Arsenal pip Porto, plus a night at the Belgrade derby – Football Weekly

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Hello and welcome to the Guardian Football Weekly.

Arsenal make it through to the quarterfinals of the Champions League for the first time in 14 years.

It took David Rayer to save twice in the penalty shootout after the gunners matched Porto's 1-0 score from the first leg.

A rare piece of brilliance from Martin Herdegaard and a red offensive lapse from an otherwise brilliantly organised Porto.

Pepe is 41.

He was brilliant.

Barca also make it through.

3-1 over Napoli.

Makes it sound straightforward.

But that wasn't the case after racing into a 2-0 lead.

The Italians got one back, could have had a penalty, missed a huge chance at 2-1, but Barca also looked good with teenagers Lamin Yamal and Paul Kabasi.

Seriously impressive.

Then there's the race for 10th place in the Premier League as Chelsea beat Newcastle on Monday night.

Crystal Palace and West Ham are accused of acting like King Canute over the EFL payments.

I don't remember him disregarding the pyramid.

Lots of you have been in touch about how good Lincoln City are for some unknown reason.

Some of you really have done fridge audits after Monday.

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

On the panel today, Nikki Bandini, welcome.

Money, hello, Johnny Lou.

Hi,

and hello, Nick Ames.

Hello, Max Ruston.

So there we are.

Arsenal through, 4-2 on penalties.

I mean, it felt so tense, Nick.

And I am 10,000 miles away from the Emirates.

You were there.

How was it?

Yeah, that was a proper crackling knife-edge Champions League atmosphere.

It was almost everything you want in...

in a knockout tie.

Like, you know, the team that everyone favours, plays their beautiful football against the snarling opposition that has something to hold on to.

And I thought, like, I don't know,

as Barney was saying the same to me during extra time, you felt like you'd been watching the game forever, watching the same things happening time and time again for about 120 minutes.

But I also found it absolutely fascinating.

I thought it was a really good tie.

Ortetta, at the end of it, who obviously is never, never shy to betray happiness at a victory, he absolutely bounded into the press conference.

You could not wipe that smile off his face.

He was absolutely full of beans.

You could see that he was, you know, it clearly meant a lot to have cleared the hurdle that he cleared.

But yeah, those pens,

there was a lot of discussion going on in the press box before they were taken about whether Arsenal have the minerals to come through it,

whether they would bottle it, etc.

And I've got to say,

they really handled that pressure brilliantly.

I thought the fans did their job waving the scarves behind the goal at the Porto players and making a lot of racket.

And Arsenal just kept their composure superbly.

The penalties were pretty flawless.

The Porto Keeper, on the other hand, was a bit of a hologram, I thought, on those spot cases.

He just sort of stood there and didn't really do much.

But you've got to say,

it was quite an impressively seen-out win.

When you zoom out and look at the Arsenal performance, which I'm sure we will do over the two legs, it wasn't particularly impressive.

And I think you could probably make an argument that if Porto take their penalties better, Arsenal take those worse.

We're talking now about Sergio Consteisao doing a job on Nickel Arteta, and Arteta's European inexperience being

shown up and unable to win a European knockout tie, losing another one at home, you know, the narratives that have been stacking up beforehand.

So, you know, football is a sport where one kick, a couple of kicks can completely change the way we talk about games, ties, people, everything.

So, let's not go overboard.

But it was a very encouraging night and moment for Arsenal.

I think we can say now that whatever happens this season, it's been a successful one for them personally, because they've, you know, jumped a hurdle that they hadn't done since 2010.

They will be at the last knockings of the title race into April.

That is pretty certain.

However, that pans out in three ways.

And, you know, it's a year of progress.

And I think last night's result did show that.

But yeah,

in response to your original question, so I've lumped in various themes there.

Which was about half an hour ago, but that's fine.

The atmosphere was very good, Max.

Yeah.

No, it felt, and actually, there is talk, isn't it, you know, that the Emirates has had a bit of a bashing, but it feels like it is building now to be a bit of a cauldron.

As a neutral, Nikki, I loved the tension.

As an Arsenal fan, how was that?

Yeah, less fun.

Less fun towards the end.

Although

in the end, very satisfying.

And talking about sort of even penalty shootouts, there was something in

the Martin Odegaard reaction to the scoring the first penalty and the sort of grabbing David Array and giving him a shake and basically...

But sort of...

we're still up for this mindset rather than the sort of fearful thing you see teams going to penalty shootouts with.

And I know that's sort of easy to put on everything with hindsight, right?

But I always think about, you you know, easy example is Italy, Spain and the Euros, where Giorgio Collini is giving out bear hugs beforehand.

There is a certain sort of way you can carry yourself going into a penalty shootout that is different that I think transmits something.

And I think it was something that helped a little bit in this shootout was seeing the first penalty taken so confidently and then

the response to that.

I thought it was interesting as well.

I wasn't unfortunately there.

I was multi-screening with the Napoli game, but Nick can probably speak to this more than I can.

It sounded loud in that shootout as well.

Every time Porto player was going up, it sounded like it was a really like crowd are going to get on top and try to make it harder for them as well.

So

I thought that was interesting to observe.

But no, it was an incredibly tense night.

I do think inevitably we are an English language podcast with a massively English language audience.

But I think that the thing about Arsenal not looking impressive, Porto are very good at making you not look impressive.

Porto did a very similar job unsuccessfully against Inter last season at this stage.

Sergio Consewa is a good coach and I think that one of the things that struck me in both of these ties, I know everyone's going to zoom in on the

acts of play acting or whatever things that got their goat, but I think they managed to make time pass, wasted time, without just that.

Like while the ball is in play, you would have 10 minutes disappear and you'd think, what happened in those 10 minutes?

Nothing.

And that's a testament to what Porto were doing, keeping Arsenal at arm's length and just not letting them have those opportunities.

yeah and actually you're you're you're right aren't you johnny i i wondered arsenal felt flat a bit in this game but that is because porto were brilliant i thought and they actually they played more than i was expecting them to and in pepe they have this guy who's 41 it's sort of mad they carried out over the like the 210 minutes or whatever it was they they carried out their game plan almost perfectly.

You know, there is basically one little slip.

that the right back basically doesn't doesn't cover Trossodes Ron.

And that's it.

That's literally the only thing they do.

Oh, and

they didn't take their penalties.

And that's it, they're out.

And I guess that's the when you were a club of sort of that level, that is, those are the margins that kill you.

But yeah, they were quite threatening on the counter, obviously great in the first leg.

Just really, really spatially, tactically disciplined.

Like, hardly anybody was left one-on-one.

There's always, you know, there was always a a midfielder or there was a centre-half coming into cover.

And then, obviously, yeah, you have you have Pepe, who's 41.

And, you know, we're going to talk about like a 17-year-old centre back later for Barcelona.

But this is, you know, a guy who's, I don't know, he's so old that he basically finds the Emirates a bit loud.

He feels a little bit...

He is old enough

to think that the TFOs and the Ultras are a bit much now.

He kind of preferred it in the older days.

I mean,

I've researched this during the World Cup, actually.

Pepe made his debut in the same season that Mark Hughes retired.

There is overlap in the careers of Mark Hughes and Pepe.

And I find that incredible.

And I think Conte Sauer is a great man.

Based on

what he's done in the Champions League this season, I have a lot of time for him.

And, you know, it's unfortunate for them, but they've come up against a better Award Resource side.

And I guess I think they've come up against the atmosphere as well.

I just want to make one point about penalties, right?

There is this kind kind of, I think there's a sort of false opposition between people say, Oh, penalties are lottery, it's all emotions, and you know, whatever.

And people say, No, it's a repeatable skill, it's totally controllable.

And I think it's actually neither, it's a it is a repeatable skill, obviously, but it's actually a controllable emotional

moment.

And the way that Arsenal controlled, you know, the way that Nikki was talking about how they sort of got themselves up for it, and Porto have lost their last seven penalty shootouts, now eight in a row.

I think that that shows that it's one of those things that you can control, but it's not something that is just a repeatable skill.

You have to harness the emotions and the psychology of it as well.

I think David Rayer dived the same way for every penalty.

So I think at some point, does that become like a double bluff?

The next portal player is thinking, well, he can't dive that way again.

So I'll put it there.

I mean, the first save was brilliant.

Bit of fortune that it bounced off his legs and went out.

Just on Pepe,

when he was born, number one was Too Shy by Kajagugu, which is such a relief for me that it's so old, I'm not really sure if I know the song.

Whereas i normally i normally don't know the song because it's so recent and we'll get to the barcelona kids in a minute i wonder nick with with arsenal

they've been so good in the premier league right in the last what they've won eight in a row and okay they weren't amazing against brentford but i just wonder if there is just a difference between

knowing that if you don't deliver you are out in this compared to you're playing in the Premier League.

Okay, their fixture list has been quite friendly in these incredible wins.

And we've talked a lot about have they made these teams look bad or was it just a nice run of games but they just didn't look the same did they in this game i still think that's about the opponent and i do think um the other thing more generally about uh the opponent is not even specific to porto i think there's still

somehow

and this shouldn't be for someone like michela tetra i'm sure that there isn't for lots of those players but but certainly in the way things are talked about in england i i think um there's still some naivety about oh it's good in the premier league means you can just go into europe and be good it's it's different football played in Europe, but it is different leagues have different styles.

And I think you can go back to one of the

great teams that I grew up watching.

Not that I was a fan at the time, but Manchester United under Sir Alex Ferguson, how long it took him to get it right in Europe.

But it's not straightforward to go, oh, we're doing well even in the richest and therefore

inverted commas best league.

It doesn't mean you have to just go and play teams from other countries and assume they're going to be inferior.

It doesn't work like that.

It's a different kind of football.

And I do think there's adjustments to that that people don't always acknowledge.

I think on the night there was some individual performance who thought, yes, maybe not at the level we've seen recently.

I didn't think it was Saka's best night, although he took his penalty well when he needed to.

There was a viral thing that

went round after Brighton against Roma because there were some English pundits talking about, and I'm afraid I don't know them, they're on football daily talking about

if Brighton were in Serie A, they'd win the league.

And everyone, of course, who follows Italian football is enjoying that because they got thumped by Roma, who are nowhere near near winning the league in in Serie A.

And I think that this sort of idea of oh it's it's Porter who by the way beat Benfica what 5-0 the other day the idea that they should have been playing at the same level as Sheffield United are you thumping

six past is is ridiculous

and I think

the the goal Arsenal scored by the way which we haven't really talked about was flipping brilliant.

They had to score a brilliant goal.

Absolutely.

It was amazing.

His feet, I think Barney wrote it up perfectly.

His feet were insane over Odegaards, in that moment.

Yeah,

incredible pass.

Like, it was the only window it could go through.

Trossard

took the shot on perfectly.

I think that's actually an underrated finish by Trossard as well.

I think when you look at it, I think that's not an easy finish at all.

So you do have to be brilliant in the Champions League.

You do have to play at those levels.

And maybe not,

again, not for a second suggesting that Mikhail Artetore's players are pundits sitting around saying, oh, Brighton would win Serie A.

But I think that perhaps it's still an adjustment to play against the very best in Europe from some teams you get to play in the Premier League.

There was a good

Josh wrote on that Erdoga assist, quoting Rio Ferdinand, saying, You can't give a locksmith like that the keys.

He says, The whole point of a locksmith is they don't require the keys.

Well, you can't give him the keys, Max, or he'll just print several more copies and give them out to everyone.

Very good point.

I was just about to

back up the point that, yeah, Porto do have some really good players, and I think it's quite easy to forget that when we're sort of talking about shithousing and dark arts and stuff like that, some of which was there, but I don't think Arsenal, by the way, were blameless on some of their fouls either, which

I think is easily forgotten.

I thought the other Pepe for Porto,

the number 11, was

Pepe.

Oh,

really?

Yeah, there is an accent.

Yeah, there's an accent on the E.

Okay,

So I was impressed with Pepe, but even more with Pepe, or at least equally

with Pepe.

I thought he was an excellent ball carrier.

He sliced through that midfield two or three times, and then the final ball was sometimes off.

And the left back, Wendor, I thought after Saka burned him up the first time in the game, absolutely had his number in a way that not many people have.

So, yeah, you know, you can go through individuals and say, you know,

these teams and Porto are a team that produce players time after time after time, who we'll probably end up seeing in in the premier league or la league quite soon or wherever um we can't write them off or disparage them did you know that there were two there are two aldies

there are two aldies yeah there are two aldis there's is that is that aldi and and aldi well yeah exactly it's like it's like there's two pepes on the pitch right there's there's there's there's two aldies aldi nord and aldi sue there's two brothers and they had a massive falling out about like a few like a couple of decades ago so and they they divided are we talking about the supermarket yeah the supermarket and they they divided up

i wasn't sure what we were doing they divided up the world between them so the in the uk we get aldi sued that's the uh it's the dark dark blue logo and and um and and then but there's an aldi nord and other countries get the aldi nord

and they just start they just started divvying up do they sell different products uh i mean yeah they're basically different supermarkets but they're both called aldi and they both have you know have the same have the same logo but in slightly different colours anyway that that's just what those were the two pepes made me think of yeah no no and you were right to bring it up um what

what do you think johnny of of uh of arsenal's chances then in the champions a lot of people saying oh they're the one team that could give this man city a go over two legs and i'm sure they could but i wonder if again we're in that sort of premier league hubris situation right you know whoever they get now they will come up almost certainly against another if not gnarled like experienced champions league team yeah i mean you said it was 14 years since they they've made the quarter final i'd say it's probably 16 or 17 at least until since they actually felt like they could win it.

Since they were genuinely one of the best teams in Europe.

I mean, 14 years ago, they came up against that Barcelona side.

It was the messy night when he scored four.

And I think even though they made that stage,

you wouldn't say that they were among the European elite and they are now.

But

it's one of those where, you know, you feel like they could beat City in the same way that Spurs turned over City in 2019, but could very easily lose to an Inter, say, or

a Burushi Dortmund.

It's one of those because of what Nikki was saying about that inexperience of this level of European football.

We're talking about a performance at home against Porto in front of an incredibly loud and passionate crowd.

But in order to win this competition, you need to, you know, you can't just blow teams away in the first 15 minutes at home.

You need to go into hostile environments,

atmospheres that are against you, and put in bigger way performances.

And that's, I think, what we haven't yet seen.

They did pretty well in Seville.

I wasn't in Seville, but I mean, I can't speak to the atmosphere there, but

they need to go into an elite.

Basically, they should do what United did in Turin in 99.

Do they have a performance like that in them?

And we don't know.

We don't know that yet.

Consequent Sao claimed that Arteta insulted his family after the final whistle.

What Arteta said towards the bench in Spanish, he insulted my family.

He said in the news conference, Arsenal Club sources have said that Arteta denies the accusations.

No comment, thank you very much, is what Arteta says.

I think John Cross from the Mirror was saying Consell has a bit of form for saying after games, he insulted my family.

It's a kind of go-to.

You know,

he said your mum a hundred times, which, you know, if Arteta did that in many ways, sort of begrudging respect to yell your mum at another grown man.

You were nodding, Nick.

You've seen that sort of history before.

Yeah, he's, I

think, just from the very,

it was very late at night by this point, but a few of us were looking this stuff up after the game.

And I think there's some previous with Toucor and with Guardiola as well.

Um, and I mean,

there'd been a sort of simmering dislike between these two managers, even

around my first leg, actually, where Arteta expressed his distaste for how Porto had gone about it.

And Conseil Sal was saying, Oh, yeah, they just came here to play nice football, blah, blah, blah.

And you sort of got the feeling from the start that they didn't like each other that much.

So I guess Arteta may well have had some feedback from Pep, shall we say, on Conce Sao's modus operando.

But yeah, it was, I mean,

I think, from what we know, I think it was Conseil Sal trying to deflect slightly, which goes back to my point, though, from earlier that a couple of penalties are different.

And we're talking about him being a hero and masterclass, and which big, which big job is he off to next, and that kind of thing.

But instead, we're in the realm of your mum slurs.

We are.

Well, you know, we're only going to get sillier, but lots of people talking about Leandro Troslov looking quite a lot like Clement Turpin.

David said, Should pressure be put on UAFA to investigate the fact that Leandro Trossov was both playing in and refereeing the last 16 tie.

It's a great photo of the two of them just looking at each other.

And it is quite striking how much they look alike.

th

90 said did uh did declan rice have his own munich moment yes there is a video doing the rounds of uh declan rice bending over

i mean

i haven't looked at it too many times johnny

he could it could be a grass stain he could have shot himself that's i mean that's they are the two possibilities i guess yes uh i mean do you want me to analyze this or you know should we should we should we get the should we get the laser the electron electric pen out and start drawing you know circles and arrows on it like they do on Monday night football?

Yes.

I guess the two possibilities here are Declan Rice shat himself and Declan Rice did not shut himself.

And

without knowing,

it's hard to say which it was.

Sure.

Well, lots of people did ask us, so we did have to reference it.

I think you answered it absolutely perfectly.

And that'll do for part one.

Part two, we'll begin with Barcelona's win over Napoli.

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Barry's here too.

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Coach, the energy out there felt different.

What changed for the team today?

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Welcome to part two of the Guardian Football Weekly.

So Barca 3, Napoli 1, Barca 2, 4-2 on aggregate.

Like I said in the intro Nikki, it makes it look quite straightforward.

And Barca might have been the better side.

And they raced into that lead, but Napoli really pushed them into this game.

And this was pretty feisty as well, wasn't it?

Yeah, but it's this classic multi-screen chat here because I had the big screen on the Barcelona game to start the night, and then Barcelona went tuning up, and you thought, all right, time to put Arsenal on the big screen.

Then immediately Napoli scored back.

So there was a lot of back and forth on I've got to say, that's very professional of you, Nikki.

I know, you know, you know, Deseriat is that's your heartland, that's your bread and butter.

But when your team, I would have forgiven you for putting Arsenal on the big TV.

The big screen, yeah.

No, we started with Napoli on the big screen.

Having just sort of given the big

about the big talk about underestimating European teams, I did come away from this game thinking, God, Barcelona, yes, they're brilliant going forward, but they're awful at the back.

They are really, really bad at the back.

So it was

a wide open game.

I mean, the first goal that Barcelona scored for me in Lopez was like, Napoli's defending was like something out of one of those slapstick silent movies where you've got a defender's going, woo,

running with their legs up, feeling one direction, but certainly nowhere near the football.

And it felt ridiculously easy.

Two minutes later, Cancello makes it 2-0 and you just thought, well, this should be done.

But it wasn't because

actually

every time Napoli did go forward, it seemed like Barcelona were there for their taking.

They were playing really high and tight on Victor Ossiman, which I think could and probably should have been a recipe for disaster.

Napoli were not getting the final ball right most of the time.

And there's a whole conversation to have with Napoli about self-inflicted harms, which frankly I could do a whole show on because it goes back to everything that happened with luciano spoletti and and ale de la rentis the owner and the fact that that relationship broke down the fact that you had your first title win in 33 years and you managed to to sabotage it and get to the point where this season you've gone through three different managers already but among the self-inflicted harms that felt particularly poignant on this night pyotr zielinski who is one of the best passers on this team is not in the Champions League squad because his contract's running down and he wouldn't sign a new one.

So they just decided not to put him in the squad for the knockouts, even though he's been really effective in the league.

This is, of course, before the last managerial change.

I think throughout this game, I just sat there thinking if you had Jelinski on the pitch to play some through balls for Ossimin, you'd probably have had a heap of goals.

But Barcelona were brilliant at times going forward.

I mean, Yamin Lamal is something else.

Absolutely ridiculous 16-year-old talent.

Robert Lewandowski is Robert Lewandowski, and I think they can score goals against anyone.

I think they were definitely the better team here, although I do think that at 2-1,

Napoli should have had a penalty for Kubasi's step on Ossiman's toe.

I felt like the commentary in England at least was very uncharitable to Ossiman saying, oh, he's making a fuss.

Well, he was making a fuss because he had

his toe trot on in a penalty area, and it

should have been a penalty.

There was also a header for

Lindstrom at 2-1, which...

Massive chance.

It's just before Levin Dolsky scores, right, isn't it?

So there was real chances for Napoli, but I do think Barcelona in this game and across both legs were the better team and deserved to go through.

Yeah, and Christensen maybe could have got sent off as well.

That was quite a

pivotal moment.

I mean, this for Barcelona is because Barcelona, Johnny, are in such a financial mess, getting through this, which I think gets you, I don't know, 10 million euros or something, is actually really significant, which sort of sounds ridiculous given how much money swirls about the game.

Yeah, I mean, the story is coming out of Spain this morning that Barcelona have already leveraged their quarterfinal place.

They're selling it off to a private investor.

And Silverlake, I've got to purchase a 30% stake in their quarterfinal,

which, you know, which is definitely going to ease their, you know, some of their shorter terms.

Like a charity game, like a large man will come on who just, you know, just play 30 minutes in the second half.

They'll just let him have a shot.

It's all on paper these days, Matt.

It's all sort of locked away in a filing cabinet.

You know, that's how it works these days.

Yeah, I mean,

in terms of how, like the rest of this season you know obviously xavi has said he's leaving and and

it's too late for them to obviously save you know the la liga title but there is there is a kind of liberation to him it's it's almost like there's a there's a huge weight off his shoulders i i think you can you can kind of see that in the way barstone are playing and

what what his job at now is is kind of leaving a legacy you know you see the likes of you know pokebasi in um in defense who's you know 17 making his debut in a champions league quarter final from the start in the center of defense you know know guys like yamal and you know the sergey roberto the youngest 32-year-old la marcia graduate in the in in in the squad uh he's obviously you know they've been partly forced into it by finances but this is this is

Xavi I think trying to leave something that the next guy can build on and you know I don't think they are

solid enough defensively to to win the title um but i you know i do think they can go on a run in it because just because of the freedom and

the options and the tools they have going forward, they can cause a lot of teams a lot of damage.

And I don't, I'd maybe like a few months ago, you wouldn't mind drawing Barcelona because they were a bit of a shambles.

But I think the way things are just sort of coming together for them now, I think a lot of teams will be thinking, I'm not sure I want them anymore.

Yeah.

I mean, obviously when you get to this stage, most teams would go, oh.

They are at least quite good at something.

I guess the fact, Nick, that Barcelona are not playing at the New Camp is quite big.

We talked about how big the Emirates Emirates has been for them, uh, for Arsenal.

Like, not having the new camp is a big deal, I think, for Barca.

Yeah, I've never,

never actually been to, well, I've been outside the Mondiet Stadium, but never been to a game there.

But it always seems a bit more distant, doesn't it?

The

crowd seems further back, maybe, and just a little bit more sort of echoey.

And I guess, yeah, it's it's a big psychological realignment, I guess, for especially players who

know the new camp well and know the atmosphere well to sort of recalibrate and treat it as their home and build up the same kind of atmosphere and mystique, if you like, that the new camp has.

So yeah, fair play to them for harnessing whatever there is in Monduik and putting in

what looked from what I saw and like a really intense performance last night.

Whether better opponents than Napoli or more practiced ones can sort of turn that on its head and pick them off

remains to be seen.

But yeah, they're making a pretty good fist of it.

And I'd quite like to visit Montjuri for a match while

they're playing there, to be honest.

I don't actually know if this one...

This is crazy because for a game like this, Camp New would always be sold out.

I don't know if they even sold out, Monjo, for this.

I know.

Yeah, they couldn't feel the ground.

They couldn't fill it.

It has been really, really unpopular.

Just to drag back to boring money conversations, Max, because you mentioned about the prize money for going through.

For Napoli in this game, if they won, it was going to mean moving ahead of Juventus in the spots for the Club World Cup next year.

So I really

Darentis was offering some pretty huge bonuses to the players.

They didn't make it, so Juventus get that spot.

And that's worth 50 million euros, apparently, being in the Club World Cup next year.

So Juventus, the big winners from Napoli going out.

Nick Stole, a colleague of mine at Stan, who's out in Spain, said, like, it's 250 euros for a ticket.

When the average salary in Barcelona is around 700 euros a week, tourists used to come and pay whatever to see Messi and the rest, and they don't do that now.

They gave members an option of not renewing the season ticket this season, but still getting to keep their seats at the Camp News.

So I think a lot of people have just stopped having a gap year.

Interestingly, also the stadium is up a big hill, which Andy Brussels said to me was, you know, that's a bit of a hike, isn't it?

The band The Weekend filled it last summer, and their support acts were

Kay Tranada and Mike Dean.

And I was very excited to hear that Mike Dean was supporting The Weekend.

Oh, The Weekend is one man, apparently.

There we go.

The weekend is a person.

It's a person.

There we go.

Keep it.

Keep it in.

Keep it in.

I don't care.

You know, if it was top loader, that's a band.

Heard of them.

If it was cast, you know, I understand it.

Anyway, good luck to the weekend

in all his endeavors.

I sound like Pepe.

What's this infernal racket?

The point I was trying to make is that Mike Dean was supporting the weekend, but, you know, sadly, I looked it up.

It's a 59-year-old 59-year-old DJ from San Francisco or something.

It's not actually Mike Dean.

Jim says, how mad would it have been if UEFA had turned the Champions League into choose your own adventure?

This is Miguel Delaney writing The Independent.

The newly expanded Champions League, right?

So they're trying to work out how to do the draw.

It's going to have like a tennis-style seeding system for the knockout stages.

They did have an idea where if you'd come top of that league, right, so the top eight go through and then the next 16 go into a knockout.

If you'd come in the top eight, if you come first, you'd get first pick of who to play.

You'd pick your opponent, which, like, I mean, is

it's simultaneously terrible, but utterly amazing.

Oh, I sort of love it.

It's, it's horrendous.

I could imagine exactly the team that gets picked, how they're going to come into that game with that mindset.

I mean, there's the potential for soap opera drama is brilliant.

It's the draw equivalent of sort of putting up on the dressing room wall someone completely slagging you off for motivation, isn't it?

Like, if you're a younger dog, this is basically what happened.

They tried it in Super League, in rugby league,

where

the playoff, the team at the top of the table got to choose their opponents for the knockout rounds.

And

I think after a while,

the bigger clubs, the successful clubs, they're like, can you stop doing this?

Because it's just firing them up.

And the fifth place club or whatever would

come out fired up.

It's basically like that bit in a reality show where you have to make your nominations publicly.

You have to publicly evict someone and go and they go i'm so i'm so sorry i'm so sorry you know i just had to choose someone and and i'm choosing you and yeah you know i i think it's fun but i think it it it injects a little bit more of this kind of fake artificial sort of reality tv nonsense into into sport and um yeah i'm i'm i'm not in favor but you know it drives content so it probably will happen at some point

No, yeah, I agree with you.

I think it's absolutely terrible.

But at the same time, you know, the idea of going Arsenal and Mikel Ateta says, I'm picking Porto because Conseil Sal's mum's an idiot.

You know, then you're suddenly like, okay, now

this is exciting.

Yeah, I can't help the sort of bloodlust in me going, yeah, or you're like a reality show where they go.

PSV, I think you're a wonderful, you've been a great housemate.

I really enjoyed you in the league stages.

I have to pick someone.

So I've gone with you, PSV.

I'm sorry.

Anyway, that isn't going to happen.

They also modeled that if they did the draw manually, it would take four hours, which seems to be actually less time than it takes now.

But anyway, it's going to be done.

It's going to be done automatically um back to italy reports i've been on that mauricio sorry has resigned at lazio um is that a surprise not a surprise not a huge surprise i think perhaps timing is obviously interesting because there's a bunch of the season left having said that lazio have been losing a lot of games they're no longer in a very well positioned for the european hunt uh his relationship with claudiolotito has hit the owner has clearly been deteriorating for a while um ever since the the transfer window he's been pretty open in saying that he wasn't happy with with decisions that were made.

He hasn't been given

hi pod fans of America.

Max here.

Barry's here too.

Hello.

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coach the energy out there felt different what changed for the team today it was the new game day scratchers from the california lottery play is everything those games sent the team's energy through the roof 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 play the new los angeles chargers San Francisco 49ers, and Los Angeles Rams Scratchers from the California Lottery.

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And the players that he wanted,

I think the Champions League was the one thing that he was still enjoying.

And you know, with Marizio Sari, he doesn't...

hide his emotions, does he?

Right?

He wears them on his sleeve.

He lets you know exactly what he's thinking and he he often

is thinking along quite grumpy lines.

but he he's been very clear that he wasn't having um having a uh an enjoyable time i think the the the two ties the two games against by munich clearly got him um motivated and enjoyed them but i think it was certainly i was expecting that their relationship wasn't going to last past the end of this season the fact that he's made the the the choice to walk now i wonder if it's almost giving himself room to decide if this is going to be an until the end of the season break or a longer break it's if you take the break now then you can give yourself a couple of months to decide if you want another job next season or if you're looking at a sabbatical.

All right, that'll do for part two.

Part three, we'll begin with Monday Night Football, Chelsea's 3-2 win over Newcastle.

Welcome to part three of the Guardian Football Weekly.

So Chelsea beat Newcastle 3-2 in the race for 10th place, or probably the Conference League, maybe the Europa League.

Cole Palmer again, very impressive Johnny.

I think that he's probably the story of this game.

Yeah, I mean, I think that the story has been quite a familiar one for Chelsea this season.

Like, you know, incredible moments of speed and promise, and, you know, Cole Palmer playing well, and Nicholas Jackson, you know, running through people and occasionally himself.

And then just moments when they play like absolute children.

And,

you know, this, this is.

Chelsea should not have been anywhere close to losing this game.

And yet somehow, you know,

it feels like they sneaked by when, in fact, you know, they were, I think, in control for large periods.

And

it's hard to try to find new things to say about Chelsea because they're just such a thoroughly immature team.

And Palmer is obviously, he's the guy who makes it work.

Gallagher, I think, had a good first half, not so good second half.

And

you know,

there's still a work in progress.

They are the most expensive, football's most expensive work in progress.

I was going to uh praise mikhailo mudrick please do um

because um he's he's he's kind of been i guess almost the epitome of what's been happening at chelsea the sort of brashness of of the whole thing that you know he he was nailed on to be the you know the signing that arrival arsenal really really wanted and then they sort of helicoptered in in at the last minute took him out bought him um possibly against his will maybe and it all started quite badly for him not so well um there's a a lot of pressure on him with a price tag of course but he i mean i mean i haven't seen him week in week out but is he coming good um you're more than happy to respond and say nah um but i thought his finish was good actually um very important time in the game you know you get that good goal you wrap it up i'd say he still had inverted commas work to do didn't he well he did he did but yeah he got around the keeper and slotted it in in, didn't he?

He had work to do.

Quick,

nimble feet in a finish.

He's got, I think, two in his last three.

He's got five or six goals this season.

And definitely a player who, if you can unlock,

will do something for you.

Like

half this Chelsea team.

But I just wonder if sort of him coming good would be a symbol of Chelsea and this Chelsea era kind of

blundering through and finding its feet at last.

I don't know.

I just thought he's in quite good form, relatively speaking.

So I thought I'd interject.

That's exactly what we're all here for.

You know,

greatly appreciated.

I said the interesting for these sides, Nikki, is like, do you want, and it's a conversation that happens every year, right?

You want to end the season strongly because it makes you feel good about going to next season.

Do you want to qualify for Europe because, you know, it is a possible trophy.

You'd imagine Newcastle could give the Europa League a really good run, Chelsea as well, even though Chelsea have, you know, won the Champions League before, so you feel a bit like, oh, can we be bothered?

Or do you want to have those spare weeks weeks that like Tottenham have this season, which we now sort of feel like might actually help them when they're going against Villa European football for next year?

Yeah, I think certainly looking at Tottenham, it's hard to shake off at Zenz at the moment, the freshness that you get from not playing in those competitions.

But having said that, Chelsea have, I think, the youngest average starting 11 of the whole Premier League.

And I think that those players will want to get into Europe to play European competitions.

I think they should have,

not only do they have a young squad, they they have a huge squad, Chelsea, of course.

And I think those players should want to get into European competition and have more opportunities to play, more opportunities to develop.

So I think certainly for Chelsea, that seems like an easy answer.

And I think for Newcastle as well, again, I know they were in the Champions League this season and they got that

brilliant or awful group, depending on how you want to view it, but certainly six big games against Bruscher Dortmund, Milan, and Paris Saint-Germain.

I think that having had that taste of it, to not be in Europe with everything that that they've spent and with how lavish that project is would seem disappointing.

I would have thought.

So I think they should both be very much motivated still to get into Europe.

I'd like to praise another footballer, if that's all right.

I would like to praise Isak, whose finish was, I thought, lovely.

And he's just got this effortless way of like gliding with the ball and with barely any backlift, just stroking it and making it look easy when it's really, really not.

I just thought that was a lovely finish.

And I think, obviously, he's had his ins and outs and injury problems but when he's in full flight there's there's not another striker that i quite enjoy watching as much i think in the league because you sort of feel he's he's capable of anything and i just thought that was a a very nice goal that kind of epitomized the way he operates.

I like Jacob Murphy's goal just because he kicked it so hard and Adam Sandler was there for some reason.

Rumours that Todd Bowley is hoping to move on 15 players this summer.

And you sort of think, Johnny, Chelsea can't be as mad this summer as they were last summer.

But I don't even know how they'd even begin to get rid of that music.

Yeah, I mean,

I think the best, obviously the best way, you know, the way that a genius like Todd Bowley would would try and shift 15 players this summer is to tell everybody, tell the whole of Europe through kind of well, well-placed sort of media stories that you're trying to move on 15 players.

And

that's really going to, you know, to

fuck the market up, basically.

They're not going to be prepared for this.

Yeah, I think this is just,

we talk about the

financial gymnastics that they're going through.

And obviously, last week, the financial results come out and the losses are bigger than usual, which probably means bigger than expected savings that need to be made to comply with FFP or PSR or whatever you want to call it.

But I think

what we don't really talk about so much is almost the kind of the human side of it.

These are young guys who who have been, for the most part, this squad is full of young, you know, really talented young players who have been uprooted from whatever life or whatever milieu they were in, moved to London, you know, staying in a hotel or some flat that's basically where everything's still in cellophane and whatever.

You don't know anybody.

And now, you know, because of, you know, some bloke with

a mullet

who decides to move you on.

You don't have to go somewhere else because some guy with a, you know, with a ballpoint pen has basically put a line through your name.

i you know i there are lots of things to object to with this chelsea project but i think that the way it just kind of it treats

like human talent as asset is i think the most offensive part of it for me um

you just want to see some of these players on the pitch playing getting support getting

you know getting settled you know learning how to learning you know or in many cases relearning the joy of football and it just doesn't happen at chelsea partly because of the you know the atmosphere and the currents around the the club, but partly because they are just treated like meat.

And this is something that the club has been doing for decades now:

buying up players like their houses, like investors buying up London property and flipping them or selling them on or sending them out on loan.

And I just think it really stinks, to be honest, because how much wasted talent, how much inefficiency is there?

So some guys can make the accounts look nice.

And actually, it's an interesting point you make.

And

we were looking at that Dejan Kulisewski Players Tribune article he did and the video he did.

And like the first thing I read was him saying, you know, that Chelsea game, actually, we may have lost, but we won at life.

And I wanted to end with, but we also lost 4-1 to Chelsea.

But actually,

but like the actual film is really interesting, and what he wrote is interesting.

And it does make you think about these players.

You know, he obviously they're all so talented, and they, you know, they're the absolute top.

And then he went to Juventus, and for the first time, he was people sort of saying, actually, you're no good.

You're hopeless.

And, you know, you're in and out of the team.

And like the sort of fortitude to get through that.

And obviously, all these elite people will reach their ceiling at some point, unless they're messy, right?

Like, like you have a ceiling, you're, you are, you know, every time you move up, it's harder.

But when you talk about those Chelsea players and sort of the fact that, you know, what Kulasevsky is saying, he's now at a place where, you know, he loves the manager.

Everyone loves everyone.

It's all great.

He's probably, that's what you have to say, right?

But it felt real.

And I suppose there are lots of, there are probably lots of Chelsea players, like you say, just sort of kicking about

sad hotel rooms, being really young and not really knowing what the right thing to do is.

And that's quite...

Well, you might not know the language.

You are incredibly rich.

And also, you'll get no sympathy because you're loaded.

But now you're surrounded by people who

don't know whether you can trust them.

You don't know whether

they're just trying to get

a cut of your income or whatever.

And you are...

19 years old and still trying to work out who you are.

Yeah, it's brutal.

The Premier League failed to secure an agreement for new financial settlement for English football.

This is from The Guardian's reporting.

The proposed deal would have passed down more than £900 million

down the pyramid, also imposed a new set of financial cost controls on the top flight.

At least 10 clubs are understood to have been in favor of making the offer, but not enough to clear the Premier League's rule at 14%.

The league was criticised by the chair of the Cross-Party Culture and Media Sport Committee, Caroline Dinage, who said that the stated commitment from the Premier League clubs to striking a deal with the rest of the pyramid looks like nothing more than an empty promise.

The Charlton minority owner, Charlie Medven, you may remember him and his red trousers from Sunderland Till I Die, accused two clubs of holding up the process, alleging West Ham and Crystal Palace were against a deal.

There are a few Premier clubs that are holding the industry back, are driving the rest of the industry mad.

for only thinking of their own short-term narrow self-interest, he told Talk Sport.

It's on record that Palace and West Ham are leaders of this King Canute style movement.

They need to grow up.

Guardian understands that Vice Chair of West Ham, Cameron Brady, has received an apology from Charlie Medven for those remarks.

West Ham and Palace have been approached for comment.

Paul says, Interesting to hear Nick's view on his recent trip to Belgrade.

I went in 2019 to see United play Partisan, Love the City.

Enjoyed his recent article.

What were you doing there, Nick?

Yeah, I went to the Belgrade Derby, which I know feels like a title of a groundhopper blog from 10 years ago, but

I did.

I was in the region doing

a few bits and pieces, some of which will be out nearer to the European Championship.

But tied it in with this Sabelgrey versus Partisan, which I think we all know, we've probably all seen and read a lot about the atmosphere and the fans and the chanting and the flares, and the fact that normally it's actually an absolutely terrible football match.

This time, not too much went on in the stadium, but it was quite an intense and interesting football match.

2-2 draw, woodwork hit four times, stuff like that.

So very, very enjoyable.

I mean,

the interesting thing about Serbia in general, this might be a longer conversation for another day, but for now,

it's a very important country in Europe at the moment because it kind of triangulates

triangulating between the European Union and Russia and looking in two different directions as it's being

pulled by Putin one way, possibly joining the EU another way.

Then public sentiment is drawing very much away from the European Union and very pro-Russian.

And then there's lots of issues around Kosovo as well and nationalist sentiment stirred up towards the situation there.

And a lot of this stuff anyway manifests itself inside football stadiums more than anywhere else.

So you see a lot of banners

inside grounds asking Serbia to invade Kosovo again basically and lots of banners like that in the city of Belgrade as well which is, you know, feeling like quite a tense and uncomfortable place at the moment.

The government is pretty, I mean,

very these days, authoritarian.

The recent election result that gave President Vucic another term has been,

is, is being contested.

There's a lot of uncertainty and tension there.

So I was broadly going to look at football as the kind of space and vector where a lot of these things are played out.

And yeah, very, very interesting.

A lot of the banners and flags and things like that that you see displayed inside the ground.

And yeah, I'll write more on that later.

I wrote a little piece about it, I think, a day or two ago.

But yeah, Serbia is quite an interesting and troubling place at the moment in Europe.

And obviously, they're playing England too in the European Championship in June.

I mean, their national team is always Mercurial, isn't it?

I think is the word to describe it.

it.

They're sort of very, very talented, but quite flaky.

But no, interesting trip, always, always a tracking stadium for American R, the Led Star player.

But there's so much non-football trouble and tension going on there at the moment.

And I think the direction that Serbia eventually turns in politically, because it's going to have to at some point, it's going to be quite important for the future of the continent, really.

And this all gets played out through football.

Johnny says, how good are Lincoln City?

Jim says, Lincoln are good, aren't they, Max.

Rich says, can we play Cambridge every week?

Craig says, what is a Cambridge United and is it biodegradable?

This is after Lincoln City beat Cambridge 6-0.

It is looking quite the Gary Monk.

I don't know what the opposite of a new manager bounce is.

I said new manager Thud or new manager splat.

But yeah, it was a very, it felt like Lincoln had about five more players than us.

And I don't think they did, but yes, it's looking pretty bleak.

And

we have a little four-point cushion above the relegation zone at the bottom of League One.

And I don't think that'll last for long.

Andrew notes that Dobbin the Mule was the pantomime horse from Renta Ghost, the kids' TV show from the 80s, right?

So I was correct about it.

On the subject of fridge audits, because someone asked

if we had anything in our fridge

that had, you know, we'd got longer ago than when Valerian Ishmael was appointed at Watford.

It was actually quite a long time.

It was like 92 days or something.

Tim says, I have a Kiwi fruit in my fridge that I bought when I first moved out of my parents' house in 2006.

I call it Cecil.

I don't recall why.

It's completely devoid of moisture, solid as a rock, and has been joined by a lemon and a banana.

I took it on holiday without my partner knowing.

The banana.

You can't.

Banana in the fridge.

Banana.

But like, I mean, you can't have had a banana since, you know, the mid-2000s.

Alex says, regarding the age of items in our fridges, I decided to do...

An audit and I can confirm that our fridge contained the following items that were definitely older than 304 days.

It was 304 days, apparently, for Ishmael.

Miso, sliced jalapenos, fish sauce, oyster sauce, horseradish, bulldog sauce, Thai red curry paste, chocolate sauce for ice cream, marmalade, chili oil, maple cream, sweet relish, cherries, Hondashi salted shrimp, pickle cucumber.

I'd also like it on record that my wife caught me mid-audit and asked, what the hell are you doing?

To which I responded, trying to answer a question for a football podcast I like.

I fear I may soon be relegated to Barry's Park Bench.

And finally, Rob Priestley Fenn writes a lovely email saying, hi, dear Max, Barry and all.

First time contact via email.

And I've been loving your dulcet tones ever since you made a guest appearance on the Cheese Room podcast, which is a Tottenham podcast I went on.

You've all provided me with a lot of laughs as well as comfort in hard times.

This last year saw my dad plunge and it really was remarkably quick through the depths of Alzheimer's until he passed in April.

The pods always helped me take my mind off things and provide some much-needed light relief.

I've always wanted to contribute, but I've never felt like I had the material that would really add value until now.

It did make me laugh when Baz mentioned Cranberry Sauce as a long-term inmate of the fridge.

I just knew that this time I could contribute, so behold, it must easily be from 2015-16, considering the best before is 2017.

Why do people like this stuff?

Why do we even buy it?

Keep up the good work.

Thank you to the team for various incredibly moving pods over the last few years.

And from Barry's moving at the same time jovial stint and the moon underwater pod, which was very good.

And Nikki's fascinating backstory, along with all the other incredible investigative specials you cover so well.

Cheers, Rob.

Thank you.

That's enough compliments for one pod, isn't it?

And that'll do for today.

Thank you, Nick.

Thank you.

Thanks, Nikki.

Thanks.

Thanks, Johnny.

Thanks.

Football Weekly is produced by Joel Grove.

Our executive producer is Daniel Stevens.

We'll be back tomorrow.

This is The Guardian.