MNC: Arsenal one step closer & Guardiola to step down

26:08That is the big, big question at Celtic. So is the anger still there? Because at times it has been a very angry place this season. Yeah, I mean, I would probably say it's bubbling under the surface. You know, it is still there to a huge extent. I was walking out of Celtic Park on Saturday. We were all high as a kite. What a day. What a special day. And a guy chinned me on the stairs and said, don't forget, keep the pressure up on this board. You know, that was still the feeling for some. But I think nothing will take the edge off or take the heat out than a title win. And to do it in the manner we've done, you know, you shouldn't excuse the club, absolutely not, for the mistakes.

26:46And there have been many mistakes. But Martin O 'Neill has played the ultimate get-out-of-jail-free card for the board now. And the hope, and maybe it's kind of hopelessly optimistic from my point of view but the hope is that they take this opportunity that Martin Hill has given them and that they finally get it right this summer particularly with regard to recruitment There was a quote on BBC Scotland on Sports Sound last week where Alan Preston said this might be the worst Hearts team that you will see in the next 10 years Would you like Hearts to get stronger? Because one of the reasons why Saturday was so special for you all is because you were pushed to the wire and for so many titles, for so many seasons, you haven't been pushed that often.

27:31And actually, you kind of want the competition, don't you? Because that's what gets the juices flowing. Yeah, 100%. I think it's Brendan Rodgers' quote. I think he uses it specifically for players, but competition is often the best coach. There's an old cliched example now that James Forrest really stepped up his game when Paddy Roberts came in on loan at Celtic. James was maybe coasting a wee bit, expected to start every game and Roberts came in and really pushed him for a spot so that competition in a playing sense absolutely elevates you and I think in terms of the bigger picture what Hearts have done and Rory's right to pick out as I say it's been so healthy for Scottish football they've been a breath of fresh air and for it to go down to the wire tells its own story and I really hope Hearts come back and I hope other teams come back Motherwell have been great under Jainsbert Alasku Falkirk have played some great football at times Rangers may get their act together who knows so I think that can only be Do you really hope they come back?

28:24Chris Sutton:Do you really hope Rangers come back? Hope is such a strong word, isn't it? But we'll see what they do We'll see what they do Did you think it was a penalty at Motherwell, by the way? Yes You can put your hand up here and expect to get away with it Really? Really Okay And I'll just echo where Martin O 'Neill is at with it because in the modern game if you jump in the box and your hands are anywhere above your shoulders you're running the risk and I think that's exactly what it played out it is extremely unfortunate and yeah to be really honest I would be screaming you know for the decision not to be made where I have you know motherable persuasion but it's always a risk and yeah ultimately it's cost motherable on the night so why wasn't it a penalty I think it was a penalty I'm not asking you I don't think it was conclusive by any means I think but it was a handball the way they run the VAR was the issue Hang on a minute.

29:22Chris Sutton:So the bottom line is it was a handball. The position of the arm where it was, it hit his hand. And people are saying, well, it couldn't have hit his hand because the ball travelled 30 yards. I mean, who are these people? Are they scientists? Yes, they are. They are not. They are. So all the anger there was, and I understand the anger there was on Wednesday night. I absolutely understand it. You couldn't tell it was a penalty on Wednesday night. What it meant for Hearts, no. You couldn't tell it was a penalty. You couldn't. No, as soon as John Beaton went to... Hang on. No, Andrew Dallas, who was doing the VAR, he sent John Beaton to the monitor.

30:08Chris Sutton:John Beaton made the decision within 15, 20 seconds. He made a quick decision, OK? It was a handball. People are saying it's not a handball. You can argue about whether his arm was pushed up or whatever, but it was a handball. So, you know, that's it. That is a good point, Chris, and I think the same logic applies to the penalty that Hearts should definitely have had at Motherwell three days earlier, which was not given because he made too much of it. Was there sufficient contact? Well, these are subjective calls. No, it's not. It's not a subjective call. It's absolutely a subjective call. You cannot sit there and say it's not a subjective call because with that one, Stephen McLean, the referee, He didn't give a penalty.

30:51Chris Sutton:He was then advised to go to the monitor, and everybody thinks when they go to the monitor, they're going to overturn it. And he didn't. He didn't think it was sufficient contact, hence why Derek McInnes came out and said it was a disgusting decision. And, you know, no, that was the Ian Atchuk one. But he was very unhappy about that decision as well. And I can understand that from Hart's side, because, of course, they're going to be frustrated because they're going for a title and they've been brilliant all season. More importantly, Tino, do you think that the fact that, I think inside Celtic there will be an expectation that Hearts will build again I'm not sure the psychology of it works quite that easily, like there'll be a lot of, like Andros says, there'll be a lot of shattered players in that squad Do you think that forces Celtic to change the way that they work?

31:37Martin O 'Neill said on Saturday it's a wake-up call for both Celtic and Rangers Don't know what your view is on whether Rangers might heed it, but do you think Celtic can? They have to. And I think Tony Bloom has proven, you know, successful at Brighton and USG in Belgium. And, you know, sometimes those approaches, whether it's a moneyball approach or whatever term you want to use, it can take time. And I think he and Hartz will have been delighted at the season they've had. And it's a sore one right now. But I think when they take a step back and reflect, it's been phenomenal. I think Hartz have scored their highest of our points tally in the league, for example.

32:11And he would expect that trajectory to keep going upwards and to the right moving forward. So Celtic do need to respond. And ironically, I think when appointing Wilfried Nancy, Celtic were moving towards maybe a more data-driven type of approach. And just because that one didn't work out and it didn't work out spectacularly, you shouldn't throw the baby out with the bathwater and just ditch that kind of approach to how you do things moving forward. So we don't have access to Jamestown Analytics, but there are other similar softwares and packages and things like that out there. Celtic need to go down that road because if you stand still you're going backwards as they say and we need to be careful not to be fooled by this title one this title one has been amazing but there's work to be done Tina thank you very much for coming on appreciate it Tina Callaghan from the Celtic Exchange Podcast Five Light Sports So here's the first ball of this series All the cricket you love J.R.B.W.

33:05Ouch Lives on BBC Sounds Smash straight back down the ground this girl Here ball by ball coverage of the biggest competitions on the domestic and international circuits. It's a fourth rig and it's the huge one. Jeez, whoosh. Settle down, tough. I'm sorry. Cricket on Five Live Sport. Oh, I'm living every ball of this. Listen on BBC Sounds.

33:30This is the Monday Night Club with Mark Chapman. On the Football Daily Podcast.

33:40How much do you think, Chris, Alonso's appointment is going to hang over Liverpool?

33:47Chris Sutton:Yeah, I mean, that's an interesting one, isn't it? I mean, a lot of the Liverpool fans, as far as I can see now, just are not having on a slot. But I mean, Rory, did you not say a couple of weeks ago you don't think that slot is going to start next season as manager, as far as you understood it? But with every sort of passing game, every passing week, every sort of unsure performance, every defeat, I think Liverpool fans are thinking, blimey, are we doing the wrong thing by keeping him on? And then you see the Mo Salah stuff. I mean, Mo Salah's like poured petrol on the flames, hasn't he, really, on a difficult situation for slot.

34:33Chris Sutton:and he knows exactly what he wants to do by doing that. You know, clearly it's a personal thing between the two of them. And that really hasn't helped the situation. And, you know, it's made it worse. But, you know, and Alonso with his Liverpool connections. Yeah, I mean, he would have been maybe, you know, an obvious choice. So, but, you know, Chelsea have got him and Liverpool seem like they're in a bit of a pickle now. Chris, do you not think that Liverpool would have sounded out Xabi Alonso before he went to Chelsea? Do you think they would have done? I think for sure they would have done.

35:06I don't think you can let a generational manager like Javi Alonso come on the market and then get snapped up when you're still not sure about your own manager. I think for sure they would have happened.

35:18Chris Sutton:How do you know that they're not sure about their own manager? I don't think they approached Alonso. No? In the last few weeks. They talked to him in 2024 when Klopp was leaving and the message was that he wanted to do another year at Leverkusen. Sam Wallace in the Telegraph had a story yesterday or maybe Saturday that FSG, the owners of Liverpool, kind of remembered that, that Alonso said no to Liverpool, then waited a year for Real Madrid and that that maybe factored into their thinking. I think Liverpool think Slot is a better bet than Alonso. That's not to say they think Slot is a better bet than anybody else.

35:59I go backwards and forwards on that a little bit. I think Slot is a better bet than Alonso partly because of kind of the way that they feel that they're, whether it's a tactical thing or a data thing I don't know but I think part of it is probably that Alonso would go in with a power base at Liverpool as a beloved former player and I'm not sure, I think there's maybe a little bit of worry that that might affect the model because it might give the manager a bit too much power in a system that's not meant to have it I think, yeah everything Liverpool are saying is that they believe Slott is the right man for next season.

36:34I think that is in total defiance of everything I know about football, which admittedly is not very much. We've established that, but it just seems very... I don't see how it can work from the position it is, but that is the official line from Liverpool. It is possible that that will change, as football does change, but if they don't enter next season with Slott, it would be a genuinely fascinating thing to see. Why do you think that Rory? Why would it be fascinating? He won the league 12 months ago. They've had their injury problems. They've had their turnover of players. I think Klopp had a similar season after he won the league.

37:07Why would it be strange to see him continue? Yeah Klopp had a similar season after he won the league. That is absolutely true but he had already won the league in the Champions League and also they literally ran out of centre-halves. There was a point where Jordan Henderson and Fabinho were playing at centre-back. It was really obvious what the problems were. I think you're right. It feels mad that Slott should have won the league a year ago and there should be this kind of overwhelming sensation among the fans that that he shouldn't be the right he isn't you know he doesn't get a chance to kind of he doesn't like to get a best of three chance do you know what i mean but i think watching them this season they've they've had the same weaknesses throughout they haven't solved any of the problems they they seem so open that there seems to be an issue as chap has alluded to in terms of salah that suggests to me an issue within the dressing room i think the fans have lost faith in him and I don't see how that comes back and the big thing is that even though you know they're fifth which is in many ways remarkable but I'm not sure they've played well in the Premier League once this season they've played well a couple of times in the Champions League they were good against Real Madrid against Daniel Tassaray and it's Marseille I can't remember a game even a game they've won in the Premier League where you come off and think Liverpool played well there for 90 minutes I'm not sure the no I mean I would need Rory to to tell tell us more here but I'm not sure Andros the noise around Klopp season after they'd won the league and then fell away a bit was anything like the noise and the murmurings that are around now I mean when Mo Salah puts that message on social media us crumbling to yet another defeat this season was very painful and not what our fans deserve.

38:53I want to see Liverpool go back to being the heavy metal attacking team that opponents fear. That is the identity that needs to be recovered and kept for good. It cannot be negotiable and everyone that joins this club should adapt to it. Winning some games here and there is not what Liverpool should be about. all teams win games I want to see it succeed for long after I have moved on now I'm sure there are a lot of Liverpool fans who would be exactly on the same side as Mo Salah but he has absolutely eviscerated his manager there hasn't he yeah I think again it's Mo Salah using his power using his knowledge of what the fans want to sort of throw the manager under the bus.

39:40I think the sort of mixed zone interview he did earlier on in the season, you could say, okay, he at the moment didn't get on, not happy. He let his frustration show, but this is premeditated. There's no reason for this. I don't think there's, for me, the fans backing because they don't like the manager, but for me, it's disgraceful. How can you say this about your manager who won the league with you 12 months ago and you do this to throw him under the bus like that. And that's probably the second or third dig he's made in a short space of a couple of months as well. He made the comment about the standards in the gym and what have you and slot bit back.

40:17But yeah, for me, this one, because it's premeditated, I don't like it at all. Gary Neville then said about Mo Salah, Chris, he's pulled the pin out of a grenade and thrown it into the middle of the room. If that was a Manchester United player, I'd be fuming.

40:31Chris Sutton:Yeah, it's a bit of a snaky thing to do, isn't it, from Mo Sal. He knows the damage that's going to do to Slott. He knows Slott isn't popular with a large section of the Liverpool fan base and he wants to destroy him. I mean, why else would he have done that? And it's going to be interesting to see what happens at the weekend. What would you do with your managerial experience? What would you do? Well, I had players who were match fixers. They're far worse than what Arna Slott's going through. But what would I do? I'd put them on the bench and I wouldn't put them, or I'd maybe put them on for the last half a minute.

41:14Okay. I mean, the point, I suppose, Andros, is he drops him for undermining him and the fans will be on his back because they don't get the opportunity to say bye. and Wayne really said you wouldn't have him anywhere near the stadium for the last game or he does include him and I don't know does he look weak by doing that what do you do I think I don't think you can include him I don't care what the fans are going to say they're going to disagree with you anyway they want you out anyway but you can't have a player undermine you like that because then next season when Salah's not there all the other players are going to remember it and they're going to start undermining him as well so I think you have to nip it in the bud you have to say listen, I know you want your farewell, but you haven't been professional on and off the pitch.

42:02I'm not going to play you. I think that's the only choice.

42:05Chris Sutton:Will that tarnish Salah's legacy at Liverpool, that at all? Or will it not? Because most of the fans are on his side. He knows that as well. Yeah, I think that's a relevant factor. I think the more important thing is that Mo Salah's legacy, as with all great players, will be defined not by kind of the way he leaves or the controversies, but by all the things that he achieved. I'm not sure that when Man United fans think of Wayne Rooney, they think of the bit where he tried to leave and thought about joining Man City. That's not something people remember about Rooney at Man United because that's not what's important.

42:43I don't think this will be, I don't think in 10 years' time, people think, oh, most times it's a shame. Shamey really threw the manager under the bus at the end. I think they'll probably remember the trophies of one of the goals he scored. what I'm interested by is as much as anything is whether you two think he will have done that with the tacit blessing of his teammates Salah's leaving Salah is free to do whatever he likes to an extent I think Slott has handled that situation quite it's one of the few areas this season in which Slott's come out with quite a lot of credit I think he handled the original thing at Leeds quite well and kind of just reintegrated Salah over time to the point where people stopped talking about it there's clearly an issue between them but he's never seemed to allow that to get personal in terms of his selection so I think he will play on Sunday Salah might be from the bench, he's not fully fit so that slot's already made its use but to me the fact that Salah's putting that out and as ridiculous as it is to use this sentence, other players are liking it on Instagram that does suggest to me that he's maybe taking one for the team Which other players liked it then on Instagram?

43:51I don't have a full list. I think Soberslight, Endo, Curtis Jones, a couple of others, Frimpon maybe, a couple of others.

43:58Chris Sutton:I mean, that's incredible. I didn't know that. I mean, that's incredible, really. I mean, how much can you read into that? But why would you do that if you're a player? Why would you get involved in stuff like that? But that really isn't a good look for slot, is it? I think sometimes, you've got the cynic hat on, Rory, but I think sometimes when you're on these social media platforms, it is scroll, okay, my friend's posted, like, I'm not even going to look at that, or scroll, scroll, like, I'm not going to watch that video. Whereas, Anders, I saw you making your own Easter eggs a few weeks ago, and I actively liked that post as I enjoyed it.

44:40It was good content, but I didn't actually press the button. What, making your own show? It's the best thing I've seen on the internet for years. Oh, that's nothing, yeah. So you make your own chocolate? Oh, yeah, 100%. In the UK, cocoa is 20 % in chocolate, and some of it now is made in a lab, whereas mine is 50%.

45:00Chris Sutton:Right, okay. Is this a dragon's den? Say that again. Now in the UK, chocolate, in some chocolate in the stores, it's fallen to 20 % cocoa in the chocolate, and the rest is obviously sugar and preservatives and what have you. And when I make it at home, it's over 50 % cocoa. But what's nicer? My one's nicer because my one hasn't got the nonsense ingredients. My one's got real ingredients. And do you have like an egg mould? Yes, you have like a half egg mould. So you put two half egg moulds. And then once they set, you get a bit of melted chocolate and put it around the edge of one and then stick it together.

45:40It was so satisfying watching it. Do you make little chocolates to go into the egg? No, I haven't got that advanced yet. Maybe next year. It's the kind of thing that might bring me back to Instagram, this, Andros, after six years away or whatever it is. I'll send it to you. Thanks, thanks. But, no, Andros is right. I think you shouldn't read too much into the who liked what. Not only does it make us sound less serious. Of course you should. but I think people like stuff automatically without thinking.

46:13Chris Sutton:That's not a good look for the players who have liked it. Arna Slott is going to think they're traitors. Put yourself in his shoes. What would you think? Well, that's the issue, Chris, that there seems to be a break between the players and the manager. There's a break between the manager and the fans. And the other thing that I think is really important is that FSG have kind of handed over control of their football operations to Michael Edwards, who deserves a lot of credit for Liverpool being where they are or where they've been over the last 10 years. But he came back because he wanted to run a multi-club model for Liverpool, which is not something I like.

46:50I don't approve of that. I think it's bad for football. But that was his thing that he wanted, and FSC said they'd do it. They've now said they're not going to do it. So I don't really understand what Michael Edwards is there for. Richard Hughes is the sporting director who has data in control of Liverpool. but his contract expires next summer as well. Slott's contract expires next summer. I don't know who's, like, who is looking after the long-term thing here. The whole thing looks an awful lot like FSG, the owners, have kind of taken their eye off the ball a little bit and things are, to use Mo Salah's word, crumbling.

47:26Just a final thing here, and I don't have a lot of sympathy for people that run football clubs, I suppose, because, you know, what an amazing privilege it is. But they probably are, Andros, caught slightly between maybe feeling that they should do the right thing by someone who won them a title 12 months ago. But at the same time, sometimes you have to make that hard decision and read the room, don't you? And there is an element, and I know there have been articles recently about comparing Slott to Ten Hag, But the situation, I think, is similar in that United, a few years ago, felt they were doing the right thing by persevering with Ten Hag.

48:10And missed out on Tuchel, Pochettino, De Zerbe, whoever else was around at the time. And it came back to bite them. But Ten Hag didn't win a Premier League title in his first year. So I think it's completely different. I would say, I half agree with what you're saying. I think, for me, Slot should, he's the man, he won you the Premier League. He deserves a chance to go into next season, hopefully have all his players fit, get rid of the bad eggs, and see if they can build again. But for me, a generational manager who is an ex-player of your club, Jabi Alonso, is on the market, is going to your rivals.

48:49And I'm amazed you haven't at least tried to. Because sometimes you have to get rid of a manager because there is a better manager who might not be there again. So that's my only thing. I don't think he should be sacked. I think he deserves next season. But the fact that Jabi Alonso was there, I think they probably should have at least looked into it more than they did. And now what will happen is the run on managers, those clubs looking for managers, the run on managers increases.

49:16Chris Sutton:Yeah. So, you know, if, I mean, as I say, it's a really precarious position Liverpool are in now because it's all right saying, well, and I do agree that they should give Slott another season, but once the fans turn on you as they have turned on Slott in their numbers and Salah's putting the boot in as well, I mean, a slow start to next season and they'll make a change and then everybody will say, well, why didn't you do it when you could have done over the summer? So you're absolutely right. Let's bring in Hull City Assistant Manager Dean Holden. We're going to talk about the Championship Playoff Final.

49:57How are you doing, Chapo? Good, thank you. You're on to talk about the Championship Playoff Final, which, as things stand, is you against Southampton and the EFL inquiry starts tomorrow into Southampton and the spying charges that Middlesbrough have levelled against them. What are you preparing for at the moment? Great question. I've been asked a lot in the last week. We're preparing to play Southampton on Saturday at Wembley 4.30 kick-off. That's what we've been told by the EFL. If anything changes in the next couple of days, then we'll have to adapt to that. But you can sometimes get a little bit too clever and people are saying you're preparing for two games and two teams.

50:34I think the key thing for us as a staff, when we deliver to the players this week, we've got to make sure it's as concise as it can be. There's obviously going to be a lot of emotion, a lot of nervous energy going to such a big occasion. And for us, it's making sure that the players go out there and they're not overthinking in terms of the messages they've had throughout the week. So for us, we're preparing fully on Southampton. I think I read one quote yesterday as well, which is, if it was to change, then you would be used to that anyhow, given how quickly games come in the Championship. You know, if you're playing Saturday and then moving on to a Tuesday game, you don't have long for those opponents, do you really?

51:12So it's something that you would, if anything was to change, there are no indications that it would at this stage, that you would take in your stride? Yeah, listen, I think what we have done well this season is we've adapted to teams that we're playing against. We've adapted to having suffered a lot of injuries, unfortunately, and we've found ways to win throughout the season. You're right, normally in the Championship, the reason it's so unique is that you get so many Saturday, Tuesday, quick turnarounds. So for us, if it comes to that, we will deal with it. We're not going to be... There'll be people inside the club who will be speaking with the EFL, of course, at a much higher level than me, who will be trying to find quick answers.

51:47But for us as a staff and the players, I just repeat what I've just said there, we can't afford to take our eyes off it and start trying to overcomplicate this situation. So obviously, Dean, you said that yourself and the coaching staff are preparing for one team and one team only, that you're preparing for Southampton. But are there people behind the scenes like your analysts who are just having one eye on Middlesbrough, preparing stuff for Middlesbrough just in case things switch at the last minute? Just before that, Andros, I'd say you're looking great. How's your seven-day water fast going?

52:17It's very good. It's very good. I'm really enjoying it. Loads of energy. Good stuff. Listen, I think for us, we've obviously approached the end. It's such a unique situation. We've approached the end of a tough season and we've obviously played every one twice. We've had two great results against Southampton. First one was against Will Still at home early in the season. Second one, we went down there and Tonda was in charge and they played a back five on the day. so Middlesbrough we've beat them and they've beat us so I think we've got a dossier on every club we've played against of course we have obviously watched both semi-finals in depth so we've got a good understanding of all the teams but the full focus is and will remain on Southampton because again you'll know yourself with the analyst it's one of the toughest jobs in football the amount of work they have to get through the amount of games that they have to clip up and you've always got players in their office saying can you show me some clips on such and such a player or obviously you've got all the set pieces to clip up.

53:14Throw-ins nowadays have become really important. So there's so many elements to it. If we're asking our analyst team, which is really small, I have to say, to start preparing for two teams, it's going to cause a few problems. Dean, is it difficult to kind of keep the players' mind on it? Presumably, I mean, this is a weird circumstance to be in where the playoff final, the biggest game in the EFL, might not happen. Have you had to do anything with the players or is it easy to kind of instruct them, right you just have to act like it is going to happen can only go off uh rory the what you see front of your eyes and great atmosphere people will say well that's normal you're going to a playoff final but it doesn't seem any anxiety at the moment yes it's early in the week still um you can't get away from the noise it's everywhere that you turn and the players are exactly the same but the gaffer's been great in terms of his messaging he's not he's not at a meeting every day we're getting that many messages coming through from different people who want to want to show us and the staff that they know key information.

54:09And if you relied on that or listened to that and started passing that on to the players, you'd be having a meeting two, three times a day. So we had a big meeting on Friday morning where the gaffer went through everything that we knew at that point. And throughout the weekend, there's no more news. So we've trained as normal today. It was an excellent session. And tomorrow's going to be maybe a little bit different with this hearing in the background, but it certainly won't affect our planning and our training until we get a final result. Has this season surprised you? I'd be a fool if I was going to sit here, Chappers, and say I expected us to be in the playoff final in the four days after joining the club last summer because we went into an embargo and nobody's seen it coming.

54:46Nobody inside the club's seen it coming. And at that point, we had to readjust our, obviously, recruitment in terms of the way the club was looking to do it. And hats off, by the way, to the recruitment team, Jarrod, the sporting director, Hodgie. Chris, you'll remember him, Martin Hodgie, old goalkeeper, Chef Wednesday. we've got a really strong recruitment team obviously led by the gaffer as well and Ajin and the board but what we did at that point we just went for ready-made players who've been there done it who've got experience and that's going to be key obviously going into the game at the weekend

55:17Chris Sutton:You know Dean I think so much has been made of this situation I mean the players don't really care who they play right? I mean the players aren't going to be bothered whether it's Borough or Southampton am I right with that? I think it's making sure that we perform to our best on the day it doesn't matter, you're right, it doesn't really matter obviously tactically there'll be a couple of different tweaks going into the game, of course there will I don't know what you were like as a player Chris but for me playing at a completely different level I didn't want loads of information on the opposition and I know data and analysis now is a huge part of the game and rightly so, but you've got to get a sniff and a feel for each individual player so certain players need a lot more than others So Olly McBurnie, for instance, doesn't need to be told every single bit about his opposition centre-backs, how tall they are, how quick they are.

56:06He reads the game really well and he knows most of his opposition. So there will be some tweaks if it ever came to that. But no, for us, it's just making sure that we go out there and perform to our best on the day. So is that a thing with, you know, when you do team meetings or plans, do you take into account what different players respond to? Do you do things more individually? Or how do you balance that sort of some who will want the information and others who are like, seriously, I know what I'm doing, just let me go and play? Yeah, I think most players now, having come through the academy system, are used to it.

56:40There's obviously a lot of time that goes in. You're normally watching hours and hours of footage and bringing it down to anything from 10 to 20 minutes, depending if it's a free game week. We try and keep it as light as we can but give as much clarity. So at that point, of course, there's a lot of individual type stuff going on but for me as well I always think back I worked for Dean Smith at Walsall in my first job and he was a brilliant guy in terms of taking meetings and getting a feel for the room and one of our players just I will never name him just couldn't take in he couldn't sit and watch a screen and watch the opposition and listen to somebody telling him at the same time he found it really difficult he needed to be on the grass in his position he was a left winger I'll give you that's all I'm giving you um and talking him through in terms of where he lives on the pitch and talking through scenarios like that.

57:23So again, without trying to reinvent the wheel, it's just getting an understanding of how each individual's picking up the information because it's all right taking a meeting and then sitting in the office on a Friday afternoon with a cup of tea and going, great, we've took a meeting, tick. It's how well did the players receive that? So we do a lot of Q &A, a lot of two-day meetings where I'll take the opposition meeting and then the next day we'll go in there and ask the players for some feedback on exactly what it was that they were given. So that's the only way, if you know the listing or not, and taking it in.

57:51And just before we let you go, forget who the opposition might be. I mean, if it was delayed or anything and there were changes made and it might not have to be at Wembley, that would change things, wouldn't it? If you didn't get the playoff final at Wembley, or does that not change it either for you? To be honest, Chappers, at the moment, I think that's very far-fetched. Obviously, we're in the middle of this, but we're not allowing it to take our focus. I feel a little bit for the fans, I'll be honest with you, because there's people buying tickets and booking hotels. And I can tell you from my own experience in the last 48 hours how expensive it is to get an hotel in and around Wembley at the weekend with three playoff games going on and not many doing refunds and stuff like that.

58:34So there's a lot of travel and all that. So the fans are always the last to be looked after normally. So for us, we'll focus on the game. We'll go there. We'll hopefully do the job on the day and we can go and enjoy it with the supporters that can't get in the stadium with something maybe planned next week up in Hull again. So it's been a magnificent season and we just hope that we can finish it off in the right way. Good stuff, Dean. Thank you very much for joining us. We will end it there. John, Rob, thank you at the Emirates. Andros, good to have you in the same country as us at the same time frame.

59:05Rory, Chris, thank you. Are you all right, Chris? You're not saying bye? Have you lost something?

59:09Chris Sutton:Yeah, no, lost a lot of things, yeah. All right. Bye. Marbles, number. Yeah, thank you.

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