Arsenal falter in Porto and Liverpool’s Luton scare – Football Weekly Extra

This is the Guardian.

Hello, and welcome to the Guardian Football Weekly.

A flat return for Arsenal in the knockout stages of the Champions League.

Galeno's curler in injury time gives Porto a slender lead while Arteta's men never really got going.

In many ways, Porto didn't let them.

Good to see 41-year-old Pepe still doing it at this level.

There is hope for all of us in the other game, Napoli and Barca, show why they're not quite the same teams they were last year, a one-all-draw in a game that neither dominated, but both could have won.

We did get a bit of elite striking from Robert Lewandowski and Victor Ossiman.

Liverpool overcome a stodgy first half and scored four to beat Luton to go four points clear at the top of the Premier League.

We'll look ahead to the Reds Caribou Cup final with Chelsea and the Premier League games as Big Sir Jim talks to the media for the first time.

Then everyone will laugh at me as Neil Harris buggers off from Cambridge United after five minutes.

All that plus your questions.

And that's today's Guardian Football Weekly.

on the panel today jonathan faduba welcome good morning max uh hello lars ivertson good morning guys and welcome barry glendenning thank you max tom says have arsenal used all their goals michael says has there ever been a bigger discrepancy between the quality of a winning goal and the quality of a game than we've just sat through uh yeah porto won arsenal nil uh galleno's injury time curler barry was the difference um it was a great goal after not a fascinating football match Yeah, that's about the size of it, really.

I think there was this presumption that Arsenal would win this game quite comfortably, and it turned out to be far from correct.

And now the presumption seems to be that they will win the second leg quite comfortably, and they may well do.

But if they are to win the second leg comfortably, they'll have to do something they didn't do in this leg, which is get a shot on target.

And that's quite surprising considering how clinical they've been in recent games.

But in Porto, they were facing far wilier, more street-wise opposition than Sheffield United or West Ham.

And they played really badly.

Porto didn't let them play their game.

And there was lots of niggly fouls by various Porto players.

They crowded midfield and

didn't offer Arsenal away through there.

And you would think then that that would leave room out in the flanks for Bacayo Saka and Martinelli, but they didn't.

Any time the ball came towards Martinelli, he was immediately sort of crowded off it by Jua Mario, who's very good at right back for Porto.

And

the manager's son, Francisco Conchau, was

you know, they would double up on him.

So, you know, lots of hard running by Porto's players who worked very hard, should have taken the lead in the first half

when

Wenderson Galeno, who scored the winner,

rifled one off the upright.

Well, sort of rifled off the upright and the angle of upright and post and then came straight back to him.

He had an empty goal to volley the ball into and somehow put it wide.

But he redeemed himself with just a wonderful finish.

But it was a sloppy goal for Arsenal to give away because Gabriel Martinelli tried to play this sort of Hollywood ball across the field to because Saka missed his target.

Ottavio won the ball or intercepted the pass and ended up with Galeno, and he scored this absolute worldie, which was completely out of character with what was otherwise a reasonably absorbing but quite dull game.

And Michel Arteta was interviewed afterwards, and he was quite clearly very, very angry with his players.

after the game um last mark bosnich who i was on tv with criticized david rayer quite a lot actually and as he said his starting position for that goal was terrible because if you watch it it sort of goes in the bottom it's not right in the top corner and sort of went further to say like he's cost arsenal quite a few times this season and it's interesting because that ramsdale rayer chat has quietened down quite a bit

Yeah, yeah, far be it from me to challenge the goalkeepers union in this regard.

Mr.

Bosnich knows more about this than I do.

i from a more layman's term in terms of that it it looked weird and and i think it's because the the shot isn't moving at the kind of speed you would expect a shot to have to move at to beat a goalkeeper from that range it's it's almost like a it's almost like a cross really in terms of the the the curve and the move but when you watch the sort of when you watch it back in slow motion it it's very hot it's quite high so he he can't really reach it but he would have almost had time to sort of shuffle across a little bit and and and change his positioning Of course, that's a hard thing to assess as the shot is coming in.

No,

it looked a little bit strange.

And

he did make some mistakes earlier in the season.

And

Ramsdale's not a flawless, but I do kind of still feel Arsenal may have caused themselves a bit of a headache by...

adding him to the mix without really upgrading that much on Ramsdale.

I mean, maybe I'm rating Ramsdale too highly now, but he never occurred, never struck me as a bad goalkeeper.

Just one that's maybe not amazing.

And that's kind of how I feel about Raya as well.

Jake says, can you name a body part that a Porto player hasn't fallen down holding during this game?

Charlie says, is there a risk that Porto have to play football in the second leg?

It's funny, Jonathan, because I was focusing on Napoli Barca.

I had the comms of Napoli Barca, but I'm watching this game.

I saw the Porto game plan, but it didn't feel as anti-football as that.

And I mean, obviously, I didn't hear the commentary in the UK, so I don't know how influenced people get by commentators.

Or if you thought Porto were playing sort of anti-football, kick arsenal stop the game at every single opportunity no i didn't think it was anti-football really to be honest um they weren't amazing i mean this isn't a vintage porto side by any means a lot of the players are sort of you know not not not the porto sides of old you know in the top top talents they've had there's one or two sort of star names potentially uh conste sal for example is one who uh on the wing has got a bright future and he he was quite good in spells but i didn't really think they intended to sort of break the game down or anything i think both sides i think i think arsenal are kind of of a quite a conservative team in many ways.

A lot of, well, they had zero shots on target and their main sort of attacks were corners.

They looked most threatening from set pieces.

Arsenal and had a couple of, you know, Havertz had one header that he maybe could have could have done better with

in the first half.

But I didn't really see much difference between the kind of approach in terms of how attacking either side was.

Arsenal looked to control the game in that sense, but not necessarily flying all out attacking.

I thought with Porto, they were

quite scrappy was the thing I thought about them.

It wasn't that they were maybe playing a negative style, but it was more when they sort of got into Arsenal's half, they just lacked a bit of nouse.

They had this,

they gave me this sort of like street baller vibes where imagine like, you know, like you're playing five aside and you've got the sort of technical five aside players who are sort of trying to, I don't know, hit the ball off the in a cage or whatever, trying to hit the ball off the wall and go around you and stuff like that.

And, you know, trying little things,

little moves.

But they just didn't quite come off.

The final, third play was scrappy, and

you know, as I said, the final ball wasn't great, but the goal was magnificent.

When it came to it, I think a lot of people were expecting Arsenal to win the second leg, but when it came to it, Martinelli Saka didn't really, really show up in this game.

Presuming that those

people who are complaining about Porto are Arsenal fans, I think this is a throwback to the Wenger era where he got very sniffy indeed if

teams he considered beneath his didn't roll out the red carpet and just usher his players through to allow them shots on goal.

And to be fair,

Arteta didn't really complain about that.

He did complain about Porto's shithousery at corners, but I think that was six of one and half a dozen of the other because Ben White was constantly trying to get up in Porto goalkeeper Diogo Costa's grill

and actually ended up being wrestled into the back of the net while one corner was being delivered in the second half, which I thought was quite funny.

So you know Porto played how they played.

I thought they looked more dangerous throughout, always looked more likely to score.

And

Arsenal have given themselves a bit of a problem.

They should be able to turn it around but they might not.

I mean I agree with Barry and let's not forget as well that it was Arteta that took off took off their nominated forward Trossard for a midfielder Jorginho and kind of at 0-0 and looked more to sort of solidify that midfield rather than say they were going gung-ho and throwing on forwards trying to get a win so i i didn't really necessarily agree with that idea that porto were uh trying to sort of negative their way to a

to um uh you know to the results so no i didn't really necessarily see that there's certainly not jose marino's porto that won the tournament in 2000 what was it four

now that that was a negative portal

no

presumably pepe was still like 54 then even though he was you know kicking about around madrid yes last i wonder about that jorginho thing i mean that the big x factor with him is that we don't know what his fitness fitness situation is because of course it's been said that he's been carrying in ock and and for a long time and stuff but after he was so influential in that liverpool game and that arsenal midfield worked so well then i i was a little bit surprised that he didn't start i mean and again it might be he's not able to but it just

It seemed that that was the midfield against tough opposition that kind of made sense because he gives them a bit of tactical nous and there.

He moves the ball well and it frees up Declan Rice to roam around a little bit more.

Whereas, when you're playing the Burnleys and the West Hams of this world, the various sort of disjointed clarish sort of rabble, then

you can sort of just have Rice in there, and all the attacking guys can sort of be free.

I do wonder, I don't know, maybe they underestimated Porto a little bit.

Maybe they thought this was the game they could boss and play as if he were playing

a less good Premier League team.

I don't know, but it's a funny one with Porto because I would refer us to the very excellent Tom Kunders of Portugal, who covers the Portuguese league and knows everything, who sort of commented after the game that

this is probably the least talented Porto squad in 20 years, yet the coach Conceao leads them to victory through being tactically clever.

I mean, Porto...

They've not scored a lot of goals domestically.

Like, they've scored 37 goals in 22 games.

Sporting, by comparison, have scored 60.

So

they're not exactly a swashbuckling team in Portugal, but they are very niggly, and they managed to stop Arsenal from getting any kind of rhythm.

And Arsenal maybe

lacking a bit of maturity.

Very few players in this team has played much in the Champions League before.

I guess it's only Havertz, really.

So

that probably was one of those nights where they needed a few more cooler heads on the field.

This was Porto's sixth consecutive clean sheet at home.

So, you know, they know what they're doing.

Theo Walcott was on the radio last night.

I've made a really, what I thought was a really interesting point about Premier League players don't play in the evening very much.

And so they're not used to playing in the evening.

So they're sort of bored or they're, you know, they, they just don't know what to do with their day.

Or like the, the structure of the day means they just go for walks and have sleeps and eat chicken and, you know, have to read all the data that they have to, you know, that they've been given by the manager.

And so by the evening, they're just sort of they're past being ready to play football, which I suppose is got quite, if you have have a routine, right?

You sort of know when your kickoff is.

I guess we kind of assume that they all do really important sort of sports science-y-related sort of preparation stuff so they're at peak physical condition.

But I once asked John Anaris what he did during the day before the big game in Istanbul, of course,

expecting there'd be something very fascinating, like maybe,

but it turned out he'd been like binge-watching 24 in the hotel most of the day and was

sort of channeling the spirit of Jack Bower as he was running around.

So I mean, I don't know, it's a very good point.

I mean, because they can't really do anything, they have to just kind of be ready.

It's like when we have a live show, Max, or if we're doing a tour, you sort of have to come up with a routine.

Mine invariably watched involved watching Escape to the Country and

the repair shop, you know, then you have a shower.

Slightly different vibe.

Go and have one pint on my own, which I suppose you can't do if you're about to play a football match.

and then turn up at the venue and hang around for ages, you know, just

doing not very much, eating crisps.

That's why we deliver such flat live shows, isn't it?

Anyway, good to see two lads on the Arsenal bench you could mistake for one of those definitely legit imported American candy shops in Oxford Street, Sweet Heaven, next to each other, James Sweet and Aiden Heaven, of course.

I mean, it shows the youngsters that Arteta has, and you know, he doesn't doesn't bring them on in the way that Klopp does, which we will get to in a bit.

Just on the coefficient, Lars, because

there are fans of Tottenham and Manchester United and Aston Villa who are watching this thinking, hang on a second, we need

the English teams to start really turning up because Manchester United haven't, Newcastle United haven't.

So they are waiting on this.

And at the moment,

England will, the Premier League will not get a fifth place, but obviously there's a lot of football to be played, right?

Yeah, no, as it stands, it's Italy and Germany who are who are top of the pile there.

England are lagging a little bit behind.

I guess

and what will have hurt England is

losing teams in the group stage of the Champions League.

I mean, that's bad for your coefficient.

But

the advantage is that

you don't get really more points for winning in the Champions League than you get in the Europa League.

So if, for instance, Liverpool were to win the Europa League, that would be enormously helpful.

And then

feasibly, you would expect the English teams to do well in the Europa Conference League as well.

So I still have faith that the English coefficient will turn out the way those teams want,

but the English team stuffing it up in the Champions League, Newcastle

and Man United, was certainly very, very unhelpful.

Yeah, very funny if Spurs fans have to cheer Arsenal in a Champions League final.

Which could happen.

And I also just remember the day after Newcastle went out of the Champions League group stage.

I heard quite a few pundits say, well, you know what?

They're better off not getting into the Europa League.

And I was like, lads, that,

given that fifth is really not an improbable scenario for Newcastle, that could turn out to be very, very wrong.

I mean, contributing to England, not getting that spot would is not helpful, I don't think, for those teams.

In the other game, Napoli won, Barca won.

Jonathan, not a classic.

I mean, quite an interesting game.

I thought Barca started better.

Napoli, obviously, under their new manager, came into it.

By the end, you sort of of felt Barca were holding on.

And then Barca almost won it with the last kick.

Yeah, and

I find it still quite curious to see sort of Leminiamara at 16.

I think he became the youngest ever player to appear in the Champions League knockout stages.

I think 16 years, 200 and something days.

Almost carrying FC Barcelona, which is

such a massive club.

He seems to have almost become the figurehead.

I was at in Spain a couple of weeks ago, and he's like front page of all the sports papers, Mundo Da Potivo and others, because of how well he's playing.

He's been incredible, really.

I've got kind of split opinions on a 16-year-old having that much pressure on them,

having to carry such a massive team.

But at the moment, he's taken to it really well.

And, you know, putting an okay performance in this one, and I know he got substituted.

Obviously, Levandosky and Ossimen were the two goal-getters.

Offset men back from the Africa Couple Nations, where we won't talk too much about Nigeria's disappointment in the final there.

But yeah, no, I think both teams will probably be fairly satisfied with this one.

I don't think either side was necessarily amazing, but at the same time, neither side kind of let themselves down.

I would have expected Napoli maybe to get a result, but they are in a bit of a transition phase at the moment, a bit of turmoil going on there.

So I think that's maybe to be expected.

And obviously, Barcelona, you know,

they haven't been the Champions League sort of heavyweights for the last few, well, haven't been the Champions of Heavyweights, have they, for the last few years?

I mean, they weren't even in in the knockout stages last season um having dipped into the europa league so a curious game really it didn't really i don't think you could really i couldn't really conclude too much about either side i don't know what what you other guys thought yeah i mean actually that that um that lewandowski goal last was Barca's first goal in the knockouts for sort of more than a thousand days.

Messi was the last guy to score in a knockout game for Barcelona, which feels extraordinary, but I guess a thousand days is only three years.

Anyway, what did you make of the game?

I am hearing words like interesting and intriguing.

And I just thought this was a bit crap as well, to be honest.

I was doing my usual thing of

having both games on at the same time.

And again, like you having the audio from one and kind of looking at the other, I find that's the best way to

double screen.

And what usually happens is that your eye is kind of drawn to watch whichever game where the most is happening.

Here, my eye was drawn to my phone and to like the wall.

To escape to the country.

Could I find 24 on somewhere?

Is that which streaming service has that now?

It was real bad.

And I just think it's, I know it's not news because we've been talking about it all season, but both these teams are so much worse than they were last year.

I mean, Napoli, it's one of the most scandalously bad title defenses in recent memory.

Like, you start out with Spoletti leaving, you hire Rudy Garcia, which you should never do, and you sort of end up putting Valta Mazzaro in charge.

And now you have the Calzona guy who's also in charge of what is this, Slovakia or Slovenia.

I always mixed them up.

And this is like,

you shouldn't have a guy who's like

doing this part-time whilst also managing a national team from Eastern Europe.

Like, that's not how Scudetto winners are supposed to behave.

So it's just not a good situation for them.

And given what an absolute mess Napoli are in, I was kind of expecting Barcelona to win.

And, of course, they dominated possession.

Well, they did for a while.

But they weren't great either.

And you mentioned Laminia Mal obviously looks fantastic.

And you've got Pedric in there who looks fantastic.

And that's kind of the good news for Barcelona, these young players.

But all this stuff they've done around, the stuff they've spent all the lever money on, I'm not sure, man.

Like, Lewandowski obviously scores a great goal, and Lewandowski will do that.

But I do wonder when you are this club that's in huge financial problems,

that you've kind of made much worse by selling off bits of your future income for short-term success.

And

the thing you've...

Partial what you've spent it on is giving a massive contract to old man Lewandowski.

I do think that's the sort of behavior that sort of future sports management students will be pointed to at a blackboard showing like, what on earth were they doing?

This is really stupid for the for the club, I tend to think.

But all that being said, and we've gone on for a bit now.

They eventually got into it.

Like, I think the goal from Ossiman, which is a really good goal, and you can see why Ossiman is one of the most sort of in-demand number nines in the world.

That was, I think, their second shot in the game.

Never mind on target.

I think that was their second effort.

And it was like in the 79th minute.

After that, they woke up a little bit and had a bit of something about them and kind of started pressing a bit and running a little bit.

But no,

this was real bad, I thought.

And

Barcelona, in a way, I guess if you're Barcelona, you're happy to come out of the away game with the draw, bearing in mind how bad they've been defensively in the league.

Like, Barcelona conceded 34 goals in the league.

That's just like one fewer than Khadid, who are 18th.

So, like, it's

for them to get out of the away game, having only conceded once, I guess, is fine.

But given how bad Napoli were, you also feel like they kind of maybe should have won here.

And it was just, no, no, no, it was frustrating to see that many clearly good footballers on the same pitch produce so little of notes.

Yeah, just to just for our Slovenian and Slovakian listeners to apologize for the flippancy of our Nordic correspondent there, you know, like it's like, you know, it's like saying Norway and Sweden are the same, which we all know they are, but obviously, which people do say.

And no one ever apologises.

So actually,

I think you're all right.

Anyway, that'll do for part one.

Part two, we'll do Liverpool's victory over Luton in the Premier League.

Welcome to part two of the Guardian Football Weekly.

Liverpool for Luton won.

Liverpool back to four points clear then at the top of the table.

I mean, there was a bit of a scare for them, Baz, in this wonder down at halftime.

Struggled struggled to create in the first half.

I don't know if any part of you thought a half-time, oh, this might be the game, or did you think, well, they'll probably score three in the second half, and it turned out to be four.

We all know Luton scored far too early, yes.

Um,

and they were ultimately punished for their impertinence.

Uh,

Liverpool have recovered 22 points from losing positions this season, they were at home.

Um,

admittedly, they have a lot of injuries, missing Salah, Matup, Jotta, Nunes, Bozlai, Curtis-Jones, Trent Alexander, Arnold, Allison, each of whom

probably cost far more than, or are worth far more than Luton's entire squad.

But

yeah,

Klopp, they were poor in the first half.

Klopp got them in at half-time, changed things around a bit, I think moved Connor Bradley into midfield, moved Gravin Birch out wide, played with two two at the front, up top, and

the goals eventually came.

The only thing I and it's no great surprise, the only thing I would say that most of the goals were avoidable from a looting perspective.

They fell asleep for one.

It came from a throw-in.

There was one from a corner or it was a two.

But anyway, yeah,

they were avoidable goals.

Rob Edwards said after the game, you know, we just made them mad by scoring the first goal.

And he said his team could learn a lot from the the exhibition of counter-pressing put on by uh Liverpool so

you know defeat for Luton we all expected it but they continue to score goals they continue to play reasonably well against what very well or reasonably well against elite opposition and

I wouldn't imagine Edwards was too disappointed at losing the game.

I wonder if Connor Bradley's been put into midfield.

Where the hell's Trent Alexander Arnold meant to go up front?

Jonathan, Louis Diaz was sort of shooting from everywhere.

He's got real manic vibes.

And I guess that because Darwin Nunes gets all the headlines for being the sort of chaos centre-forward or attacking player, I forget that Louis Diaz has quite a lot of chaos as well, even though he took his goal beautifully in the end.

Yeah, I think it's up to, isn't it, we have to credit for the stat that they all five Liverpool forward, all five Liverpool forwards have scored 10-plus goals this season, which is a really good sign of their strength and depth, to be honest.

And I think that's an underrated element of Liverpool's squad just the fact that they they have good strength and numbers you know a lot of people are talking about the injuries maybe to Jotter for example but they they can replace them with I know I know Elliott's maybe not a forward he played a bit in a bit more of a forward role in this game but they could they've they've just got so many options to replace them gak poe uh diaz as he mentioned there and and others so yeah diaz is a you know he's a really good player

kind of had his injuries didn't he last season and and maybe went out of the radar but you know everyone remembers when he first joined the club he was he was so had such an immediate impact and it's just a testament to sort of like the the recruitment at Liverpool in terms of how they recruit their forwards and and and even the midfield they've sort of really solidified it the likes of Endo and Gravin Birch and McAllister of course so yeah they definitely have the depth I think to challenge for the title and potentially go all the way I mean they already are challenging for the title of course four points clear now so I don't think even though they do have some injuries you know to the likes of Trent and Alison and others I don't think that's necessarily going to massively hamper them i think they've got the strength to beat most teams it's of course that game against man city probably that's going to be so decisive and that everyone's sort of looking at in the calendar um for how their season is going to go but they they really are in an excellent position with a real chance of winning the title i think so lovely moment i thought for chidos you've been to score because i believe he is a liverpool fan so there's exciting times for him to score at an field and he seems like a lovely lad um i would just echo what barry mentioned about the goals being avoidable.

And this worries me a little bit about Luton because I've watched most of their recent games.

And they've started conceding a few goals that are of the kind of nature that we may be worried about Luton conceding when they got up.

You know, where you look at and think, good lord, someone should have done a little bit better there.

I'm sure Rob Edwards is right on top of this.

And they did so well for so long,

being competitive.

And listen, still games left, yada, yada, yada.

But I'd worry a little bit about that development.

they've they've started conceding soft goals recently i feel yeah just on uh just on um liverpool and their use of their youngsters uh benj says can we give the credit to the role of jaden dans in the fourth liverpool goal the son of neil danz who in my mind is 24 so like this is a nightmare um who i think had a music career i feel sort of prime soccer i am guest because he sang songs and was a footballer neil danz there's a lovely moment where who which who which one was neil danc because i was thinking of scott dan no scott dan is a who i remember centre back Very different.

Very different.

Yeah, he did a Phil Bab on a goalpost once.

So I'm...

No.

He probably may not have tuned in on that.

I don't know.

Neil Danz is a sort of...

Who did he play for?

Millball, I think.

Palace?

That's my sort of...

Colchester.

Did he play for Colchester, did he?

Yes.

He did.

Good one representing there.

So

Jonathan, our Colchester correspondent.

Yes, I may have not got his career totally correct.

But there was a nice moment when Rob Edwards came on and said to Jaden Danz and to Johan Klopp, I played against your dad,

because he did play against Neil Dance.

But Klopp does use his youngsters in a way that perhaps, you know, you know, Arsenal made one change, which we criticize bringing Jorginho on, but you know, he could have made other changes, brought on more youngsters in that game.

And I think that is a, you know, that is a sign that you have to have great belief in those guys.

If you look at Conor Bradley, who may not have got his chance without the injuries, now looks like a stunning player.

Cam says, hi, Max Barry and crew, long time listener, first time writer here, found your riffs on Darwin Nunes' goal hilarious on Monday's pod.

This was the chip or Dink versus Brentford.

As a Latino listener born in Peru and raised in Colombia, I have no idea where Vaselina comes from as we were talking about scooping Vaseline from the tub.

However, I wanted to add a few maybe more poetic names for the move that were generally more common in my childhood.

A sombrero, literally a hat, which visually makes a lot more sense, I would think, or a globito, a little balloon, which is also a nice image and far better than that of Vaseline.

Thanks for your good work, says Cam.

Thank you, Cam.

I will happily call it a globito going forwards.

A little balloon.

Liverpool played Chelsea in the Carabao Cup final.

And this game is more tantalising, Barry, than when they both came through their respective semi-finals, I would say.

Well, I suppose it's more tantalising because Chelsea are better and Liverpool are

going to be without quite a few players

through injury.

Are you not tantalised?

No, not really.

I'm not particularly tantalised.

The last two cup finals these teams have played have been diabolically bad.

They both finished 0-0.

Chelsea won both of them on penalties.

The very same thing could happen again on Sunday.

I hope it doesn't.

A few weeks ago, I would have been hugely confident of a Liverpool victory, and now I wouldn't be confident of them winning one bit.

And it would be so Chelsea, Lars.

All the things you say about, you know, time and, you know.

Just every sort of every cliche you use about football and Chelsea just ruin it by being garbage and winning things.

And you can just see that happening.

Well, and Chelsea have not been quite as bad this season as

a lot of their critics would have it.

That's a hill I've been willing to, if not die on, but certainly sustain major injuries and contract diseases on this season, is that Chelsea are actually not that terrible.

And I just noticed something

looking ahead to this game.

I think we all agree we have a pretty clear top three in this season.

We have Liverpool, Man City, and Arsenal, who are like quite by a long way better than the chasing pack.

In the league, Chelsea have played

five games against these three teams.

They've nearly played all the games against them.

Five games.

They've only lost one of them,

which is interesting.

They haven't won any either.

They've got one defeat and four draws against Liverpool, Man City, and Arsenal.

But there is something about the way they're set up that makes them quite nasty to play against for these top teams because they're very strong on the counter.

And they've got quite a lot of guys who are good at running into space and doing things.

and and they do generally speaking seem more comfortable in these games chelsea than they are when they're trying to break down a low block i mean they they've lost a bunch of games against mid-table teams who they should really not lose against but against these top teams they tend to turn up and i think there's something about the game state that suits the players they have a little bit better

barry's obviously completely right is that these were so boring the last time we did this but i just wonder i'm not sure Liverpool have it in them to be boring right now because they've got so much going on going forward and they never fully convince you defensively and coming up against a good counter-attacking team in chelsea i just think this should be fun the the xf the expected fun is quite high going into the game but as we know with them from xg doesn't always translate into actual g whether the xf will translate into actual fun uh sunday will tell i guess jonathan your thoughts on the carabao cup final before we break for part two yeah i think liverpool will win it quite comfortably actually uh i think chelsea they've been okay this season but the last time they played liverpool they lost 4-1 um And I think Lars's point there about they haven't been too bad, but they haven't won any of those games.

And I just think Liverpool have way too much for them.

So now I'm going to sort of dampen that parade a little bit on Chelsea.

So sorry to do that, but I can't see anything other than Liverpool winning quite easily.

I would agree.

Liverpool are clear favourites, for sure.

I'm just being the hype man.

I'm trying to make this sound more interesting than it possibly is.

Which is what we need on this pod.

Just somebody make

it more interesting

than this actually is.

Anyway, that'll do for part two.

Part three, we'll look at the Premier League fixtures.

Welcome to part three of the Guardian Football Weekly.

On paper, one of those not fascinating fixture lists, like a fight to be lost on match of the day.

The last time I said that, there was a record number of goals in the Premier League.

And so perhaps these games will be great.

Manchester United Fulham, Jim Ratcliffe has been speaking, Jonathan.

What did you make of what he had to say if you listened to it?

I think to be honest, from

a United fan perspective, it was akin to

not eating anything for 10 years and then being given some Jaffa cakes

in the sense of just the complete void of any leadership from the top and any even statements for 15 years, 18 years or whatever it's been.

And then suddenly having someone come out and start making bold statements about knocking Liverpool or knocking Manchester City off their perch, it was no matter how boisterous it was, I think, like I say, from a United fan perspective,

it was nice.

It was nice to hear.

You're just too hungry to analyse it properly.

You were just like gorging, like the cookies.

You were just like everywhere.

Crumbs.

Just crumbs of optimism to cling on to that even no matter how much hot air it could be, it felt nice.

Just hearing someone with ambition.

But just how long have you not been eating for is the concern?

Because if you're really starving, then Jaffa cakes, like nutritionally, is probably not what your body needs.

I mean, they could be really dangerous to eat the wrong thing after.

Yeah, he said, look, nobody's been successful at Manchester United in the last 11 years.

That would say to me there's something wrong with the environment.

It's not constructive for me to blame anyone.

Give us a little bit of time.

Try to be patient.

We'll try and build Manchester United back to where it should be.

I thought, actually...

Barry, the most interesting thing for a neutral point of view is what he was saying about old Trafford.

You know, a big argument for regenerating the whole south side of manchester getting a new stadium making the wembley of the north um i'd be interested to know what united fans would feel about leaving old trafford it feels just insane that they wouldn't play at old trafford but you know other other teams have moved grounds before what do you make of it yeah well i mean he made it sound like the area around old trafford is some sort of slum which it very much isn't um

and he wants uh the taxpayer to pay for the redevelopment or the new stadium and cited

Twickenham, which wasn't paid for by the taxpayer, Wimbledon, which I don't think was paid for by the taxpayer, as examples of why Old Trafford should be paid for by the taxpayer.

He also, to be fair, mentioned the O2 Arena, which was originally paid for by the taxpayer before being sold, and West Ham's ground,

which was built by the government and

was, you know, that ended up being a financial black hole, the manner in which it was handed to West Ham.

And people have pointed out the irony of a tax exile who's based in Monaco or wherever it is, putting on the poor mouth and asking for government money is a bit Irish.

And I think this was raised at this briefing he gave to a dozen or so journalists in InES Towers.

And he said, well, I paid taxes for six to five years.

Then I reached retirement age and fancied a bit of sunshine.

So I went to Monaco to live.

So

he wasn't having any of that.

I'm not sure, you know, that's a fair defence.

You know,

pay your taxes.

In Ireland, we have the same sort of debates over JP McManus, who's very generous with his money and gives it to charity and gives it to GAA clubs and whatnot, and invests loads in the racing industry.

But, you know, maybe just pay your taxes instead, or as well.

But I thought the Ratcliffe briefing, you know, he said all the stuff Manchester United fans are lapping up.

And if you read the comment sections under some of the accounts of this briefing, the amount of forelock tugging going on for Manchester United fans is as nauseating as it is predictable.

He wants to knock Man City and Liverpool off their perch.

He wants Man United to win and play the best football in the world.

So this is all cat-nip for Man U fans.

But he's also bought himself time by saying it'll take at least three years to do this.

Interestingly, he was quite non-committal on the Mason Greenwood thing.

made it clear there could be a way back for mason greenwood and he very conspicuously didn't support eric ten hagg saying it would be inappropriate to comment on that when he was more than happy to comment on any other thing he was asked.

So a bit worrying for Eric Ten Hag, I would say.

So he may very well revolutionize the way Man United play and get them back to winning ways, but there's not much he's done at Nice or Lausanne that would suggest he's the man for the job.

And

I have to say, I'm very suspicious.

about him.

And it's mainly his

relationship with David Brayersford that makes me just smell a massive rat.

I think Braysford is a charlatan, but other opinions are available.

And that's just the reason I think that is because I take a keen interest and have covered professional cycling.

But he may very well be a genius when it comes to kind of running a football club.

How do those Jaffa cakes taste now, Jonathan?

After that,

very much enjoyed him saying that it wouldn't be constructive to sort of blame anyone.

And presumably the follow-up was because they're still technically the majority owners.

I probably shouldn't like stick the, probably shouldn't stick the boot in in the media from day zero.

One point he made, which I actually thought, I mean, I'm as cynical as Barry is, I'm more of the team

fags and cynicism than team Jaffacake in this particular regard.

But he did make a point which I thought was valid, which is that he's, I think he said something about already having made some mistakes in terms of running a football club.

And he's just kind of made them elsewhere because, of course, they did make a mess of Nice initially.

Like

they weren't great after taking them over, but things have been going better recently.

So he has had a sort of a dry run on the Riviera, so to speak, before he now, you know, tries to play with the big boys and run Man United, which I guess there is some value to that.

That all being said, if I was a Manchester United fan, as Jon said, I would be enthused that there is a man there there who supports the football team who said it is a childhood dream who

is sort of at least shows some interest in manchester united being good on the pitch like the that is that is like i know the bar is low but like if i was a united fan i think i would be feeling those things you know there are no guarantees of course i'm quite interested in in in barry's comments on um stave relson so i don't know if there's a chance to elaborate on that but yeah i think in terms of what i was sort of trying to get at is when you look at it from that perspective and i i take on board everything um you guys have said which I find like I'm not at the end of the day it's words right it's anyone can say anything and sound good and let's see what happens in three years time to be honest but I think what I what the point I was trying to make is I've just done a funnily enough I've just done a module on leadership as part of our as part of the NBA I'm doing so

there's a there's a concept called charismatic leadership where obviously the leader comes out and has all these big uses like metaphor and uses these grand statements to basically lay a marker of their leadership potential.

So for me, I found it, and whilst I do bear in mind what Barry is saying, and I'm not saying I bought it, but what I'm saying is that for United who have had just no communication from the top, a general feeling for nearly two decades that money is the, you know, with using the club as a cash machine and withdrawing the interest, using the club as a, you know, taking the interest and paying everyone dividends and not really being bothered about anything but maybe finishing top four.

Having someone finally talking about trying to win trophies and trying to have success and trying to play good football was something that's been really lacking at United for like 20, like a good 15 years since maybe say Ferguson retired or 13 years, how many years it is now, but over a decade.

So I think from that point of view, that was what I found quite interesting about it.

Whether I bought it or not is different.

But I definitely think from a leadership point of view, he said all the right things.

I quite enjoyed the comment about um manchester united being a completely different prospect to every other any other club in london because i think that was a comparison with chelsea made there in there somewhere so he he was careful to take pot shots at pretty much every single club in the premier league which which was quite interesting so i i can definitely see the sort of anti-manchester united fans backs being up because he definitely made a few statements that would have riled them but when you've been laughed at for the last decade i think i don't think that's too bad to have a someone coming out with a little bit of uh swagger about them so i i can certainly see see both sides of it but um i'm not not sold but it was definitely an interesting show i thought um but i am interested in they uh in barry's comments there on to dave brillsford yes producer joel says can we not elaborate on dave brasford please yeah

the other thing the other thing i'll say move it moving swiftly on just to just to quickly go away from that um

also in terms of united it's it's nice to not see sort of accountants being put in hyper so in terms of actual action so far,

from a United point of view, it's nice to not see sort of accountants and bankers being put in high-level football positions.

Obviously, the recruitment of Omar Barada from Manchester City, Dan Ashworth, I know that's been talked about a little bit already.

But seeing competent people trying to be put in high-level positions within the football club in footballing areas is also quite refreshing to see.

So I'd say it's an optimistic start, but I totally take on board

Barry's and La's cynicism as well because at the end of the day, like you said, it is just words.

Other games in the Premier League: Arsenal Newcastle,

Palace Burnley, obviously, Oliver Glasner's first game in charge.

West Ham Brentford Wolves play Sheffield United, amongst others.

Any that take your fancy, Lars, your expected fun on any of those?

My expected fun.

I mean, I was distracted by a bumblebee here.

Did you read up Arsenal Newcastle?

Because the expected fun is sky high on that one.

The expected fun for current Newcastle games is,

I mean,

Newcastle are such a strange case because they were last season season one of the tightest defenses in the league.

And they were as well in this season up until the start of November, thereabouts.

And then it just completely collapsed.

And if you look at their sort of XG since the start of November, they've conceded more chances than anyone else in the league.

Like they're worse than someone like Sheffield United and these guys.

Like they're defensively all over the place.

And they've kind of improved a little bit since coming out of the winter schedule, but still conceding so many chances and attacking a bit better now.

I just thought it was odd listening to Andy Howe talk about he was asked about all these goals going in after the game last weekend, and he said, Well, we're not really doing much different from what we were doing before.

You just sometimes get these random spells or something.

He said, Well, but it's been 15 games, like that's not a random spell.

Like,

something is like profoundly wrong with the sort of how they try to defend, and their games are fairly chaotic and exciting.

And I expect for an Arsenal team that now has to, you know, they've just come back from Portugal,

you know,

that could be interesting.

I'm looking forward to that.

I am also going to be at Old Trafford for the United Fulham game, which is exciting for me, obviously, because United are, you know, they got some exciting young players.

And also, Fulham is like the number one team in the Premier League that I cannot figure out.

I believe Barry has said similar things.

Like, I look at their team on paper, it looks a bit bad.

Whenever I see them, they look bad, but then they keep picking up results when I least expect them.

And I don't understand what's happening with Fulham.

And I'm very glad that I'll be watching 90 Minutes.

Yeah, but what is happening?

Why is this team picking up so many points?

Because they never look good when I'm looking.

So maybe they'll look good at Old Trafford this weekend.

I look forward to finding out.

Just on Arsenal Newcastle, you can imagine it will be Dan Byrne chasing Bakayo Saka like a Scooby-Doo baddie.

Chases...

Yes.

Chases Shaggy and friends.

But this is the Premier League drinking game.

This is completely, if you're doing the Premier League drinking game, Dan Byrne is the nippy winger runs away from Dan Byrne down your entire drink.

This is just a big part of the drinking game right now.

Elliot says, has a managerial merry-go-round ever consisted of just one manager before?

Charlie says, Neil Harris is good at changing clubs, isn't he, Max?

Yes, so Neil Harris, who was at Gillingham at the start of the season, got sacked, then became Cambridge United manager 77 days ago,

was unveiled as new Millwall manager yesterday to save them from relegation.

Our mates, they're not the top 20, amongst others tweeting, surely the first.

to manage clubs in the Championship League One and League Two in the same season.

Just needs to do really well with Palis with Millwall for about five games and then get the Sheffield United job so he can complete the set.

Yes, I must admit, I was quite surprised when I sort of woke up and there was all this sort of speculation.

I was like, well, surely not.

Like, he's only just, he's literally only just arrived.

Like, like, there's no way you would just leave.

And it turns out there is a way, which is,

you know, go to a bigger club, get paid more money, be near your house, where you were a club legend, where you'd already managed them successfully, and you're their record goal scorer.

Obviously, you know, all I'm doing is tweeting snake emojis and saying

there's no loyalty left in Millwall.

I guess I kind of see it from his perspective.

But

I did sign up to Millwall TV so I could watch his welcoming video.

And I've written a column about this, but the social media guy at Millwall is called Max.

So it felt really personal.

He kept saying, well, the thing is, Max, you know, I'm here to change this club.

I was like, all right, mate.

You don't have to tell me, Derek, don't tell me to my face.

I know you're fucked off, mate, but don't tell me.

And he did say, I mean, he's quite good at, he does a lot of cliches.

He's a bit like a sort of action man, you know, says the football club a lot, says in the building a lot.

And he, and he talks about galvanize, he wants to galvanise everything.

Like

everything is being, everything is being galvanized.

Everyone is going to be covered in zinc by the time he's finished.

But obviously,

I don't wish him any luck at all.

Millwall have a terrible fixture list.

They're quite low down in the championship.

I don't really want to start a turf war with Millwall.

I don't think that's a really good thing for me or Cambridge.

Don't tweak the lion's tail.

No, I know.

But

obviously would like them to go down and us to stay up and see what reception Neil Harris gets at the Abbey when he comes back next season.

Are you saying you'd like them to be knocked off their perch, Max?

I would like them to be knocked off.

I mean, they're not really on a perch, are they?

They're in absolute shit time in the championship.

Like, they're sort of at the bottom of a cage.

I just want them to fall out of the cage and come and join us in our little shit cage.

Anyway, we are, it's our biggest game of the season at home to Pre-Tube United on Saturday, who stuffed us 5-0 earlier in the season.

So, not ideal timing.

Has Savi Lonzor been linked with the Cambridge job?

Yes, he's yet to put his hat in the ring or whatever it is.

But, you know, hopefully, we'll be part of that tug-of-war.

I mean, I saw Steve Bruce linked with with the South Korea job in one of the papers the other day.

So really anything can happen now.

I think we're through some kind of looking glass where there's really no.

I did look at longest serving managers ever.

And there was a guy called Fred Everest.

or Everest was the West Brom manager from something like 1902 to 1946.

And I did think, I reckon the players have got bored of training by year 40, wouldn't they?

You know, like that is really an awfully long time to be managing one football club.

But anyway,

really quite funny.

Here we go.

Wickham's tweet.

We can confirm that Luke Lee was shown a yellow card tonight for drying the ball on a steward's jacket prior to taking a throw-in.

So that's a good booking for Wickham Wanderers.

It reminds me of in the Soccer AM Glory years when we actually made, had Rory DeLapp, we designed some Soccer AM towels for Rory DeLapp, and then they were banned from being used so he couldn't dry his footballs before his long throws.

Finally, Caroline says, hi, Max and Barry.

I'd massively appreciate it if you could give a shout out to my partner, Chris, on your podcast next week.

He listens to the pod religiously and loves you both, although he has a massive soft spot for Barry.

That's okay.

We will be driving from where we live in Kent all the way to Hollyhead next Friday, where we're getting the ferry home to Ireland for our wedding.

We have the child of Prague on standby, an Irish tradition for good weather on your wedding day.

I saw that you were looking for questions, so here is one for Barry, who might be able to impart some knowledge.

Does the child of Prague go under a bush or in front of the house for optimum luck and less chance of rain?

Also, is it tempting fate to even involve the child of Prague when we are, in fact, having a civil ceremony?

There's no doubt we'll be listening to you on our five-hour drive to Wales, and this would completely surprise him.

Thanks, Emilian.

Love the pod.

Thank you, Caroline, and good luck to you and Chris.

Tell us about the child of Prague, Barry, if you've ever heard of it.

I'm afraid, Caroline's absolutely stumped me here.

The child of Prague, it rings a faint bell, but I

not being particularly religious,

I don't know what it is.

I presume it's a little statue of the baby Jesus or something.

I've no idea if it controls the weather, but if Caroline and Chris are travelling today, Thursday,

I believe torrential rain is forecast for the whole of Britain.

And I just hope, Max, that their

trip from

east the east

southeast of England to Hollyhead in a car is more pleasant than ours was from Hollyhead to to London some years ago in

awful weather when we should have had a little child of Prague although we wouldn't have been able to squeeze it into our pokey little hire car with five people in it.

That was one of the worst days slash nights of my life

and i wouldn't wish it on anyone so yeah i hope caroline and chris have a much more pleasant journey than we did and uh i i wish them every happiness and a great great wedding day

yes i mean i mean and i hope on the ferry you don't uh as we did arrived at hollyhead so obviously you're taking the reverse journey you don't arrive at dublin and just bob around outside dublin for an hour and a half because it's too windy to moor and and caroline and chris if on the ferry you see a drunk nottingham Forest fan, avoid at all costs.

I'm not sure if he's an amen, is he a fixture on stennice eviling ferries, but yeah, drunk Nottingham Forest fans on ferries are to be avoided at all costs, as Max will tell you.

I'm looking at a child of Prague.

It is a little baby.

basically dressed a bit like the Pope, I would say.

I mean, I'm not an expert, but it's got some kind of Catholic hat on and a big robe, and it's on a little plinth.

And you can get it, the cheapest one you could get is about 25 quid.

You can get them for up to 500 pounds, you know, so it depends on your what sort of child of Prague you're looking at.

But, you know, best of luck to the two of you and to your child of Prague.

And I hope you have a lovely wedding.

And that'll do for today.

Thank you, Jonathan.

You're welcome.

Thank you, Max.

Thanks, Lars.

Thank you, Max.

Cheers, Barry.

Thank you.

Football Weekly is produced by Joel Grove.

Our executive producer is Max Sons.

This is The Guardian.