WORLD CUP DIGEST: Spain’s Second Star, Argentina’s Antics & Potential 64-Team Fatigue?

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0:37Welcome back for one final time to the Rule the Roost World Cup Digest. The podcast in which I have, for the most part, this World Cup, been setting myself a 15-minute timer to sum up the sights, sounds, smells of the 2026 FIFA World Cup. I'm not going to strictly stick to my 15-minute timer this time because it's the last show in this series. And I just quite fancy talking about the World Cup in general, talking about the final, the semi-finals, all of it. So I think sort of early days, my immediate reflection is, immediate reflection first and foremost, Spain, worthy champions. I don't think there's any debate there whatsoever.

1:33I think had Argentina gone on to win it, there would have been a lot of noise about FIFA. I mean, I don't know how much I'm buying into all that type of stuff, but a lot of noise about FIFA, about corruption, about even, say, unconscious corruption, people wanting Lionel Messi to win the trophy, all the type of things that have been floated. I think with Spain having won it there's a clear and quite obvious winner and I think an obvious winner that wasn't always so obvious perhaps to people who were a bit more say in the know or who were a bit more confident in chancing their arm about it but I would say that Spain were Spain were always one of the favorites for the tournament but they weren't the favorites they were always lumped in with I want to say like England and Argentina one of those sort of barriers I mean France to my memory France have always been number one the standout favorites for the competition then you've had that pool of England Spain Argentina Brazil perhaps after them a little bit Netherlands, Germany, Portugal.

2:55So look, Spain were the reigning European champions. Obviously a very good side. Everybody knows what Spain bring to the table. But in the group stages, I think they kicked off the World Cup with a draw against, it was Cabo Verde, wasn't it? And there was that moment of like, yeah maybe they're not quite there you know maybe maybe they don't quite have that that bit of spark um yamal like lamin yamal has been kind of half fit he's obviously the the sort of the the prodigal son of the spanish team right he's the the player that lots of people are thinking he's going to be the new Messi for this generation once Messi goes.

3:46And by that, it's not, say, a direct comparison, but it's the player who is that mercurial talent, that best in the world kind of attacker. So sort of attacking midfielder, winger, come striker, come number 10. Does a bit of all of it, right? Just an attacking enigma, a force.

4:09but he hasn't been fit or i don't know he's been shown up a little bit at this world cup but i think in the early stages you could see that he wasn't say the standout man for the spanish team and also perhaps the spanish team i think is one of the reflections i've had after the fact is that the spanish team is exactly that a team it's a side that is a complete unit that works just that works honestly unlike many international teams i i've ever seen before really probably the the last one close to this was the spanish team prior to this one that last won the world cup because it's quite rare to see an international team turn up and and play as a you know a cohesive unit right because they are they're a disparate collection of players from all over the place from different clubs that have come through different academies that are generally all playing in you know a different style or trained in a different way or whatever right um and i think i know that the the fa one of the one of the problems we always had say like the sven goren ericsson golden generation gerard lampard beckham all those type of players Owen and one of the things that they're always on record talking about is that club football was always more important to them club rivalries were still big in the England camp they all used to sit on separate tables they didn't really talk to one another outside of training even when they were in camp together all that type of stuff all that sort of silly nonsense and you've kind of I would say ushered in by Gareth Southgate had this

5:55i i don't know if it's actually to be fair i'm going to sort of check myself out i don't know if it's been ushered in by garyl southgate i think garyl southgate was part of this wider plan by the fa i'm not sure who first started to put this in but i do know that the fa have kind of seeked to change the way in which they approach a lot of things to do with football and I think Southgate correct me if I'm wrong but Southgate was working in the England under 21 setup and then actually naturally got that that promotion to the first team so one of the one of the benefits to Southgate was that he knew a lot of those players and he'd worked with a lot of those players to varying degrees at points in their England careers you know to that level to the to the national team level so i think there is there's a growing emphasis there's a growing understanding that you have to build a national footballing culture right but that's always going to be difficult i think that's always going to be difficult um given the way that the premier league is set up um the fact that the premier league is look yeah it's the english top division but you know the the majority owners are not english um they the premier league is its own corporation uh you know i might be you know telling you something you already know but to anyone that didn't know that the the premier league very very vaguely works alongside the football association but it is its own thing they broke away from the fa they broke away from the english football association so they don't they don't really serve the aims and objectives of the fa the premier league seeks to serve itself now i don't know if this is the same setup across europe i don't know if this is the same type of thing um and i don't really know how they do it in spain but that spanish team is impressive the way in which they played the the game against france was really eye-opening that French side look people are going to revise history on it and Deschamps is yeah not the greatest manager going I think we can all say that quite comfortably despite the fact he has won a World Cup I think there's been a lot of question marks over his stewardship of the national team I don't think he's always got on that well with a lot of the stars of that national team as much as I can imagine it's hard to sort of juggle big egos and all that type of thing um but the Spanish just completely put them to the sword pretty I'm not going to say effortlessly but they made it look very straightforward and I think the thing that stood out a lot was just how organized that Spanish team was the technical quality of that Spanish team I think I said on the on the pod immediately after that game it looked like they had 20 men on the pitch at all times and it was really really unbelievable i think for me like so because i'm not going to revise history i guess in that roundabout way i know in the early iterations of this pod i was sort of saying i don't really see the spanish as a team that's going to bother anybody they didn't really look that exciting in the group stages um they seem to be lacking that star power like you know laminio miles not really you know showing up or whatever is the point i was just making a minute ago so I don't think they're going to have enough to win the trophy but then I think when we got past the round of god what is it now round of 32 when it got past the round of 32 into the round of 16 which was was that the game against the Portuguese I can't remember now it all feels so long ago but I think it was going into the game against Portugal when Phil told me on here do you know the Spanish have only conceded one goal in this entire tournament and it's like the The second he said that, I just had that sort of sinking feeling in my stomach, that sinking realization of, oh, they're going to win it, aren't they?

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10:59Because it is that kind of boring, trite thing, but winning teams are forged on a solid defense, right? We all know that. And that doesn't mean chuck 15 men behind the ball with Thomas Tuchel. what it means is prioritising the way in which you control the ball and limit the amount of time the opposition has possession of the football right essentially what Pep Guardiola's done in the Premier League for the past you know decade or so what most good teams do right

11:41and so it started to become quite clear that they were going to win it I feel and they did it and I don't think it was a massive surprise I think the final was the final was drab the final was not very good at all Argentina zero shots on target which is quite shocking that's obviously been turned to a thing to make fun of Argentina about or to perhaps you know look at the way in which Scaloni approached the game and he did he ended up doing a two-shall if you like towards the latter stages of this game which you can understand to a degree but it's funny to see them doing that after they see how what happened to England when they did that Spain were just I think the main thing about Spain that gets people's backs up right and people's mine a little bit as well I'll be honest but you can't really argue with it is that they don't care about the spectacle.

12:45They don't. They care about winning the game. And that doesn't mean they're playing like Arteta ball. It doesn't mean that they're playing, you know, Stoke City, lump it up, kick lumps out of the opposition football. They are just happy to keep possession, knock the ball about, and invite the opposition onto them. and when the opposition come on to them pick them apart those gaps that have opened up play through it and create their own opportunities and it seems all very simple doesn't it seems all very simple when you lay it out like that why doesn't everyone do that and it's ultimately in my understanding from what i can see is because not everybody has the technical quality to do that i think it's a type of thing Thomas Frank wanted to try and do at Tottenham but I don't think he had the mouse to be able to do it I don't think he had the mouse to be able to create those sharp incisive attacking moves I don't think he had the coaching ability to drill that into his players and I think if I'm to be a bit more generous to him he didn't have players of the of a technical quality to be able to do that i mean to be fair when you look at some of the players who have shone at this world cup christian romero jed spence pedro porro he he you know he had all of those players available to him and didn't manage to do it but there's there's different issues of all of those um to varying degrees back to the spanish you know i think the main thing is their their preoccupation is not with the chest beating Vamanos, cojones stuff that you get from teams like Argentina.

14:35And I'm not just saying that as a cheap trope. Like it's part of it, right? It's part of what they've been showing this whole tournament. You know, guts and glory, passion, all that type of stuff. And as I said in the last one, I think that only gets you so far.

14:53And when you come up against a team like the Spanish who just, you know, I think, look, you know, I think

15:01in terms of the point about the spanish perhaps lacking a bit of that kind of that stardust i think that maybe showed a bit in this final i think they lurched over the line in this one as they lurched over the line quite a lot in this world cup but they were always in control weren't they like they were were always in control throughout the entire tournament. Ironically enough, the only time they weren't was Cabo Verde, who played with absolute freedom, who went for everybody they played against, right? No fear. Pure, early, Premier League, Barclays-style football, right? Going for it. The sort of football we all grew up loving.

15:54before all this woke, ticky-tacka nonsense came along, right, and broke all our hearts. No, but the point I'm driving at is that Spain had a fully fit Luminium mile into that side. Yeah, fully, fully fit.

16:22or uh you know whoever a top player of theirs from from yesteryear in that kind of a in that attacking thing yeah they've got players like Danny Olmer who's who I think is a wonderful player to be honest um Ferran Torres is all right and he's he's a good enough player um but they don't yeah they don't really have that star player and I think that shows but still completely in control. Rodri is just an absolute monster of a footballer. Got the absolute lot, doesn't he? And they were deserved winners. Argentina. The funny thing is, as I always go on about on here, but as somebody who is, you know, half my family is from Argentina, lives there.

17:11I'm an English person. I don't speak Spanish. I'm born here. I've visited Argentina once in my lifetime. You know, my dad has lived here since he was a child. You know, the perk to me being Argentinian mainly is that I tan quite nicely. So, you know, that's all right. But I still always have a soft spot for them. You know, when it came to like the England-Argentina game, I was rooting for England. but there was in the back of my mind was that bit of me that's like well you know if if england do lose then i've got a team in the final anyway not quite the same but you know i would have supported them um i would say though that throughout a lot of this tournament i think they've shown to be shown themselves to be quite um what a nasty a nasty group of players to be honest um i think there's a line i think there's a bit of a line between kind of being shithouses and having passion and like i say that kind of guts and glory thing and actually just being quite unpleasant ungracious winners and i know this is all very pearl clutchy and i know it's all very oh you know frilly knickers and tea and cakes with the vicar whatever you know those ghastly argentinians um but he just i just you know it was quite unpalatable really and i think i don't think it's just like an england but her england fan thing to say or whatever you've seen it throughout the entire tournament you've seen pretty much every single nation that they've played talk about the conduct of the fans and i mean fans will be fans like as an english person you know you're kind of on a on a bit of a hide into nothing look most fans have a really bad element right the spanish fans as much as people are going on about how terrible the argentinian fans are and how racist they are the spanish fans have been singing islamophobic crap throughout this tournament and people just aren't really focusing on it because that's not the way the narrative has gone the narrative right now is that argentina have this populist right-wing government and huge elements of their fan base are you know very unpleasant show lots of you know signs of being racist and everything like that right and i'm not in any way making out that like they're being victimized to that too right call it out show them up for what they are but the point is i'm making is that we all you know whether it's consciously or not tend not to delve into what certain people are doing if the narrative is not swinging that way right but i would say that throughout most of society in most societies there's a bad element we know that there's just it's more pronounced in others and i think it's quite pronounced in argentine society and culture right now at this point um but i just i just think there's been a lot of nonsense i think there's been a lot of bollocks i don't like all the as i've said i don't like all the falkland stuff i don't like all the you know malvinas falklands nonsense and I think there's been a lot of I would say there's been a lot of the kind of like you know look I'm gonna I'm gonna say and I'm sorry to any listeners from these parts but I think a lot of you know because they don't like England a lot of Scottish Welsh Irish people have inserted themselves into that discussion and taken it completely from an anti-English perspective not really putting enough thought into the complex history of that what the junta was what the junta represented um what the junta did to its own people in argentina and what it planned to do further than that but look without diving into all of that type of thing fully there's also there's also this sense that a lot of people are saying you know a lot of the kind of pushes glasses up the nose type um actually takes off this is just a part of argentinian the fabric of their society this is part of their culture this was never as pronounced in 98 and this was never as pronounced in 2002 either there's an edge to it but the edge has generally always been maradona hand of god alf ramsey called as animals right it's been a footballing thing and yes i know in 86 there was definitely a huge falklands element to that but we'd just been at war with argentina right at that point but this idea that it's this like this this it's this national obsession it's a national obsession in the same way that something like brexit or stopping the boats is right it's a populist right-wing issue that gets drummed up into people and i mean it's not it's not a right wing issue it's not you know that's not correct it's it encompasses you know the left and right and the centrists of argentina but what i'm saying right now is the point that the hotbed of this is the art you know giovanni locelso waving sort of banners on the pitch and stuff this is to appeal to mouth breathers ultimately um

22:36and I just I don't like it I don't like it I don't I don't you know I think it's I think it's I think it's stupid and you know they lots of them were going after you know Emi Martinez goalkeeper who funnily enough was actually their best player probably in the final um because after the England game you know bearing in mind I'm pretty certainly as a English wife probably his kids are more discernibly English than they are Argentinian just you know maybe like steaks and they'll probably like red wine when they get a bit older and say you know i'm from argentina and like i do sort of thing um but his you know kids are probably british probably english and he said after the match look you know when he was asked about all the stuff i think he said look i don't want to talk about all that it's not to me it's a football match we beat a good side we're really happy about that and we're on to the final and he was getting all the pelters from all the men oh he's a he's a cuck he's this he's that i don't really i don't really want to go on about this stuff too much but i just think for the most part look cootie romero celebrating in like salah's face um i don't i didn't mind so much because i think just from a spurs perspective i don't really like most salah i think he's been a particularly ungracious kind of opponent to tottenham down the years um you know he celebrated in front of Spurs fans in the Champions League final.

23:59He did that weird selfie thing in front of Spurs fans. He's always had a weird thing with Spurs. It kind of comes from the, you know, I guess the sort of golden boot races with Harry Kane and stuff. So I didn't really care about that in a hypocritical level, but it's not particularly, you know, a very classy thing to do, is it? And there's been a few examples of that, like Barco, the little ginger one that ran on when Enzo Martinez scored the equaliser against England, ran off the subs bench and was like giving it to the English defence in their faces and stuff and said whatever he said to Jude Bellingham that Nico Paz took objection to as well when he heard it, forgetting that Bellingham could speak Spanish.

24:43Bellingham hasn't elaborated on what was said to him, but I would imagine it wasn't particularly pleasant for him to go over and give him a slap around the head. I just think they've been a particularly ungracious group of players I don't think Lionel Messi deserves that really to have his sort of legacy tarnished a bit by being associated with a lot of those players but you know they all live and breathe and die for him so maybe it's all part of it maybe it's all part and parcel of it but I would have liked Argentina to have won it for my family and for Messi, to be honest, because I just think it's a nice story.

25:24It's a nice story to see, you know, somebody who I think is the greatest player of all time, probably. And, you know, my father, who loved Diego Maradona and everything as well, says Messi's just without question better. Just, yeah, just an unbelievable footballer. It would have been nice for him, but also I'm just not that bothered at Spain, wasn't it? And that's kind of how I feel about them. That's kind of how I feel about this crop of players.

25:55So yeah, that's kind of what I feel about that, about the final, all that stuff. France, the France-England third place, I didn't actually watch it. I kind of forgot it. I kind of forgot it was on to a degree, but I wasn't particularly bothered. I don't know why they still do the third place game. um why bother why do it there you go England finished third their best world cup finish since 1966 I know I I completely understand I completely understand why some people will say there's something to be proud of in that and there's something to take from that no I'm just I'm just speaking from the heart I don't really you know like it's whatever way you look at it England have failed to get across the line um at a crunch point you know when they've needed to they seem to be just unable to get it over the line Thomas Tuchel's spoken about the English DNA I think that's letting himself off the hook for everything that he said about Gareth Southgate's team when he first took over saying that England under Southgate played like they were more concerned about losing than they were about winning.

27:12Let's just have a look at that semi-final again, shall we, Thomas? Let's see what you did in that game.

27:20Very disappointing. A disappointing end to the tournament. I do think, look, people want to brush it off, but I do think the heat played a massive part, the accumulative fatigue. um definitely played its part for England the injuries but yeah probably to his selection and is that I don't think we can draw any conclusions from the France game I think it was put best I'm not sure who said it online but the French basically it was beneath them as world champions three times well two times world cup finalists and you know semi-finalists in this occasion

28:07to go all out in a third place game right and so they almost played this one perfectly England get a big lead in the first half then France come out in the second half and say all right well if we were going to play properly this is what we do to you score a load of goals absolutely play England off the park and then be like yeah fine okay well you've scored and you've won well done enjoy your bronze medal we've still got our you know we've still got our our gold medals from 2018 most of us fine you know enjoy it nice one um I can't really remember the point I was making but it's just it's just it's kind of disappointing for England again oh no yeah so you can't really draw any conclusions from that but um obviously naturally people are starting to talk about like look how much better England looked without Harry Kane is that a point I don't know is it an uncomfortable truth that maybe Spurs fans don't want to talk about does it mean that Harry Kane needs to not feature at all or does it mean that Harry Kane is the sort of player that you bring on in the 60th minute or something like that I don't know could England not play dynamically could England look we still had Ivan Tony up top who wasn't really provided Ivan Tony was awful I thought um I watched the highlights to be fair I didn't watch the game so I can't really say it was awful I'm doing that from hearsay from what other people have said and from watching highlights so maybe he wasn't awful maybe he was linking up play um or whatever in a way that Kane wasn't able to do because he doesn't have the he doesn't have the legs he doesn't have the the sprints he doesn't have the you know the dynamic kind of physicality to do that type of thing but still as we saw against Argentina took off our sort of our quick outlets down the wings and we didn't do anything did we Saka Rashford playing in this game England suddenly looked like they could they could go for teams a bit more is that something that England need to do more I don't know was Saka injured this whole time seems not from what a lot of the English players are saying there's been a lot of less kind of cryptic stuff sack of liking stuff on instagram and declan rice doing kind of you know zipped up mouth emojis i mean it's all so pathetic it's also ridiculous nowadays isn't it oh look a player did an emoji on instagram and all this type of stuff um but i guess that is the way we communicate now it sounds pathetic but it is fact of the matter is it's the way we communicate it's the way that messages are conveyed um in society now so it is what it is are they a bit over thomas tuchel do they not like the way he approached the games that's maybe the conclusion you would draw from this so does he stay on as england manager well it seems as though the fa want him to stay on for the euros so we'll see how that develops we'll see what happens from there but um yeah he kind of yeah you know he

31:19he let he let he let the side down didn't he a bit he let the side down with with that semi-final performance um but i'm just sort of repeating myself in this one now really um overall reflections on the tournament um let me let me find friend of the show Adam Nathan essentially his tweet was dreadful final to put an appropriate bow on a strange but ultimately deeply flawed World Cup so much of the football was great but too many fiascos and alterations or interventions from FIFA and the hosts to make it feel like the showpiece event of our sport and I think that's the main kind of thing I would agree with I think maybe around the quarter finals it started to dawn on me the feeling that the energy was dissipating from the tournament a bit it makes me shudder to think that it's going to be a 64 team tournament next time around I do think 32 teams is a sweet spot I think the energy flows through a 32 team tournament much better um i do think like i love the world cup um i've enjoyed a lot of this world cup and i'm not going to say otherwise but i do think you feed off the energy of it right and i do just think it went on a bit too long i think it went on a bit too long i think things like that i've spoken about this at length please go back and listen to it if you want my full and balanced take on the balagan red cards rescinding not rescinding um things like that just aren't particularly great you know things like infantino making himself the star of the show things like donald trump being on the podium whatever you think of him any political figure being on the podium along with the winning team along with infantino on there as well it just leaves a sour taste it's all become a bit too much of a spectacle too much of a show the plenty has been said about the halftime um cup final show thing the americanization of the sport and all that type of thing not really my cup of tea i think i think a few of the takes are a tad overstated you know like like i say the americanization of our sport and all that sort of stuff i guess to a degree it is but there's always been an opening ceremony there's always been a sort of a ceremony ahead of the final you know i as long as it doesn't go on to there was some talk originally there was some talk at some point that that half-time show was going to be like half an hour an hour long or something like that and I thought that that is going to be ridiculous and that is going to be completely destroy the final this was what 15 20 minutes probably it was crap but you know it's provided a few memes and whatever you know who really cares fine um would I choose to do it no I wouldn't I don't like it do I want it there no not really but am I am I that bothered no not really I guess the main thing I felt and this is that this is I don't think I think if I really truly search search my feelings um on the matter I don't think this is because England didn't make the final I do just feel like the final and Spain winning their second world cup quite a big deal just felt a bit flat it kind of felt a bit flat maybe it's just because I've just gotten that bit much older now that perhaps I've seen a few world cups that it doesn't feel I don't know that special or something anymore maybe it's that maybe it's partly that but all I would say is that the world cup final on a certain intangible level let's say a spiritual level you kind of feel it you feel the gravitas of the world cup a huge golden trophy and you feel the the historical significance of a of a captain going up to lift the World Cup trophy for their country.

36:01It's huge and it's always felt massive. And I don't know why, but just this time in particular, the final in Spain winning it, it just felt a bit flat. And it felt not quite as special. And I can't quite fully nail the feeling why. I think there's a lot of things at play there I think there's a lot of things that like you know like Adam said in that tweet there that I've talked about afterwards and I think there's a lot about football to a wider point and there's an irony to me saying this on a podcast but there's an oversaturation of football content right isn't there there's an oversaturation not just of football content but of football in general the club world cup the sort of semi-expansion of the Champions League the constant news cycle, the constant narrative where it just kind of feels like success in football just all feels a bit more cheap nowadays it feels less organic and I guess this is partly because football is such an industry now right football is such a there's less surprises I think one of the things that people have always complained about with rugby is that rugby's a sport that's always defined by the richest nations because you know it stands to reason that they should be able to do that and it probably has always been that with football to a certain degree but I always feel that like football as a game to a certain point has always been quite open and it's been such a great expression of joy and of sporting endeavour.

38:00And we've seen that kind of encapsulated by teams like the great Brazil teams of the past. But we've even seen it in moments. And I think Cabo Verde kind of gave us that, didn't they? They kind of gave us a hint of that in this World Cup. that anybody can beat anybody at the end of the day right leicester city winning the premier league greece winning the euros even if they did it in the most agricultural fashion sorry to any greek listeners but it was not it was not a pretty watch and i remember it um but it's still the story was incredible right but is football losing a bit of that is it quite simply just the richest teams the richest nations those with the most money poured into their academies those who whose coaches treat football in a you know in a in a spreadsheet in a spreadsheet fashion less about the passion if you like less about the artistry of the game

39:09we talk about what what has happened to the fall of the great brazilian side you know where have brazil gone what's happened to them there's a great kevin bridges series if you're not sick of the world cup go and it's not even that you know it is about the world cup but it's also about brazil and about brazilian culture and about brazilian football culture watch it if you're in the uk on iplayer if you're not in the uk get a vpn go to the uk watch it on bbc iplayer kevin bridges just as a scotsman going to brazil talking about essentially what's kind of happening to the beautiful game right have people have has football been completed has pep guardiola broken it if you like the most genius football manager of our time has finally cracked the code It's finally cracked how you win and how you continue to win.

40:00And it might not be pretty for the spectator, but it will breed success. And I think there's something about getting too deep into it here, but there's something about, again, that loops all the way back to late-stage capitalism, right? Extremely late-stage capitalism, where we find ourselves, where everything now is about a tangible return. It's not about the endeavour. It's not about the toil. It's not about the artistry. It's not about the trying and failing. And it's not about extracting the worth from the process of trying and failing. From the moments of beauty in a failure, the echo of glory, if you like, the mantra of Tottenham Hotspur Football Club, it is about did you succeed, yes or no?

40:49Did you win or did you lose? that's the tangible worth. That is it. That is the only thing. That is the only mark of success. Yes or no, a binary. Has that bled into football? It governs most of our lives now, right?

41:14Does that add this air of grey to everything that we do when we talk about what's wrong with football, what's happening? is it because of stuff like that or is it quite simply that we're all just dopamine addicts my hottest take on all of this right as well is that we're all just dopamine addicts now we all may use our smartphones or our netflix or our screens or whatever to varying different degrees and yes some of us like to go for a walk in the woods whereas some of us like to sit and scroll on tiktok all day but still the foundation of our society now is I want strawberries tonight in winter yep cool I can still go to my local Tesco and get them everything is on demand we have a complete safety net at least you know in this country to a certain degree where people can get whatever they want

42:19we don't have that same hit of dopamine we don't have that same hit of dopamine as our as our ancestors once did when those first berries started coming up in late spring early summer and we knew the winter was over we knew the harvest was coming right we don't have that anymore it's always harvest time and it feels like i'm going off paced a bit now so thank you everybody who has tuned in to the uh to the world cup digest look i know most of you many of you will just come here for the spurs stuff um but seems so many people have enjoyed this type of thing and as this season goes on i am going to try and sort of you know do a bit more do you know do more different stuff um across this season that will be rooted in spurs but maybe we'll take on legs and you know use spurs and football as the as the entry point and talk about other stuff but we'll see um now it's always appreciated if if you can support the show on patreon there's two tiers there you've got the inner sanctum where you'll get extra content throughout the season or you've got the supporter tier which just essentially means you have my back you're helping keep the lights on if you like that's i think 150 a month 150 a month and you'll get every single pod ad free on there you listen through patreon you can feed patreon into your normal podcast player so go to patreon.com rtr pods sign up for the patreon there look great if you want to join the inner sanctum thank you i appreciate that very much if not and if you enjoy the show you've enjoyed the show last year and you're Looking forward to it coming back proper for the new season.

44:07Then why not consider signing up for Patreon?

44:14And yeah, obviously I'm going to continue recording a couple more pods to see out the end of this season. But then, yeah, I will start the new season of Rule the Roost in time for our preseason friendlies. Business as usual, really. That's it. but uh yep thanks for thanks for sticking with this pod over the summer i hope you've enjoyed it like subscribe all that type of thing leave any um reviews spotify keep keep you know rating rating on spotify please please please really appreciate it um anyway much love come on the world cup whatever bye