Liverpool are back and Van de Ven scores a goal of the season contender – Football Weekly

Speaker 1 This is The Guardian.

Speaker 2 Think enterprise software is too costly, too complex, and takes too long to get up and running?

Speaker 1 Think again.

Speaker 2 Workday Go makes simplifying your small or mid-sized business simple.

Speaker 2 HR and finance together on one powerful AI platform right at your fingertips. Workday Go gets you live fast and fits the needs of your business.
Find out what Workday Go can do for you.

Speaker 2 Go with Workday Go.

Speaker 4 Old school security kicks in after the break-in.

Speaker 3 Too late.

Speaker 4 SimplySafe rewinds the story, stopping crime before it starts.

Speaker 4 Active Guard Outdoor Protection uses AI-powered cameras to detect intruders, alert live monitoring agents, and can deter intruders before they reach your door.

Speaker 4 It's proactive protection, plus a 60-day money-back guarantee and no contracts. To get 60% off your new system, go to simplysafe.com slash podcast.
That's simplysafe.com slash podcast.

Speaker 4 There's no safe like simply safe.

Speaker 5 Hello and welcome to the Guardian Football Weekly. Liverpool beat Railwood Rid 1-0 in the Champions League, but for Thibault Courtois, it would have been much, much more.

Speaker 5 This was Arnold Slotslide's best performance of the seas of last year's midfield three all brilliant and Connor Bradley giving Vinicius absolutely nothing while the panto of booing Trent Alexander Arnold happened over on the other side.

Speaker 5 Elsewhere, Mickey Van der Venn turns into Sun Hyung Min and Gareth Bairn at the same time and scores the kind of goal you see in a computer game and immediately think this game is unrealistic.

Speaker 5 You don't get those goals in actual football. Arsenal winner gets a clean sheet, obviously.
Also, there's a statement win for Bayern at PSG.

Speaker 5 We'll look back on Sunderland's draw with Everton, Gary O'Neill turning down walls, and discuss Mary Erps and Hannah Hampton. As always, we'll answer your questions.

Speaker 5 And that's today's Golden Football Weekly.

Speaker 5 On the panel today, Barry Glen Denning. Hello.

Speaker 1 Hi, Max.

Speaker 5 Welcome, Johnny Lou.

Speaker 3 Hello.

Speaker 5 And hello, Nikki Bandini.

Speaker 3 Morning.

Speaker 5 Let's start there at Anfield. Liverpool 1 Real Madrid, Neil.
Brilliant performance from Liverpool. And we kind of said on Monday that maybe Liverpool weren't as back as some has reported.

Speaker 5 But this feels, Johnny, like a very significant result and a win they totally deserved.

Speaker 3 Yeah, I think...

Speaker 3 It was a brilliant performance, actually. And I think there is always a danger.

Speaker 3 And I think we've seen this not just with Liverpool, but with all the big clubs this season, there's always a tendency to overreact to one result, one performance.

Speaker 3 You know, Liverpool were, you know, they were going to walk the title earlier, weren't they? And then they were incredibly lucky, and then they were finished in crisis slot, eternally bald. And

Speaker 3 now they're back again.

Speaker 3 I think what we're seeing is obviously quite still a slightly fitful and inconsistent team that is capable of generating a really high level when it clicks, when the new signings and

Speaker 3 when the parts all fit together. And that's what we saw.
I think the main issue, the main factor really is the fact that that midfield appears to be back. I mean, McAllister has had a,

Speaker 3 you know, he's been injured for part of

Speaker 3 this season, and now he's back. And they've got Graven Bush and they've got Shaubers Ley, not playing it right, but back in the centre.
And they just look like a more functional team.

Speaker 3 They look like a more functional, organised, confident, driven team with those three in the centre. And it's no secret, I think, that

Speaker 3 when they haven't had those three in tandem and fully fit, they haven't really looked like a, you know, they haven't really been firing. And 1-0

Speaker 3 could have been a lot more, to be honest. I thought Realm Witchwood were really poor.
They looked totally bummed out.

Speaker 3 I don't know whether it was like a delayed reaction to the Classico or whatever, but they were... you know, the number of 50-50s where they just didn't even look like getting the ball.

Speaker 3 I thought Dean Housen was, was, he had an abysmal night, to be honest.

Speaker 3 But I think, you know, to a large extent, this is because this is, this is because Liverpool put so much pressure on them that the press looked organised.

Speaker 3 So, yeah, are we declaring, you know, we're declaring them back, are we? We're putting their name on the trophy.

Speaker 5 I mean, you've got to say, Barry, because it was just such a brilliant performance. And, like, of those three in midfield,

Speaker 5 I thought Soberslai was just ridiculous in this game.

Speaker 1 Yeah, he was brilliant. Yeah, it was a bad night night for former Bournemouth players who went for big money during the summer because Kirk has was dropped and

Speaker 1 Hussein was poor, or Hausen, sorry, was poor.

Speaker 1 Sabozlai was everywhere. He provided the assist for the goal.
He had shots saved.

Speaker 1 Another fine performance from Thibault Cortois on the Real Madrid goal, I thought he won for his English haters, even if he did emerge on the losing side.

Speaker 1 But Samuzlai, I saw him being interviewed after this game.

Speaker 1 It was an interview Jamie Carragher conducted for that,

Speaker 1 is it NBC banter show?

Speaker 1 But he said his favourite position is even deeper than the one he was playing last night. But he also stressed, you know, I'm happy just to be on the pitch, so I don't really mind where I'm playing.

Speaker 1 But he has been outstanding. Everyone thought that the arrival of Wurtz would lead to him having to fight for his place and probably end up being a substitute.

Speaker 1 But he has made himself totally indispensable this season, wherever he ends up being on the pitch.

Speaker 5 And actually, Nikki, Slot managed to get Wertz into the team as well. And Wirtz played well as well.

Speaker 3 Yeah, I mean,

Speaker 7 I feel like more or less everyone played well, didn't it? There wasn't particularly a player you looked at in their Liverpool lineup and thought had a weak performance.

Speaker 7 I think they completely owned the middle of the pitch, which was interesting

Speaker 7 when you take

Speaker 7 a view on just the bald stats of the game. I think Real Madrid had like 62% of the ball.
It didn't feel like that. Obviously,

Speaker 7 that's just because of how the ball was used. And the intensity, which I think Johnny was already referencing, just felt so much different on one side of this picture than the other.

Speaker 7 And to an extent, I do think... that is the reality of this extended Champions League group.
Real Madrid didn't need to beat Liverpool, but it still

Speaker 7 wasn't like they came here expecting or wanting to lose and certainly didn't expect to lose like that, I would say, in a game where it felt like they were, in the end, only really close because of Thibaut Courtois, who was absolutely sensational.

Speaker 7 I thought his first half save from Shobusla in particular, the one with his foot, was...

Speaker 7 The more you watched it, the more sensational it looked because the body controls keep his foot there and wasn't just one of those, I think sometimes when a keeper saves their foot it's just because they're close and they hit it into their foot but he really he really didn't he used his whole body there so it felt like it was very much coupois against the world for a lot of this game and um in the end i suppose the liverpool world won aiden says would a super league be worth it if it means connor bradley can play against real madrid more often i mean it was perfect johnny wasn't it in that he is having this absolute worldie against vinicius trenton alexander arnold isn't on the pitch and then finally comes on the pitch and then gets booed and doesn't really do anything all the while.

Speaker 5 Vinicius is just kind of, I mean, Connor Bradley is kind of shepherding the ball out of play with Vanissius sort of tugging at him and everything.

Speaker 5 He was, he, it was such a great, that whole theater was perfect.

Speaker 3 That was a great little subplot. I thought, you know, Bradley was absolutely fantastic.

Speaker 3 And you see the sort of player he can be when, again, when he's fully fit and he can cover that, that whole flank, he brings them a real energy and dynamism and a final ball.

Speaker 3 Then, of course, you know, you have the,

Speaker 3 I guess, the

Speaker 3 entrance.

Speaker 3 I don't know what you call it, a little vignette, because, you know, it's hard to.

Speaker 1 The Trentrance.

Speaker 3 The Trentrance, there we go.

Speaker 3 There's a sub, a former sub talking.

Speaker 3 And, you know, because it's hard to say that he had very much impact on the game itself at all. I mean, almost none.

Speaker 3 But obviously,

Speaker 3 everyone was waiting for this. Everyone wanted to see what the reaction would be.
And the reaction would be, I guess, what everyone assumed the reaction would be. I mean, this is, this is,

Speaker 3 you know, you don't get to take your,

Speaker 3 I'm not a Liverpool fan, but if I was a Liverpool fan and

Speaker 3 I have been dumped, you know, I imagine it's kind of like being dumped, right? You don't, you don't get to take your dad.

Speaker 5 You relentlessly go around town booing.

Speaker 3 I mean, the mural, the murals of her were to face.

Speaker 3 I was shit talking her on the internet.

Speaker 3 I burned the

Speaker 3 jersey I had with her on the back.

Speaker 3 Metaphor running dry here.

Speaker 3 But yeah, I mean, this is.

Speaker 1 The Hern's bathrobe.

Speaker 3 But, you know, you don't get to take your dream move and move on and expect it to happen on good terms. I think the amount of pearl clutching that has been,

Speaker 3 you know,

Speaker 3 that there's been over this.

Speaker 3 This is not how modern football fandom works. And yeah, there is a pantomime element to it, but there's also, I think, real genuine feelings.

Speaker 3 He's not having a great time under Alonso, by all accounts, Alexander Arnold, this season.

Speaker 3 He's had to fight for his place with Valverde.

Speaker 3 It wouldn't surprise me if

Speaker 3 he saw coming back to Anfield as almost a way of

Speaker 3 making it real.

Speaker 3 This might be the point where it's all basically the whirlwind of the last six months finally sunk in. Yeah, this thing is totally done.

Speaker 7 It was interesting that Alonso then throws him into the game in that situation, honestly, because the game was going so badly already for Madrid at that point. It's 82nd minute.

Speaker 7 It's not like there's an expectation. Maybe there is an expectation.

Speaker 7 Maybe there's a hope from Alonso that this is going to galvanise him and he's going to come into the game and in eight minutes provide this injection of, oh, I can't wait to show those guys and turn it around.

Speaker 7 But it felt like, especially leaving it that late. I think maybe if you do it with half an hour, it feels a bit different.
But leaving it that late, it felt a bit like...

Speaker 7 It felt a bit like throwing him to the wolves to me. It felt a bit like you could have given him more of a chance than that if if you wanted him to try to use this moment to

Speaker 7 get some uptick in

Speaker 7 something out of him, I guess.

Speaker 5 Yeah, I mean, it almost did it for the script writers. You know, almost better not to bring him on.
Charlie says, Would Max boo James Richardson if he ever came on as a panelist?

Speaker 5 I mean, I guess the thing is, Barry, booing is quite fun.

Speaker 5 And I suspect a lot of people who booed him actually quite like Trent Alexander Arnold and were just having a bit of fun having a boo because you don't get to boo very often, right?

Speaker 3 You know, unless you're an ever-more surprising, you know,

Speaker 1 yeah, I mean,

Speaker 1 there is genuine resentment among quite a sizable proportion of liverpool fans over the manner in which he he left them uh without the club being able to get a transfer fee and that's fair enough i suppose i think i would probably

Speaker 1 be fine with it he was a good servant he was there a long time he helped them win loads I think the mural being defaced and this seems to be, you know, when men of a certain age get angry they immediately reach for the paint pot and brush

Speaker 1 I suppose it's better than going for a more dangerous weapon

Speaker 1 if if the worst thing you're going to do is deface a mural or paint a roundabout have at it you know it just doesn't really bother me probably doesn't even really bother trent i'd be curious to know what he makes of it he probably doesn't care he knows what he probably had a fair idea what was going to happen Some people lapped that stuff up.

Speaker 1 Some people might be hurt by it. I'd imagine he's probably somewhere in between.

Speaker 5 What did you make of the Real Madrid performance, John? I mean, you've said already it was bad, but it just felt really, you know, all so many of their stars were bad in this game.

Speaker 5 In fact, so many of their players were bad in this game.

Speaker 3 Yeah, I mean, I think...

Speaker 3 Again, you know, we're talking about Liverpool as a slightly inconsistent team

Speaker 3 that still has a really high top level. I think you could say the same about Real Madrid.
They looked, I thought, really good in the Clásico.

Speaker 3 They rose to their level for that game.

Speaker 3 But then, obviously, there have been

Speaker 3 the Atletico performance, for example, where they've looked totally disjointed. And you can see that what Alonso is trying to impose on them, it's still coming together.

Speaker 3 There are still gaps in the system. There are still glitches in the mainframe.
And this was one of those,

Speaker 3 I think the physicality and and the the quality of of liverpool

Speaker 3 it just got in their faces really early on and i'm not going to say they weren't up for it but i i think there's they're still not able to to come up with the solutions in real time i think if alonso sends them out and and he says this is going to happen and then it's going to and it's going to unfold like this and then you do this and you do this i think they know what what they're doing i think they could they can live with that but when when the game starts coming for them and they have to come up with solutions on the fly, you can tell that the base level of understanding and cohesion isn't quite there yet.

Speaker 3 So, you know, I think it's still a work in progress. I still really rate Alonso very highly as a coach and I think they have a, again, I think they have a lot of potential with the players they have.

Speaker 3 It's potentially very exciting what they're doing, but it's just still not quite there yet.

Speaker 7 Just to add, I mean, I don't know how much, of course, like when you get these European games, me and I'm sure you might know definitely like Johnny and Baz and Max are all watching a lot more European football than maybe some people who just watched the Premier League are, right?

Speaker 7 And so like you have some of the background going on here that I don't know if everyone who's listening would, which is like the stuff with Vinicius Jr. in the Glasgow and

Speaker 7 the apology that managed not to include an apology to Xabi Alonso after the game. And there has been some underpinning tension.

Speaker 7 Yes, they've had some great performances, but there is this feeling, to me at least, with Real Madrid, that Xiabi Alonso is still hasn't yet shown that he's got control of this squad.

Speaker 7 And I think that's always the question for Real Madrid managers coming in. It's never about is there enough talent here to do something.
It's never about

Speaker 7 is this squad capable of doing something. It's about how you can you can manage that.
And I think that in general, it's always been the question coming in with Xbox Alonso.

Speaker 7 In general, in recent years,

Speaker 7 the most successful managers have often been those who have been able to be a bit more hands-off, who've been willing to let those

Speaker 7 big personalities and talents express themselves with a bit less control. And the Alonso experiment is fascinating because he isn't like that.
He is going to be very much wanting it done his way.

Speaker 7 And so far, his way has been a bit less generous to Vinicius Jr. than the old way was.
It has been more about Killian and Bappa, who had a disappointing game last night as well.

Speaker 7 And there's just a bit of tension. about exactly what that looks like for Madrid.

Speaker 7 There's just a bit of, despite all the winning, despite being five points clear in their Liga, is the camp as happy as it could be? And I think that maybe these

Speaker 7 there are relatively few games in the season where they really get tested. And this is one of them.

Speaker 7 And maybe that's also part of the picture of a team not completely running in the same direction at the moment.

Speaker 5 Matthew says this referee just unknowingly made himself a hero of the pod with this decision. He should get a segment named after him.
This one is for the purest max. We are back.

Speaker 5 Yes, this is the fact that the penalty, well, it was a hand ball that that was given against Shua Mane from a Shobbers Life shot.

Speaker 5 Then the ref had to go to the screen because it was inside the box, not outside the box. And then he decided it wasn't a hand ball.

Speaker 5 Mark Clattenberg joined the comms to say he couldn't believe it was overturned, that Shuha Mane knew what he was doing. He was like 10 centimeters away.
Alan Shearer said it should be given.

Speaker 5 People have lost their minds. This, Johnny, was this the best moment of the game.

Speaker 3 Well, yeah, I mean,

Speaker 3 I like that the referee had the, I guess, the, he felt like he had the autonomy to be able to, so obviously the VAR has sent him to the screening, oh, I think this is inside the area.

Speaker 3 And, and he's like, oh, I don't think this is a handball.

Speaker 3 You know, it's like when someone sends you to the shops and, you know, to run some errands and you decide to take it upon yourself to, I don't know, get a few, get some salted peanuts and maybe a little can for the train home.

Speaker 3 It's one of those where

Speaker 3 I think

Speaker 3 we've despaired quite a bit about how the handball law has been applied. I think there was another one in the Slavia Arsenal game, which we might come to later.
Oh, we will.

Speaker 3 This felt like common sense, and I do hate that term, but this felt like common sense reigning finally.

Speaker 5 Yeah, how Clattenberg can say, honestly, that Schumanni knows what he's doing. I mean, he's so close.
Anyway, Istvan Kovacs will forever be whenever there is a good VAR decision.

Speaker 5 We will sing his name. Tom says, is there a pitch that can contain Mickey Van der Ven, Spurs 4, Copenhagen 0? And Barry, Mickey Van der Ven scored.

Speaker 5 It is a ridiculous goal. It is absolutely ludicrous.

Speaker 1 Now, I think Paolina deserves some credit for the assist Matt. First off the bat.

Speaker 1 It was him that robbed the ball from Mohamed El-Yunusi.

Speaker 1 gave the ball to Van der Veen and he kind of set off between two defenders at top speed, 0 to 60, as quick as Wesley Fulfana Lamborghini on the hard shoulder.

Speaker 1 Skipped around the third defender.

Speaker 1 This is all before the halfway line, then bursts between two more and has a crack from just, I think it was just outside the box or just inside.

Speaker 3 And boom, yeah, what a goal.

Speaker 1 And no one saw it coming, really. I don't know if he even saw it coming.

Speaker 1 It was like a cheat code or

Speaker 1 just this terrible charge upfield and um yeah

Speaker 5 he was obviously delighted with himself yeah i mean it's some finish you know after all that way you sort of think you have to score this like you just can't you can't not score this i'm trying to think nikki like it It's like, what is the best kind of goal?

Speaker 5 I mean, this is obviously a ludicrous question, but because there's something about the way the crowd, like the crescendo with the crowd, as every man he passes, and you know, like, it's just building and building to this moment.

Speaker 5 It's just, i i wonder if this is the best type of goal or maybe one that comes out of nowhere i don't know

Speaker 7 i think best type of goal is always going to be very subjective isn't it i've i've got a soft spot for a volley off the underside of the bar there's something about that satisfying thump of the ball off the underside of the bar that always feels feels good but i mean a coast to coast is is always magic and when it's a centre back it's it's even better isn't it because um

Speaker 7 I mean, gosh, it's a very long time since I played any football, let alone 11 aside football but a feeling when you are a defender and you start running and you suddenly see the pitch in front of you is like a bit open you think hang on go somewhere here never ended for me like it did for for um for Van der Venn let me tell you but um it's uh it's it was a brilliant brilliant goal I really liked um the way that that Joe Cole was framing it on um on the goals show for TNT just said it's why you go to watch a football game and it is right like that that is especially for those of us who watch a lot of football games

Speaker 7 those moments when someone just takes it onto their own shoulders and does something that's completely outside the frame of what they're trained to do every day, the systems and the structure that are so important to top-level football.

Speaker 7 It's just magic, isn't it? And

Speaker 7 it was a magic goal, would be a magic goal for a centre-forward, but the fact that it is not a centre-forward definitely makes it a bit better.

Speaker 1 Much of the criticism Thomas Frank has been shipping this season or since taking over from Spurs is that they're not entertaining anymore.

Speaker 1 I don't think Tottenham fans can have any complaints about that match last night because it was very entertaining. I mean,

Speaker 1 the fourth goal was superb as well, I thought. It looked for a moment like Christian Romero was going to say, hey, I want in on this action.
A counter-attack from a Copenhagen corner.

Speaker 1 That was a really good goal as well. Just a really fun game.
Very entertaining. Copenhagen didn't offer much in the way of opposition, but as they say, you can only beat what's in front of you.

Speaker 5 Yeah, I wonder what Andrew's thinking, seeing Vanderven and Romero up there. Look, it's where I know it is only Copenhagen, and you know,

Speaker 5 with all due respect to Copenhagen, Johnny, but there were signs. Javi Simmons had a good game, Kodo Mawani missed some chances, but looked like a good centre-forward.

Speaker 5 I suppose those are the things that, if you're a Thomas Frank, will give you hope after, you know, especially the weekend against Chelsea.

Speaker 3 Yeah, so I didn't, I didn't watch the Chelsea game live, I came to it later. So I saw the discourse first.
I saw lots of people saying this is the worst Spurs performance of the season.

Speaker 3 This is worse than anything they did last season. I saw some people saying it's the worst.
It's one of the worst Premier League performances of all time, certainly since they started measuring HD.

Speaker 3 And so I, but then, so I saw all that first, and I came to the performance and I actually watched it later. And I thought, well, this, it was obviously...

Speaker 3 horrifically bad, but it did also feel a little bit like

Speaker 3 a little bit of a freak show not something

Speaker 3 you know the the the the individual errors they're just sort of dribbling it into chelsea players it didn't feel like that was representative certainly of what i'd seen from spurs this season so it it almost felt like uh

Speaker 3 just uh just one of those horror shows where you know you say okay that was a that was a horror show let's let's draw a line under it now copenhagen are not chelsea right they're not um they're struggling in the in the danish super league they've been leaking goals they've they've been lacking a lot of confidence They've had a lot of injuries.

Speaker 3 And Spurs are a streaky sort of team. They're still, you know, again, as we see it at this point of the season, there are lots of teams that are still working things out.

Speaker 3 But that, I think, was a lot more representative of what Frank is trying to do there. I think he's, you know,

Speaker 3 there's been a little bit of talk about how Spurs are Spurs' league position is a little bit false, how the underlying numbers

Speaker 3 aren't quite matching up to what they're putting up in terms of results in the table. But that is the sort of

Speaker 3 performance that really just changes the mood and changes the narrative and changes the weather again. And

Speaker 3 just in terms of this competition,

Speaker 3 given the fact that the league table is going to be so tight and so many teams are going to be level on points,

Speaker 3 a big win like that is just really useful for goal difference. I think you're going to see teams that go out on goal difference or teams that make it through on goal difference.

Speaker 3 So again, from that aspect.

Speaker 5 Okay, that'll do for part one. Part two will begin with Arsenal's win in Prague.

Speaker 4 You've worked hard to build your business.

Speaker 5 Simply Safe helps you protect it.

Speaker 4 With Simply Safe for business, AI-powered cameras watch over your entry points and instantly alert live monitoring agents. They can deter intruders before they get inside.

Speaker 4 It's protection built for growing companies: 24-7 monitoring, no contracts, and a 60-day money-back guarantee. To get 60% off your new system, go to simply safe.com/slash podcast.

Speaker 4 That's simplysafe.com slash podcast for 60% off. There's no safe like SimplySafe.

Speaker 6 Is your business struggling to keep up? When the world moves fast, relying on yesterday's technology will slow you down.

Speaker 6 Ericsson powers your business with 5G and AI enterprise solutions.

Speaker 6 From local franchises to global companies, Ericsson helps businesses like yours to operate smoothly, stay protected, and keep growing every day. Speed up and stay ahead.

Speaker 6 Visit us at ericson.com/slash enterprise.

Speaker 5 Welcome to part two of the Guardian Football Weekly.

Speaker 5 Nikki, what more to say about Arsenal? You know, a comfortable win and a clean sheet. I mean, we're running out of things to say, and it's the 5th of November, so

Speaker 5 they need to do something different in the next few months, so we're really stuck.

Speaker 7 Well, I mean, I suppose the only place to go, Max, is after the in no way hyperbolic coverage I saw in the last week or so asking if the title race was already over.

Speaker 7 I suppose

Speaker 7 the only question to ask now is, is the Champions League already over?

Speaker 7 Already over, yes. Because Arsenal won another game without conceding.

Speaker 7 Yeah,

Speaker 7 there's been some, in my opinion, absolute nonsense that's been happening in the coverage in the last

Speaker 7 few weeks with people deciding that a season can end in November.

Speaker 7 But Arsenal are playing very, very solid football at the moment. And I do like understand,

Speaker 7 because I'm a fan myself, I do understand that feeling of like when you're a fan of anyone else and you're watching this team that looks like a juggernaut, you're like, just show us something, show us some crack of vulnerability.

Speaker 7 And right now, Arsenal aren't,

Speaker 7 I don't think Slavia Prague was ever particularly the place that they were likely to show that crack of vulnerability. It's not the place that you expect them to go and

Speaker 7 show some, but they certainly didn't and i think it's fair to say that there might have been past versions that might have have had a different night there going away from home the first little bit of the game was a little bit they were a little bit slow to come into the game i think it's it's an exaggeration to say it was a little bit wobbly because it wasn't really like they gave up any chances in that time particularly they just didn't immediately sweep uh sweep their opponents away they did need i don't know i i i think it is a penalty in the current rules but a very boring kind of penalty penalty, I suppose,

Speaker 7 to get the lead in the first half. But

Speaker 7 when you're this hard to score a goal against, and they are really stinking hard to score a goal against,

Speaker 7 it becomes a lot easier to win football matches. And when you've got...

Speaker 7 I think the other thing that's just big picture, even though everyone is probably bored of hearing about a set piece as well, another thing that is big picture, definitely a takeaway from this round is Liverpool obviously scored from a set piece against Real Madrid.

Speaker 7 And when you get into the underlying numbers, you see that actually Real Madrid,

Speaker 7 I think this is the athletic I saw in Real Madrid.

Speaker 7 If you look at how many chances they've given away from set pieces, if they were in the Premier League, they'd be like the third or fourth worst team at giving away chances from set pieces.

Speaker 7 So that's something that clearly they've targeted. It's something that clearly Arsenal target in every game.
And

Speaker 7 seeing a game like this against a team where you've got some absolute giants, I mean, the centre forward who's just like like towering over all your defenders and going away on a night like that where you think, well, you know where the quality is tilted in this matchup.

Speaker 7 You know Arsenal are team that have more quality in absolute terms because the money is with Arsenal. It's just the boring reality of football.

Speaker 7 But the fact that you go there and you're also the better team at set pieces feels like a shift from where they might have been in the past and in less successful chapters because they're dominating even the parts of the game that the lesser team might in the past have fancied itself of being able to control.

Speaker 7 But Arsenal were great. They even got to bring on Max Dauman and have him be the youngest

Speaker 7 to play in Champions League history. So

Speaker 7 pretty great night all around for Arteta and Arsenal, really, isn't it?

Speaker 5 Like we said, just show us something. I mean, you could at least let the opposition have a shot, is what I was thinking.

Speaker 5 Just one, just one shot for one team, one shot a month, the opposition get, don't they?

Speaker 1 They've won 10 in a row now. They've not conceded an eight.
They've scored 18 since they last conceded a goal. Yeah, Slavia Prague got a penalty.
penalty and Arsenal's players were furious.

Speaker 1 A, because it shouldn't have been a penalty, but they really don't want to concede a goal and the penalty was correctly overturned. But

Speaker 1 they just love keeping clean sheets. And sadly, that'll all come to a sorry end on Saturday when

Speaker 1 they have to go to Sunderland and Granite Jacka scores. against them as is written in the stars.

Speaker 7 Need to say again, even though everyone knows, I think, what he is for football, it's still great that Michel Marino is scoring two goals again and just being the guy

Speaker 7 when the guy who's meant to be the guy isn't there, right? He does keep doing it for someone who I think

Speaker 7 gets

Speaker 7 probably more flack than he deserves, given it's not like he's shown up there with some ego about himself saying, look, I'm supposed to be this guy. I think

Speaker 7 his contribution has still been absolutely brilliant.

Speaker 7 And exactly as Baz says, the thing that marks great teams apart sometimes is that furious competitiveness and Arsenal have it in absolute buckets, don't they?

Speaker 5 Yeah, um, PSG won by and two. Bayern, speaking of teams who are doing quite well, Johnny, have won all 16 of their games in all competitions so far.

Speaker 5 It doesn't seem far-fetched to say in that first half, because obviously the sending off of Louis Diaz changed things. In the first half, they sort of destroyed PSG, Johnny.

Speaker 3 Yeah, I mean,

Speaker 3 I thought it was the performance of the night, to be honest.

Speaker 3 And really, a performance of it was almost two great performances rather than one, because, yeah, the way they hunted PSG in the first half, and then after the sending off, after PSG, then pull one back.

Speaker 3 The absolute, you know, the rearguards,

Speaker 3 the clearances, the clearing of their lines. I thought Conrad Leimer at right back, who's

Speaker 3 normally a midfielder, but at right back was absolutely incredible. I thought Pamicano was fantastic.
And yeah, I mean, just

Speaker 3 in terms of PSG,

Speaker 3 they haven't been setting Ligon alight this season. They haven't been setting the Champions League alike this season.
And something does seem to be missing from last season. I know Dembele

Speaker 3 hasn't really been starting for them. He's been struggling with injuries.

Speaker 3 I think you see how crucial he was to the way, not just in terms of his goals, but his build-up. But it's also kind of the speed of pass and the speed of thought and

Speaker 3 that little flash of lightning that made them so devastating last season.

Speaker 3 Something is missing from there. And I think Bayern have really, you know,

Speaker 3 they managed to

Speaker 3 pick at those weaknesses. I thought, you know, know, did you see the second goal where basically Diaz takes it off Marquinhos? It was absolutely shambolic.
And, you know, Marquinhos.

Speaker 5 Well, I mean,

Speaker 5 you said speed of thought. It was like someone had accidentally unplugged Marquinhos.

Speaker 3 It was there for an hour.

Speaker 1 He was buffering.

Speaker 3 But he looks over his shoulder. I mean, I don't see any way he can't see Diaz coming.
I just think he can't get his feet in order.

Speaker 3 And, you know, I think that epitomised the difference between them last night.

Speaker 5 Barry, the Lewis Diaz red card, I thought it was soft. Producer Joel said it was a horror challenge.
Maybe I'm just a dinosaur. I don't know.
He does jump into it, but I don't know where you sit on

Speaker 5 that decision.

Speaker 1 I'd be somewhere in the middle. I thought it was nasty.
I think he jumped into it and he caught Hakimi like

Speaker 1 a scissors, basically, and seemed to squeeze to deliberately hurt him. And he has hurt him.

Speaker 1 Hakimi left the ground. on crutches wearing a plastic boot.
He was very upset when he had to go off.

Speaker 1 Obviously, he plays for Morocco the AFCON is in Morocco in December and he he had the air about him of a man who thought maybe the AFCON jig at home is up for him yeah it could be ligaments uh

Speaker 1 could be broken I don't know dr.

Speaker 5 Barry how many weeks you how many weeks are you giving him dr barry I'd say a couple of months yeah right

Speaker 1 but he might he might get lucky he might get lucky Okay, producer Joel says

Speaker 5 I edited out that he'd said it was very clumsy and the outcome is horrific, not the intent. And to be fair, I didn't see the outcome from the highline, the highlights that I had.

Speaker 5 It's a yellow, isn't it?

Speaker 3 It's a yellow, but exacerbated by the fact that it it was a quite a bad injury. And I think also exacerbated by him looking really upset about it.

Speaker 5 Yeah, I think so.

Speaker 5 I mean, we haven't really talked about Lewis Diaz at all, Nikki, in, you know, in when we talked about Bayern, because Kane is having a ridiculous season, because Elise has done so much.

Speaker 5 But he is a brilliant footballer, right? And we've talked about actually Liverpool missing him more than how he's benefited by Munich.

Speaker 7 Yeah, I think he's been really important to

Speaker 7 Bayern Munich at the start of this season. I think like as great at Kane is at leading the line, a little bit of

Speaker 7 control in that area behind the attack is really important.

Speaker 7 And I think that I've heard people talk about this with Bayern, that the moving on from Thomas Miller has been this protracted thing that's gone on and perhaps he's really helping with that

Speaker 7 area of the pitch and a little bit of leadership in that area of the pitch as well, to be honest.

Speaker 7 And yeah, he's having a strong start this season, Bayern having strong starts this season, and obviously, before he got sent off, he was having a great night last night as well.

Speaker 5 You've made one sporting one. You wanted to talk about Spoletti, Nikki.

Speaker 7 Yeah, well, it's just a fascinating moment, isn't it? Spoleti coming back in, obviously, got plenty to prove to people after a pretty dismal time in charge of the Italian national team ending,

Speaker 7 of course, with that absolute shellacking 3-0 by Norway.

Speaker 7 And

Speaker 7 I think I've had

Speaker 7 some reservations about how this was going to unfold because I think that there's a lot of much deeper issues at Juventus at this point

Speaker 7 than just the manager.

Speaker 7 And they certainly hadn't started the season well under Igo Tudor. And I think it's far, far too soon to draw any conclusions about Juventus.
They didn't win last night.

Speaker 7 Clearly, they drew as sporting, and both they and Napoli, who also drew last night, really are going to have to start winning some games at some point in this group because they really could get themselves in trouble and not make it through even to the out of the top 24 if they're not careful.

Speaker 7 But

Speaker 7 I have really liked some of the stuff that Spoletti's done so far. He started with Coop Miners at left centre-back again in this game, same as he had at the weekend.

Speaker 7 And I'm not sure if that's a long-term gambling, but Coop Miners did his best work for Atlanta as a midfielder who did a lot of running on for midfield to be behind the attack, is kind of one of the symbols of everything that's been done wrong at Juventa in the last couple of years because they spent a lot of money on players who, I mean, some of them aren't even there, like Douglas Lewis, who's a 50 million euro player who isn't even there.

Speaker 7 Obviously, like there's been players from the next-gen squad, they've like leave, like Gene Hoison who's gone to do better things, Hausen.

Speaker 7 And then you've got Koop Miners, who was signed for a lot of money and hasn't been good, hasn't left, but it just hasn't been good.

Speaker 7 Moving him to that left centre-back position, I thought, that's a bit out there, isn't it? But they won at the weekend.

Speaker 7 And afterwards, he said, part of why I've put him there, he said, he's played there for his national team before, so it's not completely out there.

Speaker 7 But part of why I've put him there is because I want to send the message to my players that we're not trying to draw these games.

Speaker 7 We're putting attacking players on the pitch because we intend to take the game to teams and try to win. And whether that's going to work, I don't know.

Speaker 7 But I do think it's an interestingly bold approach, especially for someone who, again, had such a bad time with Italy.

Speaker 7 He's come in trying to do something quite aggressive. And

Speaker 7 I'm, yeah,

Speaker 7 I'm going to enjoy watching it with Spiletti. He's always produced teams for fun to watch.
He's also always given incredibly chippy press conferences. I think it'll be an interesting chapter.

Speaker 5 Elsewhere last night, Athletic Union Sanja was 3-1. Monaco 1-1 and Abodo, Olympiakos 1, PSV-1.

Speaker 5 Napoli drew Nilnan with Aintrek Frankfurt. Bit of a shame that Einstretch Frankfurt, their 5-1 either way,

Speaker 5 record is over. Barry, Johnny, anything that piqued your interest for any of those games?

Speaker 1 Well, I thought

Speaker 1 Atletico were quite lucky to beat Union Saint-Jouis.

Speaker 1 They were 2-1 up.

Speaker 1 Louis Patrice had a brilliant opportunity to equalize for Union deep in injury time.

Speaker 1 Header, entire goal to aim at. He just couldn't get any power behind his header, put it straight into Oblack's hands.
The other thing that's and then Atletico went upfield and scored to make a 3-1.

Speaker 1 So Union could probably

Speaker 1 feel a bit hard done by there. Ross Sykes, formerly of Accrington Stanley,

Speaker 1 got to score Union's goal at the Wanda Metropolitana, which was probably a career highlight for him, one imagines, even though his team lost.

Speaker 1 And the other thing to take from that game is Antoine Griezmann's mullet is a thing of just quite extraordinary beauty. The The shag, the volume.

Speaker 1 He looks like he should be playing as a ruckman for Collingwood in the AFL.

Speaker 3 Just superb.

Speaker 1 Yes. I could never pull off a mullet.
Not many can. I've seen Johnny Lou pull one off before, but Griezmann's is a thing of extraordinary beauty.

Speaker 5 Barry, maybe you could grow a mullet for your half marathon.

Speaker 5 I mean, I guess it could slow you down a tiny bit. and like we don't need any that we don't need any

Speaker 5 air any more air resistance.

Speaker 5 Our commentator that I was watching called Ross Sykes Big Man Sykes. And for a small moment, I just thought he had been christened big man Sykes.

Speaker 5 And then to turn into such an enormous man, I was utterly delighted. Napoli, nil, Eintrech, nil.

Speaker 5 I mean, it's interesting after Napoli was thrashed by PSV, wasn't it, in the last round, that they didn't get a victory in this one. And, you know, Conte's terrible record in Europe, Mickey.

Speaker 7 It gets to a point where

Speaker 7 it's almost hard to explain quite why Conte's teams are so consistently bad in Europe. It's not like

Speaker 7 it's

Speaker 7 been a year or two or a moment. It's like a decade of just consistently different clubs managing to not produce anything like the same football in Europe as they do domestically.

Speaker 7 And this was such a frustrating watch. Because Frankfurt,

Speaker 7 you alluded to the five ones either way in the Champions League max. I think they'd conceded 11 goals in their first three Champions League games.

Speaker 7 They'd conceded 19 goals in their first nine Bundesliga games. They are not a good team defensively.
They're a team that's got some things going for them going forwards.

Speaker 7 They're a team that can attack you, but they are not a good team defensively.

Speaker 7 And the fact that Napoli, really until a final, left it too late, throw everything at the wall, push when they could have scored.

Speaker 7 And McTominay probably should have scored later on, they really didn't look to exploit that at all.

Speaker 7 It's hard to explain. Napoli are definitely imperfect.
They are, I would say, behind where they were last season.

Speaker 7 There was a lot of talk when De Bruyne got injured that maybe they'll get back to where they were last season because now McTominay can move back inside and he has been so much the heart of the team over the last year or so.

Speaker 7 I think that people have maybe underestimated that De Bruyne, even though the dynamic between them wasn't perfect, was helping create scoring chances in the first part of the season.

Speaker 7 So I think people may have underestimated that.

Speaker 7 I haven't got all the numbers in front of me right now for quite how disappointing Conte's European record is, but it's something else when you look into it, when you look at the clubs he's had and the results, they are really hard to explain quite how poor they've been.

Speaker 7 And I think Napoli are in serious danger in this group, more than Juventus, of finding a way to stuff it up.

Speaker 5 All right, that'll do for part two. Part three, we'll begin with the draw between Sunderland and Everton on Monday night.

Speaker 2 When you're a forward thinker, you don't just bring your A game, you bring your AI game.

Speaker 2 Workday is the AI platform that transforms the way you manage your people, money, and agents so you can transform tomorrow.

Speaker 4 Workday, moving business forever forward.

Speaker 8 Are you noticing your car insurance rate creep up even without tickets or claims?

Speaker 3 You're not alone.

Speaker 8 That's why there's Jerry, your proactive insurance assistant. Jerry handles the legwork by comparing quotes side by side from over 50 top insurers so you can confidently hit buy.

Speaker 8 No spam calls, no hidden fees. Jerry even tracks rates and alerts you when it's best to shop.
Drivers who save with Jerry could save over $1,300 a year. Don't settle for higher rates.

Speaker 8 Download the Jerry app or visit jerry.ai/slashacast today.

Speaker 5 Welcome to part three of the Guardian Football Weekly. Barry, you've predicted a comfortable win for your mob against Everton.
It was a draw in the end.

Speaker 5 It was full of robust challenges, kind of what you'd expect from Sunderland Everton, I think.

Speaker 1 Yeah, it was a weird game. Sunderland started really, really badly.
As bad as I've seen them this season,

Speaker 1 could not hold on to the ball, kept giving it away. Iliman Njai

Speaker 1 scored a lovely solo goal to put Everton in front.

Speaker 1 They missed a couple of excellent chances to extend their lead. Jack Realish hit the post with a shot from outside the area.

Speaker 1 Tierna O'Barry missed an absolute sitter on the 28-minute mark, and that just sparked a complete turnaround that miss.

Speaker 1 And Sunderland dominated from then on, equalised just after half-time with a slightly fortunate, well, a very fortuitous Granite Jack

Speaker 1 shot that took a horrific deflection that completely wrong-footed Jordan Pickford. I think he'd probably have saved it otherwise.
And then it was all Sunderland for the second half, really.

Speaker 1 I think they had 16 shots after that. Tierra Barry miss.
And probably should have won, I think. But point is all right considering how bad they were in the first half hour.

Speaker 1 They welcome Arsenal to the stadium alight on Saturday. And I don't think people are expecting it to be the...

Speaker 1 straightforward Arsenal win they might have a couple of months ago when they were looking at the fixture list but Arsenal may well be too good for them. Everton are a funny team.

Speaker 1 I've said this repeatedly.

Speaker 1 They're a half-decent striker away from being a half-decent team, but the two they have, Betto and Barry, are hopeless. They have a goal between them this season.
And

Speaker 1 unless one of them starts firing, I'd still worry for Everton because

Speaker 1 they're just awful.

Speaker 5 They're so bad.

Speaker 1 The chances they miss.

Speaker 5 Poor Barry. Poor Barry.

Speaker 5 What do you make of Everton, Johnny?

Speaker 3 Yeah, well, it's almost like, you know, they have a really solid back five, and then

Speaker 3 they've added some flair in the middle with likes of Dewsby Hall and Grealish. And you have NDI, who's, I think, you know, a really, really top player.

Speaker 3 And then they get into the final third, and it's like, oh, gosh, what do we do now?

Speaker 3 it's like, you know, it's like, um, you know, they've spent so much time working on how to progress the ball.

Speaker 3 And once, once it, once it gets into the final third, you know, I do, I think Barry has a lot of potential to him. You know, it did really well in La Liga last season.
Beto is Beto.

Speaker 3 He's, you know, he's a very Everton striker, a guy who will score maybe one legendary goal that everybody remembers in about 28 games. You know, he's going to end up with

Speaker 3 an Everton record of about 13 goals and 112 appearances, 74 as substitute.

Speaker 3 That sort of record.

Speaker 3 Yeah, I think

Speaker 3 slightly worrying

Speaker 3 how little ambition they showed on Monday night, I thought.

Speaker 3 Especially after they scored the goal, they just sat back.

Speaker 3 I know Sunderland have been good this season.

Speaker 3 It's also a mark of

Speaker 3 how much respect Everton paid them,

Speaker 3 that they showed that they could actually control a game in which they had the ball

Speaker 3 rather than simply sitting tight and trying to hit on the break. They were the ones who were having to make the running.

Speaker 3 And I thought that that showed a side of Sunderland that maybe we haven't seen so much from them this season.

Speaker 5 A mate of mine, Tom, who's a Sunderland fan, messaged me to say, Does this mean we're a proper established mid-table Premier League club again?

Speaker 5 On the fact that Sunderland have formally written to the Premier League and PGMOL seeking clarification as to why they were not awarded a penalty in last night's one-all draw with Everton.

Speaker 5 Sunderland are keen to hear more on both the on-field decision and the VAR rationale, which determined no offence occurred or no further review from the referee Thomas Brammel was required after Michael Keene's handball in the 73rd minute.

Speaker 5 Give me strength, world.

Speaker 5 Not quite enough AI, I think.

Speaker 3 It needs to be a little bit more AI, and then they can call themselves solid mid-table Premier League stalwarts.

Speaker 1 I mean, I have no complaints over that. It was a McCleary cross that hit Michael Keene's outstretched hand.

Speaker 1 No big deep problem with it not being given as a penalty, but

Speaker 1 they are often given as penalties.

Speaker 3 But again,

Speaker 1 you know, we're discussing the handball law again in a podcast, and this is a second. Where's the consistency? Where's the consistency?

Speaker 3 All you want is the consistency in a sport where no two situations ever replicate.

Speaker 1 Well, we want consistency and we want common sense, but you can't have both.

Speaker 3 So

Speaker 1 just cherry-pick whichever you want as it suits you.

Speaker 5 Wolves wanted Gary O'Neill, and they can't have him because they went to talk to him over the weekend. And on Monday, before he pulled out, he was finalising his backroom staff.

Speaker 5 Club felt he was the ideal candidate to galvanise the squad.

Speaker 5 The fans definitely didn't. Wolves have maintained dialogue with other candidates.
There was a belief that O'Neill would take charge this week.

Speaker 5 No clear reason why he had a change of heart, unless he logged into social media, I guess.

Speaker 1 I'd say that might have had something to do with it.

Speaker 1 There is talk that he wanted a longer contract than they were prepared to offer offer him but i imagine having seen what happened to russell martin at rangers and and at forest he probably went nah i don't fancy that uh and i think if he had taken the job his first game is away at chelsea i think

Speaker 5 so he's already on the back foot before ball's even been kicked you'd imagine don't know who the next i heard somewhere that uh well it says here that eric ten hag at five to two and rob edwards at three to one i did see somewhere that Sam Allardyce was the favourite.

Speaker 5 And I was like, yeah, I'll definitely take that. I'll take that.
Why not? Now, Johnny, you want to talk about Mary Earps.

Speaker 5 An extract from her book featuring The Guardian on Friday drew a lot of attention.

Speaker 5 She says she protested to Serena Viegman that bad behavior was being rewarded when rival goalkeeper Hannah Hampton was restored to the England side.

Speaker 5 It was interesting to chat about this on the Guardian Women's Football Weekly. So download that wherever you get your podcast.
But you wanted to talk about that situation more broadly, about

Speaker 5 sort of what this means for how women's football is covered.

Speaker 3 Yeah, so I mean, yeah, obviously, like Faye, Faye Susie, and Sophie covered it, you know, the substance of what Earp said, you know, really well on the women's pod this week.

Speaker 3 I think it's quite interesting. It's a bit like, you know, when

Speaker 3 two players start squaring up on the pitch and everyone, you know, starts clutching their pearls and shaking their, I know, nobody wants to see that. And secretly, everybody does want to see that.

Speaker 3 I think

Speaker 3 one of the really interesting things this has shown about, i think women's football discourse and coverage is that the extent to which this this sport i think a lot more than men's football is is dependent on on reputation and pr where you're almost having to to build a personal brand uh at the same time as you're trying to build a a playing identity and a football career in a team sport.

Speaker 3 You know, we see this so often where individual players become, you know they they get elevated into you know this this huge stature overnight which which is basically what happened to her she got she got thrust into the limelight really really uh you know from from nowhere almost uh winning you know bbc sports personality and and being on the front page and all of that and i don't think anything

Speaker 3 certainly in women's football prepares you for for that kind of for that kind of elevation and the fact that it's it is by definition transitory, right?

Speaker 3 I don't know, you know, I don't know the details of Mary Oakes's personal finance, but I'd say she's not set up for life. And she knows that this is a very, very narrow window.
Unlike men's players,

Speaker 3 you're not owning millions and millions of pounds and you are struggling for attention

Speaker 3 in a very competitive attention economy. And I think that the pressures that we put women's players under to absolutely milk every last drop of capital and

Speaker 3 cultural clout and attention and the way

Speaker 3 we demand them to

Speaker 3 sell themselves and build their brand and sell their bodies almost is uh I think it's it's something it's a part of of women's football that is very very different from from men's football and I think it's in many ways quite exploitative a game that I think ultimately doesn't doesn't really benefit anyone except the the people getting content out of it uh so I don't want to comment too too much on on the the rights and wrongs of what Earp said about Hampton and whatever and the details of that but I think the the way that that that discourse has been shaped and I think the toxicity of a lot of it,

Speaker 3 I think it says a lot about the attention economy of women's football and the way people follow it.

Speaker 5 The cameras,

Speaker 5 she wrote the stuff, didn't she? But do you think she's under pressure?

Speaker 5 She's playing because she understands, right?

Speaker 5 If you, you know, we all know that if you write a football book and you say, I think, I don't like them, I don't like them, I don't like them, you'll sell more books than I thought everyone was lovely to play with.

Speaker 5 And we all had a few bust-ups, but that's what happens.

Speaker 7 Yeah, no, she's playing this game she she's i'm not certain that it is true that everyone understands that max and i think that's that's like an easy thing to say when we sit here and and cover it every day and and do all this but the assumption that all footballers um women all men are fully understanding of the media environment i think is is is unrealistic and i think you could even point to just your last night a slightly terse exchange between Wayne Rooney and Van Dyke in the post-game interview for Liverpool's win.

Speaker 7 For I think even someone who's been at the centre as much of the men's football world as Rooney was, perhaps not quite realising how his podcast was going to get listened to and responded to by real footballers, which

Speaker 7 and real footballers, I mean current footballers, I don't know why I use the word real there.

Speaker 7 I think it's actually... in that set that part of it is if anything is

Speaker 7 like quite a repetitive scene that you see footballers will spend their time as professionals lamenting how ex-pros talk about them. Then as soon as they become ex-pros, they do the same thing.

Speaker 7 It's like a pattern that goes on and on.

Speaker 3 I think

Speaker 7 I agree to bring back to Johnny's point. I agree

Speaker 7 the nature of women's football, because it doesn't get the same amount of coverage, doesn't get the same amount of eyeballs on it all the time, means that your career is distilled so much more down into those moments when the world is watching.

Speaker 7 And of course, big international moments,

Speaker 7 tournaments are those moments when the world is watching which is why as as johnny was saying um herbs really shot into uh

Speaker 7 because she didn't come from nowhere actually she played really well for a really long time but what johnny means is in the public perception for a lot of people who don't pay attention to that she she shot into public consciousness very quickly and i don't think it's completely alien and unrelated to what can happen in in men's football but I just think it's so much more intense

Speaker 7 because sadly still, the amount of time that

Speaker 7 most football fans are,

Speaker 7 I don't know, maybe the most is the wrong way of putting it, but the time when you have a huge audience is smaller than it is for the men, is the reality of it.

Speaker 7 The men have a huge audience at the top level all the time, whereas women only get it. for those big events.
And so

Speaker 7 your window is much more, is much shorter and much more intense. And I think that Johnny said all the rest of it very well, so I need to repeat it.

Speaker 5 On to another business on the subject of benches and the most expensive bench.

Speaker 5 And producer Joel was trying to think of the most expensive bench of footballers, and I was just trying to think of the most expensive bench.

Speaker 5 And we found one on the Hudson River, not in the river, but near it, in a park that was very expensive. Sean Bon Jovi says, has sent me this.

Speaker 5 Scarborough Station is home to a grade two listed bench, said to be the longest bench in the world. It seats 239 people.
He says it's basically priceless.

Speaker 5 So thank you for that.

Speaker 5 And many people got in touch on this subject. Brad said, Will Max and Baz be seeking a return of a favor from the mayor-elect of New York?

Speaker 5 Clearly, the endorsement of Max and Baz via Football Weekly in September paid dividends for Zora Mamdami. Tom says Zora Mamdami won the election.
Yeah. He did following his Football Weekly exposure.

Speaker 3 That's how I discovered it.

Speaker 5 Who are you electing next and where? It's another one, Barry, isn't it? You know, you come on this podcast, you get elected.

Speaker 1 Yeah, well, I hope he does a better job than than the last man we got elected. Up your game, Keir.

Speaker 5 Um, uh, look, it's not talk politics. Uh, for more on if you need any more reaction to uh, the New York Mayor race, go to Today and Focus.

Speaker 5 But I think we pretty much covered it in all the detail you need just there. Uh, but whatever it is, more proof that this podcast runs the world.
Uh, and that'll do for today. Thanks, everybody.

Speaker 5 Thank you, Johnny.

Speaker 3 Thanks, thanks, Nikki.

Speaker 7 Thanks, Fizz Baz.

Speaker 5 Thank you. Further Weekly is produced by Joel Grove.
Our executive producer is Phil Maynard.

Speaker 1 This is The Guardian.

Speaker 9 If you're a maintenance supervisor at a manufacturing facility and your machinery isn't working right, Granger knows you need to understand what's wrong as soon as possible.

Speaker 9 So when a conveyor motor falters, Granger offers diagnostic tools like calibration kits and multimeters to help you identify and fix the problem.

Speaker 9 With Granger, you can be confident you have everything you need to keep your facility running smoothly. Call 1-800GRANGER, clickgranger.com, or just stop by.

Speaker 3 Granger for the ones who get it done.

Speaker 6 Is your business struggling to keep up? When the world moves fast, relying on yesterday's technology will slow you down.

Speaker 6 Ericsson powers your business with 5G and AI enterprise solutions.

Speaker 6 From local franchises to global companies, Ericsson helps businesses like yours to operate smoothly, stay protected, and keep growing every day. Speed up and stay ahead.

Speaker 6 Visit us at ericsson.com/slash enterprise.