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PSG dominated club football last season - finally winning the Champions League.
But this year they’ve not yet hit the heights.
So can they step up and defend their European title?
Host: Ayo Akinwolere
Guests: Tom Williams, Carl Anka
Executive Producers: Adey Moorhead, Guy Clarke
Producers: Mike Stavrou, Nick Thomson
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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The Athletic FC.
Welcome to the Athletic FC podcast with me, Ayo,
PSG dominated club football last season,
finally winning the Champions League as well.
But this year, they've not hit the same height.
So can they step up to defend their European title?
Right, joining us today in the studio,
we've got Tom Williams, we've also got Karl Anker as well,
good to have you with us, Jens.
All right, so ahead of PSG's match against Chelsea
in the last 16 of the Champions League on Wednesday,
we thought we'd talk about their current form.
They lost a Monaco in league last Friday,
meaning their lead has been reduced to just one point.
And of course, Monaco are also the team,
they narrowly beat in the Champions League playoffs as well.
So Tom, this is not the PSG we're used to seeing, is it?
It's not, it hasn't been for a little while,
and I think the expectation in recent weeks
has been that at some point, things would click into place,
and they would become the PSG that we got used to seeing last season,
the one that laid waste to the European elite,
and finally claimed the Champions League,
finally scaled the Everest that the club had been trying to conquer,
ever since the arrival of their Caterione is in 2011.
And as the weeks have gone on, you've started to think,
maybe that just isn't going to happen.
Like I personally have been sitting down to watch PSG
and thinking, surely at some point,
we're going to see some sign that this team is getting close
to what it was last season.
And if anything, it's been the opposite.
The more that time has gone on,
the further away from that level they have got.
And so now you find them approaching this game against Chelsea,
and this tie against Chelsea,
with a sense that if they are going to go through,
it's not going to be playing
the sort of swashbuckling all-action football
that became their trademark last season.
They are just going to have to grind out results
in the hope that that form still returns.
The fact it's the same coach, the fact it's the same player,
the fact it's the same general idea
makes you think that things could click at some point,
but recent evidence does not suggest
that that is about to happen anytime soon.
How the French media treating this?
It was interesting the coverage of the defeat at Monaco,
or the defeat against Monaco,
rather on Friday that you mentioned.
Le Keeps report said,
you know, PSG are on the brink of crisis,
and it is time that we abandon this idea
that they are the same team they were last season.
They are showing week after week
that they are not capable of producing that performance level.
And, you know, we saw that towards the end of the league phase.
I mean, the best football that PSG have produced this season
has tended to be in the Champions League.
In the early weeks of the competition,
they were fantastic in their opening game
against Atalanta, four-neil winners,
won away at Barcelona with a second choice attack,
put seven goals passed by Elevacuson,
and were really flying.
And then they finished the group phase
by taking two points from a possible nine,
drawing away at Attic Bill Bell,
losing away at sporting,
and then drawing it home to Newcastle,
and what would basically, you know,
what felt like a must-win game
if they were to avoid going into the playoff round,
and they weren't capable of raising their level.
And so, I think the feeling in France is that, you know,
we need to perhaps come to terms with the fact
that PSG are just at a different phase in their revolution.
Now, they're not kind of on the launch pad.
They are just sort of muddling around,
desperately trying to find some semblance of form to cling to.
And so, I think most people would still have them as favorites
going into this tie against Chelsea
as the defending champions with all the fantastic players
and the fantastic coach they've got.
But there's very little certainty at PSG at the moment.
Yeah, Carl, not many teams hold on to the Champions League
other than the name Real Madrid, of course.
And you remember the dismantling of Inter Milan
in the Champions League final,
there's a redoing them,
they're doing what they do best, you know,
a kind of a kids from PSG,
scoring late winners as well.
This is a very different outfit.
I rewatched the Spurs match just before this podcast
at PSG Beat Spurs,
but they kind of made a meal of it.
Are you surprised to see the PSG from last season
not really replicating the same kind of swashbuckling
kind of football in the Champions League this season?
A little bit, a little bit, in January.
I'm a friend, Jerry Tackle, who works with PLP.
Well, I was simply watching a PSG game going,
what's going on?
And Jerry, who supports PSG,
offered his points to me
and one thing he made very clear to me was something
I think quite a few of us overlook the club walk up
in that the PSG team that we saw
defeat, not even defeat,
dismantle Inter Milan in that Champions League final.
And the one thing that sticks out to me
about that Champions League final,
yes, the goals, yes, the performance, yes, there's right, do it.
But also, the referee blew exactly on 90 minutes.
He was like, this is done.
It's like a boxing match.
Just like, stop it, stop it.
Done, done.
I'm plugging things,
just wrapping it up this wire on a stereo like this is over.
You don't need to do this anymore.
And then it happened again
into a three other matches in PSG,
early in this season.
But also, they had to go to United States,
they had to play in a club walk up.
They went to the final,
they lost to Enza Morescu's Chelsea in the final.
And one thing that Chelsea fans like to remind people
was the gap between the club walk up final
and Chelsea's first match of the Premier League season
was something around 35 days.
They have a very, very short turnaround.
Now Chelsea can two degree stomach
that quick turnaround a bit more
because they have a very, very deep squad.
They have a large amount of players
and I'm not gonna make a joke about that.
Chelsea have a big squad.
So they can rotate a little bit more
than a PSG team that for manager reasons,
Lewis and Ricky doesn't like working with a particularly
a large squad because he wants to have more contact time
with a lot of these players.
So this PSG team came into the new season quite tired.
They had to play the super cup game as well.
So another short turnaround.
And also, there's been two or three against Tom Hotsper,
which I mean, they were,
Tom went to know up and you think,
and this is Tom was frank,
that get a trophy in his first season
and then they go to the penalty success,
I'm excited, excited, excited.
But then it's, while it's the same players,
there are two or three changes.
I think moving on Donna Ruma and bringing on Lucas Turevelia
is a big change because even,
yes, PSG were fantastic in that Champions League run,
but there were two or three matches
and two or three opportunities where,
I want to say Liverpool had a chance.
I want to say Arsenal had a chance.
So Donna Ruma had to do big things.
I've keep saying it.
Donna Ruma, when he's playing at English club,
his disciples get big.
He just finds an extra five percent
and he's just breaking your heart
and he's been doing it since the year of 2020 final,
where Chevalier and Tom, you can correct me here
if I get any players' pronunciation wrong.
My French is quite bad.
Absolutely spotless, so far.
Thank you very much.
Chevalier was picked because he's good with his feet.
I did a piece ahead of the new season about Manchester United
and about the goalkeeper's Manchester United
might need to replace on J.O.N.A.
and in the piece I wrote about Chevalier,
I said, this is a Pep Guardiola goalkeeper
hiding in plain sight.
He's not necessarily someone who can make himself super big
and get you something out of nothing
to make a huge save.
And therefore the team, I think PSG defensively,
has probably lost five percent just by that goalkeeper swap.
I think Marquinius, you know,
father time has caught up with Marquinius as well.
He's not the same center back that he used to be.
So that's another five, 10 percent off their defense too.
Hakemi has been injured and he's gone to Afcon
and he's just not been the same player that he was last season.
This is a player that for the last three or four years
was regarded the best right back in the world
and now there's a conversation
as to other right backs being in there.
So three members of that back five
are not the players they used to be.
Then you add in the injuries to Dan Bele,
there's a duet, but Abba's been on and off.
So you've got a slightly smaller squad
that played a ridiculous amount of football games last season
including the club World Cup.
They all come back for a brand new season,
two or three changes at the back,
two or three players who are a bit older
and or absent and or injured.
And all of a sudden the team that many, many people
were reloading as the one great team in European football
of a sudden is good-ish.
And I think this is something that might continue to happen
in this new expanded format of the Champions League
where there's no parodies and quite the word.
There are fewer times where I'm going,
that is a great team and more times I'm going,
that is a good team with a goal scorer
who might go supernova for 10 minutes.
I think what happened last season for PSG
is that all the planets aligned.
Luis Enrique found this way of playing
and he didn't come across it prior to the start of the season.
We go back to the first part of last season.
PSG were very underwhelming.
They would very frequently dominate matches
but not score the goals,
that their domination of both possession
and territory suggested they should.
And then he starts playing with his Mandambale
as a false nine halfway through December,
things fall into place.
In the second half of that season, no one got injured.
He was able to rotate players freely
because in Liga, there was no real challenge.
They had a big, they went into the year 2025
with a 10 point lead at the top of the table.
And he was able to work with, as Carl says,
a very small squad and even within that,
12 or 13 key players,
by the time we got to the knockout phase
of the Champions League last season,
you knew pretty much exactly which team was going to start.
The only query between games
was is it going to be dizzy,
I do it or is it going to be bloody back cooler?
Every other player was guaranteed to start.
And PSG produced spectacular,
but quite complicated football,
a very intense, very minutely coordinated press
without the ball,
that involves every single player on the pitch,
positional interchanging,
that involves every player on the pitch.
And because he was able to rest players
in domestic games,
and because none of his players were injured,
it meant that he could work with that very small group of players
week after week after week,
and ended up producing this, you know,
extremely well-drilled kind of football.
And this season, because of the injuries,
but also because of the domestic challenge
from Lars in Liga,
which I know we're going to go on to talk about,
he can't rotate, the players aren't fit.
And so everything that was working last season
is no longer working this season.
And that very,
that very finely calibrated style of football
is just currently beyond them.
And I think, you know,
those are all key factors in explaining why that is.
This is the Athletic FC podcast with I.O. A. Camelere.
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Well, let's move on to the Chelsea match on Wednesday
because we did mention they'll be playing Chelsea
in the Champions League Liam Rossini
has a decent record versus PSG.
We know that from his time at Strasbourg.
So one win, one draw and one loss.
Now, how have previous meetings gone with this two sides?
Because I'd like to think Rossini is coming into this.
There I say it with a much bigger squad car
and feeling possibly a little bit more confident
than he probably would under Strasbourg in legal.
Yes, but also we spoke to him
and the way that explained about taking on PSG.
He was like, well, go for it.
Yeah, I think in football,
it's one of those sports where you can play really, really well
and you don't always win and you can play really well
and you can lose the way I gauge my team is always
on performance and in terms of our performance and our bravery
and the players engagement infuse as a man energy.
As a manager, you can't ask for any more.
So even if we'd lost the game,
the way that the players conducted themselves
in the way that I wanted us to play.
Now, I was so proud.
I was one of the proudest moments of my career
but hopefully there's many more to come as well.
These are the games you want to manage.
These are the games you want to be a football player
and that was Liam's entire approach.
He talked about his history playing for Hall,
playing for Brighton and playing for
some of the smaller teams that when they finally got to go to
to Anfield or when they got to Old Trafford
and he'd explained his own frustration
about playing the bigger teams and not really touching the ball
because everyone sort of,
the game plan was about sitting in deep and I was like,
oh, well, this is the pinnacle in my career
and I've just stood there looking up,
watching balls just go over in my head
because we're playing a long ball.
I believe when we spoke to him,
Strasbourg had just drawn three-three with PSG
after being two goals up at the start
and Strasbourg pressed very, very high
which you can do that when you're the Strasbourg coach
because you've got very, very young players
but also I think you can do that more against this PSG team
because, as Tom has explained,
the very, very precise footballing machine
has been disrupted into her three phases.
Fabian Rousse does not look the same player in 2026
that he was in 2025.
There's been an entry to Jal Nevers
who, I mean, that kid is scary good.
Special, isn't he?
If Pep Guardiola signs Jal Nevers were all in trouble
and I mean that as the greatest compliment,
Jal Nevers is five foot nine-ish
and he's ability to predict where the ball is going to land
when it's been up in the air
is the only player I've seen with that sort of size
who's that good in predicting the flight of a ball
is in Galicante, like he's brilliant.
Vittinia, sometimes Vittinia's a nine out of 10,
sometimes he's a seven out of 10
but Vittinia can't do everything.
He's exceptionally the first phase,
Fabian Rousse and Jal Nevers takes things in the second phase
and this is it, in that PSG have a lot of good players
but they may turn into great players
because their weaknesses are hidden very often
by the other football players next to him.
It's very good squad building
when everyone is fit and everyone's fit
and everyone's fit and everyone's doing well.
When they're not, that's the interesting bit
and the fact that Leon is a little bit more competitive now
and the fact that you've got a manager in the Emersonio
who has already, I'm not gonna say profit too,
profit maybe isn't the word when it's a 3-3 draw
but has dented PSG in the past.
I think is...
I think there's a psychological edge here.
I think there's not going to be no fear
when he's going through his training routines
and when he's doing things on the whiteboard.
I also think increasingly now
when we are watching Champions League football
or Europa League football,
the physicality of the Premier League now
is coming to the fore.
In that, I mean, Tottenham Hotspur are in a relegation battle
and yet they were finished the league phase fourth
because even the smaller fishes in the Premier League
are able to hurt and run with an intensity
that a lot of teams outside of,
in Europe's other top five leagues,
cannot quite manage.
So if you're a Chelsea player,
if you're more like this,
say it all, go at them.
And I'm sure,
and I'm sure one of the Chelsea coaches
is telling him words to that effect,
well, far more complicated instructions
and just go at them.
But yeah, I'm really, really interested
to see how Premier League combativeness works
against a PSG team that can be very, very good
using possession as a defensive tool as well.
Yeah.
Man, Karl talks about going at them at your own peril
because we've also seen PSG this season
absolutely obliterate teams.
You look at the Marseille 5'0 in league.
Ah, you look at that leal game with Dembele
doing what Dembele does.
You know, that chip.
Dembele.
Oh, Chimney's long way.
Pulls back.
Dembele, what's it all?
That is super.
That graceful drag back and then chip over the keeper.
You know, this is still a stack team.
You spoke about Vittinia there.
You know, the Tottenham game.
Vittinia's first career hat trick against Tottenham,
rescuing his team from a possible defeat,
you know, against Tottenham Hotspur.
This is still a stack team.
Let's not forget them.
Yeah, it's the exact same team as last season on paper
with the one difference being in goal, as Karl said,
and clearly replacing last season's outstanding goalkeeper,
Jean-Louis Jadona Ruma, the current holder
of the Ash in Trophy with Lucas Chivalier,
who then lost his place to his Russian understudy,
Matt Vesafanov, who's basically a goalkeeper
with a similar profile to Dona Ruma,
but multiple levels below him has not been a success.
But it is all the same players, and we have seen glimpses,
and that's one of the great frustrations with PSG,
is that you do see these glimpses,
and Dembele's form since the start of the years
been one of the few bright spots,
because he has had multiple injury problems.
It was a hamstring problem in the first part of the season.
Since Christmas, it's been carfish shoes.
It was the carfish shoe that forced him off
in the first leg of the playoff round tie against Monaco.
He came on for last half an hour against Monaco on Friday,
looked relatively sharp.
But there again, is it, would it be a risk to start him,
given that there is now that vulnerability?
But he has shown with that fantastic brace against Leo,
that impossibly delicate laugh-foot-chip brace
that he scored against Marseille as well.
And they need that, because you watch PSG attack
when he isn't on the pitch,
and they looked to him even when he isn't there.
They used to him dropping in and dragging centre-backs
around and creating space for the wide players
to attack in the central midfield as to attack.
And that doesn't happen when he's not there.
It's been interesting that in the last few weeks,
Lewis and Ricke has been trying Bradley Barcola
as a false-knighting.
Very much not his natural position,
but he's scored three in three in Liga
and has shown some signs that he might occasionally be
a serviceable, understudy to D'Ambelli in that role.
But yeah, it's not quite the same thing.
So talent-wise, there can be no disputing
how good this PSG team is.
But I think the fundamental issue is that physically,
they are not capable, or they do not seem
capable of playing the kind of very high-octane,
that smothering football that they did last season,
and that's with and without the ball.
And as you say, when you get a team that attacks them
as naively as Mercedes,
that team can find themselves in big trouble,
but if you get a team who do it a bit more intelligently,
a Monaco have done that very well in recent weeks.
Obviously, the winning league on,
but even in the two matches of the playoff round,
when both teams had 11 men on the pitch,
Monaco actually won that tie,
which shows how much PSG struggled to bait them down,
and how Monaco were able to exploit some of the weaknesses
in PSG's play when they did have the ball.
So yeah, on paper, there can be no contesting the talent,
but the sad reality for PSG is that it's been several weeks now
where what you see on paper hasn't quite translated
to what you see out on the pitch.
Let's move our attention to League on briefly, Carl.
I think since 2012, PSG have pretty much won League on,
I think only Leal and also Monaco,
only other teams that have won it.
I mean, Carlo Ancelotti finally bringing League on
back to PSG under his reign.
I mean, for the product,
and I know PSG could still go ahead and win this
for the product though, if Ron's win this,
this is great, this is wonderful.
The mighty PSG can be toppled.
Yes, yes, look,
German Renato Sanchez.
Yes, Renato Sanchez.
Renato Sanchez, young player of the tournament at Euro 2016,
Atben Fieker goes to Bayern Munich,
gets loads of injuries to Bayern Munich,
has an unsuccessful Loan sport, Swansea ends up at Leal.
It's part of that Leal League on winning side,
and now every time someone goes,
oh, Renato Sanchez didn't do much,
I'm like, ah, ah,
one of French League titles for someone that wasn't PSG.
He then eventually went to PSG and didn't quite work out,
and they went to Rome, etc, etc, etc.
But I am now farce becoming of the opinion that,
if you can win the French League title for someone
that isn't PSG, that is a heavier medal.
So French football is in a really interesting position
in that the broadcast deal,
and the most recent broadcast that I want to say
lost to a three have been terrible,
and they have, the French League has been quite honest
about how the recent days have been terrible
and trying to package up a new sort of subscription style
package for anyone interested.
And we've got the wonderful Alex Barker
at the Atadek who's a huge proponent
and a huge fan of French football,
and he's constantly telling all of us
about how cheap it is to watch all the French League games
and how he wanted to be doing this as well.
So you've got that, and increasingly for leagues,
if your broadcast deal is terrible,
you're just gonna suffer.
You're gonna find it really, really hard to get people
to watch your games in addition to the matches
they're already gonna watch.
Domestically, it's a lot harder to get hold
of the flow and narratives of your league
outside of Champions League games.
So I mean, the majority of the time I'm watching PSG,
I want to say 95% of the time I'm watching PSG,
it is a Champions League match.
So I'm only watching them X amount of times.
And also there's a problem of the Premier League
is just an all-encompassing, devouring beast
in that when I actually nightplayed Leon
in the Europa League last season,
I had the great joy of talking to a scout
for a Premier League club, and they were based in France.
And they explain it to me in that the French League
makes good players all the time.
The French League finds it increasingly hard
to produce good teams, because the moment,
two or three good players emerge at someone
that isn't PSG, a Premier League club goes,
oh, thanks mate, I love that, boom, boom, boom.
And you get cherry picked.
So if there is ever a season where the stars align,
where PSG is having a down period
and another club is having a good period
and perhaps they've got a good academy class
or perhaps they've got a good coach
or perhaps one of their strikers goes supernova
and you can get a winning run.
Absolutely, fantastic, good for the product
because it gets more eyeballs on there.
And if you've got, now the French League
is slightly improving their broadcast deals,
it is now easier to tune in.
I want to watch Monaco this season
because they got Paul Pogba and Anne Souffatty
and two or three other players.
And I went, well, I want to see how this works out.
So I paid a sort of trial subscription for you
and I've been watching Monaco games three or three times, right?
Loans.
But sadly not much of Paul Pogba.
Yes, yes.
Unfortunately not, I'm not going to see much of Paul Pogba.
But this, I think this is the thing now in that,
increasingly in the not, if you're not the Premier League,
leagues are now having to think very, very smartly
about how do we get the quote unquote casual viewer
or the, I'm going to watch you once in a month viewer.
And the French, the French League
have now got a streaming service and online offering
that makes it very, very straightforward.
And if you can do that, that means in times like this,
where there is a genuine competitor to the PSG,
you can get more eyeballs onto your product.
And then hopefully those eyeballs can stick,
providing those competitors can stay together.
I remember speaking to Jose Fonte after, again,
after Leo won the league.
He was a Leo, yeah.
He was a Leo and he used to play for Southampton.
So when I was a Southampton reporter,
I had a conversation with him two or three times.
And when he won the league, I sort of sent my message
after the victory thinking, well, you know,
he's just going to league title.
He's not going to want to respond to me.
And he eventually did.
And I was just chuffed a bit and he explained
what it meant to him to be a French League champion.
Yeah, you can really, really see how much it means
to win a league title when you're not at PSG.
And also, quite frankly, if you're a manager at PSG
and you don't win the league, I'm looking at you
with sideways eyes going, you want me?
So like, Pochettino didn't win in his first season.
A Carlo Ancelotti did not win in his first season.
And Tom, you can correct me here.
I believe Ancelotti came in midway through
in his first season.
He did, and PSG came in and he had like a sign now.
He came in at Christmas time.
And I'm pretty sure PSG had like a six plus points lead
at the top.
And they didn't win it.
So you do need a unique alchemy for PSG
to not get it done.
But when it does happen, it's absolutely worth watching
every single week or at least in high level.
I'm not sure if they were that far clear,
but you're right.
It was nevertheless a fairly enormous surprise,
particularly given they lost the league to Montpellier.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I'm looking at these about Montpellier
that I read the other day.
Montpellier led by Olivier Giroud.
Giroud, you know, and referred to in this piece
that I read as, you know, France is less the city
in terms of the probability of that title win.
And talk to me about, along the possibility of them
winning league time.
I don't think they've won the top tier since the 90s,
I imagine, like 1998.
1998, I mean, come on.
This would be amazing considering the riches
that exist at PSG and the plethora of talent
that they have at their disposal.
There are so many levels to this.
I could literally talk about, about Lance for,
and this is your time to have this day.
First of all, the fact that any club other than PSG
might win Liga is remarkable.
But the fact that it's Lance,
this very traditional club from the North of France
with this fantastic boxy English style stadium
that has been sold out for something like 81 Liga
and Home Games in a row.
This club that has had to sell so many of its best players
in recent years, you go back to January last year
and Abdukadeh, Kusanat of going to Manchester City,
Kevin Dancer going to Tottenham.
They lost their starting goalkeeper,
Boris Sombra, went around at the same time.
There's just been this constant churn.
And then here we are this season
with a new head coach in PSG.
He was sacked at Leon and in a manner
that a lot of people both at Leon and elsewhere
felt was very unfair.
And with this really interesting,
Hodgepodge collection of players,
players whose careers were drifting players,
who looked like they reached a dead end,
who've just been picked up
and put into this fantastically coached team,
playing very uncomplicated, quite direct
but extremely effective football, flying wingbacks,
Floyd Antauva, who came in from Udinese last summer,
playing just of Odson Eduard,
whose career looked like it had completely come off the rails
in England.
And these players just kind of picked up,
seemingly from nowhere,
who've now proven themselves as being
among the very best players in Liga.
And it is a classic case of halves and have nots.
They are, I mean, Leo winning the title in 2021
was remarkable and comparable to this.
Monaco likewise, albeit Monaco,
have always had money behind them.
But this is a proper underdog story.
And so it's, yeah, it's the halves and the have nots.
And there was a feeling up until, I'd say,
even last weekend,
that lawns chance have probably been in gone
in that prior to last weekend,
they were four points behind PSG.
They'd lost unexpectedly at home to Monaco,
having been too near up.
They'd played well,
but then drawn away, it's Hazborg and PSG had won.
And you're like, okay, we know the drill.
PSG just going to move through the gears,
lawns are going to encounter turbulence
and then this dream sadly will die.
But then PSG lose at home to Monaco,
lawns, brushersides,
mets who are the bottom club in Liga
and suddenly the title race is back on.
And if you look at lawns running,
they've got nine fixes remaining.
Most of them are winnable.
There are some key games.
There's a trip to Leo in the WDNR,
which is always a game that matters
a huge amount in that part of the world.
It is a route as well, of course.
And then the following weekend,
we kind of 12th and 13th of April,
I think it is lawns at home to PSG.
I think the whole for everyone who follows French football
is that they are still within touching distance
at that point.
Because if lawns go into that game knowing that if they win,
they'll go top
or they'll put distance between themselves and PSG,
then it will be fully on.
And yeah, if anyone hasn't yet had a chance
to watch lawns this season,
I'd strongly recommend it.
It is the most fantastic feel-good story.
Stadiums always fall, super noisy, super colorful.
They play really exciting football.
There are so many little subplots and storylines
and hopefully for the good of French football,
it will be great if they can push PSG all the way
at the very least.
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You're listening to the Athletic FC podcast with Iawakima Leroy.
All right, let's move on to the Champions League once more,
Carl, because this week Liverpool versus Galatasaray
kicks off on Tuesday.
You know, a lot of pressure on this game
considering the league form of Liverpool,
big one for Anna Slot.
Absolutely.
Big one, as we are now increasingly heading towards
a summer of managerial merry-go-round,
and Anna Slot now not only needs to get some momentum together
to make sure Liverpool qualify for next season's Champions League,
but also needs to show some sort of convincing style of play,
some convincing style of attack and open play
to suggest that he should be the man next season.
One thing that unfortunately,
an unfortunate, unforeseen complication
on the Slot's Liverpool career,
is the fact that Javier Lanzo is available now.
And I think we're all sort of like, oh, hang on.
Wasn't you meant to be at Real Madrid for ages?
So Javier Lanzo's left, but also Javier Lanzo
left for reasons that he convincingly say,
it's not my fault, that's more to do with Real Madrid
being Real Madrid.
So big game for Liverpool.
They played Galatasaray earlier in the league phase, I believe,
where Victor Oshman just gave him absolute hell
because that's what Victor Oshman does.
There's no harm, no foul.
He's just one of the best strikers in the world.
And then going to Galatasaray,
never leave people an easy place to go.
This is the quote-unquote early Champions League game kickoff
on, it is tonight?
Yeah.
As we're recording it.
I don't know, I days anymore.
You can tell I'm a reporter for a club
that's not in the Champions League anymore.
So it's the quote-unquote early game.
Just one game a week for you, Carl.
Sorry.
It's the quote-unquote early game.
And I'm interested to see if that's
going to play into Liverpool's favor or not,
in that playing at Galatasaray,
playing in Istanbul slightly earlier in the day,
that doesn't quite play into the welcome
to hell into a dating atmosphere.
And indeed Liverpool are,
well, they're acquainted with that sort of atmosphere, too.
So very, very interested in there.
I think the fact that Andrew Robinson played on Friday
against all Hampton Wondrous was interesting.
I wouldn't be surprised if you played again or started again
today just to give him that a little bit of veteran
now and to keep two or three players online
or like switched on for the first 20 minutes,
be really, really interesting today.
I'm also going to be really interested to see
how Ryan Gravenberg plays there, too,
because I think he's a supremely talented football player.
He's just signed a brand new six-year contract there,
but he needs to be a little bit more defensively resilient,
particularly in these trickier circumstances,
because if he vacates the space too much,
there's going to be a very angry person
flooding into the space and Liverpool could be vulnerable.
We need to talk about Atlético and Madrid vs. Spurs,
Atlético, obviously, doing what
Atlético do in La Liga, but Spurs,
are at a point where they are eyeing relegation
or at least that zone, isn't that strange
in terms of when we talk about the riches available
to certain clubs and Premier League clubs in particular.
You're looking at a team facing relegation
and you're looking at a team in a decent position in La Liga.
Yeah, it's maddened.
Again, I think it speaks to the enormous firepower
of the Premier League that you could have all
the Premier League clubs still in contention in the Champions League.
And that includes one of the most feeble Tottenham
Hotspur teams, I think any of us can remember seeing.
I mean, yes, they had a relatively
clement draw in the league phase,
but they nevertheless produced convincing performances.
They beat decent teams.
And I think the qualified in fourth place, didn't they?
Which is, I mean, didn't make the play absolutely remarkable.
And I mean, they were able to successfully switch
between domestic difficulties and continental assignments
during the league phase.
Are they still capable of doing that?
And we saw how that group of players,
albeit with a different coach,
were able to compartmentalize what they were doing domestically
and what they were doing very badly domestically last season.
And European objectives in the way that they slid down
towards a finishing position of 17th in the Premier League.
At the same time as they were grinding their way towards glory
in the Europa League, will they prove capable
of doing the same thing again?
I mean, I've had to go are a sort of very interesting phase
in their in their evolution under Diego Simeone,
in that they are quite un-Simeone-like,
in the sense that they're quite an attacking team these days.
They score an awful lot of goals.
It's just the Vatimodo Lugman's probably helped that as well.
Absolutely.
You know, put four unanswered goals past Barcelona
in the semifers leg of their Copadel race semi-final.
That's the second leg of the Copadel race semi-final.
Second leg of that.
I mean, yeah, they were cleaning on in the second leg.
This is this is true.
But it's, I mean, yeah, we know what to expect from Tottenham
in domestic football is generally just quite bad.
But when it comes to London football, I've no idea.
It would feel like simultaneously extremely Tottenham,
if they were to go out having lost 10-0 on aggregate.
But also if they were to somehow to go through.
And be athletic, yeah, it's very spicy.
So Simeone uses pretty much press conference
to say Tottenham had the favorites for that.
And I'm putting on the face going, is this,
is this game's mission?
Are you doing the dark arts or do you genuinely believe
Tottenham are the favorites?
And Tom's absolutely right.
The financial wealth of the Premier League
means Tottenham Hospital now are the ninth
richest football club in World Football.
They have the seventh highest wage bill in the Premier League.
This is why they've had these back-to-back
bottom half finishes for Tottenham are so strange.
This is shocking on the performance for the amount of money spent
and yet because of the wealth of the Premier League.
Because the amount, the comparative amount of wages
they can spend, right?
Connor Gallagher has gone from athletic home
in Dredge to Tottenham.
And Connor Gallagher Gallagher now is Tottenham's,
well, apparently Tottenham's highest-paid player.
I'd be really interested to get him in the mix zone,
get him talking about how these two clubs compare right now.
And Tom's absolutely right about how's
just athletic home in Dredge team just aren't very Simeone
in that when you think about their two triumphs in La Liga,
the centerbacks, just the way they looked,
it's night and day to their current centerback pairing,
in that they're not as stocky.
I'm sorry, I can't say that in a more intelligent way.
They're a really, really fun team
to watch this athletic home team.
And I would like them to win a trophy, one more trophy
for my constant ongoing argument that Simeone
is one of the best managers of the 21st century.
I don't know if Simeone Chad was like her.
Right, still plenty more actually to look out for
in the Champions League Newcastle versus Barcelona,
Atlanta versus Bayern, Liverpool's in versus Arsenal,
obviously Bordeaux Glimps,
still doing what Bordeaux Glimps do versus sporting
and Real Madrid versus Manchester City once again
in the Champions League.
All right, Jens, it's probably a tough one to call right now,
but Tom, if you got to win the Champions League,
I might just put my hat out to Bayern on this one.
Yeah, I was going to say Bayern as well.
All right, yeah, partly because I think there is,
I can't think of many more pleasing forward lines
in the recent history of European football
than Michael Alesa, Jamal Mosella, Louis Diaz
and Harry Kane, I think it would be a wonderful thing
for that team to become European champions.
When they beat PSG before Christmas,
despite having Louis Diaz sent off,
made way through the game.
I remember thinking, and okay, this was at a time
when we didn't realise quite how far off
the levels of last season PSG were,
but that was very impressive.
I think they're the team that have probably impressed me
the most in the Champions League so far.
So yeah, I think if I had to pick one, I'd go for Bayern.
Yeah, I was salivating at that front line car.
Incredible, Michael Alesa has formed this season,
has been exceptional.
It's ridiculous you got to possibly win the Champions League.
I am steadily preparing myself
for Arsenal to win the Champions League.
Okay.
You look at that bracket,
and I think this is another thing that the Champions League now
in that the bracket and the knockout bracket means
just as much as how good you are.
And Arsenal have a very, very, very favourable route
to the final.
I text one of my friends saying,
if Arsenal don't make the Champions League final minimum,
I think that would be class as a disappointment.
You're pulling your face now,
because you're annoyed that you weren't that friend I text.
No, I think Arsenal, I think Arsenal's squad building
is best equipped for this new era of football.
I think the league phase and its current construction
and the fact that the brackets are up in a certain way,
and if you finish a certain place in the league phase,
you can have a more favourable draw.
Again, it's less about being great and more about,
do you have, are you good and do you have depth
in your squad in a way that you perhaps didn't have
to consider in the 2000s or the 90s,
where I was born in 1991.
So I was born in the era of 442,
and top teams having four strikers.
Whereas now it is now a piece that you need six centrebacks
to get through a campaign,
and the way MacArthur can compose things
is that you couldn't have an injury to Califurie,
or have Califurie go off with some sort of complaint,
and then you can bring on a player as good as in Cappé.
I think that's really, really good.
The fact they rested deckling rice
and some of the mendi is really, really important,
and if they can have more matches where they can do that,
and they don't have to play 90 minutes running up and down,
they should get things done.
Yep, okay.
I do have some question marks over how they're going
to score goals in open play,
because Jacarise hasn't been the football player
that we thought he might be,
but if Arsenal don't get to those,
it gets to the final, I'd be surprised,
and if they don't get to the semi-final,
someone else on that side of bracket
would have had to go supernova to get it done.
So I think Arsenal and the Premier League,
and I'm slowly preparing myself
where Arsenal to win the Champions League too,
have fun, I'm not going to be in North London where it happens.
Still well-clear, most groups.
Anyway, let's see if they're just thoroughly enjoyed that.
Karl, Tom, appreciate your time,
and also thank you guys for joining us as well.
We'll catch you soon.
You've been listening to the Athletic FC podcast.
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