Gab and Juls Show: Norway sends Brazil packing

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22:16Quick Hits is brought to you by Gusto. Gusto is your small business partner for payroll, benefits, and so much more. Get started for free at gusto.com. All right, Jules. Enough Brazil. So how about some quick hits instead? Let's go, Gab. England make history, beating Mexico at the Azteca 3-2. Jules, Mexico had never lost a World Cup game before Sunday night at the Azteca. They also had a ridiculous record, I think, in the last 54 games. There was like two defeats before last night, something like that. The three Lions exercised the ghost of Diego Armando Maradona in 1986.

22:53Julien Laurens:Yeah, it's a big, big win. It's one of the greatest wins in English international football history, if you want. I know it's only the round of last 16, but the character that they showed in difficult circumstances, of course, with the altitude, with the home support for Mexico, it was not a great performance football-wise, it means, and we can see on the stats, they're down on everything pretty much that Mexico did. and yet they found a way of winning by again showing that character, grinding a win towards the end after the red card for Kwanzaa. I was really impressed by that, by the character, the togetherness, the desire that they had and how they clinged on to that win and everything.

23:40Julien Laurens:With the ball, it could have been better, but maybe not in those situations and contexts and circumstances. So I'm really impressed by the win from England. another performance, but it was a game that you had to win, regardless of if you played well or not. And they did it and they won it. Yeah, I mean, I think you put this in context, the altitude, obviously there's a factor. Tuchel talked about how like until the first hydration break, he just wanted them to kind of sit tight. The two goals early on, both the result, I think, of craving individual errors from Mexico. I mean, all three of them, even the penalty.

24:14And the third one, the penalty as well. Um, you know, to me, if I'm Mexico, I look, I know afterwards, we're still sense of party and whatever. I'm not happy if I'm a G either. I say we lost this game as much as England won it. I mean, even though we conceded six shots, I mean, we saw the XG there as well, but, you know, Declan Rice can't run the length of the pitch. Gilberto Mora, or sorry, it wasn't Mora, it was Romo who lost the ball there. Yeah, I think so. You can't lose a ball in that position. the Bellingham header where he comes through bro you can see this large man running and he's got two guys and he just runs past them like seven against four Mexico in their own box on that first goal you can't have these situations and I think that's going to be the big regret because England were there for the taking I thought it was balanced and then obviously you had the red card and then you have kind of this heroic end to the game Jordan Pickford making some unbelievable saves and that's encouraging and we can talk about spirit and togetherness.

25:18It goes both ways, right? In those situations, you're in a World Cup. You may never play in a World Cup ever again. I would like to think that every single person out there would show spirit and sacrifice and togetherness, whether they win or lose. I'm not going to say, oh, look, Mexico didn't show the same one. I think both teams did. Both teams gave us a spectacle. with Kwanzaa out now I don't know are we going to roll the Rhys James dice, are we going to play Jed Spence at right back we can't play Declan Rice at right back, maybe we should

25:52Julien Laurens:no maybe, I mean we need to know fitness wise where Rhys James is out, because he missed some games but he hasn't missed that much time either, and he might be able to play in their quarterfinals against I guess nowhere later this week there might be enough time for him to get there. I mean, the Prime Minister, Kier Stammer, can also call Infantino and have that red card suspended. We will see in the next one, in the next question. But more seriously, the red card is bad. England haven't played well in this World Cup, apart from the second half against Croatia, and yet they're here. They're in the quarterfinals.

26:31Julien Laurens:I would not want to play against them. I think against Norway, it would be an incredible battle where they will have to raise their level. England, absolutely, collectively, and individually as well, outside of Bellingham and Kane, who have been incredible and really have been carrying this team since the start of this tournament. You have to expect more from basically the rest of the team, including the two wingers, even if that was Gordon's best game against Mexico, sure. But you expect still him to continue at that level consistently. Saka has to step up. Arthur Anderson had a good game in difficult circumstances.

27:08Julien Laurens:but he needs to step up, so does Rice. And even that defense looked really shaky at times against Quinones, Alvarado. We're not talking about Haaland here or maybe later on the Argentine forwards or the French forwards or the Spanish forwards or whatever. So England will have to step up, but they're here now and they're a threat. Yeah, Quinones, by the way, scoring again. What a tremendous World Cup he's had. Raul Jimenez with the penalty. as obstacles is significant. I think we have to give Mexico credit. I did not think Mexico were going to be this... Not to get this far, but come to a situation where you could have knocked out England.

27:48Because if you look at the individuals, I don't think Mexico are anywhere near many of their peer teams. So, all credit to El Tri, all credit to Javier Aguirre, who has been very much criticized in the past. And Mexico did it also with a number of players who weren't necessarily fit or in great condition going into the World Cup. And I think that's something that should be noted as well. The Kwanzaa red card, I don't think anybody's going to argue about that. Yeah, there's nothing. There's not much to say there. It's a young naïve mistake. I wonder if the solution against Norway might not be moving Kwanzaa to right back in that situation.

28:24Yeah, yeah. And then you have Stones and Chalaba as options in the middle. I don't think you're going to chuck in Chalaba straight away necessarily. But then if you don't know if Stones can last you 90 minutes, Who knows, right? But that's why 2H gets paid the big bucks. Exactly.

28:41Julien Laurens:Got the US kickoff in a couple of hours against Belgium, as we record this on Monday morning. We don't know how it's going to go, obviously. But we do know that Folarin Balogun is now available for selection after his ban was suspended by FIFA's disciplinary committee. This sets a dangerous precedence, and many are saying it's a disgrace. I do too. Yeah. Yeah, UEFA put out a statement saying that Gianni Fantino crossed a red line. And I think it's very obvious that he did. This is, I cannot understand the reasoning behind this. Now, first of all, let's get this out of the way, okay? The incident itself could have been a red card, could not have been a red card.

29:27There have been greater injustices in this very World Cup, bigger mistakes. and one of the basic things is we have rules rules are kind of what keep this thing together if there's a bad officiating decision unless it's something where you know they meant to send off number six but instead they send off number four mistaken identity it's pretty clear you cannot go back and wind it back which will this doesn't happen um so that side of it was broken the fact that then this came because the president of the United States, I took credit for it this morning. There's a video of him saying, oh yeah, I called him up.

30:04I thought it was an injustice. I thought it was unfair. Didn't even think it was a foul. And I had it fixed. Johnny, you have to show some pride. Okay, the president of the United States, like any president, can go and ask for something. But FIFA's rules are very clear. No political interference. You suspend FAs around the world all the time because governments interfere. Yeah. And you can say, oh, thank you, but I'll put it to the disciplinary committee. And the disciplinary committee says, no, ha ha, no, ain't going to happen. The fact that they haven't even explained why. Oh, and by the way, another thing, which I hear everybody talk about, oh, it's because VAR made a mistake because they looked at it, they looked at it in slow motion, it looks worse in slow motion.

30:46No, no, no, no. The slow motion is used to determine whether there was contact. They look at the entire incident in regular time. This is how the system works. These match officials, these aren't like randos they found on the street. These are experienced match officials. Maybe they got it wrong. Fine. But stop making up procedural because we know it's not a procedural thing because had it been a procedural thing, they would have used it as an excuse, right?

31:09Julien Laurens:Exactly. This is really, really bad. As we record this on a Monday morning, there are even suggestions that Belgium, they're going to go to Cass. There are even suggestions that Belgium may not show up. I'm sure they will show up. but they will put, I don't know the word in English, I know in French, but a reserve on the game if Ballon Gump plays, saying that he's not eligible to play this game. I don't know what the president of FIFA is thinking right now. It's embarrassing. This is going beyond everything. People can criticize him for the FIFA Peace Prize, and yes, they always talk. You cannot have somebody comes in and, the leader who goes and does it, snaps his finger, and you say, thank you, sir, may I have another.

31:54It's also sort of politically longer term. It is a massive miscalculation from Johnny in terms of the appearance of impropriety, the appearance of illegality. Also, longer term, you're dealing with a guy on the other side who in two years his term is up. And football will continue. And you, Johnny, will presumably continue as well. You have elections coming in 2027. With this, and I spoke to a number of people, with this, you may really have gotten yourself in trouble. We'll see if a challenger emerges. But this does not benefit anybody. And there's a lot of reporting in the Wall Street Journal about the people involved, Howard Lutnick, Andrew Giuliani, that they're the ones who went and got the president involved.

32:39Honestly, Howard Lutkin, Cantor Fitzgerald, this bald, honestly, the two of them they really

32:48Julien Laurens:should know, especially... Even that, it doesn't matter who asks or who convinced, you know... It comes from them, according to the report. Yeah, but Gianni Infantino should have been strong enough. It's not even strong enough, just smart enough. Just apply the rules. Exactly. We have rules. You know, Balogun cannot play against Belgium. He can come back the game after if they qualify. They've made a mockery of this World Cup, of this situation. I think it's an embarrassment. I don't know how Infantino can look at himself in the mirror and think, yeah, I did the right thing here. It's okay. it's not okay it's not okay even if you think that the red card was harsh it doesn't matter there are rules in place if you're Belgium and I'm not wearing this shirt simply because I had to wear it today because I don't think they will qualify and then after that it would have been too late it's just if you're there and rightly so you feel aggrieved like that because you cannot change rules halfway through a tournament which has never been done okay Garinjai happened to Garinjai in 1962 it was a different life even this is so bad I agree with you on everything you said and you said it so well What about Pochettino's reaction?

33:49I was really disappointed in him. You know what? I know you're being paid a salary here. Yeah, yeah. All you have to do is say, oh, it's good that we have him back. Obviously, football-wise, it's good. I don't understand the process. I just follow what they tell me. Right? That's all you have to say. You don't say, oh, they're remedied an injustice. You know the right thing to do now?

34:09Julien Laurens:For Pochettino to shut up about this and never talk about this ever again? Also, the right thing to do, which they're not going to do and probably we would not do the same if we were in that position. Not play ball again and still beat Belgium? Yeah, but you know what I mean? It's just like, okay, this is very controversial. We, as a federation, didn't ask for this. Chachino saying, as a manager, I didn't ask for this. Flo Balogun, who I know well, didn't ask for this. You know, he went and shook the referee's hand after the game against Bosnia and I thought was really gracious in the way he took a red card that was quite severe and harsh, I think.

34:47Julien Laurens:None of them asked for that. That is a question. They didn't have Balogun. Definitely not. But there is reporting out there, not my reporting, but that they got involved. And if I was with the folks on the U.S. team, I'd pin JT Batson down and say, hey, did you engage with him on this? Did you ask for this? It would not have come from him. Did you get Ken Griffin and his friend Goodwin, the people who are paying Pochettino's salary, who, let's face it, I presume are aligned with the people in the White House. Did you get them to intercede? Or did this all come? Did this all come just temporarily from that?

35:23I really, I would not believe that. These are questions that need to be asked. And I wish people did their jobs.

35:28Julien Laurens:The other thing to do is for him not to play. He will play, obviously. And I love Flau Balogun. But yeah, this is all an absolute shambles. A Kylian Mbappe penalty in the second half gives France a 1-0 win over Paraguay. Jules, we were both there. Yes. Mbappe said after the game that Le Bleu aren't afraid to get their hands dirty. I actually said something else. I will use the washroom. They're not afraid to put their hands in the feces, which I'm assuming is some French term. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We said that in French. That's kind of like when your toilet is clogged. I'm not going to get there.

36:01That is exactly what they had to do given how this game unfolded. Yeah, stay patient.

36:07Julien Laurens:Don't lose your nerves. Don't get angry. Don't react to all the provocation, all the dark hearts, and stronger words than that. The fact that, as you see the bottom line of this stat graphic, that Paraguay had zero yellow cards in a game where all they did was foul or trick or, you know, or use all those dark hearts, It's pretty unbelievable, terrible performance from the referee, but it doesn't matter in a way. Sorry, we should care about the penalty. The penalty had to go to VAR. Yeah. That penalty was visible from outer space. Like when Artemis on the dark side of the moon could have seen that penalty.

36:48Yeah, absolutely. What is this dude doing in a World Cup?

36:51Julien Laurens:I don't know. I mean, it's not one for now, but you did explain it to me in the hour when we were driving back from the station. How that guy got the game, yeah. But anyway. For the French, while I would say, And I love, in a way, the post-match reaction from them by saying, like, if you want to go to war against us or, you know, with us, we can do that. And Mbappe had a really nice line, I thought, saying, like, oh, Paraguay thought that we were just pretty football, doing one-twos and things. And that's where the line comes from. If we have to get dirty or ugly, we will do that as well. And Cherokee was on the same line.

37:25Julien Laurens:And I thought they were right. They're sure they can fight. They show they're not easy to play against in that way, despite the beautiful football that they've played all through the season. And this was a different game. This was a game where you had to win with your being brave and by being strong mentally and physically. A word on Paraguay. I don't have a problem with the way they played. I think the referee is there. You have to give yourself the best possible way of playing. Is it negative? Is it a bit dirty and sneaky? every time they cleared the ball, they made it a point to clear it into the second tier, to waste time and whatever.

38:00The referee is there to enforce it. If the referee, you push it as far as the referee can allow you, this is a World Cup. I agree. I don't want any moral judgments of Paraguay. They did what they needed to do, give themselves the best possible chance to win, and they gave themselves the best possible chance to win, and against, probably for me, the best team in the World Cup, in the end, they lost by a single goal. So, lay off Paraguay.

38:21Julien Laurens:Argentina are through, beating Cap Verde 3-2 the gap the legend of Vosinha and friends only grows yeah this was demented um look Argentina uh when you look at the chances over the whole of the game Argentina mullered them yeah but you have to put your chances away to twice take the lead once we mentioned this Lionel Messi not following Guardiola's instructions controlling the ball with the wrong foot yeah um but still scoring. Yeah. It was tremendous. Deroy Duarte, maybe a bit of good fortune on the first one. The second one, Sidney Lopez Cabral. I just love that. I love that this guy just invents his goal out of nothing.

39:07And then of course they get the late winner at the end of injury time. I don't know what to make of this Argentina team, Jules.

39:15Julien Laurens:I don't know. I thought physically they struggled, they really did in terms of fitness because you're right, they moved the ball they were constantly in the cap value half of the pitch which is what you expect I thought at times they struggled to find Messi a bit and then if they don't find Messi they're not really sure what to do or anything like that but the biggest worry for me was that physically they looked tired, they looked like they were really struggling at some point Messi himself too and you do wonder if now that they play Egypt and then potentially Colombia or Switzerland in the quarters as well, how physically they will cope between now and the end of the tournament, how far they go because the games are now every four days compared to every six at the start of the tournament.

40:04Julien Laurens:It'd be very interesting, but you're right, credit to Cap Verde and for Cabral to then go and celebrate in the stands, waiting for the girlfriend who is not expecting yet, looking, spending 45 seconds just for a cut hole was incredible. And shout out to the Martinez boys, Debu, Lissandro, and Ballon d 'Or. Yes, of course. Mohamed Salah lives to fight another day as Egypt squeaked past Australia on penalties, Jules. Yeah, first time, I think, since 1934 World Cup that they get this far. Finally, you would say, because often we had, you know, maybe not high expectations for Egypt, such a massive country, such a successful country in Africa to go find World Cups, which they never did, and finally they did.

40:46Julien Laurens:It was not the greatest of games, let's be honest here. And the main talking point, obviously, in this game is that Australia and Tony Popovich changed their goalkeeper just for the penalty shootout. Matthew Ryan coming on instead of Beach. And then... Beach who made some huge saves. Maybe Ryan is a specialist. Yeah, he's certainly better and has more experience on penalty shootout and penalties in in general. What was funny is that Egypt had clearly thought that that would be the case and had this clip available of players taking penalties in La Liga against Matthew Ryan, including Kylian Mbappe.

41:24Julien Laurens:So they're preparing for the penalty shootout, watching how you score a penalty against Ryan. And to be fair, and credit to Egypt, they did. And they won. Yeah, I thought Egypt were by far the better team. They deserved it. It would have been cool if Volpato had scored. It would have been cooler still if he'd been playing for Italy in the World Cup and if he'd qualify for Italy. But hey, look, I don't, This is not a good Australia team, but it's a credit to them that they got as much as they could getting this far. Co-host Canada out of the competition, Gab, to beat in 3-0. Beat in 3-0, sorry, but Morocco.

41:53Julien Laurens:Azazeddin Unai scores twice. Gab, this was an ill-tempered affair that referee Michael Oliver from England struggled to control at times. And some argue that Unai shouldn't have been on the pitch for his second goal. That's right. There's a strong case there to be made. We talked about how Morocco more attacking in this World Cup. Well, clearly they can beat you more than one way because we've seen them more attacking this time around. I didn't see a lot of that. It was Canada who went at them. I think Jesse Marsh kind of took it, was a bit excessive, but then, hey, it's Jesse Marsh when he talked about, oh, I'd rather be us than them and blah, blah, blah.

42:31Bro, you don't need to make any moral judgments. Like, maybe don't wear jeans at the game. Canada, I thought, played well, but you get burned on the break when you play a team with superior quality. A team with more experienced players at this level. Could Oliver have handled it differently?

42:52Julien Laurens:38 fouls is a lot of fouls. Combined between the two teams. That is a lot of fouls. The bar is very high with Michael Oliver because he's one of the world's best referees. I think he's going to be studying this, looking back and saying, what could I have done better? I'm sorry to see Canada go out. It's never fun when the hosts go out. Now we only have one host left. As we record this, there might be no host by the time we come back on Wednesday. I thought they had the right approach. Yeah, yeah. They go out with their head held up. They can be proud of their journey. For sure. So Jesse Marsh is right.

43:20Yeah. John Aria scores the only goal and Colombia advance West Ghana into the round of 16, Jules. I thought this was fully deserved.

43:29Julien Laurens:Yeah, I mean, we've said it about Ghana before. not a good team despite some decent players like Antoine Semenyo, for example. Not good in this. Colombia in control. They could have scored a second goal without a problem. I like this Colombia team. We both like them. They have energy. They have intensity. They've got borders. They've got physicality. They've got a bit of everything. I don't know how far they can go, but that game against Switzerland would be really interesting, certainly. And then see who wins and who qualifies. But this was a pretty routine win for them. didn't have to work that hard for it.

44:02With Suter now, is Yeri Mina the tallest player left in the World Cup? Or is it Christoph Ayer? I don't know. No, Ayer, I would say. Answers on an outfield player, obviously.

44:11Julien Laurens:And Gap, following that defeat, Carlos Keros announced that he was leaving the Ghanaian national side. Yes, waiting for another offer from surely someplace other than Europe. And going and adding some... This is what he enjoys doing in life. Hey, go for it. You know what you're going to get with him. also saying goodbye to international football the very handsome Arve Renard his stint with Tunisia lasted 18 days yeah he's been telling everybody I'm available now if you have a job anywhere like journalists agents you know and people like that middle aged man model yeah maybe you know you can do Marks & Spence catalog if you want we said it at the time we can repeat it Arthur he had far more to lose by taking this Tunisia job in this World Cup than not he still went for it It was a disaster.

44:59Julien Laurens:He made that team worse than before he took over. It was just an absolute embarrassment again, an absolute shambles, and I don't think he needed that in his career. He will find another job. I'm not worried for Herve Renard, but I thought this was a really bad look on his own World Cup legacy anyway. Yeah, coaches need time to work. It's as simple as that. You can't come in, but now he can spend more time with his daughter, Wendy. Leandro Trossard is on his way out of Arsenal. Gav is reportedly heading to Besiktas in Turkey. Yeah, he had a year left on his contract. They were in the situation a year ago.

45:30They gave a one-year extension. I'm assuming they would have given him a one-year extension again. I can see I would want a little more stability. I am a little bit surprised because, as we saw late in the season, Mikhail Arseta really trusted him. And I think he performed, and he's been performing at this World Cup. But you look at age, you look at wages, you look at the fact that you've been saying for a long time they wouldn't mind bringing in another decent left-sided player. I think all these things come together to sort of explain why they need to get some money back in and clear some space for it.

46:04They have spent a ton of money in the last couple of windows. So I guess you would explain it that way. Denzel Dumfries to Real Madrid is finally a dumb deal. It's around 20 million euros and a four-year contract. I have a feeling I like this more than you do, Jules.

46:19Julien Laurens:It's not that I like Denzel Dumfries when you play on his strength. although his four-year contract is already 30. And with Cucurea on one side, as you can see here already, the signings from Jose Mourinho and Real Madrid. Cucurea on one side, Dumfries on the other side. This is already quite an attacking, well, it's an attacking pair of fullbacks. I'm interested to see how this is going to work because Dumfries is more of a wingback really than a traditional rightback. You've got Trent Alexander-Arnold already there. I think it'd be fun I think this whole Mourinho Ramadrini is going to be fun to watch anyway It's a different profile obviously to Trent but I think Denzel Dumfries is a bright guy when he needs to play wing back like Arinta with the back three he plays wing back if it's a four and he needs to stay tighter I don't think he's going to have any problems doing that and the same thing with Kukuriato if they want to get in the side they have to follow Jose's instructions you have to defend Chelsea Klobac some money in the effort to meet UFA's financial stability rules, Gabi.

47:22Julien Laurens:Tyreek George joins Everton for$18 million, rising to$24 million with bonuses. I mean, permanently joins them. $18 million going straight into the bottom line. They keep themselves at 15 % of the sell-on fee, which would help them down the road. I don't think Tyreek George, when he played two years ago, I thought he was contributing. Obviously this season he didn't have any space. Again, nonsense, Gittins, and Garnacho, and whatever. Then he went to Everton on loan. Then he goes to Everton and he does badly. But obviously they see enough in him. He's still a young man. I think he can contribute.

47:55Newcastle have picked up that winger they needed to replace Anthony Gordon. At 50 million euros, Pazumana Touré from Hoffenheim doesn't come cheap. No, it's a lot of money.

48:04Julien Laurens:It's a lot of money for such a young player who is very much still unproven. If you want, he had a great season with Hoffenheim who had a great season as a team. Overall, he was at the World Cup with Alvaric Coast, I think started their first game, but you saw how raw he still is and how young he still is. He's got great qualities, great potential, super high ceiling, sure. But you're replacing an England international player who played in the Champions League, who played, you know, those kind of games. Whether you like Gordon or not, this is his status. And instead of trying to get somebody of, you know, maybe similar experience or similar age or who's gone through similar things, you go for much younger, again, untested like Toure.

48:44I mean, they obviously have financial restrictions, which is why they sold Gordon and Tana in the first place. But 50 million is a lot of money. But 50 million is a ton of money. That's what I mean. Like, I don't, I mean, if it goes up to 100 million and then you move him on, is this the plan? I don't, I don't, it's a curious profile, put it that way. It's the kind of signing Chelsea would have made the last couple of years.

49:06Julien Laurens:Very true. Now, talking about Chelsea, Gabi, the Times report that Manchester United are after Andre Santos and Chelsea set the fee at£50 million for him. I like him more than you. We know that. I used to love him even more when he was in France. What do you make of all of this? Would you let him go for that price? Of course. But what I make of this is not that Manchester United said, hey, we really like Andres Santos and we're willing to go as high as£50 million. No, no, no, no. Maybe he was offered to Manchester United. Maybe Manchester United is seriously looking at him and Chelsea is saying, hey, we want£50 million.

49:40We had this recently with another Chelsea player where they put a big fee on him, and then it's a negotiation, but whatever number you want on him. The 50 million pounds for Andre Santos is absolutely demented. I know he might have been good at Strasburg two years ago, but he has not made a dent at Chelsea. Right? Chelsea team that we... And he was given a shot, by the way, because Chelsea were crying out for that three-man midfield. Nobody was expecting him to be better than Caicedo, but to be able to play with Caicedo. And he hasn't stepped up, so I don't know. Meanwhile, Leicester's young standout winger Jeremy Manga Is reportedly snubbing Arsenal for Manchester City What's going on here with this guy?

50:19Julien Laurens:He's not really snubbing He'd agreed terms with Arsenal Who thought, I think, they had a deal with Leicester And then some of the details changed a bit There was a problem with the structure of the deal Not that much money You know, around 12 million euros I think, or slightly a bit more maybe for Manga And Arsenal just at some point had enough and say like, okay, we out then. And then after that, City came in and they like his profile. He's a very, very talented young boy. Again, you know, didn't make much of a difference in the championship, for example, with a struggling Leicester team last season.

50:52Julien Laurens:But he didn't want to play in League One either after they went down. So it'd be interesting to see what City do. I wouldn't be surprised if he goes on loan, for example, which is probably the right thing for him. I don't know if he's ready right now to play for City in the Prem. He's 60. I don't even know. Can you send 16-year-olds online? Like, aren't there restrictions? Yeah, you're right. That's a good question. I mean, maybe if it's a very local team in the Greater Manchester United. Yeah, I don't know. Maybe. Maybe it's interesting. But it's more that Arsenal, I think, yeah, just could not get the structure that they wanted.

51:24Julien Laurens:So they took themselves out of this deal. And then City saw the opportunity and took it. And I think it might be a really good one for them. Tottenham's curl of excess central defenders continues. after Vuscovic, Radu Dragusin is on his way out to Fiorentina now. Well, they're just getting rid of the bodies because they worked out that they don't need 99 center backs. They also have to play for Sandro Sonani, who, by the way, is now official. Yeah. This deal is a Fabio Paratic deal like 1 ,000%. Yes. And I'm sorry, people don't like it when we criticize all sporting directors and stuff like that.

52:03But, bro, it's almost like, hey, Todd, I'll do you a favor. One and a half million for the loan, loan fee. But there's an obligation to buy, which by the way, at the end of the season. So it's really 19 million.

52:15Julien Laurens:So this is really an accounting trick. Yeah, this is good. I don't know if it's an accounting trick for, to be honest, for Tottenham or if it is for Fiorentina. Because obviously Fiorentina get to pay later, but then Tottenham get the benefit. Maybe they need the amortization later. I don't know. He's not particularly good. He's not, I don't think he was great before he went to Tottenham. I don't think he was great at Tottenham. Maybe a different level at Fiorentina. He can do something. But Fiorentina fans have been through so much that all of a sudden they're hailing him like they just signed Bobby Moore and Beckenbauer.

52:48Rolled into one. But no, not the case. Right. That brings us to the end of our first quick hits segment.

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53:49No, just Duracell Remember, goats only trust goats Because they're built different And Messi only trusts Duracell MLB.tv on ESPN is your home for every out-of-market game, live or on demand. Catch your favorite teams and players, plus MLB Network and ESPN app features like Multiview, syncing your stats, key plays, bets, and fantasy, all in one place. Sign up now for MLB.tv in the ESPN app. Separate subscriptions required, blackouts, and other terms apply. Visit stream.espn.com slash MLB TV for more information. The Gabby Jewel Show is presented by Gusto. Jules, we're not done. We got more quick hits?

54:40Yes. Cristiano Ronaldo has confirmed it. He says this will be his final World Cup. Do you believe him, Jules? I don't.

54:48Julien Laurens:Of course I do. I mean, the last one should have been the last one already. He's 41 years old. there's no way he's going to be around in 45 to play in the next World Cup. And he shouldn't anyway. Hadar, he played in the World Cup at 46? Yeah, not Cristiano. He's not good enough anymore. Anyway, so we record this show before Portugal plays Spain in the round of last 16. That might be his last game. It might not be. We don't know yet, obviously. But he won't be there. It was a very good press conference, though, I have to say. He was very aggressive, very offensive, very kind of on the front foot at times, saying like, I want him to ask a question because I know he doesn't like me.

55:25Julien Laurens:Ask me your question. He's hyped and amped, man. Yeah, and he also said like, you know, my World Cup is not as bad as you all make. No, it is. You scored two goals against Uzbekistan. I could have scored against Uzbekistan and you scored a penalty. So let's keep it real here. Let's keep it real here. It's not a good World Cup. You should not be here. You should not start against Spain. In my opinion, and again, we don't know. And by the time you listen to this, he might have played, not started, not, we don't know. but he cannot come back. He won't be at the Euros in two years' time. He will certainly not be at the World Cup in four.

55:57Julien Laurens:Stanley Matthews played into his 50s. Just saying. Just saying. Jürgen Klopp says that he feels rested and re-energized and that he's in talks with the German FA to replace Julian Nagelsmann at the national team head coach. Do you like this? Well, I'm glad he's rested and re-energized. That tells me that either he worked, he took a lot of the energy drinks from the energy drinks company he was working for or he basically did nothing. Maybe a bit of both. Which I think is a little bit of both. Look, I think Klopp fits the national team manager. It would have been a time when he was at Borussia Dortmund, when he was actually, I think, very tactical.

56:32And I said, this is somebody who needs the day-to-day. But he's moved on from that. He showed at Liverpool. He changed things around at Liverpool when he needed to. He adapted to the personnel more than making the personnel adapt to the system, which is kind of maybe what we saw in the early years at Liverpool. the principles of his football it's not like they're so weird and sophisticated that the players aren't familiar with him other people play that way so then you have the tactical adaptation and then you have the other thing the in-game decision making the getting the team together the team spirit, being the face of the program in that sense yes, he's a big upgrade over Nagelsmann who has another skill set Nagelsmann is a cover boy as a face man is obviously not ideal, right?

57:20Yeah, yeah. I mean, but then again, they did win a World Cup with Yogi Leu, who used to eat his own boogers, so that's a whole other thing, right? That said, I don't know. I almost don't want him to come back unless he really, really wants to, but just because...

57:33Julien Laurens:I think it's cool to have him, Zidane, arriving at the same time. If Carlos stays, Guardiola, at some point, we'll take a national team. I think we think it's pretty obvious that it's his next step and something that he said before he wanted to do. if we have a World Cup or Euros with Guardiola, Zidane, Klopp and then for the World Cup, obviously, Ancelotti and Mancini. And Tuchol and Mancini. Yeah, exactly. I think this is cool. You know, it's the League of Gentlemen for national teams. It would be special. Rudy Garcia? Imagine that. Roberto Martinez. Please, no. Jesse Marsh? Okay, okay. Okay, okay.

58:07Let's leave it at that. Jules, this brings us to an end. We're going to come back on Wednesday. There's some pretty big games in between. Um, remember, thanks for tuning in though to the show presented by Gusto. Gusto is your small business partner for payroll benefits and so much more. Get started for free at gusto.com. We're going to be back on Wednesday. So until then, love the game. Love your neighbor. Love yourself.