Gab & Juls Show: Are PSG the best in the world?

20:36Julien Laurens:Yeah, I think that's a great point. because you could look at it and there were cooling breaks in this final but we were there, it was humid and it was really hot. Not like it's going to be in the World Cup. No, no, no. And the intensity was not so much physically because we said one team had the ball like 75 % of the time and the others. But I think it's the kind of mental intensity that you have to play with in those kind of games final where you can't make a mistake and you're so focused. and so the concentration is so high that I think that asks a lot of your body and even more than with the running, even more than with the heat and the humidity and things like that.

21:19Julien Laurens:And for me, that's the reason why. I've never seen Vitinha, who usually runs more than 11k a game, like Crump, but then after a long season as well, maybe that's also, even if PhD players played less than Arsenal players overall, but I think it's probably more mental than anything else. One of the points, we talk about the mental side. We've talked about, I'm not picking on Saliba, he's still among the best, right? But we talked about how few mistakes he had made this season. So you could argue he's due one. And in this game, it came arguably twice. I wonder how much of it is also the, and I was thinking about this, because I said, all right, some of it is the intensity.

22:02But most of the time that Saliba was defending, he had a million players around him. Both times that it came, it came kind of in transition in open play. And certainly the Speedy Barcola one. I know Barcola is not the most technically gifted player, certainly on this PSG team. If he doesn't take that last touch wide, he's got a very clear chance, probably better even than the Kraskelia chance.

22:29Julien Laurens:Yeah, I mean, he has to score the ball regardless of a bad touch. I don't know about that. Shooting on his weaker foot is not the answer here. But he clearly never looked up at Gonzalo Ramos, who's just there for the tap-in. And that's the thing. And he even mentioned it on his social media, saying, I know I should have won the game right at the end. In the end, it didn't matter so much. And for William, yeah, that was a rare mistake. That could have been costly, that didn't cost in the end. not on that move certainly. A couple other things. One, just because I think Kai Havertz is the best on earth and I get defensive when people question him.

23:13When he took off Utegaard for Jokera so he could kind of keep that 4-2-4 pressure defensive set. One incident which I think, for me, it really stood out for a lot of people. I haven't heard anybody else mention it. I don't even know if you remember it. But it was an incident, I think it was at the end of, I think it was in the second half, because Arsenal were attacking the goal to our left. There's some mad clearance from the back, and he goes, and he's chasing it down. There's two Paris Saint-Germain defenders. It goes from one to the other. He somehow manages to bully Pacho. I'm assuming, in my memory, it's Pacho.

23:56It might have been Marquinhos. and he just pokes the ball through to Saka, who's coming from the right side. Safonov is coming off his line. And I assume this is a goal because Saka is going to get there first. Instead, Safonov gets there almost relatively comfortably. This is what Havertz brings you. And when people go in, and the fact that you can have Havertz with all the technical stuff that he brings, but he can also bring that level of physicality. For me, it's a freaking no-brainer that the guy should be your center forward because he can do so many more things.

24:33Julien Laurens:Do you remember the incident? Yeah, was it for Saka, though? I thought Saka was off already, no? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think it was very obvious that Kahaves would start this final. They needed his skill set more than what your characters could have offered in a final like this, in the setup and the game plan that Arteta had. For the team, if he can stay fit and when the team has also more going forward because they will next season, I think we could see a very, very good kind of habits. The problem is I think fitness is always an issue with him, unfortunately. A couple more things. First on the penalties.

25:16So David Raya did that thing, which he either thought of himself or he got all those mental, coachy-type people that Arteta employees would tell him to do, which I thought was interesting. So every time he would run to the ball, pick up the ball, and take it and personally hand it to the next Arsenal penalty taker and pat him on the back. Clearly that was by design. It's not by accident because he did it every time. Safanov seemed totally disinterested.

25:47Julien Laurens:Safanov was looking at his paper. Because I saw him kneeling down while PSG players were taking their penalties and opening the towel where he had all his notes. I presume Raya had notes too. Yeah, maybe on the bottle or something, and maybe he looked at them after handing them the ball. But yeah, there was clearly two different approaches. But he was handing the ball to the Arsenal players. So he had time to look at them while the Arsenal guy took the ball. After handing the ball, he was coming back to his bottle. but Safonov was just focused on the nose. Not that I helped him that much, although I think on the A-Z penalty, the Gabriel one, he gets the right side.

26:25Julien Laurens:I don't think Gabriel misses because Safonov has gone the right side. But for the A-Z one to stand up as long as he did, I think it kind of throws him off. So even though he managed to win a Champions League without making a single save, and also that was horrible I understand he thinks Javic is going to put the shot low but bro you're a goalkeeper move your arms up at least even if you move them late just make it look I wonder if he's ready for the cross because I think Paco is waiting for the cross and Paco slows down thinking like he's not going to shoot from there because really the angle is so tight that you might think maybe the cross is a better option and maybe he will take that option.

27:14Julien Laurens:And I think both of them, both Pacho and Safonov, for me, Pacho definitely can go for the ball. And you see him waiting and waiting, almost like if the cross was coming. And Safonov definitely for staying like a statue. Final point. I was watching this final. I had next to Mark Ogden. You can imagine the experience of sitting next to somebody old school and northern and grumpy. He was complaining about the lack of flow. about the fact that every time there was an injury or whatever, Arteta would, I mean, both managers would talk to the players who were around, but Arteta made a point of the huddle and conviviality and all this stuff and the time wasting and so on.

28:00Is he just being grumpy? Is it just normal?

28:02Julien Laurens:No, I can see what people like, you know, Luis Enrique, it took him 10 minutes to do the referee, the gesture with his hand, the finger on the eye, what the watch is usually saying to the referee. I think you, again, to go back to disrupting the flow and the tempo of the game, I think the Arsenal team, when they need to be, are very good at it, and that's what they do. And I think there's not much, maybe the referee can say, please, can you hurry up, do you throw? Or you just book a guy. Yeah, which he did, to be fair. Eventually, it may be a bit too late for some of the PhD people, but I've got absolutely zero issues.

28:38It's hard, too, because if you book somebody early for somebody like that, I mean, if you start doing it after 10 minutes, and you say, I'm going to stamp out on this, and you book somebody early, then they have to play the game on a booking, which is going to affect their game. Maybe you make it a point to book a forward or a winger. Maybe.

28:55Julien Laurens:So there needs to be a recurrence before you book it. Yeah, exactly. It has to be persistent on sporting behavior. You've been doing it too long now. All of you here in this team, here you go. Jules, we need to put this into some kind of context because it is a big deal winning back-to-back titles. Nobody has done it other than Real Madrid, who kind of play a different sport, since 1990. I made the point after Paris Saint-Germain won it last year, and you disagreed with me, that this put Paris on the map as a footballing capital. You said, no, we were always one. Fine. Now even more so. Yeah. Two in a row.

29:34And when I look at this club, and I made the point, I always think about how different Paris Saint-Germain are from the other European elites in the sense that one of my favorite things is that when Premier League teams do well in Europe, well, it's because they play in the Premier League, they're battle-hardened, they play top competition every week, right? When teams like Paris Saint-Germain do well, oh no, it's because they're playing rubbish every week so they're all well-rested. So you can't have it both ways. That's one consideration. My other consideration, you can tell me I'm wrong here.

30:11Obviously, Paris Saint-Germain built a tremendous brand. Most casual fans around the world do not watch Paris Saint-Germain games unless they're Paris Saint-Germain fans. So the experience of the club, in some ways, through highlights, through TikTok, through whatever, they're not necessarily in tune with the way a Manchester United fan here might be in tune with Liverpool because he sees more of Liverpool, which in some ways I think helps to globalize and helps spread the brand. At the same time, though, Paris Saint-Germain are more identified with the city of Paris, I'd argue, than any other top European side with a possible exception of Bayern.

30:56And the way they can balance having that hardcore local support, very identified. I mean, there's a freaking Eiffel Tower is on the badge, right? That's something Real Madrid can't do. It's something it doesn't want to do, probably. It's something Arsenal can't do. Barcelona are obviously heavily identified with Catalunya, but there's also a nationalist element. There's also a lot of people there who are not Catalans, not nationalists in the city of Barcelona. They can't identify with the city in the same way. It's a pretty unique set of circumstances.

31:21Julien Laurens:Yeah, yeah, I think so. And I think they saw it very quickly after the Qatari took over. That's why they slightly changed the club crest, for example. and that's why I think they push very much the angle that you're describing it, Gabi. They've done things really smartly marketing-wise too. For example, they had two pop-up shops in Budapest and that was not for PSG fans or Arsenal fans. It was for people in Budapest ready to watch their team play. And I think things like that, they have a shop in London. They're the only European club, non-English club, to have a shop in London. They actually are the only non-London club to have a shop in London.

31:59Julien Laurens:So I think some of the stuff they've done is really, really impressive, but they also had to win. And now this has taken the brand but also the club to make history like they did on Saturday to another level. Where did we go from here in terms of the summer and the signings potentially? There's talk of Barcola possibly moving on. Safanov still hasn't convinced everyone. what do you see happening? Yeah, it's a big summer, I think, and Luis Enrique said it, but in his own way, saying, you know, we're not going to change everything. We'll do little by little. With Compos, the sporting director, he's already looking.

32:37Julien Laurens:But I think last summer's investment, so there was Chevalier, which, you know, was expensive at 50 million. I expect him to go this summer. Zabani, who hasn't really worked out, maybe like the club would have wanted, and Luis Enrique. He's not ready to take over. No, and it's the first season, and you're still adapting. and that was it really so I think the idea now is to go and get a bit more depth even they want a forward that can play in different positions, Julien Alvarez is obviously a big name on their list so he's Eli Kruppi Jr he's going to come back but go again, Eli Kruppi Jr at Bournemouth is also very much on the list like Jan Diomande who's also on the list of other top, top clubs, in midfield I think they will be looking at somebody like Ayubouadi for example or Magnessa Kliush.

33:27Julien Laurens:And then defensively too, I think there will be, whether it's a goalkeeper like Diogo Costa, Porto, that can come and really challenge Safranov, for example, or a defender that can play a centre-back or a right-back like Joel Ordonez, a Club Bruce. So all those names are people they're following. I think Ibrahim Akonate now as a free agent, as a Paris-born and bred kid, has to be on their list too. Because at some point, Marquinhos who turns 33 this summer and was great in the second leg semifinal, in this final, at some point... You have to think succession. Exactly. Yeah. And also, I want to see Warren Zahir Emery, that succession of him as a starting midfielder.

34:05I was so good when he came on. And Mr. Mickey, obviously,

34:07Julien Laurens:will extend his contract in the next few days to 2030.

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35:29Get started for free at Gusto.com. Arna Slott has been relieved of duty as coach of Liverpool. Jules, I'm a little confused here. It wasn't that long ago that the club briefed everybody that Slott was staying and some of the recruitment guys, in fact, might be going. Remember Richard Hughes was learning Arabic and everything off to Saudi? Was this all some clever misdirection on the part of the club, or did they change their mind? I think they were still going through with the process, if you want,

36:01Julien Laurens:of reviewing the season and the two seasons on the slot. I think they had to show support in a way because the season was not over and they were chasing that fifth place in the Champions League, which was not given and not guaranteed at all. I think that was the idea. As you know, I've always been, for the last few weeks only, repeating that for me there was no Arnold Schropp was just not good enough to deserve a third season at the club that a lot of the mistakes that he made this season just showed his limitation and I think he's a really nice guy I think he's a good coach he's just not good enough for me for a club like Liverpool so I can understand why whether they changed their mind or not it doesn't matter so much I think they they got in the end at the right decision I think it does matter because I wonder now about about the process I'm guessing because the people at FSG are smart.

36:50Mike Gordon is a very clever guy. I'm guessing that what happened is they said, okay, Edwards, Richard Hughes, Slott, you guys all do reviews of your own. Tell us what you think went wrong. You can do them together. You can copy off each other if you like. And then we kick them upstairs to FSG. And then Mike Gordon and the smart people read them, maybe even some independent people, and we decide how to go forward. Because everybody assumes Richard's staying because Iraola is now coming in, and they worked together at Bournemouth? Maybe. I mean, I think Richard's exceptional, even though I think he made some mistakes.

37:25But this review cannot be conducted by Edwards. Like, Edwards must be under review. Richard Hughes must be under review. So all of them. And this review clearly was done with Mike Gordon and FSG at the top leading it. You can't just be these people reviewing themselves. I don't think anybody said that FSG were not involved, though. If you read some of the papers today, including the one I used to write for it, It reads as if Edwards and Hughes decided this. Edwards and Hughes felt that that. Edwards and Hughes felt that slot had blah, blah, blah. It sounds like they're the ones who made the decision.

37:57Yeah, no, FAC were definitely available, for sure.

37:59Julien Laurens:Anthony, as you just mentioned, Gabi, fresh off leaving Bournemouth, will reportedly start a formal talk soon with Liverpool. Not that long ago, your money would have been on a different Basque manager, right? This is another one of those questions I would love to ask. So, do you know which Basque manager? His name is... Gabi Alonso. Oh, no, it was Miquel Arteta. Oh, no, it was Unai Embry. There's so many of them! No, it's obviously Xabi Alonso, right? Somebody needs to explain. Oh, by the way, Xabi Alonso and Iraola have the same agent, which is kind of funny to me. I don't understand why, if you're going to change managers, you would not, why Xabi Alonso wouldn't have been top of your list.

38:38Maybe he was, maybe something went wrong. At some point, they need to explain why Xabi Alonso ended up at Chelsea not at Liverpool, ahead of Iraola. I find that aspect of it, I know they're different people. Like I said, would you prefer Iraola to Chabbi Alonso? Who would you prefer?

38:55Julien Laurens:For example, if you didn't like a back five or back three like Chabbi still more often than not does, you know, why not? I love Iraola, but for all the history, for all the ties there, for the fact that Chabbi Alonso... I'm with you, but maybe they have a different view. I hope they get to explain it at one point. More Liverpool, more mystery. Ibrahima Konate told us he was close to an agreement not that long ago. We said it. Yeah, yeah. All right. And on the fast day of the season when Salah and Robbo are saying goodbye, he acts as if he's staying. Yeah. Right? You couldn't tell that he was leaving.

39:30No. And now, all of a sudden, we find out that he's gone as a free agent.

39:34Julien Laurens:What happened? Yeah, no agreement, Gabi. I don't know if the goalpost moved and who moved them, if they kept moving or not. We know it wasn't Arnest Slott. No, definitely not. It would be one camp or the other. It looks to me like financially there was too much difference between what they thought they could agree on and what in the end somebody wanted or didn't want to give. And that's the problem again. He's 27. His season was not very good. The teams won. It's not just him. But I think there will be also a lot of clubs will be after him as a free agent. I really believe that. Again, briefings, clubs briefing, the same one.

40:14They said that, well, they're going to buy two forwards, presumably one to replace Salah and one to hold down the fort until Etike returns. No mention of the defender. Surely that can't be right. Surely you cannot go into it.

40:27Julien Laurens:Jacket came in already and he only was fit. So there's doubt. No, but there's doubt. I'm not saying that this is enough. I'm just saying there's doubt already. Yeah. I would find that really, really extraordinary if they do that. With just those three. And Van Dijk and I don't know what Joe Gomez situation is. He's got another year.

40:45Julien Laurens:You're up. Yes, you. Real Madrid elections are next Sunday, Gab, which means that the candidates are speaking up. And we heard Florentino Perez. Talk about Vinny Jr.'s contract, which expires in 2027. So this is funny because there have been a lot of reports. This is what makes me really wonder about Florentino and how coherent his messaging is. There have been a lot of reports that the reason he signed his new contract is he wants too much money or whatever. And he says, and he came out, he denied it. No, no, no. Vini's not asking for too much money. Okay, so if Vini's not asking for too much money, that means you've agreed a fee, right?

41:18If you've agreed a number to extend him, why haven't you extended him? Is it because you want to move him? Yeah. I don't understand what benefit there is to saying something like this at this stage. Yeah, I agree. But there's more for Valentino Jules because he also talked about Real Madrid's other Paci striker, the one who's Paris born and bred, saying that Mbappe was thrown off a bit by the fact that he has been playing in a different position than at PSG. Presumably he's talking about centrally rather than on the left. And he's saying that they're going to correct things now.

41:51Julien Laurens:I mean, I'm sure Vinicius Jr. I don't understand this. To hear that we already know that Kylian Mbappe will not play as a center forward, but as a left winger in his position and that he will end up on the bench. I mean, I don't know. What are you doing, bro? Is that really what you should be saying right now before the election. We saw Enrique Riquelme, so the candidate against him, who had buses in Budapest as well to talk about his own campaign and what he promises and things. It should be fun, I guess. It should be fun between now and Sunday. He's asked for a debate. He ain't going to get a debate with Florentino.

42:29Florentino doesn't do debates.

42:30Julien Laurens:Although that would be fun as well. Meanwhile, Gab, there's no love lost between Barcelona and Atletico de Madrid over Julian Alvarez. This is absolutely extraordinary. So Fabrizio Romano, who obviously is often very well sourced, comes out and he says that Barcelona have made 100 million euro bid for, or have sent a bid to Atleti for 100 million euros. Atleti came out with these extraordinary things, saying like, ha ha, no, they haven't. We haven't received any such bid. They attack Fabrizio. They attack Barcelona. they make these like mock-ups saying oh like oh give us la miniamal in exchange for like uh whatever it was like a bag of peanuts or whatever the money tickets um i trolling them yeah and they go and they blame barcelona have a dig at them over the referees political influence blah blah blah but they got it we're saying like this isn't a problem with the agents agents are just doing their job which is again not surprised because they do a lot of business with the people look after Julio Navarez.

43:31But basically, they're saying Julio Navarez, 500 million, no-go. Are you surprised it escalates like this? Is this necessary?

43:38Julien Laurens:Yeah, because it's really rare to see clubs on social media, because all of this was on social media on Friday or Thursday, whatever, Friday. I think that's quite rare to call out somebody like Fabrizio, whether you like him or not, or what he does, it doesn't matter, but they clearly went after him and Barcelona. I've just never seen anything like that. Also, let's be smart here. Okay, where do we think Fabrizio got the information from. Atletico Madrid wouldn't say, oh, they've sent us something, but we haven't received it. It's either coming from Barcelona or it's coming from the agents. Those same agents who Atletico Madrid, you're very careful to say, oh, they're blameless.

44:13I think, I would imagine, if he really does want to leave, and there's a lot of suggestions that he wants to go to a different club, my reading would be Atleti is preparing this to say, okay, yeah, we'll let you go, but we want more money, and it's not going to be to Barcelona. Maybe Arsenal, maybe Bayern, who knows? Yeah, exactly. Oliver Glasner is a man in demand, Jules. He's reportedly weighing up interest from both Milan and Bayer Leverkusen, where poor old Kasper Hulmund is on his way out.

44:39Julien Laurens:Yeah, and they thought they could get Iraula. Not anymore, because as we said, he's going to go to Liverpool. I think both are very interesting, both are very different. But I'm happy because he deserves a big club. And if Glasner does pick Milan, Gabi, he won't get the chance to work with Rafael Leal. This is funny, because this to me strikes me as Leal saying, I've had enough rather than Milan saying let's cash in on Leal because he came out he says everybody's dreams and challenges they want to face my ambition is a new challenge in a different league you know if this were to happen I'd be happy which this sounds like what the tabloids here used to call a come and get me please but Jules what kind of market does he have at this stage enough for the release close of 125 million or whatever oh sure as heck isn't going to be anything like that but I didn't mean I hope you have a good world cup and so on maybe you can recoups over the money even though he's got a big contract.

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47:37Help protect your family with life insurance through Ethos. Get your instant free quote at ethos.com slash sports. That's ethos.com slash sports. Application times and rates may vary. Former Flamengo boss Filipe Luiz finally gets a shot in Europe. Jules, he's taking over at Monaco.

47:58Julien Laurens:Yeah, remember we mentioned there on Thursday on last week's show that he was top of their list. We saw Donna, all confirmed. I'm very excited. I think this is great. It's good for him as a first step in Europe. His Flamengo side was wonderful to watch. Really, really good. He's got good ideas. He's a bright young manager. He needs to get used to European football. So Monaco and Ligue 1, I think, is perfect for that. He will lose some key players from the current squad, obviously, like Aklayouche, probably Balogun too. But if we also invest in young players for him, he will still have a decent squad.

48:30Julien Laurens:And I think it's a very, very exciting time to see what he does for his first job in Europe. Yeah, I was so impressed with him. And it's really funny because so few Brazilian coaches have been successful. If you look at the drop-off between player production versus coach production of any country in the world, I mean, except maybe Nigeria, the biggest imbalance has got to be Brazil. And here's a guy who certainly on paper looks as if he's got all the cards. Atletico Madrid are being linked with a move for Tijani Rinders. Gab, does this make sense to you? No, it doesn't make sense for me. I would have thought Tiani Reinders would be a good fit for Maresca.

49:13I don't know that he's a player that Atleti necessarily need, that kind of high-energy break-into-the-box guy. We've seen Diego Simeone has no problem having more players than he necessarily has spots for and then figuring it out as and when. But also, is he going to play 4-4-2 next year? Is he really a 4-4-2 guy? Well, you're going to play Barrios and him, and then where does Coquifin fit in? And you've got Cardozo there too. I don't know. I hope Reinders stays. I really like Reinders, even as a squad player at City. Yeah, I agree. If you're going to be a squad player at Liga Madrid, you'd rather be a squad player at City, I would have thought.

49:54Adi Hutter is back at Eintracht Frankfurt Jewels. He replaces Albert Riera. Kind of like when you get back with an old girlfriend or boyfriend, depending on your preference.

50:03Julien Laurens:Yeah, he knows the club really well, obviously. He was sacked from Monaco in October, after some good things and some not so good things. I think this is a good project for him. It's a good squad, we mentioned before, even if they keep losing some of the best players every summer, but that's the model. And I think it's good for him to go back to the Bundesliga. I'm sure he would have learned a lot from his time in France, and especially his communication with the club, but also with the younger players. That time was problematic. and yeah, I think that's good. If you want to track Frankfurt, he's a good coach, you know that.

50:39Julien Laurens:He's coming back to you and the aim will be Champions League, I guess, next season. Who's going to work out better on the return? Hooter or Mourinho, assuming Florentino wins the election? Oh, interesting. That's one to ponder. Yeah, and what about Max Allegri? Gabi is moving to Napoli and that logically means that Adrian Rabiot is rumoured to be joining him because he goes everywhere with him. This feels predictable? It's 100 % predictable. I don't think... Rabiot wasn't bad for Milan. I need to say that. He did his part. But he's got an important salary. They're obviously going to go in a different direction now.

51:17And he's happiest when he's playing for Max. So from Napoli's perspective, does it make sense when you've already have... You've got McTominay there. De Bruyne there, at least for now. you have other Billy Gilmore who got injured won't be going to the World Cup I you've got you've saw of La Baca I mean and I think I think Zambangisa might have a year left as you phrase it so I wouldn't think you'd be crying out for

51:47Julien Laurens:another midfielder no no and what about the Brian who said on you know Belgian newspaper they was happy con te la because they didn't share the same football philosophy wait until you work with max yeah max well it's fine I actually think, to be fair, in that sense, I think he would be happier. He might be happier with Max than Conte. Because I think with Conte, he wants people to make the same runs and he wants to tell them what runs to make and to constantly react. Max is more like, okay, Max has said this. He says, like, football's not that hard. Football is about having a defensive structure and then in the attacking third, let the talented players do whatever they want.

52:26Yeah, but we saw that in Milan this season. It didn't work. Well, it didn't work because the defensive structure had already been back. But no, I mean, look, people in Spain say that's Luis Enrique's structure. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's true. High-powering center match, which I think is a bit unkind. There's more to it than that. But yeah, De Bruyne and Allegri, look, he can be, Allegri's going to, you know, at some point, if De Bruyne stays, he's going to say, oh, look, he's my Luka Modric.

52:48Julien Laurens:Yeah, maybe, maybe. Speaking of talented players, Neymar picking up an injury. Nothing serious, it seems, but Carlo Ancelotti had some fun with it. Yeah, I mean, serious enough to miss the first game of the World Cup against Morocco, which is the main game of their group, sorry, that could potentially decide. Am I going to be unkind and say he probably would have missed that game anyway because he would have been on the bench? Yeah, he would have come off the bench maybe for a few minutes. That would have been good. Certainly, he would have been able to train with the team before, which is not the case now.

53:17Julien Laurens:They played against Panama and smashed them on Sunday night without him or Saturday night. Without him, we could have told you he was going to pick up another injury because he's picked up injuries through the last two years. at regular intervals, for example. So he's not going to be replaced. He's going to go. They can't play for the first game. That, for me, and I don't want to be too negative, and I love Neymar, as you know, but this doesn't bode well already. Even before the start of the tournament and the team getting together, there's already an injury and a problem with Neymar because this is a problem.

53:46It's a problem. In some ways, maybe it's less of a problem than if it was unhappy Neymar on the bench and the Brazilian media getting agitated and why isn't he coming on? If he's injured, he's injured. So he's out of the way.

53:56Julien Laurens:James Milne, who is 40 as we know and broke the record of the most Premier League appearances this season, has retired? It's so bizarre for me because I'm old enough to remember when he made his debut at 16 years old. And then to have the kind of career, the kind of reinvention, so many different clubs, and Leeds and Villa and I'm forgetting somebody, well obviously Liverpool and City, but New Newcastle as well. His training regimen is the stuff of legends. I kind of wonder. I hope now that he's got time on his hands. If he wants, he should pen an open letter to Laminya Mal and just say, listen, I'm nothing like the player you were, but we have something in common.

54:48We both played a lot of minutes very young. and unlike these other guys, Raheem Sterling, Wayne Rooney, and so on, Ansu Fati, who played a lot of minutes very young, I kept playing until I was 40. You may not want to do that, but here's some things that were helpful to me, and Lamine, maybe they'll be helpful to you. I mean, you're not worried about Lamine Yamal? When you look at the amount of minutes...

55:10Julien Laurens:I'm not sure James Miller can help Lamine Yamal that much. Football is so different now than 20 years ago when he started anyway. Bro, he was still playing professional football a month ago. He started 25 years ago, too. It was incomparable. But would you be worried about Lamin-Yemar in general? Completely. But I think it's also hard to say, hey, when I was your age, this is what I did because the football was so different. I think whatever he was doing at 16, he's kept doing until he was 40. Needs are staying up, Jules! It takes a while to break the ice in a stadium which had COVID-era vibes because it was entirely empty, of course.

55:46Fans were banned. I actually thought when Dante when Dante's header was cleared off the line I thought like this is made for Dante this is not all game to score he doesn't score this is not meant to happen but in the end Saint -Étienne crumble and he lose 4-1 to Jimmy Ratcliffe Jimmy Ratcliffe must be happy

56:04Julien Laurens:yeah I think he'd just be happy because it's easier to sell the club in Ligue 1 than if he was in Ligue 2 more money for it a little bit more although he keep putting the price down if you're interested you know get in touch obviously to buy Nice what is it now? probably around 50 40 to 50 if you get down okay we're not in a position Jules and I to be able to borrow 50 million from the bank not yet if it gets down to 20 give us a call Jim and it's a shame for Sant 'Etrane just to finish because they should have finished top two in Ligue 2 to go up it's actually a really bad thing that they're not going up for them and for the owner and Ivan Gazidis and Ivan Gazidis and that's a that's a big failure this season Christian Volpato has chosen to play for Australia in the World Cup.

56:50Julien Laurens:Was it because Italy didn't make the World Cup? He wants to play the World Cup. No, everybody's happy about this, though. Okay, so for those who are unfamiliar with Cristiano Volpato, he's Australian of Italian descent. He's got both passports. He moved to Roma when he was super, super young. Didn't quite make the grade. Ended up at Sassuolo. He's 22 years old now. So, as a guy who supports Italy and wants to do well, I look at him. I look at his output. He made 11 starts for Sassuolo this year. I think he scored two goals. He's a number 10. I like attacking midfielder types. We don't have enough of them in Italy.

57:23He wouldn't move my needle, and you should do what you want to do. If I were an Australian player, though, I'd be a little bit annoyed because he has turned down Australia every time they called him up. And now that Italy hasn't qualified, not that he would have gotten into the Italy team for this World Cup, he's like, oh, yeah, I'm available, and they immediately put him in there, having played zero minutes of qualification. And with respect, we're talking about Volpato here. It's not like Sandro Tonali's discovered his Australian grandmother. You know, I don't know how much he moves the needle for Australia, but there is going to be resentment, and it's something I think that Popovich is going to have to manage within the dressing room.

58:05I mean, how would you feel about it?

58:06Julien Laurens:Yeah, I mean, you know, it's an Edouard, who's the former Cruiser Palace and Celtic striker, who now plays for Laurence, who had a really good season. He's also Australian. No, he's from Haiti. No, he was born in... I think he was actually born in Cayenne, but he grew up in Paris. An industry from here, yeah. Yeah, and they asked him if he wanted to go to the World Cup, and he turned it down not to play for Haiti, but he said, I can't come into this squad having not taken part in 45s and take the place of somebody who's been there before, so I suspect he will play for them after the World Cup, and I'm sure he will hope to qualify for the next one and play for them, but he felt it was unfair to go in now just because they made the World Cup and they were asking him to play there.

58:45Julien Laurens:Yeah, I would. I think Pato should have done the same. I completely understand. Yeah, no. Well done, Otsonoz. Reflects well on you. Toluca, CONCACAF champions, Jules. They beat Tigres on penalties. After he finishes one wife after 120 minutes. Heartbreak for our boy André-Pierre Gignac, 40 years young. By the way, why doesn't he get André-Pierre Gignac's training regimen? He's still playing at 40. We keep praising James Milner for being such a wonderful pro. So look how good André Pierzignac looks with his shirt off, right? Go ahead. Okay. All right. Exactly. But that was his last ever game. He's leaving Tigres.

59:22Julien Laurens:He's retiring, obviously, at 40. He scored his penalty and took the first one. Obviously, yeah, he was never going to miss. It's André Pierzignac. And Toluca, I thought, overall, deserved this, even if they took the lead in extra time before Tigres equalized. It's 20. Let me get this right. 20 times in the last 21 years that the Mexican side win basically the North America Champions League, if you want. Who was the one? Was it Seattle Sounders? Yes, I think so. And that means the gap. I don't know exactly how to judge the gap between Liga MX and MLS. You're going to get a call from MLS if you say something mean.

1:00:02Julien Laurens:20 out of 21, that's a law. That is a law. You know when they come back and say, oh, but the Liga MX clubs care about this more. Maybe you should care about this a little bit more too Gab, remember those goalkeeper tactical timeouts When the keeper goes down for treatment And the players wander over to huddle up with the coach Well, that won't be allowed at the World Cup Yeah, this has become an issue Because obviously when a player goes down injured for treatment He has to go off the pitch And the game continues Except that he's a goalkeeper it's understood that if we saw with David Raya just a few days ago in the Champions League final and Safonov too actually now obviously you put the goalkeeper off the pitch, the game turns into a freak show because either you put Jokaris in the Raya shirt and then he would probably burst it because he's so much bigger than Raya or he'd have to whatever right so from now on what's been happening is they go over to the touchline they make people like Mark Ogden angry because they have a whole huddle and there's a long long tactical discussion with the coach, especially when there's been one a few minutes earlier when there was a coolie break.

1:01:15So Pierluigi Colina's come out pretty adamantly. He says, no more. If the goalkeeper's down, you stay on the pitch. You don't just wander over to the sidelines and have a little chit-chat. You want water, get some servant to run on with water. But you, coach, stay in your technical area. I'm okay with that. It doesn't bother me so much.

1:01:39it would be fun. It would be a different game. It would be fun if the goalkeeper had to come off a team. I guarantee you those guys wouldn't be rolling around as often as they do. The other thing that they've done, and this I'm very happy about, and I want to give them love for. So, on a dead ball situation, if there is a foul in the box, grabbing, pushing, whatever, VAR cannot intervene because the ball's not in play. But now VAR can intervene. And I'm happy. And VAR should intervene. And you should start giving yellow cards to all the people who grab and push and shove and set picks in the box.

1:02:15It's not football. I've been saying it all year. I'm not picking on any team. So many people do it, especially here in the Premier League. Hopefully they'll be empowered not to do that. Manchester City's women complete the double in England, beating Brighton in the FA Cup final, Jules.

1:02:29Julien Laurens:Yeah, massive win, 4-0. They won the league for the first time in 10 years. We said that a few weeks ago, and now they do the double. They were the best team by far in the WSL this season. Greg Gold from Cadillac show again, and Bernice Sjo signing a new deal recently. Is she the best centre-forward at City? Yeah, definitely. Thank you, Erling Haaland. Yeah, exactly. We can have that, Erling Haaland. And she got more bigger trophies than you this season, too. Her new deal is huge news, obviously, for City. It'll be very interesting to see what they do in the Champions League, for example, next season as well.

1:03:02Julien Laurens:But for Brighton, take nothing away. great season for them. They're really on the way up. They're doing something really good with their women's team, and I think they will get stronger and stronger. Luis Suarez will not be going to his fifth World Cup, Gab. Marcelo Bielsa is taking just three strikers, and he's not one of them. Yeah, so he, obviously, he retired, I think, two years ago, and then he says, oh, and I think he looked at this, and he says, oh my god, these other strikers that are available. Okay, there's Darwin Nunez, who's now at El Gilal, in case you're wondering. Fede Vines is on Is that Oviedo who finished last in La Liga?

1:03:35Although he did score a couple of goals. Rodrigo Aguirre is at Tigres and doesn't play much and doesn't score much. He's like, surely I'm better than some of these guys. He's like, 26 people, even with one. He's like, if I promise I don't bite anybody. But no. There's somebody more loco than him, and it's a loco Bielsa. He won't be going. Which means we might bump into him.

1:03:56Julien Laurens:Yeah, we might see him somewhere around in Miami. At the proper World Cup. Right, Jules, this brings us to an end. We need to thank everybody out there for tuning in. And also, remind everybody, it's the Gavin Jules Show presented by Gusto. Gusto is your small business partner for payroll, benefits, and so much more. Get started for free at gusto.com. Jules, we're going to come back on Thursday, aren't we? Yes. The World Cup clock is ticking closer. Until then, love the game, love your neighbor, love yourself.

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