Raw Carabao

0:00Ah, we got beaten by Palace! Will everyone stop playing Palace? Bound to the bound, bound to the reload. Welcome to the Football Ramble. It is 30th of October. I'm Pete Donaldson. I'm Luke Moore. And I'm Jim Campbell.

0:24Yes, it's the Football Ramble. How is everybody on El Diego's birthday? I'm joined by Luke Moore and Jim Campbell. What would you be doing if you were El Diego, wherever he is now? cocaine yeah just i would be snorting up a cloud cloud or lighting a cigar off bielsa bob's bum kind of his fiery bottom if there's anyone who's kind of got access to the the elevator between both it is el diego so depends where he has more fun as long as it does not intersect with italy where he was a lot of tax still uh yes there was a lot of tax still because he's quite literally really dead. Do you still do you not inherit debts when you die or can you is this a massive get out clause I'm learning about right now with my tax issues?

1:09Yeah handy for you comes January I cannot tell you enough Peter that it's going to be impossible for them to recover that tax money because again he's dead. I mean they struggled when he was alive so. He's only become more elusive one would suggest anyway there was a wealth of Carabao Cup action last night the busiest go up ditch shore report would have come from Molyneux as Wolves took on Chelsea. It ended Wolves 3, Chelsea 4. Little Jimmy Gittins at the death, Jim, making it seem a little bit more respectable. Yeah, he had a fantastic game, didn't he? Two assists and that absolute belt of a goal.

1:46That goal was a beauty. I'm thinking no one's topping Esteevelle's goal there. And then Gittins just absolutely larraps that at the end. He was angry with it. In off the near post from distance. It's beautiful. An amazing game. Absolutely what you want from the Carabao. I love Estabelle's goal as well, Jim. Yeah, just lovely little lofted, whatever you want to call that. Also, I think we probably should apologise to the listeners a little bit because Tyreek George got on the score sheet. Yeah. And we mentioned recently that the Chelsea players call him evil sacker. And we were thinking, what is an equivalent of star boy?

2:20And I think we settled on bastard boy. And appropriately enough, now that Halloween is approaching, the obvious answer is, of course, pentagram boy. Yeah. That's much better. We should have spotted it. That's the thing about the Football Ramble. If you don't like it, hang around for a couple of episodes and they'll do the better stuff they should have done back then and then everything works out fine. It's sponsored by Esprit de Scalier, the Football Ramble. Things we should have said on the show. Nice move from Huang to Tolo Arakadari. Tidy finish from him as well. The thing about Wolves at the moment is they made, I think, 11 changes for this match.

2:57Enzo Merskamed 10 and both teams look better for it inexplicably. They've got goals on the sidewalls and I don't know why they're not using them more. Yeah, didn't they do this already once this season? Like the Carabao Cup team beat West Ham so they became the Premier League team and then they lost and they changed back. So it was like... It's like supporting a team until they lose. Then they beat Everton in the League Cup as well about three weeks after losing at home to them in the league. It's absolutely wild. It's honestly a shame to see the back of them in the Carabao, because we've seen a side of Wolves that just simply isn't there in the Premier League.

3:32I know, yeah. I mean, I know they're rooted to the bottom of the table. I know everybody wants Vito Pereira out. But when you see them playing like that, Luke, there's something there. They've got goals. A couple of their forwards were trying to be signed by decent teams in the Premier League. Why can't they get this right? Well, you say that it's great to see. They conceded four goals at home, Peter. Correct. Correct. So I mean, they're out of the cup competition. So I don't think they'll be going away, you know, with warm feelings in their belly necessarily off the back of getting beat. Like as you kind of mentioned earlier, it became more respectable after half time, but they were three nil down after 40 minutes.

4:13It's worth pointing that out. So yeah, they've got goals. But I also found an interesting flashpoint was Liam DeLapp's return to the side. Yes. incredible decision while already on the yellow to basically see an opportunity for the ball being up in the air not taking his eyes off a defender at any point and just piling into him and then complaining that he's got to send off for it he's forgotten how to do this yeah very much so the look he gave the defender as well he might as well have got binoculars out he telegraphed it so obviously that he did in fact know what he was doing mad mad decision absolutely crazy stuff I mean it was good to see Josie Sarr coming back in after he obviously confronted those angry fans at the weekend.

4:57Good to see him get a bit of gimp, Tom. Maybe he didn't go exactly as he would have planned. No, and one would suggest that he should have been remonstrating with fans after this match, not the one at the weekend necessarily. You put me off. See what you've done. You've knocked me confidence. I shouldn't be arguing with people in the bloody car park. I couldn't drive up the car park the other day. It took me ages to get home. Now I'm knackered. Yeah, yeah. I mean, those nervy six minutes of added time were a sight to behold. Something really, you know, something the Wolves fans to get their teeth into.

5:30My favourite thing about that was when Wolves get their third goal and they're kind of rushing back down to take the kickoff again in like the 91st minute or whatever it was. Ladislav Krejci is the guy sort of in the net and he just cannot help but push Mark Kukurea over. There's no need to do it. I think players get into that guy's vicinity and they just can't help it. They just do it without even thinking about it. It was great because, obviously, Kukaria tried his very best to clear it off the line, couldn't do it, ended up piling himself in the net like a big tuna. Then as soon as he untangled himself, he just got piled over by a Wolves player.

6:07It's great to see. He's my favorite passenger player of the game, actually. I mean, there is an ever-growing compilation of people doing that to him, and that's surely going on there. The other thing to note, I mean, obviously, Wolves can see them four at home being a bit chaotic. Showing a bit, as you said, Pete, in the League Cup, which they won't be able to do anymore because they're now out. But Chelsea themselves have been totally chaotic. My favourite part of the whole discourse around this game was Enzo Maresco after the game saying his team needs to, quote, grow up because it's their sixth red card in nine games.

6:38One of them was his. That's a very good point, actually. What example are you setting, Enzo? No. Well, he said that the DeLat bookings were stupid and embarrassing. I mean, Merezko got sent off for celebrating. He did, yeah. Out of all the things you could do, I think that's probably one of the more understandable things. I think haven't the last three red cards all been really late on when the games were won? So, I mean, in terms of how damaging they could be, I'm not saying they should keep doing it from their perspective, from my perspective, and I think every neutral's perspective, we'd love them to keep doing it.

7:13Please do, yeah. Because it's funny. But they are kind of, they're not losing points because of it, at least. So that's presumably a step in the right disciplinary direction. Yeah. I mean, their next match is Tottenham on Saturday before they head to Carabao, which is one hell of a trip in the Champions League on Wednesday. That's about as far as you need to go in that competition. For Wolves, Will, we talked, I think, on the Tuesday show about whether the new manager bounce is a thing anymore. Would this be a dice that needs to be rolled at this point in the season? and rooted to the foot of the Premier League table.

7:52They need something, Luke. They need something, Wolves, and they need it fast. Yeah, and they're off to Fulham at the weekend. So Fulham haven't been great. So they would probably see that as an opportunity. Yeah. I don't really know. I mean, it's kind of an interesting situation because I think there's a lot of, obviously, unrest, a lot of dissatisfaction. The fans there for fairly obvious reasons. There's a bit of an absent ownership as well. It's confusing to me. Maybe it's just something I've missed, but it's confusing to me that Pereira has been given a new contract just a handful of weeks ago, which at the time maybe looked like they were showing confidence in him and they were happy with some of the signs they were seeing perhaps.

8:29But it does feel like, doesn't it, the type of manager he is, the profile of man he is, the career he's had, I wonder whether once this kind of get up and out, I'm mental, do what I say, I'm frightening, but I'm also quite inspiring, I'll jump on the horse and lead you into the charge with my sword in the air, Once that wears off and everyone's tired of getting slaughtered, you wonder whether he's got any tactical ability to turn things around. Yeah, my big question back to you guys and perhaps to the listeners as well would be, has Pereira got anything in his locker that shows that he can change it up, get the team back onside, get the fans back onside, do something a bit different tactically to get them up and running?

9:09Because it's going to be very, very difficult, particularly when you take into account that the promoted sides have looked pretty good overall, much better than they've looked the last couple of seasons. So it's difficult for them. I mean, their issue seems to be that they start playing well when the game is practically lost, right? Yeah. When they're already kind of losing quite badly. We've seen in recent weeks that actually, you know, that there is something about them and they can get a little bit of kind of a shot of adrenaline in the arm. It's just channeling that earlier, isn't it? And Chelsea were a good side on their day, by the way.

9:39Absolutely. And also, a very changed Chelsea side still has some really, really good players in it. I mean, all of the goal scorers are very good. I think this is a bit of a kind of landmark performance for Jamie Gittins. We've not seen a huge amount of him for Chelsea. And we obviously know he's a talented player. And we've seen a real demonstration of that now. So it'll be interesting to see if he kind of comes into the first team a bit more. But yeah, I mean, yeah, of course, they're not. Chelsea aren't the sort of opposition that Wolves are going to define their season by. But the issue is that they're struggling against absolutely everybody, you know.

10:09Yeah, and if you ask most Chelsea fans as well on the other side of things, people just are not happy with the way that Enzo Mreska is behaving on the touchdown, but also managing this team, this obsession with these inverted full-backs that don't seem to be getting any kind of joy out of sides. And also just this ill-discipline. I know some of the players are younger than others, but I think a lot of people are a little bit kind of like, they're positionally quite naive. Defensively, they just can't stop letting goals in. I mean, where do they go from here, Luke? They've obviously got a lot of competitions to play in this season and they've gone a little bit further in this competition.

10:47They're going to be playing Cardiff in the next round, which you would imagine they'd get through that test. Who knows? But right now, Chelsea fans, they're not happy with how Mareska's setting up, Luke. Well, I think they've got to make us a good cup team, though. I think on their day, they have. On their day, they're decent. They won two of them last year. Exactly. Good point, actually, yeah. So I think, yeah, look, Chelsea run themselves in a way which is quite chaotic. They've got millions of players. They've always been quite itinerant, by which I mean their managers come and go, the players come and go, they trade a lot.

11:24Look, on their day, they're good, but they're also exactly what you'd expect them to be, which is a little bit kind of disjointed occasionally. But then having said that, they've actually been decent recently. I understand they lost at home to Sunderland. Sunderland are a really good team this season. And Sunderland scored in the 92nd minute to win. I don't actually think a one-all draw would have been terrible against Sunderland. And they were very close to that. So they've also smashed teams. And they beat Liverpool as well fairly recently. So look, Arsenal are the team to beat this season. Do Chelsea have designs on winning the league?

11:59I mean, they should have because of the money they've spent and because of the size of the club they are. That's probably unrealistic this season because Arsenal have been so good and because Chelsea can be inconsistent. But I think they've got the makings of a good cup team. I do. And I think the issues they had in September were kind of weird issues around individual mistakes and kind of disciplinary stuff. And the disciplinary stuff hasn't sorted itself out yet because of all the red cars they keep getting. But I think, like I say, as I keep saying, on their day, they're a good side. well did you see Jim that Eden Hazard has joined the Premier League Hall of Fame this week along with Gary Neville obviously ex-Chelsea Eden Hazard he's only like 34 it just seems weird that he would be in a Hall of Fame at a time where he could still be playing it's weird isn't it obviously unfortunately for Hazard you know injuries played a big part in in his early retirement he played in a Legends game recently, didn't he?

12:56And he actually, even though he's 34, he does look quite a bit older than he did when he was a player. But I think he's just, I really respect Eden Hazard because he just, he enjoys the finer things in life if he wants to, doesn't he? Do you remember he used to come back from like the summer like a little bit overweight and sometimes people would, you know, have a word with him. He'd be like, I've been on holiday. I'm going to eat what I want. It's my holiday. Fair enough, fair enough. This booty don't grow on its own, buddy. maybe that's it yeah he had a separate diet for the you know to to enhance the junk in that trunk um yeah um i i always i'm always left cold by any sort of hall of fame yeah just like really like the rock and roll hall of fame just like yeah i mean yeah that's great i'm very political i know that i either like this band or i don't like this band like them yeah i think it's different for it's different for sport though jim i think you think yeah and i think i think also the cynical side of the Hall of Fame, I think it's just, it's clearly aping what American sport does.

13:56Yeah. And so that's, I mean, is it necessary? Probably not. But I think it's quite a nice thing for players who, particularly for players, I mean, this doesn't apply to Hazard or Neville because obviously they both won the Premier League, but it's a nice thing for players who perhaps didn't maybe achieve all the things they wanted to achieve in their team. And now they're retired, they can get a little bit of recognition. and I quite like the idea of building a group of players who have undoubtedly been the best players in Premier League history. I think it's quite a nice thing. I don't really like it during the careers themselves.

14:30I don't think it really necessarily matters if you win players player or footballer of the year or whatever it may be because it's a team sport, obviously. Once you've retired, there's time to be reflective and a little bit more retrospective. I think it's quite a nice thing. I also would just say that, yes, Hazard retired young. I think he had to retire at 32. He started young and he packed a lot into his career. I mean, he got 126 caps for Belgium. Obviously won a couple of Premier Leagues, a couple of Europa Leagues, played for Real Madrid. I don't think he can necessarily have too many regrets about it.

15:03But yeah, like you say, he got paid back by injuries. And I would also say, by the way, on the Gary Neville side of things, I've seen this happen quite a lot over the last few weeks. And it's probably just internet chat and Twitter doing Twitter things. But I found a lot of people being quite disrespectful about Gary Neville's playing career. Possibly because I totally understand this, right? He is quite an annoying bloke sometimes. And he's everywhere all the time, which obviously breeds contempt. He's also very self-deprecating about his own career, which I think people join in with. Yeah, quite.

15:36But I mean, Gary Neville was, you know, the best right back in the Premier League for a long time. won incredible amounts of trophies for Manchester United, was part of their golden period where they could have had any player they wanted and they stuck with Gary Neville, who came from the academy and stayed there basically until he retired. You could apply the same thing to Ryan Giggs. A lot of hate on Ryan Giggs as a player these days, which I've noticed, which is absolutely mad. Very odd. Totally mad. So I think, you know, it is worth just pointing out that yes, players can be annoying in their retirement.

16:11They can be quite partisan. Yeah, and problematic, of course, in the case of Ryan Giggs. But if we are going to be in this position where we separate the art from the artist, as it were, Gary Neville was a first-class player in the Premier League. Of course he was, yeah. And he was undoubtedly worthy of his Hall of Fame entry. And I just don't think there should be any debate about that, really. Massive player for England as well. Really, really reliable player for England for a long time. Yeah. Just because he wasn't always kind of, you know, spectacular to watch in terms of the aesthetic of it doesn't mean he wasn't a really brilliant, effective player.

16:40I think sometimes players who learn their craft rather than have it God-given like his brother, they just sort of go, well, he's not as good a player because he learns how to be brilliant. And we saw him learn how to be brilliant. Hey, you nerd, you learn that in a book. Also, the full-back role has changed entirely. It's unrecognisable now. When Gary Neville was playing, it wasn't the same. His job was a supportive role. It was a defensive role. It was a hard work role. And so, yeah, I found the Giggs thing particularly weird. Like, there was a lot of chat last week. Ryan Giggs was the best footballer in Europe for, like, a good, like, season and a half, I think.

17:18He was amazing. He won 13 Premier League titles. And there's people online saying, oh, you know, look at his assist record, look at his goals record. Ryan Giggs was, like, so good. He was so good. The crossover between people who have decided that he wasn't actually that good, and it was overrated and people who aren't old enough to have seen him play is probably quite absolute really. I'd expect so. And also the assists thing and the goals thing comes from the fact that later in his career he changed his position, didn't he? So he was a little bit more withdrawn and wasn't kind of on the front line so much as you'd expect.

17:55And he was also quite pioneering in terms of things like yoga and kind of different methods to kind of keep your body in the type of shape you need to be in to play Premier League football at kind of an advanced age. I think he was 40 when he retired, wasn't he? His longevity was not just because he didn't stop playing. He had to work really hard on that, and that was an achievement in itself. Yeah, I mean, if you don't go to work, you don't see people to have sex with. Former Chelsea boss Avram Grant, speaking of which, has been sacked by Zambia after failing to qualify for the World Cup. This was his 14th job across 53 years of coaching, which is just incredible.

18:38these kind of managers who kind of like float around doing international jobs I love these sort of gun for hire jobs and they never stop they do it well into their 80s yeah it's great it feels very I mean I'm basing this really on Harvey Renard but it does feel like quite a Mills and Booney job doesn't it just sweeping around the world just seeing these exotic locations I don't want to think about Avram Grant and Mills and Boone role thank you very much well well it's on him isn't it the famous the famous time that he was seen outside that Portsmouth brothel. Well, went into his 80s. He's only just 70, Pete.

19:13Have a bit of a mistake. I know, but I didn't say him. I just said other managers. If you listen for crying out loud, instead of thinking about what Avram Grant was getting up to in his Portsmouth tracks at that time. I can't stop thinking about it. And by the way, can I also say... Give him some R &R. He's had a busy job for Zambia. The brothel was in Southampton. Right, sure. Wasn't it on an industrial estate in Southampton? Just to really paint a picture. It was in Horton Heath, which is in, I think, in Eastleigh, which is a part of Southampton. Sexual. All right, then. We'll be back in a moment to talk all things Liverpool.

19:41And there's a lot to talk about.

19:53Is there anybody in this audience that is remotely close to my age? Young man, you look about 12. It's just nice, nice to know. That's a compliment, by the way. Martin O 'Neill there doing what he does best in front of an audience belittling people being a bit weird do you remember that do you remember that Robbie Williams I sent that Robbie Williams clip to somebody quite recently where he was being interviewed I think I can't remember I think it was the last tournament bar one I think and he was basically saying to Robbie Williams that he wasn't talented and he's really surprised at his success yeah it's brilliant it's a classic clip love it it's a classic clip he basically calls him the Gary Neville of take that doesn't he which is rude for both of them yes thank you to MrMormo2696 on Discord for bringing that clip to our attention Martin O 'Neill has had an instant impact at Celtic they beat Falkirk 4-0 last night turned it at the break and he was very delighted he said I've not seen Celtic often not live to make criticism of this side a restoration of confidence was great not watch the team but I'm here now maybe I'll get it permanently what a great quote he also said first of all, he'd be absolutely delighted to have a doozy of a game for his first game.

21:09Falkirk at home. Falkirk at home. Thank you very much indeed. I'll take that. Six points. Six points. The lead's cut to six points. Lovely. He said, I was concerned before the game, but that's just a trait of mine. That's something to do with my dreadful insecurity problems. Wow. And history of investigating murders. Three years older than Avram Grant, by the way, Pete. So you're going to have a dig at him as well? I will, yeah. Well, I don't think anyone's excited about him being at Celtic, not even the Celtic fans. But a 4-0 win at home against Fulcark will no doubt add... Remove Gris from the mill.

21:42Can you remove Gris from mill? Maybe you can. From Kian on email, hearing a chat about Celtic owner Dermot Desmond's magnificent moustache reminded me of a story from when I used to work for a company owned by Mr Desmond in Dublin. The company worked in biometric security and was preparing a demonstration of their face recognition system to show Dermot. Due to the prominence of his moustache, the algorithm had to be specially trained on men with copious facial hair, in order to not fail spectacularly when he tried to use it. That's amazing. Yeah. I mean, I guess that's probably, knowing that the moustache has come back into fashion a little bit.

22:20It certainly has around these parts. Exactly, yeah, you're the only moustache-less man here. Exactly. I mean, that probably gave you a bit of a leg up in the biometric security game. Right, the match we kind of have to talk about because it's just funny, I'm afraid, Liverpool fans. Liverpool 0, Crystal Palace 3. A good old, honest to God, cop towel throwing. We've got our game back, Lukey Ma. We've got our game back. The result that says, get in front against us and we won't chase you. Liverpool 0, Crystal Palace 3. I'm having it. It was incredible. It's absolutely incredible. And I think what we're seeing now is an amazing like mirroring of what we saw last season, but just with different teams, right?

23:03So no one expected, well, I say no one. I'm sure there are lots of people out there who were, you know, had the foresight to see it, but I certainly didn't. Given that Klopp had left Liverpool, people didn't really expect Liverpool to do as well as they did last season and win the league, right? No one expected this man, that Man City piling that happened admittedly a bit later in the year last year, November. But the parallels are amazing because Liverpool, have now completely piled in. No one, I mean, Arsenal are in danger of running away with it. So the parallels are quite interesting. You just, you know, substitute Liverpool for Arsenal, substitute Man City for Liverpool.

23:38I mean, this is getting interesting now. This is quite bad. I mean, you know, you start off with the idea that, okay, they've signed big players. They've got to have a bit of a mix and a blend. This is the first time Slott's kind of made big changes because obviously last season only really only brought Federico Chiesa and he didn't play much now they've blend trying to blend all these players in and and slot is now in a full blown crisis because they look so poor like so poor and as you guys were saying on Monday you know at times against Brentford Brentford were just walking through them well Palace were walking through Liverpool last night I mean at one point I think it was a second goal the Liverpool defender makes an inexplicable decision just to follow a really obvious run when there's a clear overlap, but it gives just the freedom of the penalty area to score.

24:31Ismael Asal to score his second goal. I think it was the second goal. And then after that, it's really, really tepid stuff. Now, I would say that obviously they made a lot of changes. Obviously, Slott perhaps felt like he wanted to give some players a bit of time out of the spotlight, give them a rest. They played quite an unfamiliar shape. The players that they brought in in some cases are, you know, just unknown teenage players. A lot of them were essentially FM regens. You know, there's no way on earth that Weller T. Lucky is a real person. There's no way on earth Trent Kone Doherty is a real person, yet they've now played for Liverpool.

25:09Shout out to Amara Nala as well for getting sent off for the second time in his Liverpool career at the tender age of 18. So all in all, it couldn't have gone worse. That's the only thing you could say is that they've made a lot of changes. That's the only thing you can kind of add in the opposite column. I have now, I mean, if I was a Liverpool fan, I would now be really, really worried. Look, I know, I've seen some Liverpool fans call for patience, say that, you know, he won the league last season, we're only in October, we've got to give him time, etc., etc. If this continues, it's going to be really interesting.

25:44Aston Villa are in great nick. They've just beaten Man City. After that, they've played Real Madrid. who I know have had their own problems with Xavi Alonso, but are clearly a very talented team. And then they've got Man City away. The next three games for Liverpool are essentially going to sum up their season entirely. Pep will be looking at that fixture and going, we could really do something here. We could really get something over on Liverpool. I mean, Jim, you can kind of approach fixtures like this in two or three ways, really. You play the kids, and if you get tonked, you've destroyed a generation of kids.

26:17You play a full-strength side. I think that's an overstatement. How about you destroy an entire generation of kids? Because I lost a game in the League Cup. And you play a full-strength side, and if you get tonked, you're risking your best players for injury and stuff like that, and you're going to get criticised if you get tonked. But at this point in Liverpool's season, playing a team that you can't say they're not familiar with, you want to play yourself back into a little bit of liquor form, especially who you've got next week. I couldn't agree more, Pete. Slott said after the game that people think Liverpool's squad is deeper than it is and obviously they have a tradition of playing younger players in this competition and I understand that because a lot of the bigger sides do that but given the circumstances they're in Liverpool have won a lot of trophies consistently through their history and the League Cup has been one of those trophies.

27:09A run in that cup would be an opportunity for them to actually claw back some positivity move the slot era further on a little bit. Klopp picked up those trophies and it is an important thing to think about. Because the Champions League game against Frankfurt, Jim, seemed like a bit of a holiday, didn't it? It really did. Yeah, it really did. And as you say, Pete, the opposition, they're familiar with them. This is the third time Crystal Palace have beaten them this season in three different competitions, in three different venues. It's May Lasara scored in every single one of those games, interestingly.

27:41So it feels like some sort of literal haunting by the failure to sign Mark Gahey. It's just happening to Liverpool over and over again. It's the can we play you every week charm, but it's actually happening. Can I just chime in and say that I would, one of the things that would really kind of worry me is that in this game, for the first kind of, I don't know, 35 minutes or so, it was quite nip and tuck. It wasn't obvious that Palace were going to run away with it. Liverpool were probing. it was quite an interesting intriguing encounter and then when Palace scored Liverpool fell apart and they didn't show anything after half time really either that showed that they could get back in the game and that one shot on target all game at home I mean like I say I know they made changes but there was a point quite early in the game when Rio Ungamoa almost scored an absolute beauty the shape on that ball was a joy to behold.

28:47But that was really it. And yeah, I mean, they've already gone through a week ago, this idea that Van Dijk has gone public, saying we've had a crisis meeting, we sat down, it's got to be better, myself included. We're showing the leadership now. We've got to sort it out. They cannot defend. They cannot defend. And it's bad. It is bad. The eye test makes it look super, super bad now. A couple of years ago, when Klopp would do this sort of thing where he'd sort of have a mix and a blend and bring in like a load of young players to Carabao Cup matches. So much so that you almost thought, is he trying to get out of this competition?

29:25Yeah, yeah, yeah. But they were too good at the back to let goals in. So they just kept progressing, which is upsetting. But you watch players like Chiesa. He seemed to be the only player who wanted to kind of hold up the ball, maintain an attack. And he spent a lot of time sort of encouraging some of the younger players. and I thought that was a lovely thing to see, but a bright spot in a very dark evening for Liverpool. Palace were subbing players two-thirds of the way through the match just for a laugh, just to protect them for the weekend because Liverpool were just showing nothing about them.

29:56Job done. But Liverpool have a history this season of scoring quite late, but they just seem like the light's gone out and there's nobody home to get them through. I'd love it if Glasper, when he was doing that, was just as though coming off in the earshot of Arna Slott going, treat yourself to an early bath. and you have a bath have a lovely old time in the bath this is your time do you remember Rafa Benitez who is it was it Sam Allardyce got really pissed off with Rafa Benitez because Liverpool scored a second goal in the game and Benitez kind of went like that done as in the game is done and Allardyce was hugely disrespectful just watch the game I'd love it if Glasner did something like that as well yeah just starts reading a book on the side yeah well do you remember when Benitez used to take his glasses off when the game was done put it in his top pocket yes Yes.

30:41Oh, so thrilling. So good. Like he's taking his glasses off and he's going, I now no longer need to do any more work. I can give my eyes a rest. Rest, yeah. He didn't quite go on the bench and have a lovely old snooze with his feet up, but he should have done. Sleep mask. We should remember when we're talking about Slott, and this is a challenge for him, and you know the way the discourse goes, you know, people are going to start calling him a fraud and all the rest of it. We should remember that when he came in, obviously he delivered Liverpool a Premier League title, but the season before he came in, Liverpool finished third, and the season before that, they finished fifth.

31:22It's just simply not accurate to say that Slott came in and just stuck his feet under the desk at Klopp's club, and obviously he was going to win the league. One, that is a junior school level of understanding of how dynamics between human beings actually work anyway. But two, it's not like the third title in a row. They come fifth and then third. So he should, by rights, have a lot of credit in the bank here. I would say at least till kind of January, February time. And if Liverpool go so bad that they finish fifth, well, guess what? They finished fifth a few seasons ago. So this is not unprecedented territory for Liverpool.

32:04It's the purchases though, isn't it? That's the problem. Yeah, the eye test makes it look bad. I think we don't have as much, if you're a Liverpool fan, you don't have as much experience of what Slott's able to do to turn things around just simply because you haven't seen it yet because this is his first real test. Yeah, and I also think that the signings feel like a problem now in terms of their being used as a stick to beat Slott with. But I think this is going to be a short-term kind of news cycle issue, really. I think the quality of those players will tell out in the end. Maybe not all of them.

32:38You know, making a lot of signings at once is always risky, isn't it? Because not every signing is going to work out. So maybe a few of them aren't what you expect. And then you move on from those players. But I think, you know, I think Verts will come good. Izac will come good. Ekotike is already working. I think, you know, this season, obviously, already it looks like it's not going to be what Liverpool expected. but we are hearing like actual rumblings of people like wondering if slot might be for it soon which we were joking about a couple of weeks ago and obviously it's not as dramatic as that because that's deranged.

33:09I'm sure the fans will be as sanguine as they're known to usually be in situations like this. They're a club that are just supported so well right across the world so it's kind of hard to know who the kind of normal supporters are when it comes to stuff like this because there's just so much hyperbole and there's so much money to be made by being hyperbolic about it as well. Anyway, elsewhere on Barrack Road, the holders near Cass United who are taking on Spurs. Pretty professional job this. Newcastle too, Tottenham nil. Both teams making changes, but Newcastle, they kind of won it a canter to be honest, Jim.

33:41Yeah, and they looked really energised and calm and there's a sense that this is our cup and we're not going to give it up easily. I was really, really impressed with, once again, Nick Valtomada, particularly his composure for his goal. It's the way he kind of, he positioned himself really, really well. And he timed that header so well. But like when you watch the replay of it, you can see him adjusting his body like four or five different times. He's really, I guess he's got an advantage being sort of lighthouse sized in those scenarios. You're looking for the word tall there, aren't you, Jim?

34:18He's just very tall. But you've got to use those advantages, right? And he's really, really adept at doing that. And I just think he's so much fun to watch. He looks like he's just sold you the best coffee you've ever had in your life. Yeah, he does. After Wisch has recommended a place to you in Berlin. It doesn't look like a footballer at all. He's the only player who looks like he should have, like, an apron on. Yeah. Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like an artisanal butcher, maybe. Yeah, he does. Can I pour water on, slightly on what you just said, Jim, and just say that I have no idea what Antoine Kinski's doing in that area of the pitch.

34:50Fair. He doesn't need to come out to try and punch it a full two seconds after Walter Mard has headed it. Stay on your line. You might save it. You're a pretty big lad. From what we've seen, you're a pretty good shot stopper. You might have a chance at saving that header, which, by the way, wasn't that hard. It wasn't like a bullet header or anything. So I think he's made to look better by Kinski's decision, but I do agree broadly with what you're saying. Oh, I mean, Jim, did you see Ramsdale's serve? Oh, one-handed, strong left hand from an absolute rocket. He's got them in him. He has got them in him.

35:25He has got them in him. Joel Hinton probably should have gone late on, but there's no VAR in the Carabao Cup. That was an erotic challenge for me. He sort of roared him like a bull. Yeah. There's a sense, isn't there, that perhaps if there's no VAR, Eddie Howe's gone to Joel Hinton. Go on, mate. I've won for you late on. Wait, hang on, Joel. That's not what I meant. Don't hug him. Yeah, and speaking of... Kudos looked like a violated. He looked offended. He was like, what were you doing? Why have you wrapped yourself around me? And well-deserved little kind of set-to from about five different people squaring up at each other.

36:03Bruno Gimoresh, who was obviously involved in that, he applauded the referee after he unintentionally stopped a total counter-attack. It just sort of bounced off the back of the ref's foot and he couldn't do anything about it. It was a really quick sort of counter-attack, but Bruno Gimera's just absolutely clapping and laughing. Don't worry Spurs, that's the bad news. The good news is you get a drop ball uncontested in a neutral area. So that's not a consolation. You'd be absolutely fuming if that happened to your team, wouldn't you? In a cup game? I feel like as well, I mean, this is a bit cheeky of me, but I'm going to put it out there.

36:37Given the profile of team that Frank played last night and the fact that against Doncaster at home, he did a kind of similar thing. I think he might have had his designs on this trophy. I think he might have been like, this is winnable for us. If you look at the game they played against Doncaster at home, I understand he made a few changes. Kinski wouldn't start in goal. Pelini wouldn't play at centre-back. But I mean, Pelini is a world-class player, you know. They play a strong team and they've obviously now gone out. I think Thomas Frank will be low-key pretty disappointed about this. Yeah, and it all kind of went through, their fortunes kind of went through Richarlison for me.

37:17Like, he spent most of the time on the floor. He kind of, every time he was needed in a position, usually at the back post, he was a full yard behind where he was meant to be. There were times last night he just looked like he was wearing slippers. I don't know whether there's a stud issue or the ground being too wet. I don't know, but it was really disappointing because at the start of the season, there were signs that Thomas Frank was starting to get Richarlison back onside, but now he's angling for a move, Jim. Yeah, he's a funny one, Richarlison, isn't he? Because he does go through these fits and starts of form and he seems to need to work really hard to be focused because otherwise he can be...

37:53He's an odd one in that he can be sort of spectacular on form sometimes. He's capable of some really eye-catching, really good stuff. Or he can also seem sort of clownish, like the complete opposite of that, where he's just sort of all over the place and you question how he's in the team at all. And, you know, last night was one of the latter performances. And it has been for a decent while now. I mean, you know, he's just, I can't get away from the fact that he seems just like he's a prat. Yes. Right? And it gets in the way of his football. I know he's had his issues off the pitch. I know he's spoken quite eloquently about how difficult he's found it occasionally.

38:30And we should be sympathetic to that, of course. But he goes on these unbelievably barren runs. Like, he's a£50 million striker. Yeah. I know it's not his fault that he costs that much, but that's the level that the game decided he's worth, right? And he's only scored one goal, I think, for club or country since the second week of the season, possibly the first day of the season. And if you are a team that's got the ambitions that Spurs have got and the ability to spend money that they've got, you just need to be better than that. And the thing about it is what the dynamic is, that he's had a touch because Dominic Solanke's got a serious injury and he can't play, right?

39:10If everyone's fit at Spurs, Richarlison doesn't start because Solanke's usurped him. Solanke's out of the picture. And Richarlison's not taken that opportunity. He was absolutely... I mean, when they played at home to Wolves and they drew 1-0, which is a really poor result for Spurs back in September, he was diabolically bad. Like, he was so poor. He also got dragged against Monaco away from home. Obviously, the whole team were fairly poor that day, that evening, but he was bad. Last night, he looked... I completely agree with you, Peter. He picked up a booking quite early on and seemed to take all the wind out of his sails.

39:45He was well off it after that. And that's unfortunately... That's part of his game, you know? Yeah. And Spurs, at this point in time, they do have a lot of first-team injuries. Probably one of the worst injury records in the league. And it's just good to see the Ange effect continuing. That's dogged them for years, that, hasn't it? Yeah, I guess so. He seems to have dogged him for such a long time, yeah. And you know, Thomas Frank probably sees how the Ange win in Europe, you know, with the last kick of the ball of his tenure, being such a sort of, having such a kind of cleansing effect of his legacy at Spurs.

40:19He'd probably sort of think, if I can win this kind of League Cup, I'll certainly get to the final, give him a bit of, you know, Wembley football in the first season of me being here. and you could probably expect Spurs to sort of do something like that with the squad that they've got and the acquisitions they've made. This could, you know, really give me the next two seasons and give me a bit of money, give me some players that I want for this squad and launder my reputation as well. It's a shame that they've gone out at this point. Yeah, I mean, I think, though, you've got to give your own team credit there, though, Pete.

40:51That's a nightmare draw for Spurs. Newcastle away, especially given that Frank is still getting to grips with the squad. The squad is a little bit kind of, you know, stuck together with tape and kind of a glue gun because of the injuries. Whereas Newcastle was so organised, so very well established under Howe. You know, even players coming in and out of the team that aren't playing every week. Like Fabian Scher hasn't perhaps played as much this season, has he? But he's such an experienced campaigner. He was obviously part of the team that won this competition last season. They are a really difficult proposition, as I remember very well from last season.

41:26so they are I think Spurs are quite unfortunate with a draw there as well Yeah I mean the subs coming off the bench you're bringing on people like Trippier and Joel Linton you're like right you can see out games and Gordon if you've gone ahead they will hump you over the finishing line essentially quite literally they will indeed but going back to Richarlson briefly there are rumours that David Moyes is interested at Everton I mean over the hill striking there's going to be 5 million more than you can afford that's Everton price I can absolutely see that because if you've got Beto, you know, why not make the most sideways move in football history and replace him with Richarlison?

42:07They both speak the same language as well. Lucas Pakatar is also briefing clearly that he wants to leave West Ham in January. It's briefing season. It is briefing season. It's Brazilian briefing season. After that second international break, if you want that January move, get it out there. Get it out there. Get your agent on it. Clear shit in the League Cup. Yeah, lovely. Wanting to leave West Ham is ultimately a default position. I think it's probably better if people come out and say they want to stay. Then that would really be notable. Yeah, just call a press conference to say that you haven't spoken to your agent for a while.

42:38I saw a West Ham content creator type the other day on Twitter posting a screenshot of the transfer marked page of West Ham's business and saying, this is the worst transfer window in Premier League history. Ha, ha, ha. Classic over-the-top stuff in the West Alpine. Indeed. Well, finally for now, before we hit the break, former Tottenham defender Toby Alderweireld is rumoured to be a contestant on the Belgium edition of The Masked Singer. It is thought that he's playing the character Eagle Owl. Yeah, I saw this. Beautiful, beautiful costume. It's genuinely not a bad voice. Right, yeah, OK, yeah.

43:17When he was asked if it was him, he said something like, who knows? So it is you then. It definitely is you. because you're not saying no, are you? Yeah, aren't you brief to sort of say no? Or is he brief to always tell the truth? I don't know. Like, to be vague about it? No idea. I'm not that au fait with briefing season. You'd have to ask Luke's Packet up. What I think should be happening is if these Belgian slugs want to do their own masked singer, they should be doing Belgian songs. He was doing Mr. Brightside in English. What's wrong with your pop scene? This is a Korean format, is it not?

43:50I think it probably is, yeah. But what I'm saying is, you should be doing Belgian language songs. I see. Plastic Bertrand is the only one I can say. I don't know any. Sa plan pour moi, that's the only one I can say. Or Mr Brightside in Belgian. At Puckle Pop. At Puckle Pop, yes. Oh, tack, tack, tack. That might be Swedish. Coming after this, Pep Guardiola finally gives Tony Poulis the respect he deserves.

44:26Welcome back to the Football Ramble. After yesterday's chat about Fulham goalkeeper Benjamin Lecomte. Is it Lecomte? We decided it was Lecomte yesterday and we decided it was named after a cheese. Ian on X has another cheese-based football pun, Tony E-Dams. Yes, very good. We did limit ourselves to goalkeepers. We were thinking of keepers specifically. Fair, okay. Robert on YouTube, Brian Babybel and Nigel Nacho are my favourites but Tom V on Discord has really gone the extra mile Luke do you want to read these out? Yeah so the goalkeeper this is a real bit of low hanging cheese that we should have got guys Yeah Peter Stilton Yeah I know I've got it when I read that Absolutely gutted This is pentagram boy all over again But I will give you a few of my favourites Gianfranco Gorgonzola obviously Great Pecorino Gattuso Neil Stinking Bishop that's my favourite Come on.

45:21Isn't Stinking Bishop just like one of those stupid supermarket brands rather than actual derivation of some fucking cheese maker when I'm going to call this naughty cheese and everyone's going to buy it? It all counts, mate. Well, interestingly enough, there's also a Stinking Bishop pear. Oh, okay, nice. Which is apparently grown almost exclusively in part of Gloucestershire for Perry, for a bit of Perry. But Stinking Bishop cheese. That would go with cheese. Well, Stinky Bishop Cheese, I think, is a kind of well-respected, specific type of cheese from the same part of Gloucestershire. And it's been made and produced since 1972, described as a washed rind cheese, and was absolutely instrumental in the reintroduction of the old Gloucester cow that was almost going extinct.

46:10So give it a bit of respect. Put some respect on this name, because it's performed a very, very important role. like 70s cheeses full of asbestos probably I'll not have that but if it's serving a cow I think that's absolutely fine there's a chance we may hear from the PR department of stinking bishop cheese there you're claiming they do not have asbestos Edam Lafondra Edam Lafondra I like it well Philadelphia Neville that's a brand name yeah that's not good that's not good that's just a soft that's just a Jerick soft cheese Jim I'm not having that all I've got is Antoine Cheeseman and Alan Watsich which is I will admit is a stretch Swansea won Manchester City 3 only the second time this season the Man City have played without Erling Haaland he'll be fuming at that one he wants to score more goals he wants to munch more goals up against Swansea away from home he was at his local farm shop buying some raw milk and couldn't be contacted I bet all he eats is raw all he drinks he probably does eat actually it's very fucking solid but rotten raw milk on pasteurised milk and meat.

47:18He must stink. Isn't raw milk something that certain areas of the right-wing manosphere online have started to take to? Yes. Because they think that pasteurised milk is woke. Yes, I think that's it, yeah. Louis Pasteur. And I saw a farmer, I saw a dairy farmer respond to one of them on Instagram saying, I'm a dairy farmer and these cows producing milk are disgusting. You should be getting your milk pasteurised. and that clearly is the end of it. The things I've seen, don't they occasionally because their stomachs just fill up with so much gas they have to put a fucking tap on it to stop them from exploding.

47:55Have you, I mean, I've been to a dairy farm. There's shit everywhere. Yeah. There is shit everywhere. And I like the idea that these kind of versions online, the idea of milk is quite probably an abstract thing to them. They don't have any thought about it other than just where they get it from the local supermarket and raw milk sounds raw. Manly. Raw, yeah. Raw dogging. and rather than the Vikings would drink. So I'm going to do it. Milk sounds like an inherently feminine thing, right? Obviously because of the nature of being breastfed as a little helpless baby. You were breastfed until you were 13, weren't you?

48:25I was, yeah, yeah. Swear by it. And that's what made me so strong. But this is it, yeah. It's looking to make it sort of Viking in some way, isn't it? It's very strange. I suppose when you are an actual Viking like Erling Haaland, it's probably fine. Yeah, I'm sure he's got his reasons. Going back to the game itself, though, All the chat going into this week was from people, I think, quite frankly, clutching at straws saying, well, the only player that scores for Man City is Erling Haaland, and they're going to be in real trouble if he gets injured or he stops scoring. One, he won't stop scoring.

48:58Two, he never has. It literally never happened. Two, they've been away to Swansea. Admittedly, a lower league type team who put, to be fair, though, did put Nottingham Forest to the sword. And three different players have scored. So, yeah. Yeah, Doku, Mahmouche and Cherki. Yeah, I mean, also Cherki, you know, was quite unlucky getting an injury early in the season. So we've not really seen a huge amount of him yet, but he looks like a match-winning player. He's been excellent every time I've seen him play for them. Very unlucky not to score a second. Yeah, and obviously, you know, Mahmouche gets a goal as well.

49:27So they're two players who are very, very capable of making massive contributions. I can't, when I saw that Doku and Mahmouche scored, I couldn't, in the way it was written, I couldn't stop thinking about Docu Moosh, Docu Moosh, can you do the fandango? Nice, yeah. But I don't really like Queen, so I don't really know why that's happened. Why don't you like Queen? Who doesn't like Queen? I don't like Queen either, Pete. It's just dreadful, Pete. Come on. I mean, they hardly fucking caught, like, I don't think anyone, I think everyone likes Queen. I think you're kidding yourselves. There'll be a song for you.

50:00There'll be a Queen song for you, surely, somewhere in there. Well, a lot of the chat coming into this match, inexplicably, was about Tony Pulis. Pep Guardiola suggested that Tony Pulis' Stoke City side inspired Premier League teams to become more direct. It's been a delayed response, one might suggest, Jim. Yeah, he mentioned this in his new column, which is called Going Direct, which I absolutely love. Who's given Pulis a column in 2025? I know the people who sort of go, everyone seems to be playing like Tony Pulis' Stoke now. Yeah, completely. He speaks a lot about that in the column and he talks about how he thinks it's quite funny, like all the stuff with people making pictures of Mikel Arteta but made up as Pulis and he talks about how he actually loves it but he can't resist a little dig at the end last line of the column or last paragraph rather Wenger is probably shaking his head about what Arsenal were doing but I know Arteta sees the Stoke comparisons as a compliment and so do the other Premier League managers who are doing the same he absolutely hated needless to say absolutely hated him and I can wear a coat.

51:09He was a bit of a trailblazer back in the day when he played. He got his UEFA air licence at 21. Yeah, he was really young, wasn't he? That was pretty wild. Yeah, he also, I think he played in Bournemouth with a very young Jamie Redknapp, which is very hard to picture, isn't it? Well, he played in Hong Kong for a year when he was very young. He just went from England to Hong Kong for a year just so he could afford a wedding to his wife, which I think is a lovely thing. And they've been together ever since. Well, they were in 2017 when I read about this. That's why Jordan Henderson went to Saudi.

51:46I also like that Tony Poulis is doing, I don't want to speculate on Tony Poulis' politics because I'm sure he's, you know, who knows. But his columns on the BBC website, isn't it? Yeah. Yes. That seems very woke for Poulis. It's a bit like the premise of This Time with Alan Partridge in that he could only get back on the BBC because of some massive, mad cultural shift. Yeah, yeah. But it's also good to see that BBC are always maintaining their neutrality by giving Poulos a column, but at the same time, they've also given Aussie Ardiles a column about tactics as well. So the balance has been restored.

52:23Yeah. Well, elsewhere in the same competition or elsewhere in the League Cup, we weren't really talking about the League Cup, we were talking about Tony Poulos. But either way, Arsenal beat Brighton 2-0, Fat Boy Slim, who's a huge Brighton fan and was a minority shareholder quite famously. He was on the shirts for quite a long time, wasn't he? He was, yeah. He revealed that he DJ'd for original Ronaldo's wedding back in 2005. And the real take home from this is that he also revealed that Ronaldo full-on snogged him. Like full-on like tongued him at his wedding. Fat boy slim. Fat boy slim versus slim boy fat.

52:54Full-on snogging. I mean, wow. That's the best thing fat boy slim's ever done. Yeah. It's got to be. I mean, I've got no B for him. I think I quite like him. but I think that has got to be I mean imagine being asked to do that that's an amazing claim incredible you have to say yes to that I mean if you're Fatboy Slim you should be above DJing weddings but that's one where you've got to go yeah no I'm absolutely doing that the disappointing thing is in the article Fatboy Slim refers to him as the original Fat Ronaldo which I thought we were passed that's a shame but yeah apparently no I also there was an intimation in there as well that I'm not sure the years quite add up but when he said that Ronaldo full on snogged him He also said that he mentioned that he's now been 16 years sober.

53:35I was like, was that the trigger point? Yeah. I am getting off with Ronaldo. What's going on? It's never going to get any better than this. I might as well just quit drinking now. No point going to party. No, exactly. Well, the quarterfinal draw for the next round of the League Cup is as this. Is as this? Yeah, fuck it. Arsenal versus Crystal Palace. Cardiff versus Chelsea. Man City versus Brentford. And Newcastle versus Fulham. Fulham get to play Newcastle again. and say Jesus' battle they're going to be happy aren't they yeah Marcus was gutted about that wasn't he it's a bad draw absolutely gutted they'll all be played in the week of December 15th a little pre-Christmas set treat fans have already been claiming that the draw is rigged because of all the big teams in the competition they've managed to avoid each other some of them have managed to avoid other teams by getting knocked out in the last round yeah exactly who knows what a big team is these days anyway for crying out loud Liverpool rigged this for themselves yeah maybe was it Mikel Antonio was doing his 67 bollocks See, I'm 44 I'm doing the 67 bollocks You can stop doing it now I don't know what that is We're killing it dead Yeah, I don't know what it is What is that?

54:36It's this thing our kids do In a song It's about crime Okay Yeah Anyway Let's get out of here Stop ruining teenagers' fun Thank you for listening to the Football Ramble Part of the Aircash Crater Network That was to Arna Slott and not us I'm back with Marcus, Vish and Luke tomorrow For the preview show So we'll see you then Say goodbye, Jim Bye Say goodbye, Luke Goodbye Ta-ta From me

55:08We would like to apologise to Stingy Bishop Enterprises. The cheese does not contain asbestos. The Football Ramble is a Stack Production and part of the Acast Creator Network.