WORLD CUP DIGEST: The Messi Show Begins, Mbappe or Olise & Vozinho's Exploding Insta

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2:00Good morning everybody and welcome back to the Rule the Roost World Cup Digest. The podcast where for 15 minutes every other morning or so, I go through some of the biggest talking points and games of the World Cup via a mixture of having watched games and watched highlights in the morning like a normal person that works. So 15 minutes on the clock. starting now so um spain versus caba verde i was actually on a train trying to watch this with train reception train wi-fi on my phone um traveling back from nottingham for work uh mad result first of all um incredible for caba verde um they won nil nil as people have been saying it it's an interesting one isn't it i saw uh an incredible tweet the other day that i haven't fact checked because why would i do that um that essentially said that since spain last won the world cup they've won three world cup games um Um, so, you know, um, take that or leave that if you, if you believe that or not, I don't have the data to hand, but you can look it up.

3:21Apparently they've won three world cup games since they last won the actual world cup. They've obviously won the Euros in that time. Um, RIP England, but I kind of, you know, I know they were billed as one of the favorites going into this. And again, the context is this is the first group stage game. Argentina, who obviously won the last World Cup, lost to Saudi Arabia in their first group stage game last year. But still, there's that thing about Spain where I just kind of look at them and I just think, are they that good? They're obviously really good. They've obviously got a lot of really technical players.

4:02um yamal is like heir apparent to the sort of ronaldo messy like battle with somebody like an mbappe maybe um you probably want to put harland and mbappe up there but harland with all due respect playing for norway we'll get onto that um but still you know you're talking about two top tier nations having top tier players they're not quite the same in age so maybe you might will need and will need a new rival to keep him fresh but still there's something about Spain that I just don't fully have maybe it's maybe it's my proper football man sensibilities kicking in where I'm sort of looking at them as a load of pass merchants and all that type of thing but I don't know just you know I don't know from what I saw of the game the other day I didn't think they looked particularly great loving the Euro 96 kit that they currently have um lovely throwback and obviously an incredible side i wouldn't be you know doing backflips if england drew them at some point in the competition for everything that i'm saying there so you know they're a great side just are they quite good enough i don't know i don't know but look they've got big tournament experience they won the last euro so maybe they are uh egypt versus belgium i think one of my initial reflections on this is much like i said of sonny before Salah just kind of looking to speak like casually washed but to if I'm to sort of give him the same kind of respect I gave Sonny you know he's two incredible players who have played at such an elite level for so long that when you see them start to look just a bit more human it feels so much more pronounced um yeah I mean he's always going to bother people he's got the ability to change a game quite obviously but he wasn't really really like threatening for the national team like he like he wasn't sort of in the last world cup i think i want to say or maybe it was 2018 maybe it's 2018 and i know egypt did go home quite early in that world cup but he still was decent he was still clearly their standout player um both been sort of run into the into to the ground by their club teams though haven't they so you know i don't know i don't even know what he's doing next year yet has it been announced where he's going um a lot of people reckon it'd be Saudi but who knows um i'd say there's nothing out the back of that game to suggest that Belgium were anything particularly special uh obviously they're sort of in the wake of their golden era now um which you know didn't actually achieve anything other than being really good um you know lots of very competent club level players and everything like that truly exceptional club level players and not just competent um but yeah nothing to say that they're they're anything particularly good again another team with players that can bother you um but equally you know uh sally ruby versus uruguay uh another game so one thing i didn't mention in at the back of the Cabo Verde game was their keeper, Vazenia.

7:21Absolutely sensational. Just a wonderful, wonderful performance. A proper brick wall type performance. And seeing him at the time, so during the game, I think he gained like 1.6 million followers, I want to say. And one of the reporters, pitch side reporters, showed him his phone, showed him her phone after the game when she was interviewing him, saying like look look how many people love you in that time since he's picked up like nine million followers or something which is kind of wild um i've seen a lot of like american dash north american fans now comparing his instagram following with nba nfl stars and all this type of thing and they're all to the theme of wow maybe football is quite massive actually um and that's interesting people are always going to use their own sports as a frame of reference.

8:13I regularly, when I'm asking Raj something about the whole New York Knicks thing that's happened at the moment, it's completely alien to me, so I'll ask him to explain it in football terms pretty much. And I guess that's the same in reverse, isn't it? But yeah, Alois, the Saudi keeper, was really, really good. Pulled off a number of phenomenal saves. it felt kind of bad for them that they ended up conceding right towards the end i think it was about around the 80th minute um but they held on for a point and i guess you would probably say like look again there's always going to be conversations around the money the nature of the money all that type of thing right um i said it of america the other day and a few people didn't really like that but you know you'd say of Saudi as well there is a there's a political a socio-political backdrop to it that people find less than palatable but still look the the Saudi league is growing they are going to be hosting the not the next but the one after World Cup um to which you know I've seen a few people be like why why are Saudi hosting it and I think you know in fairness and this isn't me I'm not like shilling or anything like that for I'm not getting paid by PIF or anything like that, but still.

9:33Saudi have been a consistent World Cup qualifier. I would say probably as far back as I can remember, they've qualified for most World Cups, I reckon. Their league is thriving. It's a very, very popular sport in the country. Lots of stadiums. you know i'd assume good infrastructure linking all of those stadiums like i get it like i don't i don't think it's the same as guitar hosting it which did feel like look with all due respect to brown paper envelope job um you know i can see why saudi would get the world cup um but yeah the you know the sport is obviously huge there um and i just i'm interested to know how much longer they will be considered, say, a minnow.

10:26Because I still think, for all the context for everything I'm saying, I still think they are one of the minnows, if you like. And one of the larger reflections on this World Cup is that minnows don't really exist anymore. But still, I'd just be interested to see how long it takes for Saudi to become a proper, proper, if you like, nation. I say proper in the proper football man-ism terms. A tier two, tier one nation, right? But yeah, fine. Good goal for Uruguay. Marco Bielsa, well done, lad. France versus Senegal. Senegal, a great side. Nicholas Jackson is somebody who's been memed a lot, but actually I kind of see it.

11:10I see he's a very talented player. It makes you see that he's probably been unfairly maligned.

11:19There's been some links with him and Spurs. I wouldn't be against it, I've got to say, but we'll see. Imagine buying your kid a toy only to find the batteries aren't included, or buying furniture but missing the tools to build it. Frustrating, right? Now imagine the exact same feeling, but you're paying way more. That is what buying business software usually feels like. Fragmented, disconnected, and incredibly expensive. Odoo completely changes that. Odoo is a complete, fully integrated business suite where all your apps actually talk to each other. We're talking automated lead routing for your sales team, seamless AI integration, and intuitive point-and-click website builder.

12:02It's everything your business needs to scale, saving you time, headaches, and money. Stop piecing your software together. Go to odoo.com. That's O-D-O-O dot com to learn more. Mbappe unbelievable again um I mean he's got I do think he's kind of got that Cristiano Ronaldo aura a bit um do you think it's a bit I'm the main event whatever incredibly talented guy is a bit arrogant I get it do you know what I mean I don't know there's just it's hard to pin down all the time but there's something about it that I just find like you know with Ronaldo with Zlatan with like Mbappe there's just there's something there that's not quite as like I don't know don't want to kind of like root for it as much um but his talent alone speaks and he is he's such a throwback to R9 as well that I can't help but like love him on a certain level because you know R9 fat Ronaldo as people know him now is you know one of my favorite players of all time as a kid growing up watching him was just you know unbelievable I'll always remember it you know So, snapping on the World Cup and watching him just playing football in a way that I'd never seen players play before.

13:18And Mbappe kind of has that about him. I mean, the real star of the show, this isn't a hot take, but Michael Elise, what a player. What a player. Genuinely one of the best players in the world now. It has to be considered in that kind of esteem. There's a lot of talk about Madrid being after him. I think PSG have even been linked. look, Bayern aren't going to sell him for cheap at all, and nor should they. What an unbelievable player. And it was always clear, you know, I remember when he was sort of balling out for Palace back in the day, and a lot of us were saying, yeah, Spurs should try and sign him.

13:58And I think many people have just been like, he's just not, he's jumping that level. He's not using the clubs like Spurs as a stepping stone, Spurs or a Dortmund or somebody as a stepping stone. he's completely skipping that step he's going to the very top and it was just evident much in the same way that Bale was at Tottenham perhaps not quite as pronounced but Lisset has always been quite clearly an unbelievable player France just are just so good aren't they but Senegal were good Senegal showed that they have some vulnerabilities

14:35great goal great goal from Senegal as well I forget the player's name, apologies. But still, good performance. France, obviously, I think probably are the favourites. It's going to be the team to beat, but, you know, there we go. Iraq versus Norway. A few reflections. Noosa looked lovely. I see why he's been linked with Spurs. I'm not even sure where he plays now, but he's been linked to Spurs for years. He'd be lovely, I think, in this sort of, the way in which Roberto De Zerbi wants to play. Listen to the pod I recorded yesterday with Baker, where we talk all about De Zerbi, the tactical evolution of Tottenham Hotspur and football.

15:14In general, very interesting. Haaland, obviously, you know, people have been watching the 3D view. I don't know if you've seen the BBC. You can actually put yourself into the shoes of a player during a game. People have been watching Haaland running at the Iraqi keeper and just seeing how terrifying it must be to be in that position. it's funny because it's become so routine watching him tear the premier league to pieces that it's almost well it has been massively normalized hasn't it um but watching him in a sort of new setting on a different stage seeing them in the world cup i actually didn't even realize norway had made the world cup until i saw their big viking photo and i kind of sort of blanked it from my mind um it's interesting to see him just be an absolute you know terrorizer on a different stage and it does kind of remind you like how absolutely monstrous he is you remember seeing all the sort of the images coming from Dortmund all the video clips coming from Dortmund before he came to the Premier League yeah the sense of like you know horror of that thing coming to the Premier League um it has been quickly normalized but you know you should never forget absolutely how brilliant he is um one interesting oddity as I like from the World Cup Iraq scored or should have scored an absolute screamer that wasn't.

16:37First time volley, I believe, from the edge of the box, which just, it looked like it had gone through the net. And I still don't quite understand how it didn't. I'm pretty sure it just skimmed the top of the bar, hit one of the, whatever you call it, at the back of the thing that holds the net up and it rippled all of the net. And it looked like it had gone top corner. Absolutely unbelievable. So even if you only watch the highlights, watch them for this, for the Iraqi goal. Beautiful technique. Would have been such an incredible goal. and looked like it was. Argentina, Algeria, Messi, 39 years old in a week.

17:10He looks fitter than he did in 2022. You know, maybe his diet's changed. Maybe his training regimen's changed. Maybe playing in the MLS has afforded him a bit more, you know, a less impactful experience. Even though I think I'd seen or read somewhere or heard somewhere that he's actually played more in the MLS than he did at PSG or something, more minutes. I don't know. whatever it is, whether he's gone out there to acclimatise ahead of the World Cup for Argentina, he's just an absolute phenomenon. And as Karl Anker said on Twitter, like, it was, you know, what if Messi is still the best player in the world?

17:44Because we have all kind of forgotten about him to a degree, haven't we? It's kind of like, oh, you know, the old man's coming back for another World Cup, but he's here and he looks absolutely unbelievable again. Record World Cup scorer now against Klosser. Got his World Cup hat-trick that he hadn't got before. Can Argentina win the World Cup? I don't know. No reason why not. Technically, they're decent. They're dogged. They've got flair. There's a great mix of all of the above that's probably pulled them over the line in the last one. It would be quite something for them to do it again, but who knows?

18:17If Messi stays in this type of form, then maybe they will. That is the timer. so one thing I do want to say in the interest of it is that Messi probably probably should have been sent off um and when we're talking about VAR we're talking about like you know whatever dodgy decisions and stuff there is that bit where you wonder if in the VAR box they're thinking do we want to lose Lionel Messi from the World Cup in America for three games for a straight red card probably not would it be three games I don't know or do they get wiped after the group stage I'm not sure but you know Messi is a main event Messi is the big drawer isn't he so you can like the tackle is very very dubious it's very very clumsy you've seen those given as red cards more often than not in my opinion Jordan Austria few bangers great performance from Arnautovic another player rolling back the years fair play well done but yeah that's it for me that's the 15 minutes over and done with.

19:18I'm not going to break my own rules too much. Thank you very much for listening. You can get all pods, so World Cup Digest and, of course, rule the roost, ad-free on Patreon, patreon.com slash RTR pods. If you do enjoy the World Cup Digest, please share. Please like. Share it even with people who aren't Spurs fans. Obviously, there is a Spurs leaning to some of these pods, but still, I try to keep it fairly neutral. But anyway, thanks for the feedback everybody has given me thus far hope you continue to enjoy enjoy the world cup enjoy england tonight if you are english obviously i've got international audience so i should probably acknowledge that more but still um england tonight so let's see what happens um anyway thank you bye

20:17Thank you.