Gab & Juls Show: Who will replace Igor Tudor at Spurs?

29:55Julien Laurens:and it's a great story already anyway, to be fair, for them to be there, to have that chance to be 90 minutes or 120 minutes or so away from a first World Cup, obviously, player from the diaspora, a lot of them, you know, but still that unity, you saw that against Slovakia twice, they came back from behind, they played really, really well, they've got some really talented players too, but the best thing I think is how spirited they are and they've always been and it's i think natural to all kosova really so i think there'll be a lot of people as great as this turkey generation is of course and they are favorites yeah they are favorite even away from home but um but i think there's a lot of people who also will be following this game and hoping that kosovo could make more history i'll tell you what about turkey obviously we talked about yield is and cardioglu and and whatever but um it would be a story if turkey make it too it's incredible turkey haven't been to a world cup since 2002 and when they were last there they reach the semi-finals yeah in parties denmark traveling to face czechia in prague uh gab who do you have in this one um i think denmark are a more complete team um i think we saw a lot of czechia's limits uh against the republic of ireland yeah and again it's fear i mean they need penalties to advance and say it's feared so two goes down yeah they came from behind it's the It's the format as well that I think makes you play badly.

31:19The finals are often played badly, and this is the reason. They are like little finals. But equally, reality check, Denmark are 21 in the world for a reason. And I think they ought to be able to ride this out. The one concern is how Czechia approached this, because against North Macedonia, Denmark won 4-0, But other goals came after the break. And so if Czechia parked the bus and waited for the alarm ball to shake or something, who knows. Now let's turn to the Inter-Confederation playoffs. Bolivia beat Suriname, which means they're going to play Iraq. Iraq haven't played a game since November.

32:03Julien Laurens:Yeah, and obviously what story it will be for Iraq to qualify for the World Cup, for this World Cup as well, especially. it would be something very very special. I think Bolivia have to be the the favorite. We mentioned the Iraqi players, how difficult it was for them to travel and all of that which kind of make it easy on top of the fact that the country is in a war zone obviously, that their players are a bit all over everywhere that they haven't played for so long, they haven't trained that much either together so you would think that this one is bolivia's to lose but again as we've been saying before with kosovo i think there's a lot of people who'd want to iraq to do something very special there and make it to the world cup yeah and look i mean i think the other thing with bolivia is when they play in south american qualifying right at home they have the altitude factor away from home they can kind of be tough and greedy and hard to break down against usually more talented opponents here i'll be fascinated do they have to take the game because they tried to take the game to Suriname and they couldn't.

33:06They had to come from behind. Exactly. So I think this is really, really close. I'm leaning Iraq.

33:11Julien Laurens:And finally, DR Congo take on Jamaica and Guadalajara. Yeah. So absences on both sides, Axel Twenzebe and Rico Henry. Jamaica, really not good. We saw that in Cacaqaf qualifying. They played New Caledonia, who are like 151st in the world. The only one 1-0. They scored early with Catamarty, who I'm assuming is the son of Danny Catamarty. just not too many jamaican catamarteries out there um all right congo warmed up for it by beating bermuda chunil congo have that big game uh toughness of course they go through the playoffs in africa nigeria yeah um nigeria who i think still have their complaint with cast over ineligible players i don't know why that's taking so long um but we both agree congo heavy favorites here now of course everybody else was playing friendlies like France who they played the A team against Brazil.

34:07This was with all my love for Marcus Trump. This was very much a B team against Colombia and they rolled to a 3-1 win.

34:14Julien Laurens:Yeah, all new 11 players in this team against the best team that Colombia have to offer. And I think this Colombia team is a really good team for me. They're the biggest dark horses to come from the World Cup and I think they do really well. But in this game, they were just outplayed, outdominated completely by France. Conte and Zaire Emery in midfield. Cherokee doing Cherokee things everywhere. And then even later on, when Aiketik and Mbappe came on, it could have been easily four or five. That was really mean, though, and uncalled for to say, not Mbappe. I mean, for Mbappe, it's because he's a goal away from Giroud's record.

34:50Julien Laurens:So obviously, I think Deschamps thought this might be a good opportunity. And to be fair, he should have scored one, scored another one that was ruled out for offside. but because the game was so badly filmed, you didn't get a replay. You didn't see really what was going on, if he was on or off. But this was very promising. The two games, the A team against Brazil, the B team against Colombia. It was very, very impressive from the French. Let's talk World Champions, they sent out an experimental lineup and beat Mauritania 2-1. But Nico Pass opened his account with the national team. You know how excited I am to talk all things, Nico Pass.

35:28So this friendly, like both are friendlies were, you know, kind of like last minute things because of course they thought they were going to play the finalissimo against Spain in Doha. So they had to rejigger everything. Given the quality of the opposition, it's kind of hard to really judge where you are. I don't have a problem. We looked at different players. You're not going to learn anything, but it's a chance to talk about Nico Pass. Yeah. Absolutely fantastic. He is. This is the first of many. Miguel Oyarzabal scores twice as European champion Spain beat Serbia 3-0 they too had to organize a last minute friendly of course I guess Oyarzabal does a fine job impersonating a center forward

36:08Julien Laurens:well you said that I think even if De La Fuentes had I don't know number 9's available early in Samu well he doesn't have early in but even if he had the ones available as a number 9 from Morata to Samu to whoever you want, even younger ones. I just think there's something that works really well with Oya Zabal in that number nine position for this current Spain team. The two goals he scored, the first one especially outstanding collectively and then in his finishing, he's been great for them. And his head coach defending him even after the game, in a way, saying he's a world-class forward that he can do everything, which I think is true and he's a super smart player as well.

36:49Julien Laurens:So I just love him and I think he's perfect for this team and I think again they will go really far in the World Cup and he will have a really good World Cup too. Interesting I think this is pretty close I mean you can make an argument for Nico Williams obviously I'm not the biggest fan but it's pretty close to Spain's first 11. Yeah? And I look at this and I go back to what I said before like in terms of individuals in certain positions I don't think that could but as a collective yeah yeah if they're not the best they're They're pretty darn close to the best. Nice to see Victor Munoz as well being given a shot.

37:26Julien Laurens:Brazil lost to my boys France back on Thursday night gap 2-1, but the real damage might be to Barcelona with the injury to Rafinha. Yeah, it's a muscular injury. They're saying five weeks. Brazil, by the way, will obviously play Croatia next without him. I expect wholesale changes from Carletto for that game. It's big because it's going to cover both games against, against the three times that they play at Madrid, twice in the Champions League, and of course in La Liga. He's touch and go whether he'll be back in time for the Clásico against Real Madrid, which obviously could be pivotal. Even if he comes back, I don't know what condition he's going to be in.

38:10And I think he's important because, you know, we go on about the high line all season long. The high line is an issue because the front people don't press properly. When he's not there, especially, they don't press properly, other than Fermi Lopez. So it's a big, big loss. Rich Eisen here. The April 15th tax deadline is coming fast, but don't worry. Hand off your taxes to a TurboTax expert today. You know how April feels. Everything speeds up. Games matter. More hoops and hockey schedules tighten. Your phone won't stop buzzing. And somewhere in the middle of it all, there's that quiet little reminder.

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40:18That's maintain and the letter X dot com slash sports. The United States, meanwhile, gets spanked at home by Belgium 5-2. Jules, are the Red Devils better than some people think? Or is the U.S. men's national team not as good as some people think?

40:35Julien Laurens:I mean, I don't think the U.S. men's national team is better than Belgium anyway. So I'm not sure why people are surprised that they lost that game. They're not better than Belgium, but they shouldn't be giving up losing by three at home. No, maybe not. I mean, the game was a bit strange, I thought. And there was a lot of things that both head coaches tried. You know, players were not there. You do a lot of things. Usually at this time, that's what you do. And we see a lot of teams doing it. So I don't think they should worry too much. Because, again, I don't think they're good enough to beat a team like Belgium during the World Cup anyway.

41:08Julien Laurens:or a team like, you know, like France or those kind of guys. You're putting Belgium, but we're not putting Belgium in the same category. Well, yeah, they're not far from France, but they are right there. Belgium are probably in the second group, right? Yeah, but not far behind. This is not like Serbia or a team like that. But I think it's fair not to expect to lose by three goals to a team in the second category. Yeah, no, sure. So they lose by one goal. You didn't expect them to beat Belgium, right? I expected, well, I didn't know how interested Belgium were in this game or whether it's going to be, how experimental it was going to go.

41:44I know, obviously, there was no Tyler Adams in this game and no Dest. Although, again, for Dest, you've got Tim Boya, so I don't think there's that much of a difference. Center backs may be more the issue. I don't understand when you've had success with a back three and when you said we're going back three. I wasn't that big on the back three, but you decide to go back three, fine. Then suddenly in this game, you move back to a back four and you play well for a half, maybe half an hour. Yeah, yeah. And then it all falls apart and Jeremy Doku becomes unplayable.

42:16Julien Laurens:Yeah, exactly. But I just don't think there was much, that would have surprised people in the performance and the game anyway. This is where they are right now. I don't think they can compete with a team like that. They might be there in three months' time, but right now they're not. Do we expect Belgium to get to quarterfinals minimum? Yeah, yeah, but the US as well, unless they have to face a team like Belgium before and then it will all be on the quarter-finals if they make it to the last four or not, because you would expect their quarter-final, like everybody else, to really be when the World Cup starts, when you have a hell of an opposition against you.

42:44I don't know. If you're talking quarter-finals, and we'll get to the next question, I have to ask myself, like, okay, then that means that there's only seven teams in the world who are clearly better than the US. Right now, I think there are more than seven teams, substantially more than seven teams.

42:59Julien Laurens:We see. Because Pochettino Gabb said before the game that we plan to be in the semifinal at the world cup we need to start to dream today to be in the semi-final are you going to be mean about this i'm not necessarily going to be mean about it um i'm going to be to him afterwards he said the plan doesn't change this is motivational talk yeah i think like i've said this before about his communications i don't think he fully understands the market that he's speaking to when he's talking to um the people who follow u.s football both not so much the ones who are who follow it closely, but the more casual fans, I think he needs to somehow give them a different message.

43:38Of course he's going to say, you know, we want to be ambitious and go far in semifinals. That would be a tremendous achievement for the U.S. Because he's not going to have to face anybody after the World Cup is over. He was hired gone for the World Cup. They're paying him an absurd amount of money, right, for this. So, of course, if he says, oh, yeah, no, well, round of 16 would be resolved and it depends. No, like Greg Berhalter could say that four years ago because he said he was planning for this. Pochettino is a hired god, right, for this World Cup. So, of course, he has to say this. I don't think it's a clever thing to say because you have raised expectations to the point that if they screw up their first game, the backlash, again, not so much from the U.S.

44:25fans who follow the teams, who can see the weaknesses, who understand this, but I assume there's going to be this massive interest and mainstream from non-football media who are listening to this and who believe this and who really think that, oh yeah, they have a good chance of reaching the quarterfinals. They don't. Reaching the quarterfinals would be a tremendous achievement. That would be a massive overachievement. Like I said, I asked you a question a few minutes ago. How many teams right now would I easily put ahead of the U.S.? It's the ones we always mention. It's Spain. It's France. It's England.

44:56It's Brazil, right, off the top. It's Argentina, who happened to be the world champions. I would easily put Senegal ahead of them, right? I'm assuming you would agree. Tell me if I'm wrong here. I'd put Morocco ahead of them. Yeah, yeah. Portugal. No, no, but there's... Portugal, that's eight. Colombia, you said we're the big dark horses. Yeah, for me, yeah. That's nine. Are we going to... I mean, we don't know. Might we put Germany ahead of them? Yeah. Would we put Belgium ahead of them, given they just spanked them 5-2? Yeah. Right? Where do Korea and Japan come into it? Like, what I'm driving at, Jules, is he's in this unique position, and it's a difficult position to be in.

45:33But when you take the one-year contract, you have to go and say things that I don't think you believe. And where it becomes dangerous, I don't think the players believe it. And if all of a sudden everybody turns on you after just one game before you have time to recuperate, then it can affect your team. So I think he's playing a dangerous game there. Thomas Tuchel's experiments continue with England as they draw 1-1 with Uruguay. But Jules, Ben White makes the headlines. he scores, he gets booed, and then he gives away the penalty that allows Fede Valvera to equalize an injury time. Now, there's a big backstory here going back to Qatar.

46:07Julien Laurens:Yeah, yeah, because he left the squad of the World Cup in Qatar. He didn't really feel comfortable in that environment, which I think that story has never really been told properly. Because he's never told it. Yeah, because we all know it, but nobody's saying it or writing about it or, you know, things like that. and it's not something that's so private and personal that there's a reason why we're not telling it it's his story to tell and he hasn't told it yeah yeah and i think he was probably right to say i just don't understand why people boo him without knowing why he left the squads at the time if you don't know don't boo it's simple as that if you know and you decide to boo because you're in disagreement fair enough if you know nothing why are you booing so i didn't get it i don't think to hold helped in the the press conference that he gave before that the talking about it when he was not there that he probably doesn't even know exactly what happened jordan henderson what about your pal blame the media yeah yeah yeah i mean i don't really know why either but uh i just felt a little bit for him because i actually don't think he deserves to get booed not that he will care but you know i don't think he deserves the england i mean maybe he wants some mega insurance in case Rhys James gets injured again but right back is a position where England I feel have so many options that I don't know why you need to get another look at him also because between now and the end of the season we may not see Ben, I mean once Timber returns we may not see this guy play again for Arsenal so what are you going to do?

47:34Bring a guy who's, you know, Timber's who's Arsenal's second or third choice right back?

47:39Julien Laurens:No, no, no, but in what Tuchel wanted to do I don't think White is going to go to the World Cup But for what Tuchel wanted to do, whether we agree or not in this international break, he had to take more players. And then I think it's right for White to be there now. But he's not going to go to the World Cup unless there's a lot of injuries. So I can understand why Tuchel did it in a way. I just don't understand the fans' reaction. That's the only thing. On England, this game was played at Wembley. Mark Ogden messaged me this morning and he had a shocking thing. He said the last time England played an away international friendly was in 2018.

48:22That surprised me initially because normally it's one in, one out. But the reason is simply friendly is so big and so lucrative. England fans always buy tickets. Sometimes to go and boo the team and create a toxic environment, to be fair, right? Yeah, yeah. and that nobody wants to hold all the every every other nation wants to come to Wembley um because they can make more money out of it yeah is that healthy is that actually hurting England a little bit no why but I think the thinking is you're not used to playing away from home albeit in a friendly and Wembley can be sorry they haven't all been at Wembley some have been in other cities in England but um I don't know the argument I think Mark might say that you're not getting a very well-rounded, if you never play friendlies away from home.

49:11Julien Laurens:They play away from home in qualifiers in Nations League. They do, in fact, yes. That would be my repost to him. Now you play too friendly in the year. But you're not going to play an experimental lineup in the Nations League. I think that's the argument. No, no, true, yeah. I mean, I don't have an issue. It's weird, though, isn't it? Yeah, maybe. Maybe. Also, because you probably have England fans or English people who live abroad and would like, like the French went to the US, for example, for this international break. And, you know, if England had gone to Boston and Washington like the French, there probably would have been a lot of British Czechs over there who would have liked to go and see the game.

49:46Julien Laurens:Maybe. But then you would have had a lot of angry Premier League clubs that their England players were leaving. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I don't know. Yeah, maybe. Quick time out. Some breakfast intel you want to know about. Kodiak frozen power waffles and flapjacks are built for busy mornings. Heat it, eat it, and you're out the door. No long prep, no complicated game plan. They're packed with 12 to 14 grams of protein per serving, a good source of fiber, and crafted with 100 % whole grains, not refined white flour. So you're getting something that actually fuels you. And there's depth on the roster.

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51:10Julien Laurens:Everton have reportedly asked the Premier League to explain why Chelsea didn't get docked points after being found guilty of making illegal payments to agent, executive and intermediary during the Abramovich era. We mentioned that on last week's show. Gab, what are the implications and do you understand Everton's point of view? Yeah, I think a lot of people understand it. This is a complicated case. I mean, you've made the point, others have made the point that, you know, they should be docked points because they gained an advantage from this. The flip side, of course, is that, you know, Chelsea self-reported this and the current Chelsea owners weren't the owners at the time.

51:43This all happened in the Abramovich era. The Chelsea executives back then are all out of football, from Marina Granovskaia to Bruce Buck. I think the implications here is I think it's also a way of turning this, putting some pressure on the fa because the fa will have to rule on this as well yeah um i'm sort of ensuring that maybe they should get stiffer punishment i think everton also say well hang on a minute you know we were docked points um for violating profit and sustainability rules chelsea did not violate profit and sustainability rules but in some ways what they were found guilty of is more serious you're paying bribes and backhanders and stuff like that yeah i think there's a lot of people who are watching this you can't rewrite history necessarily but there are teams who finish second to a Chelsea side that had some players who frankly arrived because of the legal payments and I'm wondering if somewhere lawyers are sharpening their pencils to see if if they can seek some more compensation which is not what Boli and Igbali want to hear no Cristiano Ronaldo and Mexico draw nil nil with Portugal and Mexico City Joseph's game that was somewhat overshadowed by the death of a supporter who fell from a VIP area onto a car park below.

52:59Julien Laurens:Yeah, I mean the game in itself, nothing to see much apart from maybe the little, it was quite feisty I thought at times. But yeah, really Sanchez was in the new Aztekas stadium, who'd been refurbished in the last two years, reopened for this game and obviously would be there for the World Cup. Beautiful, I mean it was beautiful before, it's even more beautiful i think now and i think it's a very very special stadium however this fan there who was uh who drank far too much uh wanted to go from the second floor to the first floor by stepping over some sort of fancy apparently and just fell all the way to them so really really sad and let's hope that maybe security around this was maybe not exactly to the point i don't know exactly how it happened but that we don't see any repeat of this obviously in the month now leading to the world cup and at the world cup calf have announced plans to expand the african cup of nations afcon from 24 teams currently to 28 teams gabby as the tournament also will move from every two years which is now to every four years yeah so this is the calf executive it's i think it still needs to be rubber stamped um so all right 28 teams i'm assuming you're talking seven groups of four and then the best placed but what do they go to then to 60 like it it seems like 28 to be a weird number you go to 32 really but it seems like pretty unwieldy to me um the weird thing though is if you miss the afcon uh being every two years don't worry about it because 2027 there's another afghan yeah in uh 2028 there's going to be a bridge afghan yeah because the next one after that is 2032 but they also have plans because to introduce the african nations league and have a 16 team final tournament every two years hey look just like the afghan exactly so it looks like you're going to end up with more tournaments if all these things come to pass uh look i don't begrudge the fa's making money here um but what i don't want to hear then is people going on and complaining player welfare and stuff like that right um seems to be like a response from a lot of people who who moaned when they decided to move to move the afghan to every four years um a 16 team final tournament depending on the format it's one thing if you'd make it like like they do with the Nations League in Europe where it's semi-finals and then a final.

55:32It's quite another thing. If 16 teams, are they going to be like, is it going to be like in Europe where it's 16 teams but you've got sort of four semi-final, four final fours if you want? Yeah, they didn't give more information to be fair when they... It better be that because otherwise you're going to get a tremendous amount of backlash and yeah, it's an odd situation where odd things happen. Let's go to the Women's Super League here in England. Manchester City destroy Manchester United 3-0. They go nine points clear at the top. Jules, are you ready to crown them champions?

56:07Julien Laurens:So they've got the nine points clear of Chelsea. Same amount of games played. They're 11 ahead of Arsenal who have two games in hand. So potentially five. Is there another head-to-head coming up? No more head-to-heads. Sadly, and to be fair, when you look at City's fixtures left in the tournament in the competition sorry i don't see where they could drop enough points for us to bridge that five points gap arsenal would rule their draws because they've only lost one game in the league all season when city have lost two for example and chelsea three or four but those five draws by arsenal earlier on in the season especially of course them dearly really so um i think city for the first time in 10 years because it's been a long long time since the last one the title will be crowned wsl champion and they would deserve it because they've been really outstanding all season long uh but it's not just according to the marco t rules not just exactly exactly there and arsenal also will have some champions league football to worry about potentially this week the quarter final second leg that you can follow on disney plus by the way roman everton could both be in the europa league next season gab and they have the same owner so UFA will make a preliminary assessment tomorrow on this case but reportedly there won't be a blind trust situation like we've seen in the past yes this is all pretty murky so the blind trust as we've seen I think UFA have kind of concluded most people have concluded that it's kind of like nonsense right Mr.

57:38Marinakis appoints resigns on the board of one club and he appoints his friends on the board and then as soon as the issue is resolved then all of a sudden these guys resign and mr marinakis comes back he's still the owner right so the idea is you have a 30 shareholding um but obviously the fried king group own like 98 and 99 percent of roman everything they're not just gonna give their shares away to somebody although i'm sure mr texter would happily take the shares if they were right now we take anything yeah absolutely um so they're they're talking about you if you're using the term operational decoupling they're saying no transfers between the clubs reduce the voting rights at the board but again that's kind of stupid because how often does does a club board actually vote yeah on anything yeah exactly right so and also for you you appoint other board members so that the freekins are like oh look we only have 30 but who are they going to appoint they're going to appoint a bunch of step and fetch it's we're going to do what they want right like mr marinakis his friends so it's a messy one if people are really cynical will point to the fact that, you know, Friedkin, the Friedkin group, very close to the current UEFA administration.

58:55And it feels like a fudge. I think you need clear rules and just enforce the rules. And if it means that, hey, look, one of these two teams is to drop down, assuming they qualify, Roma 6 right now, Everton or 8th, one of these two teams is to play in the conference league. and you know what since you both have the same owner and it's ultimately you care about money allow Roma then to let's say Roma get Europa League make more money out of it than Everton in the conference league I rob Roma to share their winnings with Everton do stuff like that this is what it's all about ultimately right but you have to have rules I don't you know my thoughts on MCOs and I'm glad they're going away goes from Nico Jackson and Ismail Assar gave Senegal a tuna win over peru in their friendly uh but jewels the story here is how they paraded the afghan trophy in front of a sold-out stade de france uh it doesn't look to me like they have

59:48Julien Laurens:any intention of giving it back absolutely not well done to senegal uh for trolling the way they did calf and everything else i mean the morocco fa even sent a some sort of no no no it was because it was actually official. Some sort of like admin guy to check on to see if the trophy was there or not. I mean, the best thing is we knew that it was very likely they would brought the trophy in. We were not completely sure. They played with a shirt with two stars, including the second star for obviously the last half con. So he's full trolling from Senegal and totally, as we said, deserved, I think.

1:00:29Julien Laurens:After the game, obviously there was a mixed zone in the Stade France, as you say, sold out Stade de France, 80 ,000 people, Senegal fans there, very happy to celebrate the trophy and the Afghan win. Yusuf Endo, who's the greatest African singer and Senegalese singer, probably in African music history. Yusuf Endo was there singing before the game as well. So it was this massive, massive party in Paris for it. And after the game, the players said, like, you know, we want it on pitch this is where you win things not in uh offices or tribunals or things like that so they're never getting this trophy back and you and and and i think i think as we've been saying before gabby cast would go with them anyway yeah i i what i think also is i was i spoke to somebody ahead of this game and they were concerned because obviously yes there's a big senegalese population in Paris, there's an equally big, if not larger, Moroccan community.

1:01:27And that, oh, well, what if there's trouble? What if they do this? What if they troll them? I think Morocco fans don't want the trophy. I don't think they care. I think they probably think, yeah, like me, you walk off the pitch for X many minutes, you forfeit the game. However, they also, if they're football fans, also recognize that on the pitch, Senegal were the better team on the day, and Senegal deserved the trophy. So I don't know how you're going to get out of this. Like I said, the right thing to do for me all along was to have Senegal forfeit the game when they went down. And the referee had the power to do that.

1:02:06And he chose not to do it, or maybe he was empowered, or maybe he was told not to do it. There's a whole mystery here about what actually happened, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Once it goes this long, like I said, if you're a Moroccan fan, you don't want this trophy.

1:02:19Julien Laurens:napoli have reportedly given romelo lukaku an ultimatum if he's not at training at the training ground on tuesday morning then he will be suspended from the squad is the love affair between him and antonio conte over now well it's it's this is a weird story it's kind of unnecessary obviously was injured in the first part of the season he came back he's only played a few minutes here and there i think over over the last months give or take um or six weeks i should say Romelu Lukaku as you can imagine is a very large man and you know him getting back to full fitness just simply with his physical structure is a more delicate thing right and the official story from Napoli is that we need him to get fit but we have Hoyland, Hoyland's doing well blah blah blah we really want him we really need him the story from the other side is Lukaku was called up to the Belgium team was sent home because they said, you're not fit to play.

1:03:19He really wants to be in the World Cup. And so he said, I'm going to stay in Belgium and try to recover over this break, right? But would Napoli care? I wouldn't have been here anyway. Napoli are saying, no, no, no, no, no. You need to come back here to recover. If I were really cynical, I might suggest that Napoli are like, wait a minute, we're paying this guy an absurd amount of money. We have this other guy, Hoyland, who does a lot of the same thing, but more importantly he's a lot younger i'm not gonna say he's better no by not he's better no he's more productive right now um we're not sure that lukaku's gonna be fit again you know let's crack the whip um i think it's sad that it's come to this that it's the reality i don't know exactly i don't think the relationship between conte and lukaku is broken down i think it's more that conte has ever puts winning first and the team first and he's going along with it and he says it's nothing personal, it's just business.

1:04:15I would like to think that if Lukaku got on the phone to Conte, he said, hey, will you get my back? Will you understand this? Because I've got a World Cup coming up, and you know how hard I've worked for you, and you know what our relationship is. I would hope that between those two guys that they could resolve it that way. It's obviously, rather than Conte saying, hey, I'm not the one calling the shots here, it's a club, I'm not happy either. But who knows, Conte may yet do that. We know how unpredictable he is, right? So who knows? They've got Milan coming up after the break. Things don't go according to plan.

1:04:46Conte might come out and say, you know what, we lost this game because the club are being unreasonable and De Laurentiis is mean and he was mean to Lukaku and that's sad mean and affected the whole team and blah, blah, blah. So I'm not going to put it. I don't want to believe, though, that the relationship between these two men was anything less than genuine. Roy Hodgson, 78 years young, has come out of retirement to take over Bristol City, whom apparently he coached in 1982. before you were even born Jules?

1:05:13Julien Laurens:Just after I was born, 44 years ago indeed, they got rid of him and now they're calling him back for the last seven games of the championship season where they are not going to go up Bristol City because I think they're 16 points behind the playoffs. They're not going to go down because I think they're 16 points above the relegation zone. What's the point you would ask? Sure, apparently he's going to help them get better organized as a whole club and and and and set the uh the the tone of their identity and philosophy and all of that all as a club to make them better i mean clearly he was not happy being retired and enjoying his garden and his family and something else i don't know why i don't know why he would go back there i don't know why they would call him it's incredible i think um i just don't see the point of it at all uh yeah you don't need to name a manager like if you just want him to help out your club if he's attached to the club you can say like a roma ranieri type you know yeah he's just above in the offices and stuff uh i really really don't know emotional scenes in antalya gabby where iran despite the war played a friendly against nigeria they lost 2-1 in an empty stadium but it's hard to imagine what these players must have been going must be going through Yeah, I'm going to say something nice about FIFA here.

1:06:33So if you don't want to hear it, block your ears. This is going to be part of a four-nation tournament. People make fun of the FIFA series. They're like, who wants to watch these rubbish teams play? Well, they want experience in teams outside their region. So this was supposed to be this four-nation tournament with Jordan and Costa Rica and, of course, Nigeria and Iran. So actually a pretty decent standard, given that Jordan's going to the World Cup, by the way. And Nigeria lost a playoff to go to the World Cup and Iran inshallah will go to the World Cup. But obviously you can't play in Amman because of the political situation.

1:07:12Because Iran will only let them play in neutral countries. Turkey officially a neutral country. So they move this tremendous security in Antalya which is sort of a holiday resort type situation. Media blackout and everything. Players weren't allowed to speak so from what i could tell there were no fans there um they lost 2-1 to nigeria as we said but um you know it was hard not to be moved when they took the pitch with uh they had uh pink and purple backpacks um in memory of the 165 children that were killed at the uh girls school in uh in minab in the early part of the war and there are investigations ongoing to see how it happened um it's so tough for me personally.

1:08:00I hope there's a way to get them to the World Cup because wherever you stand on this, there's Iranians around the world who I think could draw maybe a little bit of solace from this. Jules, this brings us to an end on this depressing note, but we're going to come back on Thursday. I make no promises about what state of mind I will be with. Until then, love the game, love your neighbor, love yourself.

1:08:56This might be a hit. You want the truth. They just want a conviction being placed under arrest. We had a killer amongst us. Murder at the U. Listen now.