Half-and-half Shakespearean scarves, scouting for Shevchenko & the half-dozen crisis

0:00K-pop Demon Hunters, Saja Boys Breakfast Meal and Huntrix Meal have just dropped at McDonald's. They're calling this a battle for the fans. What do you say to that, Rumi? It's not a battle. So glad the Saja Boys could take breakfast and give our meal the rest of the day. It is an honor to share. No, it's our honor. It is our larger honor. No, really. Stop. You can really feel the respect in this battle. Pick a meal to pick a side. Ba-da-ba-ba-ba. And participate in McDonald's while supplies last. Spring Fest is heating up at Lowe's, and for a limited time, we have the extra big deals you need to impress guests.

0:38Get your outdoor space ready and save$50 on a select Cobalt 24-volt blower kit, now$79. Plus, save$80 on a Char-Broil Performance 4-Burner Grill, now$199. It's springtime, and our best lineup is here at Lowe's. Valid to 413. While supplies last, selection varies by location. 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! For G! 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.

1:30Oh, I say! It's amazing! He does it time and time and time again. Break up the music! Charge a glass! This nation is going to dance all night! A latest candidate for commentator's curse of the season. Are we officially witnessing the fabled Man City end of season run? How not to abbreviate Wolverhampton Wanderers? Half and half Shakespearean scarves. Omar Marmouch's convoluted claim to footballing supremacy. The tactical impulses of the football illiterate. Why the old adage of it only takes a second to score a goal is 112 % out. Andy Gray's semi-forgotten BBC stint. And Richard Keyes versus the Continentals.

2:11Brought to your ears by Goalhanger Podcasts. This is Football Clichés. Hello everyone and welcome to Football Clichés. I'm Adam Hurry. This is the adjudication panel. Joining me first of all is David Walker. How are you doing? I'm good. How are you? Yeah, not bad. You went to see Craig David the other night. I did, yeah. He played his first album in full. It's like a 25-year anniversary thing. And it was really, really good. I'm intrigued by the whole playing albums in full thing. I think it's a great concept for a live show. But I feel like Legends games should be like that as well. They should be forced to recreate kick by kick.

2:47So, I don't know, Istanbul 2005 or something. They all have to drag themselves out and do exactly the same thing. I think football fans would appreciate that. Get Thierry Henry and Robert Pierce to go into Soccer Aid and recreate the penalty for fucking up in exactly the same way. Yeah, make them work for their money to re-enact things. Alongside you is Nick Miller for the 105th time on Football Clichés. That makes you, in England terms, Billy Wright. Oh, happy work. Yeah, you're going to be like a fire engine going to the wrong fire at some point. Tremendous developments in the Football Clichés universe.

3:16The Football Clichés Discord is now open for business, I suppose, for Dreamland subscribers. Just go to the Dreamland homepage and the Discord link should appear at the top. One thing we needed, Dave, is one more way to interact with our listeners, didn't we? Oh, yeah. Yeah. 24-7 round-the-clock contact. I went too heavy in the first 24 hours, I think. You've burned out already. We've got to do this all the time, do we? Just chucking a little emoji now and again. Charlie dipping in and out, isn't he? Good old Charles. Yeah, of course he is. Right. No spoilers for last week's cliches quiz, because I am aware that some listeners haven't got that far yet.

3:48But we should revisit the listener's question, which was, I was rejected by St Mirren as a teenager. I've missed penalties in six different competitions in my career but I'm the only player from my country to win the Premier League and I've done it with two different clubs. I now play on a different continent alongside a fellow Champions League winner and I'll be at the World Cup this summer. Nick, do you know the answer? I've been lying if I said I gave it a huge amount of thought last week or so but in the 30 seconds that I thought about when you asked it and the 10 seconds now, no. Great motivation from you.

4:17Anyway, the winner is first out of the blocks was Callum Dewar who got the right answer of Riyad Mahrez. Shout out also to Andy Pompey, Alistair Foster and E.H. Hood, who were the first on various other platforms to get in touch within hours of the podcast release. But yeah, enjoy that quiz. Another epic, the 23rd edition. I've created a little Spotify playlist of all the quizzes as well, so you can enjoy that too, because I know some people enjoy the quizzes. Right, this is the adjudication panel. First up, this came from Chris Robbins. You may well have heard it by now, but this surely is the commentator's curse of the season so far.

4:51They're a good team at home, Paul. Someone beat them 13 at the track. They've won 19 of the 23 games they've played here so far this season. And you can see that confidence. They've started like a team in that kind of form. Fletch, the problem they've got is that three at the back is being stretched. Oh, my God! That's how you get back in it. Wow. That's astonishing.

5:16Martin Fernandes cannot believe what he's just done. I don't think there's much more you could do to frame this more perfectly. I mean, apart from mentioning the player themselves and saying what a good game they've had, it gets the best possible build-up it is. And then if you think about the ridiculousness of Martin Fernandes' his own goal for Porto against Forest, you've got everything you could possibly dream of. Obviously, being a Forest fan, I enjoyed every single viewing of this goal. But the thing I realised just watching it back there is that it was so unexpected that Hodl and Fletch didn't even realise what was happening until it was already over the line, which is is exceptional and also the kind of little added bonus that uh that he went off with an injury about two minutes later poor bloke poor bloke yeah that's that's real dvd blooper video content but uh dave does the fact that they didn't react to it in horror straight away take the shine off it somewhat come on figure it out it's one of those where i wasn't tuned into the match but i um saw a few people mentioning it on whatsapp and on twitter and stuff and saying oh my god there's been an amazing own goal.

6:17It's been a hilarious own goal. I was a bit underwhelmed when I actually saw it. They are, I feel like they're an increasingly common sight, these over-hit back passes with the goalkeeper out of position, you know, based on the presumption that a goalkeeper might be where they're not. I kind of see what you mean. It wasn't, if it had gone over his head, it might have been better. But yeah, I know what you mean. They're basically the halfway line goal of own goals, aren't they? And they're a bit like, well, yeah, needs to be a little bit more calamitous. Was it not the from absolutely nowhere element to it?

6:46Does that not improve it slightly? I think it does. Yeah, no question. Yeah, yeah. Let's return to domestic matters now. Huge developments at the top and bottom of the Premier League table. We must answer this question once again, David Walker. What is the status of Arsenal's title challenge? Driving seat feels like a bit of a stretch now. Mathematically, they kind of are. Maybe box seats. I don't know if that's less impressive than driving seat. But where would you classify it now? it's it's a tricky one because because man city are obviously they have the momentum and to say you're in a driving seat it suggests an element of composure and control yeah and yes they've got the points advantage and yes it's still in their hands but you know it's it there is a sense of of it all sort of falling apart isn't it they were so bad on saturday and it just city are looking looking they are looking ominous aren't they yeah yes you will get on to that in a second but Nick let's take this out of the Arsenal side of things for a moment and just think are we is it all to play for I think it might be I think it might be all to play for I mean you still probably think that Arsenal will see it over the line whatever happens in their game against City but it does feel a little bit all to play though because that game in hand though yeah I mean it is it is in a literal sense all to play for given that they you know they it's not it's obviously not a title decider the city's game in hands against Palace I think so that's you That's presumably three points, and then if they beat Arsenal...

8:12Lots of presuming goes on in this scenario, doesn't it? Of course they'll win the games in hand, because we want it to happen for the purposes of the spectacle. They're a bit of a bogey team, aren't they? For City. Yeah, it's tricky. A little tricky. Tricky outfit. A kind of side issue to this, do you think there has ever been... So there was, I believe, a smattering of boos at the final whistle from Arsenal. Has a team ever been booed off, even though it was only a smattering, when they're nine points clear at the top of the table, which they were at the time? Do you think that's ever happened before?

8:40I don't know. So much was made of the Emirates crowd as well, Dave. They really tapped in the broadcasters into the paranoia, which seems to be an increasingly unique Arsenal thing. They're a very unique brand of paranoia as well. And we're into a real transmitting itself to the players situation. This theory gets proved more and more, I think. Yeah, and the situation not helped by that bloke with the water bottle on Sunday at Chelsea. Show him once. Don't show him again. please yeah although I was thinking about it earlier on and obviously your instinct is to just sort of roll your eyes at it but fair play actually to the cameraman whoever like picked him out because it wasn't planned was it they've seen that in the crowd and they've gone hang on some mad bloke's got an Arsenal bottle here quick zoom in camera five now oh no that's good the banter is perfectly kind of acceptable stuff but it was then it was not only going back to him but going back to him with his mates showing him on the phone I couldn't handle that I couldn't handle that That was a tipping point.

9:38The pace of it. The pace of it. And he's on the back pages. It's the modern game, Dave. He will, within the next seven days before that game happens on Sunday, he's going to do something somewhere, isn't he? Someone will get a hold of him and he will appear on some sort of show or betting ad or social media thing. There's no doubt about it. Who will get to him first? MHD? God, who knows? It was also, when they cut back to him, Neville said he's just, I think he said he's just witnessed himself becoming an influencer or something like that, but said it in the weariest tone that anyone has ever said anything.

10:16Neville knows content. He knows what does well these days. On Man City, they are looking ominous. But El Luchador asks, Nick, are City on one of those runs, despite two of the wins being in different cup competitions? Yeah, they've had three wins in a row, but in three different competitions. Does this constitute the run that we've all been pre-warned of? no I mean it's a step before that it is looking on ominous territory people bring out stats from like April when they've won all these games in April in the past but yeah I think you do have to have a few more of these wins in a row I mean they drew with Forrest a couple of games ago so that's in terms of in terms of a run I'm not sure you can quite classify it yet speaking of Man City related stats Dave Cartman 1978 sent this one in it's from some sort of online live score platform I couldn't work out what.

11:02And two minutes into the game against Chelsea, this stat came up. With this being his first matchup against Liam Rossinia, it's worth noting that Pep Guardiola has lost three of his last four games when facing a manager for the first time in his career, having avoided defeat on each of the previous 16 occasions and picking up 13 wins. I think the good thing about this one, Dave, is it's not the stat itself, which is obviously very tenuous. It's the fact that Pep Guardiola is somehow out of form against the managers he's facing for the first time. That's incredible meta-analysis of it. I guess, could there be some sort of logic to it?

11:34In that you haven't, well, but... Doesn't know how to say hello to them before the game. They've outsmart casualty, Nick. Maybe that's what it is. I mean, you say you've forgotten how to say hello. There was a bit, just before the start of the game, where Guardiola seemed to sort of wander past Rosinia. And I thought for a second he didn't know who he was. Oh, no. But then he, I think maybe Rosinia tapped him on the shoulder or something. And there was then a very kind of over the top. Oh, Liam, how you doing? Yeah, good luck for the game kind of thing. Yeah, you have to overcompensate if you think that you didn't see them the first time.

12:05Down at the bottom, though, you know, there's been a lot of what I can only describe, Dave, as innuendo about Spurs' relegation possibilities. This is the realest it's felt now. I didn't necessarily think that De Zerbe was going to come in and immediately bring about great fortunes for them. But this was the first weekend where we just thought, whoa, shit. this has gone from an absurd fantasy, like a real rubbernecking car crash situation to this is actually going to happen. Yeah, the fact that they're now in the relegation zone, they've dropped below the line. It's a weird moment for them to drop in.

12:36It feels significant. I still can't quite accept it. I still think that they are just going to win one or two games and that will be enough. But maybe there isn't a lot of evidence to suggest that will happen. but I just feel that it will. It's a sort of reverse Leicester. I think most people had a game in that season where they thought, oh fucking hell, they're actually going to do this. Then Chelsea could send them down when they play so it would actually be a nice reverse Leicester in that sense. I don't really know how the world of football is going to react to this. I realise that everyone rationalises everything very quickly in the news cycle these days but I genuinely don't know how we will all deal with this development.

13:16It's utterly mad. I mean, I think a lot of people quite rightly want it to happen just to see what Jason Cundey does when it happens. Maybe. I think there's a lot invested in that particular, you know, he's been a big part of this story so far. But I think it's actually going to be akin to a big upset in a World Cup. When it happens, it's a big moment. Everyone will either, you know, really enjoy it or if you're a Spurs fan, it'll be a disaster or whatever. But the reality of Spurs in the Championship next season, I think will just be weird. They'll probably go up, but it'll, you know, There'll be some bleak games rattling around in that stadium against Lincoln and against Watford and against whoever.

13:58Poor old Lincoln. Well, they're the only ones who've come up yet. It could be Stevenage. Stevenage could be playing at Spurs next season. So that'd be interesting. Bit of a derby, actually, I suppose. Yeah, in many ways. Yeah, this is a very weird season because Gary Robinson writes in, Nick, and says, with six weeks left of this season, still no club has scored six in a game in the Premier League. It'll be the first time in a 138-year history of the top flight if nobody does it. I haven't included the three-week-long season of 1939-40. Thank you, Gary Robinson. Nor should you. I know some people say, oh, football didn't end.

14:28Well, it did. But yeah, so the biggest win this season is Arsenal 5, Leeds 0. That is the biggest win this season. That's mad. You can't have a Premier League season where someone hitting six, the joy of six. Interestingly, I did sort of half-pitch this as a feature idea to my editor. And took it no further than that. I just got distracted by the thing. So if by any chance we want to workshop any ideas as to why this is happening, then that would be very helpful for me. I'm not sure I'd turn that into a thousand words, to be honest with you, but it's good for 90 seconds on a podcast, at least.

15:02This reminded me, actually. I've not kept track of it. I've just checked. You know when we did the great entertainers lineal pathway? You abandoned that, hadn't you? Chelsea is still in possession. Nobody's beaten Chelsea by the required margin this season. So they're still up for grabs in the remaining six games of the season. They've got Man United, Brighton, Forest, Liverpool, Spurs and Sunderland. So beat them by enough goals and it's yours, lads. Some crumb of comfort for the Stamford Bridge faithful. Dave O 'Leary writes in next, Dave, and was drawn towards the match report in the I paper for West Ham against Wolves.

15:41and in the little score box, Wolves have been abbreviated to Wolverhampton W' D' S. That's fucking mad. What? Absolutely mad. Just put Wolves. They're the most easily abbreviated club in the world. Oh, God. Yeah, that is strange. What's gone on there? I mean, newspapers have traditionally wrestled with this stuff, Nick, as has CFAX, of course. Space is at a premium, but that is a mad way of doing it. Just give it up. Particularly when there is a perfectly suitable... Everyone knows who wolves are. Come on. People call them wolves anyway. Someone's had to manually do that. I'm really disappointed, but I don't know.

16:17Maybe there is a tradition in journalism to stick as strictly as possible as you can to the full name on First Mention. So who knows? Tangling themselves in knots. There's a big bit of white space underneath the graphic. They could have just put wanderers on the line beneath it. Goaless wolf-ampton wanderers all doing themselves a favour there. And then the iPaper are screwing it up. Yeah, could have gone to a second line. unprecedented in print journalism perhaps so a bit late in the day to mix things up now um speaking of mixing things up this came from mike moroz and gman 1854 it is a never before heard for my sinzing on six music on sunday you today you're gonna hang spend time with the family go out for what and then you're gonna watch the villa later oh yeah yeah for my sins yeah well no yeah they're doing really well at the moment so anyway you can't back out of it this is a great well absolute Fair weather for my sins.

17:08I won't have this, Nick. This is a 30, 40 year window that you've got to work with. I can see how it would happen. It's the old kind of like Manchester United never make it easy on ourselves kind of thing where you immediately instinctively are in this mindset. And then you realise, no, actually, we're quite good. So, yeah, I am going to back out of that. Sorry. Yeah, really disappointed, Dave, that there is an undercurrent out there that think it's, you know, simply form related. Yeah, yeah. Although, I mean, look, yeah, they're in the top four. They've had a good few seasons. She's right, I think.

17:35Yeah, we'll see. We'll see. Speaking of Six Music, actually, a thrilling moment the other day when I was listening to Six Music in the afternoon and heard in real time live one of the presenters reference this very podcast. Oh, really? Ahead of them playing the new Disclosure song, The Sun Comes Up Tremendous. and the guy who was presenting uh sort of threw to his producer producer matt thomas i believe his name is who i think he he's obviously listened to the pod and he must have mentioned it to the presenter he sort of he just kind of threw to the producer and just said oh you you like this song because you heard it on a football podcast didn't you and to his credit i'll drop it in here to his credit he produced a seven out of ten glenn hoddle impression on the spot god knows what most of the listeners would have actually thought of it but i liked it and this will sound so ace in the sunshine this afternoon new disclosure their first new music this year and destined to be a big one at festivals this summer i would say this is howard on vocals for this one they're playing santa barbara bowl tonight um this is called sun comes up tremendous now producer matt has kind of killed this a bit for me because you heard this being discussed on a football podcast didn't you Yeah, and the sound comes up tremendous.

18:52It's very Glenn Hoddle, isn't it? This is New Disclosure. The sound comes up tremendous. Here on Six Music. It was a passable impression, but just the sort of, I don't know, slightly BBC-esque refusal to name us specifically. All other football podcasts are available. I don't like that. Just name us. We did the hard work on that. Well, our listeners did. But I'm not bitter. It's absolutely fine. Right, next up, footballers' names in things. This came from Reddit. Someone posted, My kids recently got into squirrels, the very first rung on the Beavers' Cubs' Scouts' ladder. I didn't know if squirrels existed, I'd say.

19:29Imagine the delight as a bloke of a certain age, finding out that the guy who runs it and emails me every week happens to be called, for some reason in rural southern UK, Andrei Shevchenko. What the hell? Superb. That's how he's doing now. Fair play. Squirrels. What age is squirrels? because I thought Beavers was like fired or something. I thought Beavers was the entry level. Maybe it's like the UEFA Conference League. They've introduced a new run. Yeah. Hopefully his assistant is Sergai Redbrov. Yeah. Need to find out more about that. Maybe it's a high-profile transfer and it's actually, he's having a bit of a tough time.

20:01Maybe he's not doing too well at the helm of squirrels. Just starting at the bottom. It doesn't feel like he's entitled to go straight in at the scouts just because he's got a big name. He wants to do a Lampard and start at the bottom. Well, not quite that. But anyway, as you ponder that, we'll take a short break and back very shortly.

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21:55Oh, look at that! That is wonderful!

22:03Welcome back to Football Clichés. This is the Adjudication Panel. You can sign up for our Dreamland service for just$5.99 a month. For that, you'll get ad-free listening of all of our episodes, two episodes a month of Dreamland, our exclusive show, access to the premium section of the Happy Hunting Grounds quiz game, and access to our brand new Football Clichés Discord server, along with hundreds of other hardcore Football Clichés fans. You can chat away. Yeah, just go to dreamland.footballcliches.com. Now, listener Steve Gabb says, I went to see Romeo and Juliet at the Harold Pinter Theatre yesterday, and I'd like to give credit to this astounding bit of merch.

22:40they were selling half and half Montague and Capulet scarves for 20 quid. Two households, both alike in dignity, it reads across the edges of the scarf. A very tasteful piece of merch, actually, I think. So they were selling it like the theatre itself was selling this, not just some bloke outside on a bit of tarp. Having to misspell one of the family's names to not get sued.

23:09wow you can i feel like that might go down quite well nick i feel like a few people might have bought those i mean it's not actually the worst bit of tat i've ever seen i thought the the half and half scarf kind of debate had been uh or you know banter had been run but you kind of get the feeling that this will be purchased by a lot of people who don't really get the reference or don't don't understand that this is a thing elsewhere they're just like oh that's a very nice piece of merchandise. Could you be partisan? I mean, could you go to Romeo and Juliet being a big Montague man or a real fan of the Capulets?

23:43Suppose you can. You've got to pick a side. So flow just down the front row with his back to the stage directing the applause. Got Tybalt on the back of his shirt. On that note, From Strange Seeds on Reddit says there must be a chant in the theatre of they died for their love, they died for their love. Romeo and Juliet, they died for their love. Yeah. I'm not against it. I think it's quite funny. And more of this, I think. There's a lot of good stuff on this thread on Reddit. I encourage you to check it out if you haven't seen it already. But there is a lot of people who clearly know their Shakespeare a lot better than me.

24:21You know, wondering what Peter Jury might sound like if he were to read out any given line from the play. God, yeah. I would pay. I'd pay a small amount to hear him read that out. Anyway, yeah, the Reddit thread is simply entitled plays gone excellent now i stumbled across at the weekend um during the sky sports coverage of the masters nick what i think might be the most universal sentiment in sport here's luke donald on what tommy fleetwood needed to do to get off to a strong start at the masters they just uh needs to get uh you've seen that ball go in the hole early i think on thursday friday on the greens i mean i can't think of a more bulletproof thing for a pundit to say in sport nick then they've got to get off to a strong quick slash bright start i was trying to think of any sport where that wouldn't be beneficial to get off to a good strong start can you think of one sport there's that weird cycling thing where they they kind of uh what's which one which one's that one were they the pursuit the pursuit right i think that makes sense the indoor one yeah where they start off just kind of not racing each other really they're just kind of stalking each other it's the final lap where they race yeah so they're just toying with each other yeah until then obviously only watching this sort of occasionally once every four years at the olympics i haven't quite worked out what the point of it is or what the advantage of to being behind but there might be a disadvantage to being ahead don't know spot on cycling enthusiast and listener michael cox thought exactly the same thing so that's the only sport i can think of dave where it's not beneficial to get off to a quick or bright start something like maybe horse racing you can you can definitely go off too quick in a race.