Goalkeepers' headers & elasticos on the deck of the Titanic: The listeners' loves & hates*

0:00Before the season even kicks off, soccer fans are already making predictions. Who wins the league? Who qualifies for Europe? And who's lifting the trophy at season's end? On Calci, America's number one prediction market platform, you're trading against peers in a live market, meaning there's no house. And as the probability changes, you can buy in and out of your position. For a limited time, download the Calci app and use code CUP26 to get$10 when you trade 10. K-A-L-S-H-I, Calci. Trade the beautiful game. 18 plus only restrictions and eligibility requirements apply. Event contract trading involves risk and may not be suitable for all investors.

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1:11So you were scrolling on Marketplace, and there it was. The bike you'd been searching for. You sent a message, and it turned out the seller was super chatty. Kind of funny, and an avid cyclist. The next thing you know, you're in a cycling crew. Well, a community cycling group. The thing about Facebook, you might find more than what you're looking for. From a browse to a bike ride, this summer, find more on Facebook.

1:38Charlie Eccleshare:I'm sorry, you can sit there and look and play with all your silly machines as much as you like. Is Gascoigne going to have a crack? He is, you know. Oh, I fell! Brilliant! Pachee! He's ran the goalkeeper, he's done it! Absolutely incredible! He launched himself six feet into the crowd and Kung Fu kicked a supporter who was without a shadow of a doubt giving him lip. Oh, I say, it's amazing. He does it same and same and same again. Crank up the music, charge a glass. This nation is going to dance all night. The body language of players who should have had the ball squared to them, but their team scored anyway.

2:26Charlie Eccleshare:the economical language of group stage permutations, high-risk extracurricular goalkeeping activity, kids doing flip-flaps on the deck of the Titanic, the absolute scourge of logo-less retro shirts, and time for the footballing authorities to open the floodgates for portions of chips at top-flight football matches. Brought to your ears by Goalhanger Podcasts, this is Football Clichés and your Mesut Haaland Dicks.

2:56Charlie Eccleshare:Hello everyone and welcome to Football Clichés. This is the listeners' Meza Harland Dicks for July. Your niche footballing fascinations and irritations. We pick the best six from your nominations. Alongside me for this one is Charlie Eccleshare. How are you doing? Very well, thank you. And David Walker. How are things? Things are good. Excellent. Right, so let's get stuck straight in to this main event. Let's kick things off with your fascinations. The first one comes from Ben Carlin. is when a player is attacking the goal, but has a teammate in a much better position in the middle who they should square it to.

3:28They choose not to, they shoot, but they score. And then watching the reaction of the player who should have been squared to. I love the whole psychodrama of it, the way the clear frustration they're feeling has to be buried and the sometimes quite forced joy and celebrations that they have to perform in order not to be seen as selfish and not a team player.

3:51Charlie Eccleshare:I find myself making sweeping moral judgments about players' characters based on how unreservedly they celebrate when they're in this situation. I will rewind celebrations, if the service I'm watching on allows for it, to check if a player joined in the celebrations by the corner flag or whether they skulked off back to the centre circle on their own. I'll watch for tiny details like the arms thrown up in frustration that have to be hurriedly converted into arms up in celebration. And finally, I love that it's never, ever picked up on by commentators. There's a weird code of silence around it, which I find almost as fascinating as the phenomenon itself.

4:29Charlie Eccleshare:Lovely touch from Ben to take a moment to recognise the mixed offerings when it comes to the rewind facilities on online streaming platforms. Really useful. But Dave, his final point there was quite telling. It never really dawned on me that commentators never, ever talk about the reactions for a player who should have been squared the ball and how he has to sort of play with his emotions when the goal needs to be celebrated. It's definitely a thing, this, isn't it? I mean, I guess it's obviously, when would it ever be the main talking point after a goal? Perhaps not. Yeah, but I mean, it could be commented upon on the sort of third or fourth replay or something after the celebrations has taken place.

5:06Yeah, I think it is a thing. I mean, the obvious one, obvious sort of scenario that comes to mind is somebody like Chris Giornauto getting pissed off. But that is almost, you know, that's kind of more to do with his personality. It's the subtle ones that probably happens quite a lot of time and goes unnoticed when it's just the focus is on the celebration. There's someone who's not necessarily flapping their arms about and making a big song and dance of it, but probably just sort of doesn't really run over and get involved and just kind of trots back. And I would say, you're right, David, it's not normally the main talking point, but I have a very, very vivid memory of, this is almost 20 years ago exactly November 2005 a game that most will remember for the Henri free kick Wigan 2 Arsenal 3 remember the Henri scores the free kick and says is that enough to the ref who didn't let him take a quick one yeah the first goal in that game Robin Van Persie scores he's got Freddie Jumberg outside of him who he could slip in and I remember vividly and this says a lot about my teenage self being at a party that night and having quite a long discussion with a friend of mine about whether he should have passed my friend was saying ultimately he's still got passed there and my argument was well he scored and arsenal were often accused of they're trying to walk in he hasn't and that's kind of why you shoot and the argument was yeah but you can't and this was actually ahead of its time as a sort of process versus outcome debate of like uh well yeah he may have scored he still should have passed and so you know i think there is a kind of

6:28Charlie Eccleshare:does the end always justify the means there so you were having a sort of xg adjacent discussion 20 years ago. Great to see. I guess so, yeah. More like XA, isn't it? Exorcist, yeah. What the XA was if he had slipped him in there, yeah. Yeah, I sort of sympathise with the sort of, yeah, bigger picture aspect. If you did this a thousand times, it's better to pass it. All the other lads are chasing girls, getting off with people. Charlie's over there talking about whether Van Persie should have squared it to Yumba. And I stand by it. At least he didn't get a guitar out, that's the best. Who's had the last laugh?

7:00Yeah. Exactly. And here, yeah, who would have thought? 20 years later.

7:04Charlie Eccleshare:Dave, if we take the goal out of the equation here, I think this is one of the most perennially consistent pieces of mini pantomime in football. When you see a situation where a cutback is on or several players are the option for a player up wide and they go for a shot instead, I am, like Ben, my attention is instantly drawn to the players in the middle about how they're going to react. And then secondarily, once they have reacted by throwing their arms out or pleading, sort of cheery on restart by pointing at the floor with both hands or something my attention is then drawn to the player who ignored them who then continues to ignore them for as long as he possibly can and then finally the camera will linger on them and then finally he will look over sheepishly and go with one hand go with that sort of puffed grimace is the only way to describe it the puffed grimace of yes i know i should have shot next time didn't see it with an open palm yeah in apology yeah yeah yeah yeah you do see it you do see it it's one of those things that you don't think about until it gets pointed out which is very much the beauty of this format but I suppose you more often see it when the player has had a shot and misses and there's a player in a better position who's pointing at the floor going oh come on come on I was there yeah I guess that's what's good about this because you do because obviously then it does become a talking point it is picked up on you know because then there's like a well then there's a clearly a better outcome but this sort of thing does like among fan bases you will get this that even if a goal goes in in the age of social media now you know people can have these conversations online rather than in real life at parties you know as to whether well even though that has gone in like got a part you just got a pass there and there'll be a sort of still of what it looks like in the moment where the other player is clearly in a way better position yeah yeah there's an fpl element to this as well oh yeah as always will be more conscious of this nowadays yeah could have squared it to x player that would have got me points or whatever people watching reacting in the same way would be fantastic there is a subtler relation to this dave it's the kind of strike partner who's out of favor or kind of want away and they're not really invested in the team so it's not that they should have been passed to but you see them in shot not really wheeling away in celebration with everybody else you think oh are they fast are they bothered like especially in pre-season players who are clearly linked with a move away and they're just they're just waiting and they've been drafted into the lineup because there's a bit of rotation going on and and they're out corner of the shot and you think they're not fussed they're not even joining in they're just sort of going they're just trotting over you think disappointed disappointed that everyone doesn't join in the celebration yeah i think it's it is the sort of thing that fans will look at in that way in with the crazy sort of hyper granularity of transfer speculation these days is you will have people analysing celebrations.

9:51Oh, I think he does want out. He wasn't quick to celebrate with his teammates. Or how quick they are to celebrate with him. There are sometimes a player will score. Alexi Sanchez, just before he left Arsenal, scored. And it was like no one ran to him. Because it wasn't just that he wanted out, it was that no one liked him.

10:10Charlie Eccleshare:Yeah. But it can often be, I mean, I think ego is definitely at the core of this, Charlie. because you'll see a strike partner who may well be sort of part of the picture of the club and not wanting away, but because they haven't scored, you think, are they jealous? Are they jealous of the other guy scoring? Yeah. I don't know, just for like, that's their reason for existing, scoring off. Ruud van Nistelrooy was famously, you know, would be like, so the story goes. He'd be, you know, United could have won 4-0 and he'd be miserable on the way home if he hadn't scored. Right. So I imagine he would be pretty annoyed.

10:40I don't think there's like a, oh, deep down, I'm happy for them. I suppose also you can't ignore the monetary element to it. It's like some of these players are probably getting like several thousand pounds per goal.

10:53Charlie Eccleshare:I'm fascinated by goal bonuses. I just think they should be a really massive part of football. I think incentivise contracts as they are these days. What if you were just paid a pittance but paid shit loads for scoring goals? I think that if you tip that balance way too far, the player's behaviour would just change dramatically. So maybe that's why they don't do it. Yeah, you get a lot more of this sort of thing, not passing when you should. right the next fascination from our listeners this month comes from andrew penman whether it's the end of the season or the conclusion of a group stage of a tournament i love the permutations for final places and when discussing the permutations of a group or league position i particularly enjoy the economy of one specific phrase that gets used which is team x needs to better team y's result in order to qualify you expect they're just trying to find the right way to sum up well if team y wins and they're through no matter what but if team my only draw then team x can go through with a win but a team x draw then they can only go through if team y lose no nice and simple team x need to better team y's result a lovely little phrase it's spot on charlie it's a very efficient use of language and also it's the only option in this situation now it's become the standout option which and it is it is a slightly odd phrase but it does even as efficient as it is it still makes you kind of stop and have to figure it out which which means it isn't quite doing its job no i do like that i think there is an economy to it and sometimes there are times where you do just really what you're like i'm like i do just sort of want in a really simple way to understand all this and i that does that does serve a useful purpose dave does your brain do what my brain does when faced with this phrase which is literally run through every possible scenario of results just to check that that would indeed be the situation so yeah okay so if team x drew that means team y that that means they need to win right because you can't do a better draw so it has to be a win and if they lose that means they could afford to draw it's um it's amazing what your brain just has to check really yeah well because you're never quite sure whether it's an all but situation too where technically team y could have some sort of theoretically almost impossible outcome would still get them through like they could win 14 nil or something or you know you kind of want to cover off that possibility as well don't you this is an interesting one if i said to you charlie that team x need to better team wise results to qualify uh does would that include goals goal difference or does it mean the result itself needs to be bettered?

13:09Charlie Eccleshare:And maybe this isn't as efficient as we thought. No, I think just the outcome. Right. Yeah, like, you know, 7-0 isn't a better result than 1-0. You know, they're both the wins. So Team X needing to better Team Y's result would not be the appropriate phrase to use if goal difference came into the equation. Correct. Fair play. Yeah, that would need to be an addendum to the situation. Because then you get the nice, like, but yeah, because look, if they win, then there's nothing that Team Y can do. That just ends the debate. It's great philosophy for my life, I think. I don't really want to win. I just want to better other people's existence.

13:44Charlie Eccleshare:That would do for me. That would do. Thanks, Andrew Penman. The final fascination for my listeners this month comes from Tim Kelly. Hi, this is Tim, Hull City fan for my sins. One of my fascinations is when a goalkeeper charges out the box to head away a hurtful through ball, ticks a couple of boxes. Firstly, the player in a position you don't expect them to be in and also when the commentators say the goalkeeper they're using their heads i just love the double meaning of that cheers charlie he's absolutely spot on that the uh double meaning gets rolled out far too much it's never gone out of fashion has it no and we recorded dreamland recently on football commentary in computer games and that's exactly the sort of little flourish which would go in because it's kind of always true and doesn't change so the little user's head in more way than one kind of like that balmy and balmy night it's very video game d this is a very pure fascination from tim kelly isn't it dave this is the sort of thing that would appeared on listeners met mesut hollandix all the way back in 2022 or something it's it's one of the crown jewels of satisfying moments in football words which is goalkeepers doing extracurricular activity yeah i really i do really like this one and i always i always think when you watch it you're always nervous aren't you when your keeper comes out and launches themselves at the ball and it's often a launch as well it's not like they just come out and just sort of nod it it's not it's never a little nod it's always almost a diving header flying it's almost the only place you sort of see a almost diving header these days but when they when they do do it you think i'm always i'm always amazed that actually that they pull it off as well as they do a lot of the time because it's quite rare that a goalkeeper goes through it with their heads and they don't make proper contact with it and clear it sometimes when they go to kick it when they're outside of the box yeah maybe they'll slice it or they'll miss it or whatever but when they go for their head no one's really going up for it with them are they exactly you see it's very unorthodox actually charlie because the spectacle of a goalkeeper coming out and using their head is is usually overrides the actual act itself it's a very unusual form of header it's essentially a half volleyed header you know yeah to use the phrase generously the ball's on the rise and they have to head it away you'd players don't often head the ball like that and so to get distance and direction on a ball that's bouncing upwards is actually quite hard so it's fraught with danger it's also the great thing about it is that especially nowadays like last ditch defending is so out of fashion like if a defender was sort of heading in such a panicked way you sort of be like what are you doing like you should have more about you defenders are expected you know a defender would be expected to kind of bring that down under control head it to a teammate or if they are going to head it out at least head it out looking a bit more deliberate about it.

16:19There's something so kind of kamikaze and desperate about a keeper. Because they are. They know, like, if I do get this wrong, we are completely fucked. So just seeing them launch themselves and it being acceptable, even in this day and age, I don't think teams would be like, oh, you've got to be better with your head than that goalkeeper. It's fine still to just fly out and get rid of it. And even though, as I said, most of the times they're successful, And I'm sure this happens to goalkeepers maybe more often than we would think. It still also feels to me that every time they do it, they're not quite certain that they're going to go over their head until the last split second.

16:56You can sense a little bit of panic in the situation.

17:01Charlie Eccleshare:It's an aggressively horizontal moment of a televised football game when a ball races over the top, a goalkeeper races out, heads it back in the other direction, probably quite forcibly, Charlie. And TV, sort of the traditional TV angle, has never really found a way to accommodate this because what you end up with is half a second of complete uncertainty as a TV viewer about where that ball is falling. Because if it's falling to an opposition player, then the whole new chapter of drama ensues. But also, in that moment of uncertainty, the idea that it might fall to an opposition player and they have the ability to just return it with interest back into the goal, I think is slightly exaggerated.

17:40Charlie Eccleshare:I think it takes a lot of skill to hit that first time. Yeah, it does. But it is still a terrifying prospect to have an unguarded goal just does fill you with anxiety. Like you see when goalkeepers come out and they're getting on the ball. And, you know, obviously now they do it all the time. But it's still if you, depending on where you're sat, like in a stadium in particular, you look at me like the goal is completely unguarded. Like if this gets intercepted, we are like a misplaced pass away from someone having a free shot at an empty net. And I do think as well, what's good about this is you can almost see the goalkeeper thinking about the next thing they have to do is leg it back to their own goal.

18:16So almost like from the moment they land, they're doing that. So there's so much going on. Do you think it's the last area of goalkeeping that still doesn't really get talked about in any sense? Because you've obviously got, you know, really good shot stopper, great distribution, good with his feet, commanding, comes for crosses. you never hear anyone say, look, for a goalkeeper, he's great in the air as well. You don't, but what you would say is good starting position. That's the sort of like go-to, oh, I know a little bit about goalkeeping and defending things to say about that. And he gets it because he's got a great starting position.

18:51Charlie Eccleshare:Very kind of sort of results dictated that claim though, isn't it? I mean, no one ever really sort of casually talks about a goalkeeper starting position before they get to the ball. Just so you know, I have noted his starting position already before he's actually got involved. Trust me, when the moment comes, it will really pay off. There is a moment where they basically have to decide whether they're going to head straight upfield and essentially gamble on where the ball's going to go, or the more business-like, just literally heading out of play and getting back into their area. But Dave, no matter how risky they go, even if they do choose the safety option, they are guaranteed a round of applause from the fans.

19:27Oh, very much so. But I guess that decision depends on how central the ball is over the top that they're coming to deal with. If it's closer to the touchline, then you can get it out. But if it's right in the middle of the pitch, you do well to head it confidently out of play from the centre of the pitch in that scenario, especially if you're running straight at it as well.

19:48Charlie Eccleshare:maybe this is where the trajectory of the ball kind of helps if it's on a rise anyway and you're basically just helping it on its way like it's like um i don't know like a hooked volley like a hooked half volley in tennis you basically just go helping on its way to the other side of the court maybe that you could head it do you think goalkeepers ever practice this scenario yeah i reckon so training i reckon i reckon they do yeah like you've got to be sharp because it's about the not so much the heading aspect but the speed off your line to get to the book because as well if you don't you could get a red card like if you are a bit slow you don't quite get there in time you clatter into an attacker and i think the purest one is the offer of throwing that's yeah that's the most kind of like i'm not effing about of course you know a training drill for this would mitigate against the circumstances where the ball bounces clean over their head dave which has to be right up there's one of the most mortifying moments as a professional footballer when you haven't judged the bounce of a ball and a very sunday league thing to happen I think.

20:44Yeah, yeah. And the thing about it, when you're right up to the last second, you think you're going to get there and then you just go, oh no, I've misjudged it.

20:51Charlie Eccleshare:This is quite topical at the moment because Charlie, England's goalkeeper, Hannah Hampton, has no depth perception due to a sort of eye condition she was born with. She has no depth perception as a goalkeeper. Yeah. And she's essentially had to train that way. And I'm not saying I sympathise because I don't have the eye disorder, but what I am saying is when I had to go and go at Sunday League, my depth perception was so shit. like it's it is genuine skill to know what pace the ball is coming directly at you from down the pitch to have to judge it and get there in time and not have it bounce over your head is a genuine skill it's incredible incredible spin-up to overcome that i know it's mad fair play right thank you to tim kelly that's your fascination's taken care of for july we'll be back very shortly with your irritations

21:38Before the season even kicks off, soccer fans are already making predictions. Who wins the league? Who qualifies for Europe? And who's lifting the trophy at season's end? On Calci, America's number one prediction market platform, you're trading against peers in a live market, meaning there's no house. And as the probability changes, you can buy in and out of your position. For a limited time, download the Calci app and use code CUP26 to get$10 when you trade 10. K-A-L-S-H-I, CalShe. Trade the beautiful game. 18 plus only restrictions and eligibility requirements apply. Event contract trading involves risk and may not be suitable for all investors.

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23:21Oh, look at that! That is wonderful!

23:28Charlie Eccleshare:Welcome back to Football Clichés. This is the listeners' mezz at Harlan Dix for July. We've done your fascinations. Now it's time for your irrational irritations. We kick things off with John Crowell. So my irritation is when you're watching a film that is set in a certain era and one of the characters happens to be kicking a football round and they perform a trick or a skill that is just so obviously not from that era. and it happened most recently watching something set in the early 70s and somebody did a rainbow flick. And I just thought, would they have been doing that in the early 70s in Northern Ireland?

24:06I don't know about that. And it made me just think, how bad does it have to actually be before it gets pulled?

24:11Charlie Eccleshare:Like, what about when that kid was kicking that block of ice around on the Titanic and if he just pulled out an elastic or something? Surely someone's going to flag that and just go, whoa, whoa, whoa. my two favorite bits of this charlie are one the shade thrown at northern irish football in the 1970s and two by some distance the concept of a kid doing an elastico on the deck of the titanic with a block of ice imagine imagine if he'd snuck that in and james cameron like later on going off for fuck's sake famously temperamental he would have absolutely lost his mind I suppose an elastico with a block of ice might be slightly easier than a ball if it's going to slide around it stick to it yeah yeah if it was bare skin yeah it might stick to it imagine imagine sort of I don't know not even at the time maybe 20 years later watching Titanic and then just noticing that that had happened and being the first person to notice that some kid had rolled out an elastico in what 1996 it would have been filmed yeah oh yeah maybe filmed yeah Yeah, so around the time of O Phenomeno himself.

25:18Charlie Eccleshare:So I think it would have been in someone's consciousness. If he'd watched enough episodes of Eurogoals, I think it would be an impossibility. But would that be acceptable in the IMDB goofs section of Titanic, Dave, if a kid had done an Elastico on the Titanic? The whole thing is absolutely brilliant. It's like the Stormtrooper hitting its head on the thing in Star Wars. It's a famous thing that just gets left in. Well, who did the Elastico? So Rivelino must have invented the Elastico, right? So that would have been 70s. Elastico, football, the flip-flap, of course, as it's known. Yeah, it was invented by Rivelino, who learned it in 1964 from his Corinthians teammate, Echigo.

25:55Charlie Eccleshare:So it's possible. So yeah, you'd have to reverse the goof. Actually, it turns out it's fine. Well, it could have been brought over to Brazil from some old bloke who was a survivor of the Titanic. João Havalas. For example. Yeah, it's going all the way back to 1912. It then got passed down the generations. So, like, Charlie, let's take a random generic film and there is a purely incidental piece of football action. It's not the point of the film, it's just some kids playing in a playground or something. If you were the director of this film and you don't want them to do anything too outlandish, don't worry about the era-specific aspect.

26:36Charlie Eccleshare:Don't do anything too silly, you're basically saying to these kids. What move are they doing? Like what's the most playing football incidentally in a film move? A step over? Yeah, a step over is probably fine, but they don't really just, just kick it. Just do really basic. Just have some shots. All right, sure, Dyche. They're like, don't take any chances. Just, you know, have some shots. Get it up there. Parries it away. Yeah, that's been around for donkey's years. Step over is your go-to, but it's also, I think, possibly one of the worst ones you can use because it's actually quite hard to do a convincing step over.

27:08Yeah. You end up doing like the Phil Neville step over where your leg's going so high over the ball. Like a can-can. I might be Mandela affecting this a bit, but I'm sure there's a scene in The Sopranos where Meadow Soprano is playing soccer and Tony's watching on. And I'm sure she pulls out a step over and it's rubbish. But we've all seen those kids playing football and somebody's running through and the defence is just sort of non-existent. and they just pull out a little step over for no reason that doesn't even help them in when