Bugle 272 – WORLD CUP!

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The Bugle, audio newspaper for a visual world.

Hello, Buglers, and welcome to issue 272 of the Bugle audio newspaper for an unapologetically visual world with me, Andy Zoltzman, live in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

I am heading back home in an hour.

I just had to come out here to pick my kids up.

That is the last time I tell them not to come home until they found one of the two largest Jesus statues in the world.

Particularly as the one in Rio isn't even top two anymore.

Equal third off of the Poles whacked up a 34-metre Messiah a couple of years ago.

Pair of losers.

My kids, that is, not the Jesuses.

Two of them, though, were.

One did the tricks, one told the stories.

Anyway, and joining me from Rio de Janeiro.

Well, from New York, same ocean, basically same continent, different hemisphere.

It's John Oliver.

Hello, Andy.

Hello, buglers.

Quick story.

No, there are no stories.

There can be no opening stories this week, Andy.

Nothing else is relevant.

Top story this week.

World Cup.

World Cup.

It's the f ⁇ ing World Cup.

Oh.

World Cup, Andy.

World Cup, John.

World Cup.

World Cup.

The World Cup is here.

Hamlet's last words, Andy, were...

The rest is silence.

And I presume that what Shakespeare meant was that everything other than the World Cup is silence in other words everything other than the World Cup is pointless.

Hamlet was so excited Andy he just died of joy thinking about future World Cups.

That's what I took from the end of that play.

The World Cup is nature's anesthetic Andy.

Nothing's going to hurt for the next few weeks until England get knocked out and it's over and then everything is going to be pain.

Everything.

Pain everywhere.

There are so many benefits.

to the World Cup, non-to the host nation financially, but that's not the point.

There are much bigger considerations than that.

I was thinking this morning and I realized that for me so much of what I know about the human body Andy is learned in the run-up to the World Cup from medical reports on players the only reason that I and most people in England know what a metatarsal is is that David Beckham broke one in his foot in 2002 and the whole nation decided to learn more about the human foot and what I learned then has actually stayed with me I learned that the human foot has five metatarsals and the worst one to break is the fifth one and if you break the second one like David did you'll be out for four to six weeks that's what I know

and this happened again as I've indirectly received secondhand knowledge this week about malaria pills because the England team are going to be playing in the Amazon

middle of the Amazon rainforest for no clear practical reason whatsoever and There have been in-depth reports all week in the English papers pointing out that the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine have prescribed malarone for the 23-man plane school of 49 additional traveling backroom and administrative staff.

And the England team apparently were given their first pill at breakfast on Tuesday, Andy.

That is just good coaching.

Before a meal, you take it, don't take it on an empty stomach.

Good new, great start to the World Cup, Andy.

They took those malaria pills very effectively as a unit.

I can testify to how difficult malaria pills can be from when I went to

India and I could not for the life of me get the mosquitoes to eat them.

I mean a lot of those pills are actually considerably bigger than an actual mosquito.

I mean what are you supposed to do?

Chop it up.

It led to a spectacular statement from the England manager Roy Hodgson who said to reassure people the bottom line is it's better to have stomach cramps than have someone contract malaria.

True Roy.

True.

Do you know what?

That's again that's good coaching Andy because that is true.

Stomach cramps is better than malaria.

He's got that written up on a whiteboard with little magnets and arrows everywhere.

He's the philosopher king of English football.

So, well,

it's a World Cup special.

As always, some sections of the bugle going straight in the bin this week in the World Cup special.

A number of sections in the bin, including a commemorative supplement detailing the World Cup's greatest nil-nil draws, chosen and explained by the legendarily defensive Italian tactical genius Gian Luigi Plottigrozzzi, who evolved the Italian Catonaccio defensive tactic into the even more defensive Dogonaccio and led small-town ASC

Blogromio to the 1974 Scudato title without conceding or scoring a single goal, still viewed as the high point in the history of Italian football.

Also in the bin, a where were you when section, celebrities tell us where they were, when great World Cup moments happened, including Marlon Brando,

where was he when Brazil scored their legendary fourth goal in the 4-1 final win against Italy in 1970?

Marlon says, I was on the Italian bench getting into character for the Godfather movies.

Don Corleone started off as a left-sided midfielder in the Italian leagues.

We talk to Red Rum.

Where was he when Cruyff pulled off the Crif turn in 1974?

Turns out he was standing in a field eating some grass.

And we speak to David Seaman, England's goalkeeper, and ask him, where the f ⁇ was he when Ronald Diño stuck one over his head from 40 yards in 2000.

2002.

Clearly, he has no f ⁇ ing recollection because he wasn't paying attention at the time.

Also in the bin, a Where Are They Now section, we catch up with heroes of past World Cups, including the winning goalscorer from 2010, Andres Iniesta.

Where is he now?

He's still a footballer.

England squad player, James Milner, also started into.

He's also still a footballer.

And the US Ford, Climp Dempsey, still a footballer.

And from 1930, Pablo Dorado, the Uruguayan goal scorer, the first goal in the final.

Where is he now?

He's dead.

Juan Bataso, the Argentinian goalkeeper in that game, also dead.

And Burt Pattenord, America's star striker, six goals in four games, dead.

All those sections in the bin.

There have been calls all this week for the head of FIFA, Seth Blatter, to resign.

Even UEFA said that he should go at the end of this year.

But

look, it's the World Cup, Andy.

He's not going anywhere, and not this World Cup or probably any f ⁇ ing World Cup.

And he said he was angered by the calls for him to leave saying this was the most disrespectful disrespectful thing I've ever experienced in my entire life and that's probably true Andy because he's never been subjected to himself so unfortunately he's removed that barometer of painful judgment from himself well he was uh he was uh

subjected to you this week you gave him uh proper judgment

slap down on your tv show i didn't say he should resign i just said that he should i don't think i i think i just imply that he should just leave everything earth but he should just go away just leave go and go and live in a hole well it is one of the big questions on everyone's lips in Brazil this week had Set Blatter gone into politics instead of sports administration would the world still exist

don't think so no I'm not saying he would definitely have nuked the world but I am saying that he might plausibly have nuked nuked the world now

but it's certainly true that God as the Bible tells us gave the world light so that we may see he gave the world plants and fruits and shit like that so we might eat.

Fish and birds and animals so that we might have stuff to shoot for fun.

And he gave the world sports administrators so that we might get thoroughly fked off at the needless ruination of our favourite form of recreation.

And he specifically gave the world set blatter to show that he is merciful.

For instead of because we got set blatter the sports administrator rather than set blatter, the 1970s death plot.

He said some extraordinary things, talking about the storm against FIFA relating to the Qatar World Cup.

I think you've clearly stung him, John.

He said, there is a sort of storm against FIFA relating to the Qatar World Cup.

Sadly, there is a great deal of discrimination and racism.

Now, if by this he means racism against the race of dodgy 78-year-old white men who have clung to power at the head of a highly questionable global organisation amidst the pervasive stench of corruption, then yes, I guess there is a slight hint of that kind of racism.

And if it's discriminating against obviously corrupt votes about where sporting events are held, then again, I guess we do have some discrimination on our hands.

But by playing a race card, John, Blatter seems to be casting himself as a kind of 21st century Martin Luther King.

I have a dream that the world's biggest sporting event can be held in a tiny country that is a cross between an oven and a sandpit.

I have a dream that footballers will one day compete in a competition where they will be judged not by the quality of their skills or by the vision of their play or their ability to go box to box for the full 90 and do a job for the team, but by their capacity to run around in 50 degree heat for an hour and a half without dropping dead too often.

I have a dream today!

Hero John, one of the great men.

Overall though, has Set Blatter done any good for the game of football over all the years he's been involved?

Well, was Joan of Arc wearing a pretty dress at her execution?

By which I mean it was very hard to tell by the end, given what had gone on since she started being executed.

Just tended to overshadow everything else.

You said that awarding the World Cup to Qatar, as FIFA did so controversially and,

well, let's say dubiously, you compared it to the Super Bowl being in a lake.

Yep.

I compared it

to the World Snooker Final being held at the bottom of the Marianas Trench in the Pacific Ocean.

The deepest point of the world's oceans conditions completely inappropriate.

The cloth gets damp.

The balls don't run fast enough.

It's really hard to get a good lighting rig down there, so you'll probably be playing in the dark.

Tourists are put off by the inhospitable conditions.

And more importantly, there's just no culture of snooker there.

The locals don't even give a shit about it.

You did yours

on a TV show in the States.

I did mine at an Edinburgh preview in Windsor to an audience of five people, John.

Five people saw my joke.

That's where we belong, Andy.

Yeah.

That's where we belong.

It's just, I'm temporarily inconvenienced by television.

I'll be back in Windsor in front of five people.

And, well, of course, 10 years ago, as we've talked about before, we had four people at an Edinburgh preview the

day couldn't lost.

We've talked about 100% walkout there.

I had five.

And bearing in mind, when we had four, that was two of us.

So my crowds have gone up by, well, that's like 150%.

That's like two and a half times the crowd I was getting 10 years ago.

Whereas, I mean, do you know, I don't know if you get figures for how many people switched off your television show while it was on.

John, I'd imagine many more than four.

So you're actually hemorrhaging audience members far faster than you used to.

Much more.

Whereas whereas my audience is growing so you know i don't think people are turning up to your gig uh before angrily screaming i thought game of thrones was on and then

and then going into a different room instead so

it's different you know horses for courses that's right

as a french restaurateur would say in term

in terms of uh trying to explain exactly the power of the World Cup.

It's the World Cup, by the way, Andy.

Oh, it's the World Cup.

The World Cup.

Yes, the World Cup's happening.

It's been a bit overshadowed here because also on this day, one of the most hype sporting events in recent history, the first day of the England versus Sri Lanka Test Series has begun.

Yeah, that's going to get overshadowed because it's also the World Cup.

I don't know if you've heard that.

In Thailand, they of course had a military coup, the ruling junter or junta.

They've realised they need to pacify the population, so they've ordered TV regulators to ensure that football fans will not pay to watch any matches at the World Cup.

That is going to work.

The military said it's all part of their quote-unquote happiness campaign,

which has seen a number of policy gimmicks, such as free haircuts and concerts.

Look, it's nice to have a free haircut handy, and you know, concerts are fun on a case-by-case basis, but the World Cup business is high-quality huntering.

Here's a little bit of World Cup history, John.

Famously, in 1966, the World Cup trophy was stolen and it was recovered by a dog called Pickles.

And he found it in a hedge about half a mile from where I live and about a mile from where you used to live in

South London.

I can still feel that doggy trophy finding magic in the air in South London.

That heroic doggy saved the World Cup.

Without him, John, all those famous photographs of England captain Bobby Moore holding up the trophy after beating the Germans would instead have been pictures of Bobby Moore holding up a large marrow with the words World Cup written on it in marker pen, mouthing, is this the f ⁇ ing best you could do?

You've had weeks to make a new one.

Pickles, tragically, died the following year in 1967, according to Wikipedia, quotes, when he choked on his leash whilst chasing a cat.

Now that's...

That is an obvious cover story, isn't it?

He choked on a leash, chasing a cat.

That was autoerotic asphyxiation.

Clearly, Pickles the dog could not handle the fame and the glamour.

He was, of course, Britain's biggest celebri pooch for a while, romantically linked in the papers with a string of celebrity girlfriends, Petra, the dog from the hit kids TV show, Blue Peter, the Queen's favourite corgi at the time, Heather.

Paul McCartney's dog, a poodle called Ethel Weisenstein.

I don't know why McCartney always gave his dog Jewish names.

Also linked with pop star Lulu and with Chi Chi, the giant panda from London Zoo.

But when the tournament was over and the celebrity appearances dried up, poor old Pickle struggled to come to terms with normality and he turned to increasingly high-risk solo sex games just to keep his tail wagging at all.

It's inevitable, really.

There's always victims.

So a special feature for our World Cup special is a Bugle World Cup Q ⁇ A.

Thank you to those of you who tweeted in your questions in what turned out to be about a 15-minute window of opportunity.

I thought we might need a few hours to get enough questions to make this work.

Within 10 minutes of me posting the tweet, we had an absolute deluge of questions of a frankly heroic range of qualities.

So

let's get cracking, John, and both you and me, of course, essentially professional football pundits.

So let's shed some light to those buglers who maybe aren't quite as touched by the glory of football.

This question came in from Nick Bryan, who asks can it really be a coincidence that the World Cup slightly resembles a hand cupping a testicle?

Well of course it's not a coincidence Andy that is that's how it was designed that's how it was modelled.

In fact that's an actual hand and an actual testicle cast in gold.

It was a man cupped his own testicles

put molten gold over it.

It set and the man died obviously like goldfinger style.

We've all been

it was cut loose and that's what the greatest athletes of today, or the greatest underwear models in the world, as they're now known.

That's what they hold up over their heads.

A man's actual hand cupping his actual testicles.

World Cup.

I think there can be no more appropriate symbol than the hand cupping the testicle for the World Cup.

It shows it's a kind of medical check.

for humanity.

It's football checking that we are okay every four years.

It's an assertion of both masculinity and virility, but also the need for coming together to help each other through our problems.

And of course this trophy dates back to 1974.

The original trophy, the Jules Rimet trophy discovered in the hedge by the late great Pickles the dog,

was kept by Brazil in 1970.

They beat Italy in the final, whichever team had won that would have won it for the third time and got to keep the Jules Rumet trophy.

Italy, if I may slightly contradict your fact about the origin of this trophy, Italy has losing finalists

their runners-up prize was to design the new trophy, and so they designed it on the classic Italian nut grab.

So that's the origin of that.

There's another question here from Nick Cheney who says, what is the biggest animal that Lionel Messi could throw over a crossbar?

It's a good question.

Very few pundits are prepared to address this question head-on.

They mostly...

you know, talk about if he's going to really replicate his club form in an Argentina shirt.

But, you know, I mean, I think that might have have distracted him in the last World Cup, this unresolved question over what size of an animal he can throw over a crossbar.

Now, the interesting question here,

the thing is, Lionel Messi has incredible control, and as anyone who's seen him play, will know that any object in the air near his foot is kind of magnetically attracted to to his boot.

So actually small animals he could not throw over a crossbar because they just all end up stuck on his foot.

So the actual question should be, what is the smallest, the smallest animal that Messi could throw over a crossbow?

Well the answer is a seal, an adolescent seal.

There's another good question regarding America, Andy, a land that I love,

saying

what positives can the U.S.

take away from this World Cup?

I would say that there's honor in unremitting defeats.

I think that's...

When you stare into the void, sometimes there's something interesting the other side.

It's not going to be a good World Cup for America, Andy.

It's good to be if you judge a World Cup on number of wins.

it's good to take the positives before you've even had the defeats.

I think that's an important thing.

Thing to do, another question on a similar subject from Matthew Broader said, U.S.

coach Jürgen Klinsman wants to play, quote, an American style of football.

What would that look like?

And would jet skis be involved?

Smash-mouth football, Andy.

That's what it's going to look like.

It's going to look like using your body as a human missile and slamming your head into someone's chest.

I mean, Zidan did it first, but the Americans are going to do it harder.

It's just basically picking up where the Dutch left off in the last World Cup final.

Four years ago, led of course by the midfield monster Mark Van Bommel who if we may take you back into the Bugle archives of course kept a diary after he sadly had to retire from football.

Today I woke up.

I excitedly looked in the mirror but my hopes were swiftly dashed when I was still clearly Mark Van Bommel.

I kicked my base and then raked my studs down the side of my bathtub.

I then brushed my teeth with my new electronic toothbrush which I had specially made.

It has little replica football boot on the end and when you switch it on the boot repeatedly kicks your teeth and gums until they're clean.

Helped me psych up for the day ahead.

I went downstairs for breakfast scithing my two-year-old daughter down as I went before running away before my wife could tell me off.

I walked into the kitchen, elbowed the coffee machine right on its cappuccino frother.

That had to hurt.

Then poured some cornflakes into a bowl.

I put the bowl on the floor, then clattered into it from behind, studs raised, shattering the bowl and sending the cornflakes flying all over the kitchen floor.

Yum, I said to myself, the perfect breakfast.

Darling, I shouted to my wife, I'll just take the dog for a walk.

I wouldn't do that, replied my wife, a little angrily.

He snapped two Achilles' tendons and did his knee ligaments after you walked him yesterday.

Come on, I hit back.

I was going for the ball.

Rover hobbled past me, growling.

F you, I muttered at him, surreptitiously treading with my full weight on his banded spring left paw.

I'm Mark Van Bommel.

This is a very interesting question,

John, and I know

your wife is

in the medical profession, so she might be able to help with this.

From Will Davis, who says, the mere mention of sport of any kind makes me ejaculate exactly one pint of blood.

Okay.

What can I do to survive the World Cup?

I mean, you've got to.

You don't hate to go full vampire in this.

You need to drink a lot of blood.

It doesn't sound great,

but you have to do it.

I mean, pomegranate juice is close to blood, so I'd go with that.

Right, not actual human blood.

I mean, look, if you want to be absolutely

potato, isn't it?

I hate that.

That's right.

Well, I mean, it's very interesting you should touch on this because there was a report in a British newspaper recently that there are 15,000 active vampires alive in Britain today.

This is discovered by a man doing some university research into vampires.

15,000, John, which means that statistically there simply must be at least one Premiership footballer who is a vampire, but will any of them have the courage to come out and say they're vampires in public?

I'm just not sure football is quite ready for that yet.

And a lot of it's been blamed on the prevalence of vampire TV series,

Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

I preferred Buffy the Vampire Prosecutor when she went through the proper legal channels.

There's a question here from Joe Carlos who says, if England ever do win the World Cup again, will the universe self-destruct?

I don't know what I'll do Andy if England win the World Cup I don't I just I just don't know what I'll do well I mean you'd be basically running around New York on your own won't you just pretty much just shouting and screaming and blending in with all the other locals who do it worried about what I'll I don't know what I'll do I don't know what a one-man riot looks looks like yeah I can't really overturn cars on my own

I might throw my back out trying to flip them but it's interesting that you say if England ever do win the World Cup will the universe self-destruct because course, we did win it once in 1966, and I think the world has moved pretty rapidly closer to Armageddon since then.

I don't know if

the two were linked, but

perhaps a more relevant question is from Michael Deary, who says, which individual are you ready to blame for England's failure in this World Cup?

Ooh, I mean, you spoil for choice.

There's always Margaret Thatcher.

Yes.

She's just laid the groundwork for the future failure.

That's the problem, isn't it?

She destroyed communities, Andy.

She did.

And these guys have been raised in a less communal country.

That's right, because also she sold off a load of school playing fields.

And so the miners strike destroyed the British mining.

Of course, most kids, it was an old British tradition to

play an old game called Kick the Coal, in which you had to kick a piece of coal with your left foot.

But when the miners closed down, kids stopped playing that, and so we've not really produced a decent left-sided midfielder ever since.

So, yeah, it was basically thatches all.

But a player will always

get the blame.

And Michael in the second half of his sentence said, who is looking likely to be blamed in the 2018 World Cup?

And that's interesting to think ahead.

Because you're looking for a player that's going to have a good World Cup this time, but who the public could easily

turn on.

And I think the young Liverpool star Raheem Sterling is a prime candidate for that.

He's a very exciting flair player.

So he's likely to be burdened with completely unrealistic expectations and then maybe miss a penalty and be hounded for the rest of his life.

That is exciting, isn't it?

This is going to be a big World Cup for him.

He's going to have four amazing years and then his life is going to be ruined.

Eileen Drury.

Eileen Drury.

No, she was

the faith healer or something, wasn't it?

Yeah.

Glenn Hodler used.

She's got to be in the mix for a comeback.

Yeah.

Well, she must have.

Could she commune with the dead?

Yes.

Right.

Because that would be good.

I think, you know, I know, John, you're a massive fan of the inspirational halftime team talk.

You've done some outstanding ones on the bugle and elsewhere.

But there could be no greater half-time team talk than one delivered from Beyond the Grave from one of the great heroes of...

You know,

if she could get Bobby Moore

from the other side to talk to England half-time, nil-nil with Italy on Saturday night,

we are going to win that game.

Simon Coleman asks, does Roy Hodgson look uncannily like an owl or is it just me?

He actually looks cannily like an owl.

It's entirely deliberate.

He's also learnt to rotate his head through 360 degrees and a hoot

because he believes it makes, you know, makes players, players respect him.

The footballer respects the owl but does not respect the puffin.

And

Bertil Frulund

says, how small are England's chances compared to Napoleon's item?

Well, that's I mean that's a very good way of...

I thought I'd like to see

because obviously we talked about Napoleon's tiny little penis

in a recent bugle, and

that should come into football commentary, I think.

You know, having a chance as small as Napoleon's penis.

You know, would Gary Lineker say that on the BBC coverage?

I think he should have the courage.

Oh, you know, hear a commentator say, well, he's taken a shot from 35 yards there.

Frankly, he had a Napoleon's

penis's chance of that one going in.

Richard Fox asks, what are the odds on Carlos Danger receiving a late call-up to the Mexico squad?

Well, do you know who Carlos Danger is, Andy?

You did a piece on him on the daily show, didn't you?

Yeah, that's Anthony Wiener.

That's his alter ego.

That's his penis texting alter ego.

So,

I mean, look, never say never, because Carlos Danger always turns up where you least expect him and where he's least desired or required.

So, yeah, there's every chance he'll turn up.

But he won't necessarily be playing for the Mexican squad.

It's just the Mexican squad will get a text in the middle of the game and go, oh, God, why would you do it a third time?

Your poor wife.

Was Carlos Danger his nickname for his

pendulum?

No,

that was the nickname for the person who sends the pendulum.

Right, okay.

Yeah,

the nickname for

the penis itself, I believe, was the Macarena.

There is a player in the, I think, the Costa Rica squad called carlo costly yeah which is uh that i mean that is a true that is a one-man satirization of the financial values of modern football uh mark spokes asks what's the likelihood of little tommy waffle single-handedly taking belgium to world cup success

well i mean i think you know belgium got a squad of very good young players uh but if they did have a player called tommy waffle they would be basically unbeatable i think they've just got a they've just got to be really be careful with their waffle intake because you can't eat eat too few waffles before a game, but you also can't eat too many or you get sluggish.

So it's very difficult.

You know, obviously they have their famous waffle trainer who, you know, if a player goes down hungry, he'll just run out very quickly with a pan

and he'll press them a fresh waffle.

That's right.

Now, the referee will try and move them off the field to make them do that at the side of the field, saying, there's no need to make this waffle now and stop the game.

But that's just not the way things are played now, are they?

So sadly.

Expect if Belgium wants to waste time, expect all the players to go down and a lot of waffle pan presses being brought out.

And finally, this came from at FIFA2022 Revote, who picked up on this World Cup QA.

The FIFA Revote petition said, Will you please support our campaign by

signing our our petition and retwating hashtag FIFA 2022 revoke?

So that's to show the power of the bugle, John.

We can bring down the Qatar World Cup.

So if you do want the World Cup to be moved from Qatar, do sign that.

Of course, you might want to see footballers attempting to play football for a month in a furnace.

So in which case,

and if you might enjoy slave labour as well.

So it might be your bag.

So sign it if you want.

Thank you very much for your cues for the

QA.

We are the only media outlet licensed to cover this World Cup, so we will keep you up to date with all the scores as the tournament progresses.

Just a couple of quick lines of World Cup news coming in.

FIFA have unveiled the new ball for this World Cup off the controversial Jabulani ball.

Basically completely ruined the last World Cup as it transpired to being specifically designed to make things like shooting, passing, controlling the ball and playing football much much more difficult.

And this ball was of course used for the very first time in the world's most important tournament.

Why, you may ask, do try answering that question without using the words FIFA, certifiable idiots, and money-grubbing imbeciles within the same sentence.

Best of luck with that.

They've unveiled the ball for 2014, the Wobbledatinho ball, which is modelled on a pineapple and made of a pineapple.

The FIFA said the pineapple symbolises the footballer, hard and spiky on the outside, but soft and delicate inside with stupid hair.

And

when it is put to them that the pineapple doesn't really work and makes football really hard to play, FIFA replied, that doesn't fing matter.

It is shifting units like hotcakes.

And hotcakes, incidentally, is going to be the 2022 Qatar mascot.

A giant cake burning.

And opening ceremony news, Jennifer Lopez has pulled out.

I believe it's a one-woman protest against football's continuing refusal to implement a stopping clock, which would instantly eradicate the scourge of time wasting.

I assume that's what it was about.

Other suggestions are that she received a much bigger offer to perform in the opening ceremony at the Hertfordshire and District Crown Green Bowls Over 65s Championships starting next week.

So that is it for this week's Bugle World Cup preview special.

Do enjoy the football.

Next week we'll have a full update on all the stories we are able to ignore.

including Iraq going more tits up than Dolly Parton's swimming backstroke.

But we can we don't need to pay any attention to that, John.

Doesn't matter.

No, no, no, because the rebels, they've taken over the insurgents.

They've taken over Mosul.

What are you talking about?

They managed to restrain themselves.

They didn't put up a mission accomplished banner, which is rather inconvenient.

They've pushed off.

But we don't need to take any notice, John, because the World Times.

Bad timing, Rebels.

No one's going to know.

It's the World Cup.

This is the World Cup.

I'll be doing some videos on the ESBN.co.uk that I'll tweet.

Links to, I think the first one's just gone up today.

And we'll be back with full exclusive coverage on the World Cup through the tournament.

Do keep your emails coming into info at thebuglepodcast.com.

Don't forget to check out our SoundCloud page, soundcloud.com/slash the hyphen

bugle.

And you can buy all your non-World Cup bugle merchandise, which you can pretend if the Bugle sponsored the World Cup and did some merchandise that had no mention of the World Cup on it, then that would probably be very much like our current range of merchandise.

And you can buy that at thebuglepodcast.com.

Until next time, may the football be with you.

Amen.

Bye!

Hi buglers, it's producer Chris here.

I just wanted to very quickly tell you about my new podcast Mildly Informed which is in podcast feeds and YouTube right now.

Quite simply, it's a show where me and my friend Richie review literally anything.

So please come join us wherever you get your podcasts right now.