Manchester United dismantle Manchester City, Arsenal stagnate, and a Jack Grealish revenge game: Men in Blazers 01/19/26

27:55They will feel that's what's been missing for a long, long time. Yeah, and this was again City, vaunted City, but in 23 games, all comps, just two clean sheets. I was like, oh my God, if they brought in Gehi after the last set of results, who are they going to bring in this midweek? Will it be Harry Kane, Lamin, Yamal and the great Beto all incoming? But it would get worse for Manchester City. 76 minutes, Cunha just ran past O 'Reilly, drove the ball over. Dorgou, only player alert to the football happening, as the City back line was so flat-footed, lost and bedraggled in that moment. He charged past Rico Lewis, who was statuesque, and slammed really a dagger of an obsidian blade past Donnarumma.

28:40It was stunning football again. Red, rapturous theatre. City's faces in that second. If you look at the players just shock, do not know who we are at all across their faces. But for United, the joy, the surging sense of self. Gary Neville on British comms instantly called it probably the best 77 minutes we've seen for years on this ground, which is a little bit recency bias, but raw vibes. Yeah, but to be honest, it's not far off. And I mean, I haven't watched as much of Manchester United over the last few years as Gary Neville would have done. but it was far more comprehensive, far more compelling, far more coherent the way they played than I've seen them for years and years and years and the crowd really fed off that.

29:24And in those last 15-20 minutes after the second goal, they tore Manchester City apart. City looked completely shocked and totally unable to work out how United were hurting them or how to make it stop. Which is the astonishing part that the defenselessness of City, also that they could barely cock a fist to strike back Raw. I think they barely had a sniff. Was it one attempt on goal? This is their biggest XG defeat ever, which means everything and nothing. Haaland pulled off the optics of that in the 80th minute, just 14 touches. Remarkable in itself. I mean, he has more battles to fight. There is no doubt.

30:04But seven games all comps, is it now, without a goal? I've got to say, since he became a YouTube influencer, dude has dropped off raw. It's hard to be. Is he getting distracted by content creation? I don't know. Or is the football getting in the way of the content creation? I don't know. I do know it's hard to be a beast on the field and miss the beast off it. In truth, Jen looks like so many of his teammates right now. Pep likes a smaller squad. They look utterly fatigued. I will say about Harlan, or let me frame this as a question. is it unfair to point the finger at him seven games without a goal the handful of touches in this one when Gent has scored more goals than whole teams this season yeah and also ordinarily when strikers are in droughts Rod you look at the supply lines don't you and against United in particular Haaland was not provided with any chances not really there was one sort of vaguely dangerous moment where I think he managed to get a shot off and it was blocked but he wasn't in the game I suppose that's kind of the pact that Pep's made though isn't it that this is the first Pep Guardiola team we've ever really seen that is built to to service one man where that one where that one man is not Lionel Messi and Haaland is kind of not it's not that Haaland sits outside the system it's the system is Haaland it is get the ball to Haaland and he will store you lots and lots of goals unapologetically so and I think that it's probably fair to criticise a little bit when the player for whom everything is designed does not deliver.

31:36And that's basically what's been happening, not just at Old Trafford, but over the last seven games for him. And that's now three draws and one defeat in four games for Man City. That's not that good. Yeah, I mean, that is sending Pep spiralling back to that dark place. As you say, points now dropped in four straight league games. All the talk beforehand was of City being six points back from Arsenal. Same time, three years ago, they ended up romping the title by five points. That talk suddenly seems very, very empty and hollow because Manchester United on this day deliver a victory for the ages.

32:09Slightly hyperbolic. Two goals. Hit woodwork twice. Three disallowed goals, was it? Two worldy Donnarumma saves. A set up top. We learned there is something called the interim to the interim new manager bounce. We've got to brace ourselves this week for a lot of talk of Manchester United being back. Carrick deserving the job on a permanent basis of DNA. being the thing that will lift the club back to the Champions League promised land. First of all, Roar, I do need to ask you, how crazy should we allow ourselves to get? Will we allow ourselves to get? Do we need some grown-up perspective here?

32:42Or is that overrated? Should we say, lads, it was just one game? Let's see a more consistent body of work, should we, before we lose our bloody minds? Or should we just submit to the emotions and declare United back? Logically, Rog, we should look at it and say, first game for a new manager. A lot of players wanting to make a positive first impression. A lot of players maybe who want to show the old boss that he was wrong. Some of that. Derby, which obviously changes things, and the Derby against the team who played completely into United's hands. As I say, in those last 15-20 minutes, City just pushed on and on and on without really pressing, without really trapping United into corners.

33:19And every time it took United one ball to break out and streak away down towards the Stratford end. And they scored once, they had one ruled out, they hit the post, and there were two or three other chances that they could easily have added to the scoreline. All of that makes you think, yep, absolutely, logically, need to see a broader body of work. It was almost the perfect game for Carrick. It was the perfect way to start. On the flip side, Manchester City are spending an awful lot of money. They spend half a billion dollars in a year. You can't catch them up by outspending them. They have Pep Guardiola.

33:53You probably can't catch them up by outthinking them. You certainly can't do either of those two things quickly. So why not see if Magic will do it? That's what I came away thinking. Well, is there really any harm in saying there is no actual way to do this? We can't physically find a strategic way forward that will close the gap to not just City, but Arsenal, Chelsea, all the others. Maybe just see if DNA works. Maybe it will. Maybe it will work for long enough that it gives United a long-term bounce back to roughly where they need to be. I've always been in the pro Magic lobby. I love that. I do wonder if Ruben Amarin watched that game and what he experienced as he watched it.

34:36This perfect start for Michael Carrick. It must have been so humanly good for him to walk around. Old Trafford, redemption, finger to the haters, just a bullet joy for now, for at least one day. It doesn't get any easier. Arsenal away next. I've got to ask you, one quick danger coming, possibly, if he is too successful. Carrick's already refused to rule out becoming Manchester United's permanent head coach at the end of the season first press conference. GFOP Jack Height in DC wrote a great letter into our mailbag and it will become pertinent, I think, if Carrick does land Champions League qualification for Manchester United.

35:16He writes, How many weeks until Carrick's given a permanent contract and what month next year will he be fired? Yeah, that is a great question. and part of the test of United's seriousness will be can they resist it. But the flip side again of that is if he does a good job, if the players like him, if he plays the sort of football that gets the fans on side, if he gets results, it is possible that Michael Carrick could be a good Manchester United manager. They have appointed every type of manager. They have tried everything. None of them have worked. So yeah, logically again, you'd say wait for Tuchel, wait for Glasner, wait for Pochettino, whoever it might be.

35:54Iriola's been the coming man in the Premier League for ages. But it is possible that the right person is Michael Carrick. That is not something you can rule out. It's not what I would do, Rog. But it may well be the right answer. Bring on next weekend. By the way, we don't have time to get into this. But it is mad that in victory, United player, Sandro Martinez, had to instantly address comments by former United legends Paul Scholes and Nicky Burt who mocked his size. I think he said something like Haaland would pick him up and throw him into the net. He had to say this. This is a real quote from a real professional footballer after Manchester League.

36:29I told him, Scholes, already, if he wants to say something to me, he can come to me whenever he wants, to my house, wherever. I mean, this is not really what football, it's not really what the world needs now. I just say Godspeed. From the chasers to the league leaders, Nottingham Forest, nil. Arsenal Football Club, nil. Well, well, how are the turntables? This fixture last time, I think, was a battle between second and third last season now. Arsenal had the chance to go nine points clear of Manchester City at the top of the table. And West Ham's win at the other end at Dr Tottenham, of which we will speak of, meant the Hammers had already closed the gap to Forest to just four points.

37:14Arsenal tried to arrest Saka and Trossard after their Carabao exertions midweek. perhaps to protect them from a Deitch kicking. This game was very much thought on Deitchian terrain. Elliot Anderson was superlative and everywhere. It was a stalemate, a muscle, a gripple grapple. It reminded me of one of those UFC ground battles. Forrest fought hard. They were obstinate. They were punishing. They reduced the game to one of duels, a mud fight, a slog for Arsenal. I think it was probably an epic world of pain for your league leaders. Martinelli missed the most clear-cut chance. squared the ball impotently from close range.

37:52Jocares let in on a one-on-one by Murillo, who then kind of joyously, I'd say, snuffed the suite out, almost emasculated him. When you watch Jocares right now play, I mean, you're not really watching him. You're really thinking, my God, the defending in the Portuguese league must be truly, truly terrible. But there's a faction of Arsenal fans, I'm really fascinated by this, who so desperately want Jocares to start cooking. We released a couple of interviews with Paikai Osaka this week. They're on our YouTube right now. There were so many comments in the chat about how Osaka, who's an ebullient joy, a difference maker in this game, by the way, when he came on, but just like, you need to start passing the ball to Jokeres.

38:35Be good to Jokeres, man. Jokeres, the honest truth, still looks like a lost boy in this league, but the Osaka-Jokeres narrative almost feels like a fan base willing desperately uh their big summer boy to to be the person they dreamt of yeah i think it's tricky isn't it there's lots of ways to like football rog and you can watch football we've talked about this before you can watch it tactically you can watch it as a soap opera you can watch it because you you like the way it reflects the darkness of the modern world like there's lots of ways to like football and one of them is transfers and people people become surprisingly attached to players that they are delighted their team has signed and I think we're all guilty of it to some extent maybe not guilty is not even the right word that you know you want the big signing to do well you want the signing to you want the signing to have made a difference and I think that loyalty can be admirable I find it a bit odd I won't lie when I see on like my obviously my my my timelines skew Liverpool just a touch Rog and the like the the transactionality of how people talk about players I find really odd.

39:41Like I get quite emotionally invested in players' journeys. The way that people are willing to discard them is alien to me. With Jokeres, I suppose it's positive that there are Arsenal fans there who are just willing him to do well. I suppose what might be the problem is that at some point that might turn and when it does turn, it might turn quite sour quite quickly. There's a lot of emotion there and if he doesn't live up to it, he might have an issue. I think, given Arsenal's lead position, there is also a tendency to look for a problem where maybe there isn't one. Jokeres is kind of doing a job for Arsenal.

40:15It was a lot of money to get someone to do that job, but he is kind of doing a job for Arsenal. Yeah, I mean, I will say Kai Havertz cannot become fully fit quick enough. And I think the goals will come for Jokeres, I have no doubt about it, but possibly only when he starts alongside Timo Werner for your San Jose earthquakes, which is how he's looking right now. So by the way, Arsenal look fatigue in the face of Forest resilience in this game. The three-game week is incredibly tough, even with that depth in that squad, unleashing. You saw it, Saka, Jesus, and then a couple of minutes later, Eze came off the bench.

40:51And you're watching this, and it just reminded me of that Logan Roy quote, that the Premier League is not knights on horseback. It's a number on a piece of paper. It's a fight for a knife in the mud. That's what this game was. I did wonder whether or the quadruple, that Carabao semifinal, playing such a full-strength side in that, ultimately that quadruple chase might be their greatest challenge right now. Yeah, it's a choice that Arteta's going to have to make because for all the depth that they have, which is by far the most complete squad in the Premier League and I would say the most complete squad in Europe, the level of fatigue that everyone is dealing with is extraordinary.

41:27And you see that throughout the league now. You will start to see it throughout the Champions League as well that teams are playing eight, nine games in January. That's a lot, especially those teams in the Carabao. So Arteta, at some point, will have to try and give some of those players a bit of a break. And we saw it against Forrest, right? He didn't start Saka. Dropping Saka for a resting Saka for a Premier League game is a fairly big call. I guess maybe the way he looked at it is, look, the Carabao is one more game, and then you've got a final, that's a trophy. The FA Cup, you could potentially play a few more reserves.

42:01They should get a break around the Champions League because they will qualify in the top eight. So maybe he thinks that they can do it. My guess is the problem, the flick in the tail, will be latter stages of the Champions League. That's when the fatigue really starts to tell. God bless. Saka did actually come on. He made a real difference. I'm only saying that because the header, the flicked header, the Celt save was really magnificent from such a cunning, audacious attempt. Celts becomes only the second keeper to keep a clean sheet against the Arsenal. after Alisson, who's done it twice. That's just me trying to make you feel good, beautiful.

42:35Oteta left a few, but by the penalty not given on Ole Aina for handball. Honestly, for me, watching that felt like misdirection. There was a lot of frustration. Penalty, yes, seeing them given, especially against Everton, all the bloody time. But the real frustration probably was with that front line, his own front line. They were blunt, disappointing. I think the context for this game was probably the biggest frustration. Manchester City dropping points, Arsenal dropping the chance to get over the hills and far away. That City implosion and the knowledge they didn't capitalise. That was probably the biggest drive of the frustration and the awareness that, hello my old friend, the low block, that is going to be the steady diet.

43:15Arsenal are going to have to face and break down all season. To me, this was not a terrible result rule. I mean, this title is now going to be won inch by inch. But it feels like every single Arsenal fan is caught between, we are effing crap and solid point on the road. It's like they're emotional and irrational. But it's the context, like you say, Rod. So the result itself is not a bad result. The City round is difficult. Forest are tough to play. They are the sort of side who will be maybe more impressive against the top six than against teams in mid-table. I think it's perfectly feasible that Forest will play Fulham or whoever and be very poor.

43:54But against the top six, they're a tough nut to crack. it's a good point just take it and move on but in the last two weeks City have dropped five points and Arsenal could have put those five points could have put another four into them and they haven't they could be 11 points clear that's how they'll look at it that if they score once against Liverpool and score once against Forest then they are suddenly 11 points clear and the title race it's maybe not over but it's starting to feel a lot more relaxing the fact that they haven't is why there is a degree of frustration for Arteta and for the fans instead they failed to win their last two games in the league on the trot but some have extended their lead to seven points we have Durian Timber joining me on YouTube on Tuesday do not miss that Anne Hathaway let's touch upon a game of joy for Chelsea fans and fans of the English office Chelsea 2, Brentford 0, the very first Premier League game for Aura Farmer slash coach Liam Rosinha.

44:54This man is quite fascinating, Ross. Somehow, we've talked about him last week, how he's like the last starfighter plucked out of obscurity to meet a global moment, save the club. But second, he seems to be doing it with a fairly high-risk tactic, but my God, it'll be high reward if he comes off. He's got this post-modern self-awareness. He's briefing the press, or somebody's briefing the press, that Liam uses Lego as a team bonding exercise. You hear that and you're like, oh my God, Cole Palmer must be in heaven. There are other nuggets. There's an incredible Daily Mail deep dive. And a lot of this detail comes, you know, the club briefed the journalist.

45:30It's how it works. There's a line, Liam Rosini is not wearing gloves in training so the players can hear his applause when he sees something he likes. There's a video doing the rounds of him from when he was in Ligue 1 dropping such, I mean, I can only call it psychobabble on David Brentes levels. This is a real quote in English. Manage, if you split the two words, is man and age. So you're aging men. That's really got to be your focus. It's almost like they're trying to goad the English media. Yeah, Badwall9 summed up Liam Rosinia's personality by tweeting, Liam Rosinia, he closes the fridge with his hip.

46:14That's very good. Yeah, the idea that he's postmodern is really interesting. My main reaction, as most British people's reaction will be, is to be very cynical about that sort of high performance, Mark Wahlberg's daily routine thing. He's a bit like a... And Rosinia waking up in the morning and washing his face with those blue fizzy waters. Yeah, or the guy whose name I can't remember who dipped his face in an ice bath and sat at a desk doing something. Yeah. And it feels very much like... He's a little king. It's a little bit live, laugh, love, if you know what I mean. Yes! Yes! There's that kind of vibe going on.

46:48And I don't want to speak for my nation. Most British people don't like that stuff. We find it really cringe. But it's possible. And as you say, Rosinia, after the game against Brentford, came out and said, oh, we've got Lego later. He's kind of leaning into it. And there is something quite knowing about him. So that briefing, as you say, will have come from someone at Chelsea or someone close to Rosinia or someone close to one of the players. It has come from somewhere. No journalist sits down and thinks, huh, could we say that Liam Rosinia is doing Lego with the players? That's not how it works.

47:22It's not invented. Or no journalist knows his, hang on a minute, I'm watching training. He's not got any gloves on. Exactly. That gets briefed in, you're like, okay, good nugget, this is how he's creating change. Not necessarily by the club, it could be someone around him, it could be someone around the club, it could be someone around one of the players, but someone is telling the journalist that stuff. Could be the big glove lobby trying to attack him, bringing him down, we can't have Vex catching on. It could be that there's some sort of thing around it being better for you as a human not to wear gloves, and they want Liam Resenia to be the face of it, or the hand of it, I suppose.

47:53Anyway, or it could be, yeah, look, the chances are it's someone from one of those camps and they are doing it to make Resenia look good. A lot of managers are really reticent to acknowledge that stuff, especially early on. Normally, the bit where the managers tell you they're reading the papers or reading the press or reading the websites, that comes five to seven days before the sack because it's the sign that they've lost control. The fact that Resenia is like leaning into it is, yeah, that's interesting. It is sort of post-mobile.

48:50decided to pass rather inexplicably and Brentford were punished for their wastefulness within five minutes. Fernandes charged down Coyote's clearance, the ball ricocheter, Shao Pedro, whose instinct was magical. First touch into space, second touch, blasting the ball. Pedro suddenly looking like a man who suddenly is reborn, a man who understands the roots of the word management are actually man and age. Why didn't I know that? We were then treated to the sight of Rosinha, sending notes onto the field via Garnaccio to Enzo. Roar, again, making it about him in this moment. What do you think that note said?

49:30Try to pass. The eyes of the window to the soul. It might have said live, laugh, love. Yeah, no, that's why I was laughing. That was like my first instinct. It was just like, lads, live, laugh, love. Come on, be the change you wish to see in the world. It might have been Mark Wahlberg's daily routine. yes it was like amazing SPS Scouser DTX in our Discord thought Rosinha scribbled I have nothing to say but make it look like I wrote to it really important alright whatever I'm not sure I've gone actually read it because he then whiffed a close range poke right after with the goal gaping Chelsea had had no clean sheet in 8 games going back to mid December Brentford was so dominant in this game this will be forgotten to history as we revel in Lego tour but they dictated play.

50:16They had chance after chance. They went back to front. They charged through the gut. Shard had one-on-one with slapstick king Robert Sanchez and he was slapstick no more. Repelled it beautifully with his foot. Criminal Costa at Ben tweeted, to be fair, Rosinha said he wanted to see wave after wave after wave of relentless attacking football at Stamford Bridge but he never actually specified the club. Brentford's dominance was so clear. It was agonising to the Chelsea fans. It was just wasteful. finishing after wasteful finishing, which kept this close. Every Chelsea fan I knew was braced for the worst, but football makes such a fool out of all of us.

50:54There was a rare Chelsea foray forward. Kelleher took a heavy touch, was challenged by the freshly on Liam De Lappe, who he brought down, and Cole Palmer resisted the urge to Penenka, send in a keeper the wrong way clinically. Noticeably did not celebrate a furious, I guess, in his own play in this one. That was it. 2-0, two shots on target, two goals for Chelsea. Somehow they come away with the three points. I'd say, Roar, it wasn't convincing, but it is a results business. And I've got to say, every single win right now for Rosinha is credibility in the bank. That's ultimately all bloody matters, I think.

51:34The credibility is as important as the points glean right now. 100%. I couldn't put it better, Rog, that he needs to win games, ideally in some sort of style, but just needs to win games to build up a body of work to say, I can do this. That's what the fans will be looking for, is can this man get results, get a tune? Can he operate in this league? I agree with you. I don't think Chelsea fans particularly are convinced by Resenia. I think his connection to Bluto is a problem. I think they feel as though the ownership, the hierarchy, whoever it is that's making these decisions, are not doing it in a way that the fans fully understand.

52:12Rosseño just needs to win games because if he can get to May, the summer, and Chelsea win the Champions League and he's won far more than he's lost, then he can point at what he's done and say, look, I can cope with this. And at that point, they might start to think, OK, we can give him a chance, but it's going to take a while for him to win them over, I think. Yeah, Lego, gloves, post-it, steady dire, that serious question, quick one though. I'm watching Real Madrid fling Alonso overboard. We're watching an interim there. We're watching an interim to the interim at United. We're watching the Rosinha experiment.

52:47Are we in a post-management world? It's a crazy question. We talk about how this game has just been reduced to one of jewels. There's less tactical analysis because the games are packed so close together. And it has just become about jewels, fights, and management matters less than ever. Yeah, plus front offices are more and more powerful and owners don't necessarily want to kind of have to reshape their teams, their clubs, their squads around some guy's vision that might not work. So yeah, I think the era of the all-powerful visionary manager, the kind of guru manager like Guardiola, that might be past, I think.

53:24God, in modern football, everyone wants an interim baby. To the dark place, Tottenham 1, West Ham 2. I wrote in my Friday newsletter, The Raven, that the prospect of this game was kind of like thinking about a fight between a wet noodle and a teardrop. And in this one, the teardrop won with a 93rd minute stutter from Callum Wilson, one-to-way Callum Wilson, prodding home from a corner to send the away fans into ecstasy. Massive three points for West Ham, who were chasing Forrest to try and get out of the relegation moon door. Profound, existential levels of agony for Tottenham Hotspur, despite the debut of poor try-hard Conor Gallagher.

54:06The football was neurotic, anxiety-filled slop. This is the second week I'm done on the run. This is an agony that they have lost to a 90th minute plus winning goal. The predicament roar can really only be summed up by every single West Ham fan I know texting me to say some version of, oh my God, Spurs is a toxic club. We just hate our board. Spurs fans are angry at their players. They're bored. Their players are angry at the fans. Everyone seems to hate the manager. Roar, West Ham are well-run in comparison. That is maybe pushing it a little bit, but there are more similarities between these two teams than either the table or our expectations of them would suggest.

54:52They are basically going through the same thing. And it is a total lack of direction, of purpose, of identity. It is hard to think of two more miserable clubs in European football. Yeah, I mean, there is Dr. Tottenham, of which we joke. But this was really like, this was if House was playing Dr. Tottenham in this one. because losing to West Ham is just next-level generosity, next-level healing. And I do believe this will cost Thomas Frank his job. But for the complete inability to make decisions right now at Tottenham Hotspur, serious decisions in the post-Dan Levy world are incredibly difficult because there's chaos within chaos, wheels within wheels.

55:39The front office is changing. You have one co-sporting director. This is a thing. a co-sporting director leaving. Fabio Perattici, the appointment of Carlos Raphael Rafi Mawson coming in as director of football operations on Thursday. And the Spurs' new chief executive, Vinay Venkatesham, had to apologise in the match programme for, quote, the gap between where we are and where we want to be. That gap is currently being filled, we've talked about at length, by booing at halftime, at full time, by Pedro Porro, cupping his ear to his own fans when Spurs did score to equalise by giddy West Ham fans singing, it's happening again, it's happening again.

56:21Oh my God, when they netted the winner. Spurs fans making their opinion though and singing, you're getting sacked in the morning to their own manager roar. This is chaos, it's theatre, it's theatre of darkness and absurdity. It's a club in stasis. almost a culture clash between the negativity of the manager on the field and the perceived way that Spurs play, which is entertaining forward football, and the club board that's in limbo, is it, just to a new era? The agony really is of just another season wasted, piling on top of the sad flatulence of the end of the poor Ange Postacoglu wealth. It feels like a club with a punctured lung roar, just crying out for a reset to the reset.

57:08It's had a reset. Yeah, and as we said of Manchester United, obviously Spurs and United operate with different historical contexts, Rog. But it's hard to see how Tottenham get out of this because hindsight's a wonderful thing, but I don't think when Thomas Frank came in, Spurs fans were broadly of the view, this guy's not good enough. I think most Spurs fans, some won't have been especially enthused by the appointment of Frank. I think that's probably fair to say. They might have looked at him and thought, okay this is a little bit of a mid-table Premier League appointment but I think the vast majority of Spurs fans looked at it and thought he's done really well at Brentford he's not going to kind of make us totally vulnerable to an ideology like Poster Coglu he's more pragmatic he can get more out of the squad he will make us more obdurate and more defensively sound and yeah maybe a little bit less exciting but Brent Thomas France Brentford didn't play bad football I don't think they they were expecting seven, eight months later to be booing him and demanding that he be sacked.

58:08And I'm the same as you. I don't really see how Thomas Frank can survive this long term and I find that desperately sad. But I also don't see who they can appoint to make it a huge amount better. After talking about Tottenham Raw, this will not hurt. Half as bad. Liverpool won. Burnley. What a point, Rog. What a point. Yeah, let's focus on the positive. Burnley won. Liverpool entered in an oddly the unglamorous run of 11 games and beating six wins, five draws in that period. But still the pretense. I think that's the word of stability. After that rocky start that scuppered their title hopes, you income the visitors.

58:44Patsy, relegation zone Burnley, hadn't won in 12 top flight games. Liverpool, no surprise, totally, totally dominated the opening exchanges. The football was better, but only really in comparison to what it has been. Dom Sobosai had a comedy penalty, which he smashed murderously off the bar. so hard that it bounced back about 10 feet behind the players following up. But seven minutes later, Eketike created slop. Curtis Jones pulled it back and Florian Wurtz took a touch and last one passed Dubravka into the Burnley net. 1-0, Ruhr, Wurtz. We talked earlier about the Jokeres narrative, willing it, you know, desperate to claim this is a day that Wurtz became president.

59:27But Ruhr, six goal contributions in his last seven games, He's better on Saturday. Does seem to be developing a real connection with Eka TK. You know, all the memes that mocked his opening exchanges in the season. Where are we? Very quickly. Flourie and Vert. Yeah, I still think there's a little bit of a question mark because Liverpool's recent run has been against relatively lowly opposition, Rog. And we're yet to see Vert maybe dominate a game against an elite Premier League team in that way. Although he was good against Arsenal. But I'm relatively comfortable offering that constructive feedback because I think I have been fairly consistent on saying that you could see Florian Virts was a really good player even at the point where the 007 memes were happening.

1:00:07He might not have been storing or creating goals directly but when he did play he looked excellent and he's now starting to add a bit of end product to that. So yeah, he's been really good for a month, six weeks. He is a rare bright spot in an otherwise terrible Liverpool team to watch but he maybe won't have truly arrived in that sense until you see him dominate a game against Manchester City. I want to pick up on that, Rourke. I do need to acknowledge that Burnley, even in this terrible run, have played with incredible fight. They came out of that second half as if J.J. Watt had distributed Watt burgers himself at half-time.

1:00:42And Liverpool, 73 % possession. I think 32 shots they peppered. But their motif in this middle part of the season, they cannot prevent themselves from being vulnerable in moments. 65th moment after a lovely piece of Benet and hot ticker tacker. Marcus Edwards fired into Alisson's far post to level the score. Liverpool did have chances down the stretch, but this is really a hard-earned point for Burnley, one which catalyzed boos at Anfield from the home fans. And Arna Slott post-game said, I understand the booing. Part of me is like, yeah, I understand the booing. They've become the first champions to fail to win at home against any of the newly promoted sides with this draw.

1:01:23But, Roar, you did win the title last season, And man, that was pretty bloody good to experience. Liverpool is a weird reality. The unbeaten streak is now an even dozen. But it's such an ersatz winning run. You have draws to Leeds at Burnley littered in. Feels like we're watching when we did medieval history as kids. They talk about the farmers inventing a year of fallow fields to make the field become verdant again. We're almost in a fallow period. I think the problem is the opposite. I think the sense is that yes they're unbeaten in 12 and clearly they have got better from the point where they lost I think at one point they lost 9 in 12 Liverpool and I think there is a groundswell of of gratitude and like folk memory of winning the title there is understanding that Liverpool are operating as we've said every time we talk about Liverpool this season Rog Liverpool are operating in very unusual circumstances and have been for all of the season so far because of what happened in the summer i think most fans understand all that stuff and would tolerate a fallow year if they could see what the purpose of it was the issue with with the type of football that slot has been playing it's not clear how you're going to use it as a building block for something else it looks an awful lot like practical pragmatic football designed to make games very low event kind of spectacles where you hope the margins fall in your favour then they're slow they're ponderous they seem deliberately slow at times to be honest they're not great to watch they're not drawing games three all because they're defensively vulnerable but you think do you know what when we can solve that problem they're gonna be electric going forward they had 32 shots against Burnley their xg i think was up towards three or four they deserve to win that game that game in itself was not the problem sometimes you get a game where you have loads and loads of shots and you just can't score the second goal and the opposition get an equaliser and it happens and you know fair play to the opposition in that situation the problem is that that game comes on the back of a nil nil draw at home to Leeds on the on the back of conceding a 97th minute equaliser to Fulham drawing at home to Sunderland drawing at Leeds you've had three or four months now of unconvincing results with unattractive performances and there does come a point where the fans are thinking I'm not quite sure where this is going anymore I think that's fair I will say the dark side to taking a league by storm is that the storm ultimately becomes the benchmark everything you've just said about what Liverpool are ponderous slow hoping to win by small margins as an Everton fan I'm like you've just described what we aspire to be and I love it give me more but let down the side you end the weekend in fourth one spot ahead of United head to Marseille in the Champions League on Wednesday also this Mo Salah coming back from AFCON which is going to be interesting Honestly feels like the return of an incredibly divisive television series that has taken years off and is coming back to our screens.

1:04:18But let's dive into a real unravelling, almost the unravelling. And it pains me there. Sunderland 2, Crystal Palace 1. Sunderland back to winning ways for the first time since that sizzling. Newcastle win in mid-December up to ninth. Two points off the Champions League places. Came from behind here to extend Palace's down. won this run to 10 games, all comps, goals from the sizzling Enzo Le Fay, Brian Brobby. But the real focus here, not on their excellence. It's on Palace's worst week ever. Before the game, the news, I think Palace fans had emotionally braced themselves for, rationally, but emotionally tried to tell themselves it would never happen.

1:04:59It came to be. Oliver Glasner confirmed he would leave at the end of the season. After the news, Captain Mark Gahey was going to move to Manchester City, broke. This in a week, which began with the humiliation of FA Cup throwdown wrecks at a non-league Macclesfield. Well, this was, I mean, I'm an Everton fan, but this was honestly heartbreaking. Because I am old enough to remember 235 days ago, Palace shocking Manchester City. The delirious Wembley lifted their first trophy. Was it 120 years? SA scoring, Gehi leading, Glastner inspiring, Europa League beckoning. And now it's all gone. We'll get into Glaston in one moment, but there's a tweet from at Benny Esther who wrote, I feel the wife's left and she's took the kids and then came back for the dog.

1:05:46Big picture. What does this moment teach us about aspiring in the Premier League from that mid table? You're eventually just going to get picked apart to a carcass, stripped for parts by those above you in the food chain. And also that you should enjoy success in that fleeting moment. Yeah, that's maybe the positive way to take it, Rog, is to say that if you get those moments, you have to cherish them. You have to treasure them for as long as you can, because they are really rare and it will fall apart pretty quickly. I think the speed with which Palace has unravelled is distressing, but maybe not as much as the fact that a little bit of it seems self-inflicted, that if the club could have maybe convinced Glasner in the summer that they met his ambitions, maybe he'd be happy to stay.

1:06:29All right, maybe you're going to lose Mark Gay, but if you got a couple of extra reinforcements in that gave the fans reason to believe that things might be better that would help the mood around the place as well it does feel a little bit like they kind of achieved this glorious golden moment and then they forgot that you have to kind of kick on from there they forgot that football doesn't stop and I think that is maybe where the pain for the fans comes from they will have expected Eze to go they will have expected Gay to go and I think to an extent like you say they might have known Glasner wouldn't be there forever but for it to happen so quickly is is upsetting.

1:07:06As Joni Mitchell sang, and she would have been proper palace, don't we always seem to know that you don't know what you've got till it's gone? We've got to talk Glaston and acknowledge there are now massive, massive doubts about the future of the club. Jean-Philippe Mateta, 18 months, I think, left on his contract, linked to Juventus, amongst other places. Adam Wharton, linked to everybody who loves exquisite football, but post-game, in an outburst, Glassner went nuclear on his team and a lack of incoming transfers since the FA Cup win. I saw a team that left their heart on the pitch. We couldn't make any subs.

1:07:42We have no one on the bench. We've been completely abandoned. Angry also that Gahey was sold on the eve of the game rather than after. He said Crystal Palace are fine to the end of the season like this with Oliver Glassner, with another manager. I don't know. Raw. Palace have briefed since then that they are not going to sack Glasner despite the finger-in-the-eye outburst after the game. But this was, I think the adjectives are, it was very Morescury. It was very Amorimi. Yeah, and that feels significant as well, doesn't it? You've suddenly got three managers in the space of about three weeks who've gone to war with their clubs.

1:08:17That's not normal. That is a new development for the Premier League that managers now have a go at their executives. There was a point on Sunday where it looked like Thomas Frank and Oliver Glasner were going to get sacked on the same day, which would have made this a more interesting podcast, Rog. Less seductive. I don't know how sustainable it is to have a manager who's that unhappy at a club. Does everyone kind of muddle through to the end of the season? What does that do to morale in the dressing room? What does it do to results? What does it do to a season that could potentially still contain glory?

1:08:51Palace are the favourites for the Conference League. Is that how you want to get through? Is there a way of placating Glasner a little bit if they go and spend a little bit of money in the next, what, two weeks? Could that improve his morale? It just feels so... It feels such a comedown after everything that they've done in the last year and everything they've given us as like a football culture more broadly. It's human beings even. Yeah. The 3 % of us that is human. I couldn't agree more, Ru. I don't know. These firings, I can't... How are we even going to talk about them when we've got to talk about which manager's wife's got a big mouth and who's going to come and fight Martinez in his house this week?

1:09:32I mean, that's the serious stuff. That's the real business. Yeah, we don't have room for this stuff. At Kevin Hunsaday tweeted, Meanwhile, somewhere in South London, Mrs Hodgson is hiding her husband's tracksuit and telling him to come away from the door because no one sends telegrams anymore. Oh, my God. Roy coming back again. I'm interested. In other games, Leeds won. Fulham nil. Leeds won the battle as approved. They are the one true Lily White overachieving team this season, puncturing Fulham's sixth game unbeaten run, custody of a 91st minute lash from Lucas Mecha, who stepped off the bench to deliver a crescendo on a quite emotional day in which Leeds honoured the passing of Welsh 1970s giant Terry Yoreth.

1:10:19Leeds now eight points clear at the Premier League relegation zone. I think they might be staying up raw. Mecha's goal came less than three minutes after a Leeds fan, Kenny, told Discord chat Mecha was, quote, going to drive me insane with his piss-poor play. I said earlier, raw, football's greatest gift. It does remind us all. We know nothing. Yeah, and incredibly dramatic. I said to you on Friday that a friend of a friend had taken their son from Colorado to Allen Road for the first time. and I'm thinking that on 90 minutes you're regretting that decision. I think on 90 minutes you're thinking this has been a long flight for a goalless draw that had very little to recommend it and then on 92 minutes you're probably thinking that's the best decision you've ever made.

1:11:00That is what football can do for us. It makes my heart sore after 90 minutes of us to crap. Talking about 90 minutes of us to crap, Wolves nil, Newcastle nil, listless leg in Newcastle because some of no creativity, no sharp edge in a game that will be forgotten by time and by time I mean by today. Wolves though, your Premier League informed club, five games unbeaten in all the competitions. They have officially more points than Liverpool in 2026. Roar, they remain bottom. Brighton play Bournemouth in a bright bouncy alliteration South Coast Rumble this afternoon. So that leaves Aston Villa nil, Everton Football Club won.

1:11:37Did this really happen Roar? Or did I dream it? It did. It was the moment that Everton got in on the fun Rog? Yeah, I mean why is it never us is what I always say. It was you you beat Villa. Yeah and I'm not even sure how I feel about it, I mean this game was insane in the memory and really emblematic of this Premier League motif of unpredictability chaos on any given Sunday. I watched it in Chicago's Premier League soccer bar have won their AJ Hudson's with the Everton supporters group I don't think any of us before the game thought the victory was Is it even a possible scenario of outcome? Couldn't compute it.

1:12:17Villa undefeated in, is it, 11 straight home games before this one? Unai Emery wrote in the match programme, all caps too, this match is crucial. It would have offered Villa a chance to go four points behind Arsenal. But I will say, Roar, I'm not superstitious, but Villa did seem to tempt fate before kickoff. Jack Grealish took the field, collar up, a little bit like James Spader in any John Hughes movie. The Villa fans, though, booed their former hero roar. When you're booing Jack Grealish, are you tired of life? I was going to say, he who boos Jack Grealish is tired of life. I think that is absolutely true.

1:12:57He is. Surely we've reached the point with Villa and Grealish where you're just happy for him. Surely. Villa are fine. Villa aren't sitting around missing Jack Grealish. Just be nice to him. I wonder what Liam Rossini would say as he watched it. He probably just turned to his team and they'd say, oh, look, the eyes are the windows to the soul. He'd look at it, Rog, and say that when you're booing someone, you split that into two in the English, and one is buh and the other is ooh. Ooh, ooh. So you're actually phrasing. You're like, ooh, I'm interested. You know, God, I think he just walked around.

1:13:35It's like that old Peter Sellers movie being there that he's just wandering around. just saying like wonderful childish aphorisms. And we're all, if a couple more wins, everything he says, we'll just be projecting wisdom into it. And I love it. Villa, got to say, they had chances. At times, the second half seemed like a one-on-one between Morgan Rodgers and Jordan Pickford. There was one shot, Morgan Rodgers, who was wildly uncalibrated for much of the game with Thomas Tuchel watching from the stands. But it's the exquisite hook, arcing drive, which Pickford, I mean, It was hit with venom, fling his entire being out.

1:14:10It's almost like watching a goalkeeper fling his entire multi-generational familial lineage at the ball. It was a stunning save. Even more stunning now. 59th minute. Villa started to look a little ragged. It's not a super deep squad. I think they're playing a sixth match since the end of December. They've got Fenerbahce. They've got Newcastle coming up next week. And in a stunning moment, no one saw coming, especially this guy, Dwight McNeil. We'll never call you a shite again, Dwight. I was quite delighted at the Everton bar lots of people were calling him as if that is now his name he arced a shot in on goal Emi Martinez muffed the save right back into the Kenny Loggins danger zone and Tiano Barry who is so his factory settings are just wild and incalculably snatchy I believe in the moment the ball dropped to him Martinez on the deck in front of him I believe he must have said to himself you know what, I'm just going to slap this shot out for a throw-in, because he did the opposite.

1:15:11He unleashed a deftly, almost an erotic chip rule, and it was as shocking as unexpected it came from him, almost as seeing me with hit. I've been saying for a while, Roger, there's a player in Tieno Barry. You didn't believe me that he was good at football in Spain. And there's a treatment that I can be getting in Turkey. Is that what you're saying, Rob?

1:15:33yeah he's it barry is a is a work in progress but there's when they signed him yeah he was one of the most promising players outside the big two in spain last season there is obviously a player in there it's just a matter of patience i mean it's crazy unbelievable it's his third goal in four games to be candid also it's ridiculous how we flung him in to be our number one line striker it's like taking a number one draft pick a quarterback and flinging him right into the team and giving him no experience, no onboarding, no kind of growth trajectory, the pressure on him, the expectation has been ridiculous.

1:16:08And yet he is delivering, delivering with joy. He posted a photograph of the goal afterwards on Instagram and geotargeted it as Barry Park. So he's clearly loving everything about life at the moment. And Tiano Barry Joy is a very naive, wonderful, effervescent kind of joy and drinking it. So Villa, my God, this massive game, this massive moment of opportunity. dead-legged, leaving a stunned Unai Emery to fire shots at his own front office, Raw, in a Morescury and Marimery-Glasnery way. We are not a contender to be in the top five. We're still not contenders. There are other teams with more potential than us.

1:16:47Everton win. Villa suffer only their third home league defeat since the start of last season, which is incredible. I have to watch every single game at AJ Hudson's now. I'm going to come back to Chicago every weekend. Shout out to Lowe, a lovely man who I met in AJ Hudson's. I asked him, how did you choose Everton? And he just beamed. And he goes, man, I'm a White Sox fan. As if, what that means, Rory, is that he already supports one team that is shocking, terrible, and utterly devoid of hope. So I looked for another one that kind of matched it. That approach to life led me layer in more misery.

1:17:20I just love that approach to fandom. But it may, again, it makes the highs worth it, Rog. And this was an incredible, incredible high. Big love to everyone in this incredible football city. I do think a lot about the Tommy Fleetwood appearance on our show last month. A really beautiful Everton fan who I admire so greatly. He talked about how Everton fandom has given him an undimmed well of optimism. I think this was his quote. We're always just ready for great times. I hope you had a great time watching this, Tommy lad. but Roar it's time to delve into our mailbag meninblazers at gmail.com do the honours Dear Roger and Rory long time GFOP first time caller and first time writer loved the episode last week particularly Rory's hidden talent at amazing voice acting I'd agree with that the voice of the proctor at unnamed university was sensational and Roar I've always enjoyed your duadiola and terrible Spanish pronunciation which I think is unfair Roar I think you do your best I do but it is terrible two things can be true rule but carry on babe what is your best soccer impression can each of you show us and what is it about this beautiful game that emotions take over us make fans do this I certainly enjoyed doing my Vinny impression after Barca's victory con Valencia y visca Barca Ander oh and I'd say I have many weaknesses in life this is I could do a podcast about my many many weaknesses I do think impressions are probably in my top five weaknesses I'm colorblind I've lived in America for over 30 years, Ru, and I still can't do even an American accent.

1:18:59I can say, like, hooray for Hollywood! Like, silly things. Billion dollars! But I can't do... That was pretty poor, too. It wasn't great. It was a four out of ten. So, Ru, you should take this one, bud. I'm also not much of an impressionist. There are actually amongst the ranks of Britain's journalists. There are two or three very gifted impressionists, but I am not one of them. Who? I'm not naming names. It wouldn't be fair. I'll tell you later. I think I used to be able to do... In fact, I've got a... Guys! Guys! For Guardiola. That's all you need for Guardiola. That's how you do an impression of Pep.

1:19:36So good! So good! So good! But my Roy Hodgson was... I've not done it for a while, but my Roy Hodgson used to be okay. You might have to dust that one off. It was difficult to play the game today, but it's nice to keep possession occasionally and work towards a goalless draw. I think my Roy would be my best impression. Is it really? That's a five. Yeah, it's not a talent of mine, Roger. I'm prepared to... Guys, so good. That's a nine. But that's all I can do. I've only got three words. Guys, so good. Sometimes, mid-season, when he's completely shattered... Editor City, so good. Guys, so good. I think the only one I can do is a scout accent, which obviously I learnt from growing up.

1:20:22Can you do a Cara? No, I can't do it, Cara. Cara's got the high Scouts accent, which is very common. You know, I've definitely got a Scouts accent, but that high Scouts accent is just that octave of unwavering dedication and surety in your own sense of wonder, which is such an incredible trait of Liverpool. Liverpool, there's a Mancunian to be honest I'm remembering H the rapper from Manchester and both cities share this, he came on the show and we asked him to describe the essence of Manchester to the audience and he said if you're hearing like five strangers have an argument and one of them's got a Manchester accent, he's right and that high scouse accent is the Liverpool version of that I can't do it.

1:21:10If you go very nasal you can go Neville, you can do very Neville quite easily just by talking like that that's all that's all you see that stuff i can't do when people say speak through the nose i don't have that ability to like uh isolate my organs so to speak i can do i can do a pretty pissed poor sean dyche that's just like going to that place you know i once did my sean dyche on on british radio and i've never lived it down so i'm doing it again but i can also do a bit of an impression of john sean dyche i'm not doing it i'm also realizing in this convo i'm so self-conscious in this moment i'm actually just talking about them without actually wanting to do any of them which is kind of like Anders tells you all you need to know.

1:21:48I've done some research into this. The last thing I'll say, Roar, about why my cousin Richard moved to America at the same time as me, and he speaks like an American now, and why I still sound like genuinely I've just landed from Manchester Airport. I've been told, Roar, stay with me here. If you have a musical ear, your accent changes. Interesting. So think of like Steve McLaren, the English manager, famously, who started speaking English like a native Dutchman after being in Dutch football for like three weeks, was it, Ruh? I bet you Steve McClammon is not the idiot that he was made out to be in that incident.

1:22:24I bet you he's a musical genius. It could be. I mean, I think we're all still very glad that Steve McClammon, when he was managing Jamaica, decided not to do the accent. No, no, he does. He does the accent. He'll do the accent. The problem is that it's one of the aspects of toxic masculinity that if as a man if you do an accent no matter how so i can do a south african accent which i think is pretty good yeah but no matter how good that accent is all of your friends are honor bound to say to you what's that supposed to be welsh regardless of the accuracy of it that is you're not allowed to say no one has ever told anybody else they do a good accent that's fair i think the honest truth is i can barely speak english andres is the uh is the reality of the thing i I love your letter.

1:23:09Keep writing to us. Send us your postal. We'll send you a patch, King Andres. And keep sending us your messages to meninblazers at gmail.com. I'll try and answer each and every one of them. That is it for today. I'm headed back to New York City this afternoon. We are headed to the Bay Area on February 4th. I cannot wait this for a quite incredible set of guests in a beautiful, beautiful live show to celebrate the World Cup coming and the Super Bowl West Coast fans come and raise many beers in our loving arms. Tickets are available in our show notes and on our social. But raw to you, you beautiful human being.

1:23:47Thank you, thank you, thank you. I think you've done very well to get through this after the Bears defeat. Mate, I'm still buzzing. I'm flying. I don't even need a plane to fly home. That's how buzzing I am, baby. This is Rog saying let's not take a second of watching football together for granted and courage. you