England Survive, Odegaard Leads Norway, Balogun Farce

0:00Music

0:16It's Rice. What a goal! Declan Rice with an absolute rocket with a free kick. Arsenal lead 1-0. Cut inside, Saka! Sublime finish! He's back with a bang with Fukuyo Saka, 1-0! Unbelievable! After seeing the Fuller and Balogun news, Sheikh Mansour has called the Premier League to get the West Ham VAR decision suspended. This is the Arsenal Vision Post-Match Podcast. My name is... Hello, how are you? Good to see everybody. Welcome to an actual God's Honest Arsenal Vision Podcast. Going to double as your World Cup daily today. We're not going to do two and release them one on top of the other. I know there's some of you crazy people who would say, I would listen to both.

0:58But, you know, come on, man. You don't want to hear me talk about the same thing twice. Give Timsey the day off. He's a young man. And besides, he played, you know, an hour for Brazil yesterday. A lot of people think he looks like Martinelli. But we have the man you really want to hear from here. We are going to talk about Arsenal, Leo moving on. But if you really want to hear that, there's a Transfer Daily out on the Patreon. There's a Friday Night Clive last Friday that I think is one of the best. I was going to say that we've ever done. Maybe podcasts that's ever been done. Like, I don't want to.

1:27Let's put it this way. I don't know that for a fact. It's just probable. So you should check it out. Sleep of 50 is the code. We've got scouting videos. We've got Friday Night Clives. We've got Transfer Dailies coming up. We've got Director of Football episodes. We have a new app coming. It'll first be for iOS, then Android. And you can put it on your phone and you can keep connected with us and get the pod there downloaded. it'll be completely ad free you know they won't be ad supported or anything like that so uh more information coming about that and a dublin event in august that we'll be telling you about but that all has to take a sidestep because we have to talk leo we have to talk england we have to talk odegaard leading norway we have to talk uh the fuller and balligan decision there's so so so so much thankfully though we have one of if not the most intelligent not just podcasters and football minds but humans on the planet joining me now it is clive palmer hello clive hello hello

2:17Elliot:some people say I look like George Foreman probably not Martinelli we got a George Foreman, we got a Martinelli and some people say I look like do you ever read one of those fantasy novels where there's a bridge troll and to cross the bridge you have to pay the bridge troll a lot of people say I look like the bridge troll of fantasy novels so we've got a little bit of everything covered here, how are you? okay, let's just talk man like cards on the table, you and I we're getting old, we're not Timsey's age, we're getting old yep you're you're you're looking they move the kickoff back of the england game you're looking at 3 a.m kickoff time 2 a.m yeah 2 a.m okay 2 a.m just 2 a 2 a.m 2 a.m used to be when i was in my at my best doing my best work some might say these days uh i've been asleep for six hours at 2 a.m so how did you manage this this this night well this is it right so obviously there was a bit of a mix and I thought to myself, you know what?

3:13Elliot:I watched Brazil, Norway, had a few glasses of wine. I'm thinking, I'm not sure I'm going to make it. I started to watch the coverage. I thought, yeah, I'm going to make it. I'll be fine. As soon as the coverage started, Kelly Cates says, kickoff's been delayed one hour. I went, oh, so I lost a bit of motivation. And then I fell asleep, right, with the telly on. And then I thought, okay, turn off your notifications. If you wake up, just try and join the game or like, you know, watch it cold in the morning. So about four o 'clock-ish, just after four, all I could hear were car horns going, do, do, do, do, do.

3:50Elliot:And I live in a village, right? This is not a place for car horns. This ain't Mexico City. And the next minute, I woke up to these car horns and cheering and I knew the results straight away. I thought, damn it, damn it. Picked up my iPad. Damn it, saw the score flash up. And then I thought, well, I can't. I can't not watch it. So 4.30, I started watching it and watched it. A little bit of skipping, watched it for an hour and 10. Fantastic. And then woke up this morning in pure Arsenal Vision rewatch style. I watched the whole night of minutes again about nine o 'clock. So yeah, unbelievable game.

4:25Elliot:I think the best way to watch it was live because you get those feelings, you know, that you can't recreate. But even watching it cold, without the events, absolutely brilliant. and then there's so much to talk about it and something relates to Arsenal I think it's just a brilliant brilliant feeling going across England at the moment yeah wonderful so I I did watch every second of it I don't have a rooting interest per se but I'm rooting for England and largely because of the the Arsenal boys but also because I have a lot of dear friends who are English and it means a lot to them I felt stress that I can't really articulate for the last 30 minutes it reminded me a bit of when Arsenal had Leo sent off at the Etihad and we spent that last half of the game yeah second half just in our box and and I think there were so many heroes of the England game you know we don't need to go too deep on it from a non-Arsenal angle but I do think it was a really fascinating game and I do think it was a beautiful performance in the first half finding those moments of quality and in the second half finding the resolve and the player who who stands out is just Jude Bellingham.

5:37And I think, you know, I don't have to know what he is tactically or where he fits, but he is a player who just seems to have that thing some of the greats have, where he will do whatever it is that has to be done to get the game where it needs to go. He obviously scored the two goals. He had that one stunning clearance, you know, to prevent a goal late. He emptied the tank completely. And I mean, we'll talk to Eklund Rice in a moment as well, but I think we got a spare moment to talk about what this player is becoming in Jude Bellingham. Yeah.

6:12Elliot:I mean, he's special, Eddie. There was lots of laughter when he was a 16-year-old and they retired his shirt at Birmingham City and everyone laughed. And the next minute he's at Dortmund, the next minute he's at Real Madrid, and maybe people are not laughing so much right now when he's just literally playing like a stormtrooper for England. His energy at the end when he was down to 10 men was just like, I'm looking at the screen saying, mate, hold on a minute, what's going on? There's lots of chats saying that the best two players England have are the two players that maybe have not been taxed so much in their domestic seasons.

6:46Elliot:And they look so fresh and they look so good. and I think we can always, we will and we always talk about players because we have our individual feelings on them, et cetera, but I do think the bigger discussion is around the manager and what he's done to create a team. And as Arsenal people, we know exactly what this means. He's created something which underpins that level of performance, which is a sense of brotherhood and playing for each other. There are players on that pitch in that game that played above themselves because of the teammates standing next to them. And it's very important you have the right people around you to allay to do that.

7:27Elliot:And as Arsenal people, we've seen players that are not really that spectacular, particularly in our forward line, but they empty the tank for their teammates. They do everything. They press, they work. And that concept of team is what Tushul has done. And he has not bowed to the media to pick sometimes the best players, you know, or the ones they feel are the best players because maybe they don't buy into the concept of team maybe if they're in the squad there'd be a clamor to play those players and clamors can ruin tournaments but when you are picked you need to deliver when the moment comes and there's no greater test of a team than when you go down to 10 men in the aesthetic i mean can you believe it was just incredible viewing to watch these people do what they did in a similar system what we do five at the back front four diamond you know five three one but also diamond shape with your two wide midfielders stretching out narrowing in one forward to stretch the game and I just thought you picked the right team and the right system you made the right substitution I was watching Brazil earlier on every substitution made them weaker with England every substitution was two way plan and it was two way plan that you picked the team the starting team and then when it changed the scenario change he picked other players for this scenario which developed in front of them and played to it perfectly it's genius of coaching genius of man management and this is and i think he's educating some of the people that normally are pine on england and i think they're starting to see it now after a result like that you want me to make of course i am to the doggies yeah yeah well you know we've all been there haven't we especially paul um so i i really enjoyed the the emotion of this game i you know i thought the azteca created obviously a tremendous atmosphere but the thing that just struck me as i watched this the cognitive dissonance of like there's so many things happening with the people that run football attempting to destroy football and take us away from football and give us reasons not to want to love it and then the football starts and it's so damn good like football's just so damn good man like you put football on we're gonna watch it because it delivers drama like this it delivers something so extraordinary and we'll talk a little bit about the ballgame thing in a moment but it's just like when the game was over you know i thought about the cabo verde argentina game and i thought about this game i thought about what i'd watched with norway brazil earlier and like football's just great you put it on and and you're likely to get something spectacular it just really is special now I I think Declan Rice is such an interesting discussion here we know he's gutting it out through pain I can't imagine Clive after the season he's had with the pain that he's experiencing you're going to altitude and we know the altitude is a problem because Miguel Delaney was kind enough to run 5k around the Azteca and tell us uh the impact of that so thank you Miguel for your sacrifice um uh like he's out there gutting it out he picks up that early yellow card and doesn't put a foot wrong the rest of the game and i you know i i think i am guilty certainly of being drawn to players who do certain things on the ball in certain areas of the pitch that delight me but i think declan rice is a player who's certainly educating me and bringing me around to other things that have to be done to help teams win and I as much as Jude Bellingham is rightfully the hero of the game with his his big contributory moments and obviously Saka had an assist for one of those moments and had to be sacrificed unfortunately um when England went down to 10 men but like Declan Rice is sort of that that glue you know that in the NBA they call it a glue guy he's the glue guy he he lets everybody else have to do a little bit less and I I I I wonder, you're halfway through your day already in England.

11:27Is England waking up to Rice's greatness? Is it all about Bellingham? What's the read on Rice right now, and how impressed were you with the way he was able to manage his way through that game despite everything?

11:37Elliot:I thought Wayne Rooney's analysis is really improving. It was really good. And he spoke about the spine in the team. And on this day, Pickford had two centre-backs. He mentioned Rice, and it's Kane and Bellingham. And I think he's right. I think that spine on this day, particularly Rice, Bellingham, and Kane, down the center of the pitch everybody else feeds off them and their big moments and what they do and what they decide to do and we're arsehole people right so saka's had three assists and so we did lots of posts about that um what he does to make these those assists look so easy i think we take for granted and when other people try to put crosses in and we don't know where they're going to go um the quality of his movements are just beautiful to watch and the way he slows down stop starts clip drop between the posts to runners just like thank you very much come buy a meal hello for bed please really easy for him um rice for me we know the injury that he has it tends to come later in games it's almost like a back spasm type thing neural pain that goes into his hamstring so he hasn't got an injury per se he just needs to rest to relieve that impingement of nerves which puts a shooting pain.

12:49Elliot:I've got something similar on my shoulder right now so I know exactly what it is, right? I've had what I think he has, which is just, we call it sciatica, right? It's like a pinching on your back that runs down your back into your thigh and down that nerve. And you can, if you're lucky, you can get like a cortisone shot or something in there and release that. But it's like a lightning bolt that just shoots down your side and into your leg. And some days he can go through it and some days he can't. And people say, oh, look at this, put something on his hamstring. well that's just to calm down the neural pain you know you have a bit of pain you want to calm it down to put a bit of ice on it and it's it just makes it go away for a bit you know so um he's not pulling his hamstring per se but if he if you have a pain a certain area you're not working that muscle so the danger is an injury so yeah he's brilliant isn't he i mean yeah you will find old tweets of mine five years ago wondering about should he be in the england team you know honestly because it took me a while to warm to him.

13:45Elliot:And I went to a game at West Ham when we beat them on the far post, 1-0 Gabriel, yellow kit. And I saw him for the first time live properly when I cared about what Arsenal were doing. And I thought, gee whiz, he's everywhere. And from that moment, I was sold. And I think a year or so later, he came in. And he is that guy, Elliot. He makes Elliot Anderson look so much better because he can go and get things. He can jump out of his holes and go and press things. without going to second goal because he knows he's protected. Eli Anderson without Deco and Rice was running around like a bit of a loose cannon in the game when Rice didn't start against Panama.

14:23Elliot:So, yeah, really, really, really, really good. Nothing more to add. Yep. I guess people would be curious to get our take. Well, will they? We'll find out. On the red card, I think I have it as a red. I think it's unfortunate, but the studs are high. It's over the ball and he catches the man. It's in that reckless challenge. You know, he's kind of, the force is, I think, excessive. He's a little bit out of control. It's not an intent to injure anything, but intent doesn't really factor into it. I have it as a red, but I also think if it wasn't given as a red, I don't think it'd be a travesty. Where are you on that?

15:01Elliot:Well, it wasn't given as a foul. I think that's the technicality that people are complaining about. Tushel said that basically it wasn't a foul even so why are we looking at it you know but it's one of those sort of Sunday morning tackles where you got a chance to put a free one on somebody you take the ball you take the lot out well you can't take the lot out anymore but actually he topped the ball he didn't mean to top the ball but he topped the ball once he go over the ball it doesn't look great and lucky that guy's foot was off the ground so he clipped him and they went up and once you go to ground with that level of force and he's six foot two he looks like a brutal assault and so you're in the justice can take care of you can't it right and he did and when I saw it you gotta go your gut reaction as soon as you saw it slowed down he went collective intake of breath that normally tells you if you get away that one you've got away with it you know so it was a red I think this isn't a time for critiquing any players but I have felt that Kwanzaa has found it all a bit much you know and even on their goal the free kick goal he didn't really screen that front post very well he got himself ragdolled a bit on the front post and he dropped Konza hitting below the knee it hit him he wasn't he was able to react but he got to protect that front zone he didn't protect it I found sometimes although he was improving this game to the first game I think he's found it a bit much but I suppose he was thinking his role in the squad and there are roles in this squad was to potentially be the third right back you know behind livermento and james and he's found himself almost the first right back and he's done okay but it's been a bit of a struggle there i think the bit about roles is really important and i almost want to talk about dan burn mate that is just the role he was made for he probably had two roles in this squad we're 1-0 down we need to get an equalizer it's 10 minutes to go stick Dan Byrne up front that would have been one role and the second role is we need to protect the lead we're down to 10 men he's brilliant in our box we go into a low block put Dan Byrne on and I just thought he was magnificent honestly again it's classic management of a squad you know Jeff Spence specialist one-on-one I'm not a fan of Jeff Spence when he's when he's heads on one-on-one he's really good he's got light feet he's really quick on the turnaround don't ask him to create too much because he's quite one-dimensional but like martin keung was a good footballer but one on one defending man marking he was brilliant right so again he's brought a specialist for a certain scenario and jeff spence can do that because he's quick against a lot of elite players and there may be a time when an elite winger is ripping us to pieces and you need to bring someone in to change that forget your biases about ched spence he's not in the he's not even in spurs his first 11 he's for a specific job you know and he did that job really really well so i i'm a obviously i'm a coach at heart i love i love what the guy's doing what he's trying to do and i'm so pleased he got through because there's a lot of people waiting to tell him who he didn't pick you know and i think you know me elliot picking teams annoys me teams will pick themselves based in the scenarios in front of you, if you're smart, I mean, what he did in this game was you picking Saka and Gordon, they were perfect for this game because he wanted to have almost like a back six to start the game and they're much better defenders than Rashford and Malweke who are maybe, at this moment in time, better attackers, more dynamic, but they can't see a defense, they haven't got defensive instinct between them, you know?

18:44Elliot:They can run around after people, but they can't see people off their shoulders. They don't know how to shake their body to slow somebody down on one-on-ones. they just run about and try hard so the two smarter players more intelligent players in wide areas defensively also they can carry the ball and be a bit more controlled in attacking areas he picked them for this game and don't tell me that wasn't planned it's been planned for ages i i love i love what he's doing i love how it's going i hope he continues because it's a lesson to all of us about not picking your favorites picking your team for the game you want to play that's yeah yeah that's fair enough i mean look we could do an entire podcast three hour podcast on the england team who should be in it and who isn't and you know not having trent not having cole palmer not having phil foden and you know what that's left him with in terms of the injuries and the risks he took but england are through and that's the reality and i mean he will be without the hugely valuable services of jordan henderson who seemed to break his arm falling off falling up the advertising wording anything you want to say about that can i touch you on the on the trend thing yeah there is a there is a bit of discussion around trent and for me trent's a brilliant footballer so for me it's not football why he's not here the chat was that him and jude are such good mates that they lose jude to the rest of the squad they lose him and they want you to make him one of the leaders of the squad and now he's come out of his shell and now he him and Kane are the best mates he he's now come out from people's side of things and now he looks like a complete team player whereas before the tournament people were wondering if if he's a too much of individualist well he's an individualist but he's doing it for the team and he's doing absolutely everything so sometimes I can't see a reason why Trent is not there ahead of Chalabar I can't see a reason come on we know football for this scenario Trent should be there but there are other scenarios which are greater than the football you know so um and jordan henson is one of those isn't he he's one of those that basically every single player in the squad would have him in the squad and it doesn't really matter what me and you think any every single player would have him in which means when you're together for seven weeks seven weeks mate you know we i just think it's incredible length of time and you need people around that make that environment a learning environment an environment that's enjoyable and I think they were genuinely gutted last night as I don't know if you've seen the clip when he fell over he sort of just jumped on the advertising board put his hand on it sorry just jumped over slipped and put his arm down to break his fall and it just broke his wrist and it looks like a baddie you know it could be a proper one operation job so which is a real shame we had to sing the thing with Steve Murrow once we went to leak up then we dropped him on his head and broke his shoulder and it sort of it sort of takes away the joy a little bit but to be honest that was a must for those players they say it's their best ever england night ever yeah um and now but oh i guess i i guess well let's move on from that that game it was it was a stunning stunning stunningly dramatic um experience just going through that game and the the dynamic of england getting two goals clear and being pegged back and getting two goals clear again and being pegged back and the funny thing is i saw at the time i was seeing a lot of and obviously my social media is filled with a lot of people from england so i totally understand this but i saw a lot of it's corrupt fifa fifa want the host to go through it's corrupt it's corrupt and i have to admit being on the other side of it for a change where i'm watching not as a neutral because i was rooting for england but more neutral-ish.

22:27My view, Clive, is the ref did about as well as I think the ref could do under the circumstances. For me, the penalties are penalties, even though the Kane one, I don't like that being a penalty, but in the current way things are reffed, it's a penalty. Again, I don't like that being a penalty. My quick two cents on this, in non-in-possession contestations of the ball, where the ball is being contested out of possession, a coming together between two people contesting the ball should not be a penalty in my view essentially if because Kane's contesting an out of possession ball and the Mexico players contesting an out of possession ball and there's a coming together for two people rightfully contesting the ball and I think rewarding someone for jutting their foot in front of Kane's foot with an 80 % chance at a goal is not right it's similar to like the Saliba header against Brighton right it's like if you're rightfully contesting a ball and it and two people just going for it and their bodies come together anyway i wouldn't give those as penalties but what do you think about the ref job there

23:30Elliot:it's even worse than that because nonny did it in the first game against croatia you could see the player was blindsided he was about to hook it clear and what you do as a forward is you rush in and get your foot between the foot and the ball and uh and wait for him to kick you and it's a classic penalty referees always give it's like an unwritten rule and you just can't clear the ball blind you've got to wait and Kane thought he had it and he just booted through him and it's a penalty after match interview on BBC in England Tushel was very very critical of the referee basically saying they're not good enough the poor official's not good enough and the feeling was was he just doing that to sort of take pressure away from the players for a couple of days you know create some headlines or did he feel that on the sideline and I haven't got that feeling on decisions because we get to watch them so closely, don't we?

24:24Elliot:We get them in slow-mo, we get repeats, we get different opinions. He's on the sideline with an iPad fighting for his life and he's got their benches getting up, our bench is getting up, we've got 10 players on the sideline just ready to fight their players and it's all a bit emotional and the players on the pitch were saying they weren't happy with the referee. If you dial down every single decision and I'm sure if I look at it today, there was a lot more right than wrong you know i felt that you know in our champions league game remember the final i felt we lost the referee you could feel the 50 50s going against us and we can we can maybe point towards them i know i know we're one-eyed i couldn't feel that this time although i felt the big decisions that could have been maybe overlooked weren't being overlooked they were they were coming our way sort of thing but one thing i didn't see was a rice yellow card I missed that earlier on.

25:19Elliot:I missed it. It was, yeah, it was a classic one of the Mexico player, the ball bounces up. It's a loose ball, contested ball. The Mexico player stoops slightly to head it and Kane kicks up to try to get it with his foot and winds up kicking the Mexico player's head. Oh, that's a rice one, yeah. The rice yellow, yeah. So, I mean, it's not a red for me, certainly, but it might be a fair yellow. Well, it's weird, right? Because Rice has every right to go for that ball in my mind. The Mexico player is slightly stooping, but it is just below head height. And I would say this, giving that in the first minute, we're used to the Premier League where you can pretty much rip the arms off of your opposition in the first minute and it's a warning.

26:08But, you know, it's okay too. I guess where I'm going with this is that refereeing performance for me was okay because the major calls, the red is a red, for me. The Gordon penalty is a penalty. The Kane penalty, even though I don't like the way it's adjudicated, is a penalty, I think, based on the way the game is ruled. He gave yellows where I felt he had to. He didn't send anybody off unnecessarily. He didn't give weak penalties anywhere. He trusted his VAR to protect him in penalty situations, right? So he let the game go, and it was a cauldron. It is a difficult environment. Am I saying it's a perfect 10 out of 10 refereeing performance like maybe not i just don't know where any claims of like corruption or bias come in because you're in the azteca it's a heated atmosphere the mexico players are shithousing a little bit as you know is their right to do yeah what's he going to do

27:00Elliot:differently i don't know i didn't i think tushel mentioned that the three or four of our guys all came from south america and he's and he didn't feel that was right and again it opens up questions there's a lot of questions around FIFA at the moment aren't there and I would rather I haven't got a strong feeling either way like you the big events they felt okay you know the only one I didn't see was the right one so that's why I asked but hey look there's some other issues around FIFA right which I'm sure we're going to touch on shortly yeah so okay um that's a good question should we touch on the FIFA stuff next maybe maybe a little bit on FIFA I want to do a little bit on Norway and I want to do a little bit on Leo So let's do the FIFA thing just quickly.

27:44We might as well, since you just brought it up. So kudos to England. They go on. They'll face Norway. That's going to be interesting. I think Erling Haaland's probably looking at Gehi and Kansa like I look at chocolate chip cookies in the oven, drooling, excited.

28:00Elliot:They'll have a couple of central midfielders in front of them. They're going to need them, Clive. Not letting the entry pass come into his feet so easily. I mean, gee, yes. Yeah, they're going to need them. um let's uh but let's talk about it then i mean i said earlier that the the ruling bodies try to ruin football and the football is just too good i'm so depressed about the fuller and ballergan thing and the reason i'm depressed is i've been really enjoying this u.s run in the tournament you know it's a chance for me to back a team that i have not traditionally been excited by that's been playing good fun exciting football i think has a chance to get past belgium i think has a chance to get past Belgium without Fuller and Balogun.

28:38And now it's the worst of all worlds because either the U.S. will crash out and everyone will say, good, they deserve it. And I get that. Or the U.S. will progress and everyone will say it's bent and corrupt and it takes away the joy of the progression. And I get that too. And this is the thing that non-football people, people that don't follow football, American sports fans who don't follow football don't get. In football, a decision can be wrong, but that doesn't mean that doing something else wrong fixes it right I don't have that as a red but it is certainly not a misapplication it's not like he sent him off for one yellow thinking it was his second yellow you know what I mean it's not a misapplication of the laws he they made a judgment call that it's a red I don't think the judgment call was right but it's a decision there is no scope for suspending the red under those circumstances and Clive for me this just this ruins it a little bit for me like i there's no world where i can feel good now even though i've been really enjoying it's just a shame and i don't know what else you can say about it this is a

29:42Elliot:horrible situation for people to be in right because if you if you win the game people are gonna wonder pelican's a good player right he's playing well he's playing for his next career move end up in the premier league no problem at all and he's worked hard to get here he made the decision to move away from england go to america for just this moment and he's here he's doing the business so when it first dropped my initial reaction we know the player was oh i'm really pleased for him then you start to look at the rules and you start to look at the then trump does his truth social then you're thinking oh no here we go then you're thinking infantino then you start to rub your eyes and you get clarity and you're thinking then you realize there are no appeals for red cards so how has this happened and so i saw someone tweet no pleased for the player but bad process and it's a bad process everything about the process makes you less pleased for the player and i'm wondering if the best thing that can happen is if pochettino does not pick him and that's for the betterment of football and because there are red lines once you start to make football about personalities and where someone is and where they live and they're the host nation and things like that you then you break things don't you risk the the fabric of the game you know how many of us have seen decisions we don't like we remember Lampard's goal no goal against Germany the World Cup that probably brought in goal line technology there's been so many unfair moments but it's part of the game that is the game and you have to suck it up, no matter how much it hurts you, you know.

31:25Elliot:The rules change based on things that happen and scenarios. But once you have this set up, you have no appeal process for a red card. And as you chose to do that, and then suddenly you suspend it. Although I can't talk for you on this case, Elliot, but I'm wondering how the American audiences are feeling about this with the interjection from the president. I'll tell you one thing, though. Gianni Infantino needs to go. It's as simple as that. He needs to go. FIFA are creating something and I've had this thing all the way along we know we don't know World Cup dailies FIFA are creating something that isn't the game that we know you know we have a game split into quarters we have different things happening outside of the game with fan treatment and things like that it's creating something that's just different so don't try and cut and paste it over what we watch every single week in the Premier League just accept it for what it is but this is one step too far and UEFA have come out of this World Cup in really good shape.

32:23Elliot:Their response to various things have happened have been pin perfect, and UEFA's organization for me is getting stronger. But I wonder, Pochettino, who is a man of the game, a class guy, a class manager, I'm hoping he doesn't pick him, but how can he not pick him? You know, if he doesn't pick him, they lose. What happens then? You know, it's just an awful situation. I don't know how American fans are feeling, but there's been a lot of joy. And the viewing figures are incredible. And I watch a lot of stuff, you know, like a lot of stuff on NBA and NFL, those daytime shows, those talk shows. I watch a lot of them.

33:02Elliot:And they are waking up to what's happening in America around soccer, as you call it. And the viewing figures are incredible. And it's starting to cut through and break through. And I wonder how this is all going to be, you know, felt. you know they as those shows educate themselves on the beautiful game it's gonna be interesting to see what happens in america post is the real true explosion what happened to mls etc but this feels this doesn't smell good does it mate it doesn't smell good what's happening no it doesn't um and the funny thing is i don't even think you have to get into politics i don't think you have to get into trump and the fifa fifa peace prize nonsense i don't think you have to get into any of that.

33:44I think you can literally just say this is corruption, period. It is corruption because the organizing body has suspended a red card ban with absolutely no justification for so doing. And that's corrupt. And it doesn't matter who you think is to blame for that corruption. It doesn't matter where you think that corruption originated. It is ipso facto corrupt. It is by default a priori or whatever you want to say corrupt um the again it's the point that like non-football fans don't get as they get introduced to the sport this sport throws up wrong decisions but those wrong decisions still bind you that's how it works unfortunately they still bind you now i'm going to tell you something i would be okay with fifa saying in tournaments in knockout stages red cards don't result in a ban unless they're for violent conduct i'd be fine with that like if you want to say cons uh uh quanta for example it was quanta who got sent off right yeah if you want to say quanta got a red card he did he deserved it's not violent conduct professional foul england had to play with 10 men for half an hour that's a big enough penalty if you want to then say quanta is now eligible the next round i'm fine with that by the way i think playing with 10 men in a knockout round is a huge disadvantage.

35:11And I don't think you need to ban players for the next game. Now you might say, Elliot, that's a massive change in the tradition of the game. I get it. I'm not saying that's how it works. Now I'm saying I would be fine with that. Like the Balogun sending off, I think was harsh. It forced the U.S. to play down to 10 men. That was a huge penalty for a borderline call. Some people, I know, I think Andrew thinks it's a red card. I think it's a borderline call. And that's a huge penalty playing with 10 men. If he can come back and play the next game i think that's reasonable but that's not the law right now that's not the rule right now and so you know and i know people point to other times he's done this apparently i think ronaldo uh would have been banned for the start of a tournament uh world cup but you know because of red and qualifying and we all snickered because we know they want him at the world cup but the stakes were a little lower to be fair right it was it was an opening game of a world cup versus a knockout round game not during the same tournament still look it was still corrupt then and it's corrupt now and it will for people diminish their enjoyment and to your point clive i would love nothing more than for poch to sit balagan not use him try to win the game without him because then you can go through and everybody can move past it but if balagan plays and the u.s go through anything the u.s do in the tournament will be tainted in the eyes of a lot of people now i know there are a lot of people that support the u.s team that won't care about that but i tend not to think that those are i hate to use this term proper football people those might be the casuals but for those of us who care about the game there is an integrity

36:44Elliot:issue here that has to be protected so yeah i've just seen a quote from trump now saying it wasn't a red card you want your best players to play the game how would you feel if he took messi ronaldo or harry kane out hey look this is so what you're saying is this isn't football as we know it this is entertainment right so um and because we want the big stars to be there we're going to create rules that allow the big stars to be there right so first of all first first of all can we just take a beat for fuller and balligan being put in the same category i'm talking conceptually i'm talking yeah i know i'm saying to the u.s he's one of the biggest stars right so you know so so yeah that's what that's what he's saying that's that's what he's saying basically he did it for Ronaldo and Messi had a big foul there in the tournament that was just sort of brushed over so what we're doing we're creating something which is not what we normally see in the UEFA and in the Premier League I've accepted that a long time ago because the FIFA president is somebody which I question his morals I question his relationships I question where things are going money-wise I question those things FIFA's got a recent track record of not being squeaky clean.

38:01Elliot:So when I see these things, I'm not surprised. I'm surprised that people are surprised. And it's just highlighting it more and more and more. I mean, come the final, the president's going to be there. He's going to hand over the trophy and he's staying in the picture. He's not moving. He's staying there. This is about individuals and their power and their influence. It's not about the greater good of the game, I'm afraid. it's about their power and influence over the game over country relationships it's politics and it is and it's a political role that infantino has it's not a football role and you know i wish he would resign you know because most people listening to this don't really want to see politics around football they want to see football be a game that grows that spreads and improves with organizations they trust their motivations are around so that's where i am yeah look um the funny thing is trump made my point in a way right because he's saying it wasn't a red card like again there are a lot of people that agree with him but that doesn't matter that's not how this works and for people that don't follow the sport i understand like u.s sport makes everything about getting everything right down to the millimeter and replaying it 42 times and organizing bodies making decisions between games there's a history of reversing yourself and reversing yourself reversing yourself football is a game of a lot of tradition a lot of laws a lot of the way things are done and sometimes the way things are done may not feel intellectually speaking consistent right well if it wasn't a red card why shouldn't you be allowed to but that's just not the debate right it was given as a red a ban has to be applied end of story so and by the way if there is like any process in life you're a lawyer with any process in life there's an exception process right there's an appeal process they have no appeal process for a red card so that's a failure right there and then because it did feel a bit unfair to me but that's not what it's about right once you don't create that appeal process then you have to stick by the rules if you don't stick by the rules why haven't you so if you open up a gap the people to think well the reason why you're stuck stuck up to the rules is because you've got a phone call from somebody powerful then you're open to criticism you know and so yeah an unfortunate situation which i don't think was it was an accident i've seen many people sent off for accidents you know so it's a tough one right it's tough but um yeah doors are open to the to the corruption calls now i'm afraid yep well i mean there's there's really no way around that i do want to talk about norway game and about leo um and maybe a little bit quickly about transfers the next 25 minutes so i think what we do is we uh take a beat and we cleanse our palate of the corruption right i think we cleanse our palate of the corruption and I think we can all agree the easiest way to cleanse your palate of corruption is with AG1 yeah AG1's a great way to cleanse your palate of corruption you just you you put a scoop of it in the water eight ounces drink it down and look all kidding aside I'm I'm thinking a lot about health lately I got sick when I was in Budapest and I came home and I didn't feel well and anybody you know this if you've ever been sick when you've been sick you're like, I need to live healthy.

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