes in rainbows and unicorns maybe that's with me but i genuinely believe we're going to stay up maybe i'm the one who believes in rainbows and unicorns, which is a lovely question.

Rainbow's not a thing.

I'm so sorry to hear that.

They're mythic at the mythical rainbows of Craig Bellamy's world.

Yeah,

I know.

What a shame.

But there you go.

Whoever is to blame for the goal, whether it's everyone's fault or specifically Moorish.

Well, I think it's your fault, though.

Maybe it's or my fault.

Whoever's fault it is, the four points that have been thrown away in their past two games

by all of us, by all of us, that would have put them right back in it.

You know, they'd have a fighting chance of staying up.

So, true.

Brentford Beecher United 2-0.

Shada's a lovely assist for Onyka was the highlight of this game.

Puts Brentford seven points clear of the bottom, three in 14th place, so that they're probably safe.

Full and 1-2-0 at West Ham.

Our thoughts with George Earthy, young player brought on for his first game

late on, three minutes on the pitch, collided with Alvarez.

David Moyes said after the game, it's a head injury.

He's awake and on his way to hospital.

So he's been doing ever so well in training.

We will look after him, he says.

West Ham lost to Leverkusen on Thursday.

Two late goals for them.

So

yeah, a tough few days for David Moyes.

We'll get on to Leverkusen in just a second.

Chelsea play Everton tonight in a game of interesting accounting as well.

Galdinio says, are the press being a touch harsh on Todd Bowley?

Haven't we all at some point gone out, got a little carried away, ended up having a bit more than we should, and woken up to find out that we've bought a hotel we already own for £76 million?

Yes, so Philippe,

this is the news that Chelsea sold a hotel on the Stamford Bridge site to another company they own to avoid breaching Premier League spending rules.

The club's accounts revealed they lost 248.5 million over the financial year ending June of last year, but these losses were reduced to 90.1 million out of taxation when the hotel sales and other adjustments were taken into consideration, the club stated, which seems the totally right way of doing things to me, Philippe, but I don't know what you think.

I think a few things about it.

I'm also quite amused to see that they made a profit through player sales, which I think will surprise quite a few people when they read that.

But this is the wonderful way amortization works and so they made profit on players yeah

yeah the sale of the hotel i have to say i think it's um

i think i would need the vow to see if it's on site or not

um i'm pretty sure that if you play by the letter of the law and the regulations it's absolutely fine and the goal is valid but should it stand i think it's open for debate

producer joel asking look can you keep selling the stadium to a new company just every year what can they sell now?

Suggs, Tim Lovejoy, pensioners?

What can they keep selling?

They need to buy 24 new hotels at a massively over-inflated price in order to restock their hotel squad.

That should come for them.

From Brighton.

They need to take down 24 hotels that are on the waterfront in Brighton and rebuild them in southwest London.

I'll tell you one thing they can't sell, Max, is the pitch, because they don't own it, do they?

The accounts also showed that Chelsea spent 75 million on agents' fees, fees, which, as Duncan Alexander pointed out on Twitter, is the same as the budget for Terminator 2.

That's magnificent.

Everton, there's no time for this, Philippe, but 777, Everton, just a minute.

30 seconds.

Today was the day that 777 was supposed to provide the money to pay back the £158 million loan that MSP had put to Everton Football Club.

They've asked for a period of grace.

They've got other

important important dates coming.

They're supposed to pay the second tranche of the payment for Stard RWH for the club and for the stadium.

So it's basically make or break time for 777 Partners and Everton FC.

But we'll get back to that.

This very complicated matter at a later stage, I think, Max.

Labour Cousin won the league.

Art is on the pod on Wednesday, but they did it.

Tarek Panda writing, great week to highlight why Football Pyramid matters.

Atalanta showing up at Anfield and Troutsing Liverpool.

Bill Bow winning a major trophy for the first time in 40 years.

Labour Cousin winning the Bundesliga with a a stunning unbeaten season.

Huge celebrations.

None of them invited to the Super League.

Well done to Stockport and Wrexham have been promoted from League Two.

EFL pod next Tuesday

as the top three in the championship keep refusing to win as well.

Ross County beat Rangers 3-2, leaving Rangers four points behind.

Celtic with a game in hand in Fitbar Corner.

A tiny Fitbar corner there.

Well done to Manchester United and Spurs women through to the FA Cup final.

Poet, Poem fan, Emma Hayes losing in the semifinal to Manchester United.

Go to the Women's Football Weekly pod, wherever you get your podcasts out tomorrow.

And that'll do for today's podcast.

Thank you so much, Barry.

Thank you, Michael.

Thank you, Philippe.

Thank you.

Thanks, Barney.

Cheers, everyone.

Football Weekly is produced by Joel Grove.

Our executive producer is Danielle Stevens.

And just finally,

Neil says, have you checked in on Jordan this afternoon?

Is he okay?

Andrew, can you sub Jordan Jarrett Bryan in for this one, please?

Autumn, spare a thought for Jordan's DMs.

Dom, Jordan, Jarrett Bryan, etc., etc.

Jonathan, JJB, out of hot hot takes question mark.

Jamie says a voice recording from Jordan Jarrett Bryan would warm the cockles of my heart.

We will leave you with his thoughts on Aston Villa's excellent victory at the Emirates.

Oh, God,

Philip here now.

Is there a shittier start to the week

of all the teams as well?

All the teams, Aston Villa.

Oh, man.

First of all, I'll start off by saying that

the best team more than one

and the biggest compliment I can pay Aston Villa

is that

it could have been three or four.

That game had

vibes of Brighton at home last year.

It wasn't quite as bad but wasn't far off that particular defeat.

It leaves Arston a massive problem now.

They had it in their hands and they've now handed it to the one team you don't want to hand it to.

But the second half was really weird.

It wasn't just that it was a poor performance, it was a performance that looked like a team.

And I know players don't like this being attributed to them.

It looked like a team that didn't care, didn't understand that there's a Premier League title here to be won.

They looked flat.

It was just a really weird second half

game.

And now we go into the game against

Bayern Munich.

And that game now is our season.

That game is our season, because I think if we don't win against Bayern Munich, I think we can.

If we don't win against Bayern Munich, I don't really have any faith that we'll go on to

beat, I think it's Wolves in our next Premier League game.

So Arsenal have to stop sulking, they have to step up, and they have to really, really now make it

at least push City all the way.

At least make sure that if if city do slip up our stock can capitalize but yeah

i've got a come off twitter and instagram now for the next week who's flipping aston villa fans on my neck

have a good day all

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