In short
The Fight Club Podcast discusses Tottenham Hotspur’s season collapse, the appointment of Roberto De Zerbi (7 games ago, no relegation clause), and whether his first training session signals a turnaround before the final matches.
Guests
Ricky (Spurs fan and co-host), “Spooky” (semi-retired/less visible member of the group), and Nick/Lido (another co-host/member). No external guests are interviewed in this episode.
Key claims
They argue Spurs are effectively relegation-bound but still have a chance if De Zerbi can quickly instill a philosophy. They criticize prior managers (Thomas Frank and others) for similar tactical approaches that didn’t energize players, and for Spurs “ghosting” on the pitch. De Zerbi’s training is seen as more detailed and passionate, with aggressive team defending and coordinated attacking.
Notable examples
De Zerbi’s “if we need to defend, 10 players defending” messaging; comparisons to Pochettino’s player development; references to Archie Gray, Baraval, and Kudus as system-fit signings; Romero vs Van de Ven debate; Sunderland and the Brighton game as key fixtures to watch for a reaction.
Written by AI. May contain mistakes. Listen to the episode to check what was said.
Chapters
Tap a time to open that second in VOThe Friendship Dynamics
0:45 to 3:00
Hosts discuss the value of their friendships and connections through football.
“And if it isn't being on a fucking podcast with me, then what is it, Nick?”
WhatsApp Groups and Football Emotions
3:00 to 5:00
The impact of WhatsApp groups on following football is explored.
“And I'd be like, oh, fucking hell, here we go again.”
The Rollercoaster of Supporting Spurs
5:00 to 8:00
Hosts talk about the ups and downs of being a Spurs fan and their experiences.
“Anyway, and yeah, that was an interesting eye-opening experience to talk to someone who's like an expert in French football, but we find ourselves with a tempestuous, but, you know, borderline brilliant tactician.”
The New Appointment: Deserby at Spurs
8:00 to 11:00
Discussion on the appointment of Deserby as head coach and its implications.
“Atletico Madrid, OK, it's not in the Premier League.”
Perspectives on Team Performance
11:00 to 14:00
The hosts share their feelings about the team's performance and prospects.
“I think, I mean, I've never watched 12 minutes of us training before in my life.”
Tactical Challenges Under Various Managers
14:00 to 15:03
The discussion focuses on the difficulties faced by the team under different managerial styles and formations.
“And I was thinking, if you're trying to change something and you've got three managers that play a very similar way with certain details that are different, these players aren't going to get reinvigorated.”
Assessing De Zerbi's Arrival and Impact
15:04 to 16:52
Analyzing the potential impact of newly appointed manager De Zerbi on the team's dynamics and performance.
“But instead of us sitting back, waiting for it, trying to keep our shape, trying to defend, I just don't think the players have taken to it at all because we're still conceding and they're looking like fucking mugs.”
Comparing Coaching Styles: Pochettino vs. De Zerbi
16:53 to 18:45
Exploring the coaching philosophies of Pochettino and De Zerbi, focusing on player development.
“Lallana, I think, was one of them, actually, at Southampton.”
Concerns About Club's Direction and Identity
18:46 to 21:21
Discussing worries about the club's identity and managerial approaches impacting long-term success.
“It's just, it just still makes me nervous guys.”
Potential Player Exodus and Squad Changes
21:22 to 23:59
Speculating on potential player departures and squad changes in response to managerial shifts.
“No doubt, Spurs, it's fucking not boring, is it, for a single second, but it's not good for your nerves and your heart and the rest of it.”
Show all 32 chapters
The Need for Structural Change at the Club
24:00 to 28:00
Highlighting the necessity for a structural overhaul within the club to improve performance and coherence.
“I don't know anything, but he desperately, desperately wants to leave.”
Lack of Confidence in Management Decisions
28:00 to 28:30
The discussion focuses on the current management's effectiveness and their ability to shape the club's future.
“who doesn't seem to have the authority to make the correct decisions at the football club to move us forward.”
Stability and Managerial Control
28:30 to 29:00
Exploring the challenges of maintaining managerial stability and control over player acquisitions at Tottenham.
The Current State of Tottenham
29:00 to 29:50
Reflections on the current discontent and disconnect fans feel towards the team and players.
“and we never seem to be able to stick with someone longer than two seasons.”
Winning Games and Affinity with Players
29:50 to 30:20
Discussion on how winning games can restore fans' affinity towards players and alleviate frustrations.
“when Tottenham play will go, suddenly we won't really care because, like I said, football is a fickle sport.”
Choosing Between Players: Van der Ven vs. Romero
31:50 to 33:00
A debate on which player to retain next season between Van der Ven and Romero.
“and as ever I think the reason genuinely think the reason why NordVPN and continue to sponsor the fighting cock.”
Public Perception of Romero
33:00 to 35:00
Discussing the public's negative perception of Romero and how it contrasts with the host's views.
“I would probably, I'd still, I'd probably say Romero, to be fair.”
Relegation vs. Financial Relief
35:00 to 36:40
A hypothetical discussion on the implications of relegation versus financial freedom.
“And I was sitting there, and I was like, am I doubting myself?”
Fan Emotions and Football Optimism
36:40 to 37:50
An exploration of the emotional highs and lows of being a Tottenham fan amidst managerial changes.
“You click the button, I'd be, I'd be happy for you because obviously you're happy.”
Current Season's Realities
37:50 to 39:40
Reflecting on the current season's struggles and the apathy felt by fans.
“And it's Jeltsky who says, why are we always optimistic when there's a new manager?”
Seeking a Spark of Hope
39:40 to 41:20
A hopeful outlook on the potential for a turnaround in the team's performance.
“Most football clubs will never be in the position Tottenham are in.”
Reflections on Optimism and Despair
42:00 to 43:36
Discussing the emotional rollercoaster of supporting Spurs and the hope for future wins.
“maybe get a breath and then and then that's my hope next time yeah next time I want to see a bit more like a new like the old spooky we used to know because the old spooky He was full of optimism.”
The Void of No Games
43:36 to 45:00
Exploring the mixed feelings about the break from games and the anticipation of the season's end.
“That would be four weeks of half of all.”
Excitement Around De Zerbi's Training
45:10 to 47:22
Discussing the renewed excitement among players with De Zerbi's coaching style.
“And at the moment, obviously seeing Deserby, the type of football he plays, seeing the training videos, hearing wisps in the paper that the players are excited.”
Question Time: Overlap and Expectations
47:22 to 49:14
Answering listener questions and discussing the overlap situation with Ben.
Personal Stories and Football Rituals
49:14 to 50:14
Sharing personal anecdotes related to football and the community around it.
“I don't think it's the end of the world.”
Bedtime Conversations and Podcasting
50:14 to 52:34
Light-hearted discussions about sleep routines and the challenges of podcasting.
“r d z but i need to know did your cock move a tinge after watching the first training session to.”
Gameday Rituals and Distractions
52:34 to 56:01
Discussing the rituals around watching games and the distractions that come with it.
“I'm up at like 5 half 5 listen to this little creature's plant that have sleep and had a bit quarter past 12 half 12 you're a fucking piece of shit Ricky hold on what Say that again.”
The Game Day Rituals
56:01 to 58:35
Explore the rituals and frustrations around watching Spurs games.
“Watching the game sober is almost impossible for me as well.”
Discussion on Club Management
58:35 to 59:36
A deep dive into the management issues surrounding Tottenham and coaching changes.
“I fell in love with Bal and Modic and the rest of the squad all those years ago and have been an avid supporter since.”
The Future of Ownership and Philosophy
59:36 to 1:02:54
Analyzing the implications of potential ownership changes for Spurs.
“And even though they knew it was going to be a quick win, that they didn't want to go down that route because it's a throwback to Levy.”
Discussion on Football Identity
1:02:54 to 1:06:06
Contemplating the identity and direction of Tottenham beyond just football.
“like Tottenham Hotspur is this entertainment entity.”
Transcript
Automatic transcript. May contain errors.0:00Spooky:This podcast is part of the Sports Social Podcast Network. It's the fighting. It's the fighting. Cock. It's the fighting. It's the fighting. Cock. I can't wait. No. Hello, welcome back to the Fight Club Podcast. Ricky, how you doing? All good, mate. How are you? And we've got the lesser spotted spooky. Right? Semi-retired? Am I fully retired, maybe? I don't know, mate. If you want to remain a part of this friendship group, you better not be. Okay, no. You've got to have value. Look, listen. Think of it as value to me. Okay. What is your value to me? Sorry, Lido. And if it isn't being on a fucking podcast with me, then what is it, Nick?
0:56What is it that you bring to my life? Did you call me government name? I did, yes. Oh, shit. I apologise for that. That's it. Going to go missing for another five years now. Have you found following Spurs better since you stopped creating content about it? Yes, kind of. But the thing is, the fact that we're all in this group and all we do is talk about football, and we share every emotion, every up and down, you're not really untethered from it. at any point. Do you know what I'm saying? Would you say WhatsApp groups make following your football club worse or better? Probably worse because you are absolutely connected to everything all of the time.
1:39It's categorically worse. Therapy, but it's also, there's something quite nice about going to Tottenham, even though we don't watch them win that often at home. And then seeing Ricky and T and whoever else that's there. And it feels nice because you're seeing, and then you can talk about football because it's in that environment. you're about to watch your game but we talk about it all the time and you know what that's just who we fucking are it's just part of our identity it's part of everybody every football supporter around the world is what they probably talk about and think about more than anything more than their kids their wife their girlfriends the lot if we're not winning i hate all your guts true true yeah especially Alex yeah yeah 100 % no but it's like I just don't want to like if we I don't want to have the conversations don't want to have the conversations but you everyone wants to have the conversations apparently so what can you do you can't leave can you it's been nice with no Tottenham now hasn't it it's been quite holiday yeah holiday good yeah yeah yeah lovely although Ricky got bone to pick with you I think you know what I'm going to fucking say already go on well have a guess what I might be irritated about you at the moment?
2:51That Instagram photo? Yeah. So what? Mate, it's been posted maybe five other times before. How do I always react? Not to that one. You react all right with that one. Nah. Yeah. It's even on the Fighting Cock, mate. It's on the Fighting Cock Instagram. Well, it shouldn't be. Well, it just... I didn't put it there. I didn't put it there either. You fucking did. You put it everywhere. Someone put it there. There was a time when me and Ricky would be going, well, we'd go everywhere together pretty much, and then we'd be in some sort of European city getting pissed up and then all I would see out of nowhere is Ricky's little digital camera would come out.
3:26It wasn't a phone back then. It was a proper Sony. Yeah, Sony Ericsson. Sony Ericsson digital camera. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I'd be like, oh, fucking hell, here we go again. Because the thing is, it's not just a photo. I know where it's going. And I know everyone's going to see it. Every single photo. I think it was 19 years ago. It's brainy as fuck. So you can't really see anything. Like a white pair of fucking Urbans. we look like a pair of herbits anyway mate people didn't need to see it and not only that you've tagged me going do you want to share this on your story no I don't want to fucking share that picture on my story do you not want to it's a story about friendship fuck your friendship I can see I went out with my schoolmates over at Easter as well and we went on two lads holidays when we were 17 and when we were 18 17 Tenerife 18 Magaluf and all the stories came around photos and everyone always knew that I had the camera and was taking, you know, the old wind-up Kodaks.
4:29Oh, yeah, even back then you were involved. Yeah, even back then when I was 17, I was taking photos of anyone and everything and I have all the photos. And they're really, what do you call it, thankful that someone had captured the moment. Some people, not so much. Exactly. lots been going on actually I don't think I've got your boys take on obviously the biggest news to happen in Spurs I say bigger than the Frank appointment bigger than obviously Trudor coming in all relevant to some degree but the Zerbi taking over at Tottenham seven games ago no break clause if we go down he comes down with us we did a good podcast with Julian Lorenz Olerons I've got a stick for saying it what I thought was the correct way and you can't say anything, you can't trip up at all these days on the internet.
5:18Anyway, and yeah, that was an interesting eye-opening experience to talk to someone who's like an expert in French football, but we find ourselves with a tempestuous, but, you know, borderline brilliant tactician. I guess the question here, I'll throw it to you, Spig, is do you feel more comfortable with the Zerbi in charge, in terms of keeping us in the league or less comfortable? Would you have preferred to stick with Tudor? No, no, no. Mate, it's a calamity this entire season and maybe the last five years building up to this point. The chaos that Tottenham deliver doesn't surprise me anymore and I'm less emotionally invested in terms of committing or backing any decision the club make.
6:15But in terms of the appointment, yeah, we probably should have sacked Thomas Frank early doors and then got this guy in immediately and then given him enough time to instill some kind of blueprint to kind of just get us playing consistent football and winning games and picking up points. The fact that we've left it until seven games are left, I've kind of like just already decided and this isn't a defensive mechanism I've just we're down as far as I'm concerned because I've seen nothing from the players that would suggest that they will respond and react in the right way collectively what do you say?
6:53I think you don't agree? what? agree about what? what? hang on a second spooky what Ricky what might have I taken exception to there what you said? that he's just you've accepted about going down Going down already. Going down. Just accept it. Give up. Don't play the last seven games. It's not a championship club now. No fighting him. Yeah. It's not about giving up. He's speaking of that dog in him. Mate. Mate. The limp cock.
7:23I didn't expect to be tag-teamed, yeah? Sorry. No, no, it's fine. Like, it's not from a, like, oh, look, I'm trying to be edgy or I've given up on the club. I cannot walk away from this football club. I'm going to end up renewing. I know even though I keep saying at principle I'm not, I'm going to end up renewing, even if we do happen to go down. I think having the appointment made at this point gives us a chance, right? Because you know what football's like. It's fickle. It takes one game to change everything. And we've been waiting for that one game for nearly four months and it just hasn't come along.
7:58We thought Anfield away, maybe, possibly. Atletico Madrid, OK, it's not in the Premier League. We thought there's still a team in amongst it all. the players have not responded at any point. They've not given us those fundamental, those basic things that Forrest and West Ham and Wolves and everyone else down there, even Burnley, are doing. And that is playing like a team and organising themselves like a team. Even though they're shit, they're still a team. And whereas we are just ghosts, just floating across the pitch with absolute no desire or effort or any of it. Now, this guy is a coach. Does he have time to instill a philosophy in seven games?
8:38No, he's said it himself. If he can get them playing, then we do have a chance. But at the moment, we've been the worst team in the Premier League for fuck knows how long. Do you believe you'll get it right? I've got to, even though I've just said we're relegated. There's obviously a part of me that believes that we're going to turn it around. You said my name again, for fuck's sake. Rick! I said Rick! You're paranoid in that case. not only are we relegated already I'm not even saying you know
9:09first podcast for a while you're rusty no I'm rusty but not as fucking broken as Tottenham are give me something Spurs just give me something we give everything and we are deflated and fatigued and exhausted and we don't see we heal loads of words we're going to give it all 200 % doesn't even mean anything. They don't give us anything. If they respond to this guy, you have to then question where you had it in it all the time. You can't be that. You can't be, you're not a bunch of fucking schoolboys. One of you, one of you has won the World Cup. You're internationals for the most part. You can pull together even if you don't think the manager's got what it takes to pull things together.
9:57But they've given us nothing and that's the thing that's haunting me. Yeah. I mean, I, for one, I think he's going to turn everything around immediately, starting with Sunderland and we're going to win. Okay. I'll inject it into my veins immediately. There was this kid, this young kid. I saw him on TikTok and he made this great analogy. And it's not like complex and we could probably all got there. I mean, he doesn't, I don't know why I'm taking anything away from him. He said that essentially Spurs is like, this is Schrodinger's Spurs. Saw it. Sorry, it was good, wasn't it? Yeah, it was good.
10:33The kid has got something. I don't know his name. I'm sorry. I should give him a shout out. You stole that from me, to be fair. I was on that on Twitter about 10 years ago. But anyway, continue. I mean, he would have been about seven at that time. So I'm sure he didn't. We wasn't following Spooky the Spur back then. And he said, right now, Deserby could be a world-class coach or he could be terrible and we're hurtling towards a championship. both things are true we are both relegated and world class right now because we don't know anything about Deserby's football and we'll know within 10 minutes probably of the game starting against Sunderland on Saturday whether or not he has had any impact and it would be emotional it would be an emotional and mental impact that he'd have to have had on these players and so I think you had a go at me that's exactly what I said at the beginning when you both turned on me you started with we're already down that was the problem the way you framed it was the problem for me and Ricky was that the problem Ricky?
11:43yeah it was don't want you coming on here saying we're down already we've got seven games to go I apologise I thought I was on another podcast not this podcast sorry sorry spook no it's fine I miss this I miss getting abused needlessly abused this is the fighting Q &A podcast because obviously we haven't played a game of football in feels like four years but it's kind of been a welcome release to sub-degree I think we all needed a reset probably needed a new manager and we've got him there was a question and I want to ask it now but I can't remember who's asked it Ricky okay another thing this lad meant was the sort of the training session with the Zerbi.
12:31I think, I mean, I've never watched 12 minutes of us training before in my life. Yeah. And it's probably well edited, but did it give you cause for optimism, Rick? Have you drunk the Kool-Aid? Yeah, of course I have. Of course I have. What else am I going to be drinking? More Kool-Aid. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Just his kind of, even something so simple as like first name terms, shouting archie archie like just him saying archie i was like and over and over again and just the small details and everything that he was doing and how passionate he was and and he was in uh burgwell's ear for like fucking 10 minutes or something and they're having this discussion you just you just let your mind wander you stick with me kids i'm gonna play you as an eight i'm gonna play you as this this is what i want you to do we i've studied the videos when you're under thomas like all these different things run through your head i just let it get away with me go on dream rick this is this is what i want yeah like when i um so with with frank it you know it run its course and it went on far too long and we were kind of uh you remember we were playing like three at the back and it was like because we were it was like a structured team hard to break down and we wouldn't concede as much we were still losing and it wasn't that and then we brought in Tudor and he was the same but playing players in different positions he was trying to do something else I remember when I watched when we were linked with Adi Hutter and And he played a similar formation.
14:33And I was thinking, if you're trying to change something and you've got three managers that play a very similar way with certain details that are different, these players aren't going to get reinvigorated. They're not going to get re-energized. And I was just like, nothing is going to happen here. and we are going to go down. So I personally, I was more of the, let's get back to back four, four, two, three, one, four, four, two, whatever you want to say. Harry Redknapp, Glenn Hoddle as the face, some other Tottenham boys in. But instead of us sitting back, waiting for it, trying to keep our shape, trying to defend, I just don't think the players have taken to it at all because we're still conceding and they're looking like fucking mugs.
15:21And without us trying to get forward or trying to attack or trying to win the game, we're losing. So I'd much rather go out and try and have a go and try and score goals and try and win that way and try and get the points like that. So I think with a Hoddle or a Redknapp or someone like that to reinvigorate the squad and the way we're playing, I didn't really kind of think about De Zerbe. I did, but he's a loose cannon. He's a bit of a journeyman. And I was like, I don't really know if I wanted, there's no doubt that there's a lot of coaches and players sing his praises, how much he loves football.
16:02Adam Lallana was saying on TalkSport. There's fucking loads of people come out saying. Yeah, Sandro, obviously it feels like he's going to get a job working with him. Yeah. They've all come out and gone, yeah, he's incredible. I think, was it, did Lewis Dunk come out and say, was it Lewis Dunk? Doug was talking about how long it took. It took a while for him to get hold of what he was trying to do. But yeah. There's quite a few people that have come out and I was like, okay, then right. He's now come in. Right. We've got Deserby. And then seeing the training and hearing all the coaches coming out and speaking about him, all the ex players as well, seeing these first training videos, him coming out and talking about, you know, if we go down, I'm here for five years, but like, it lumpy lads I've got the contract I'm here and it's kind of like for me it's like De Zerbi wasn't my first pick but now he's here and the wheels have started to to roll and I'm seeing more bits and pieces of him I'm kind of like I'm more comfortable and I feel I feel like we will get out of this now I think this is where it changes um so you know in the same way that Pochettino had a track record of turning average players into really, really good ones.
17:23Yeah. Lallana, I think, was one of them, actually, at Southampton. And, you know, Danny Rose, for example, turning him into an international. Just a series of players, Ricky Lambert getting his move to Liverpool from Southampton. Series of players that, you know, it was just, through coaching, he made better. But the Zerbi has a similar reputation. When he was at Sassuulo, he lost or developed players to the point where they became, getting picked up by Juve, by AC Milan, by Inter Milan, became Italian internationals. Whereas when he sort of picked them up, he was kind of, they were just sort of decent players.
18:00And I think that's sort of something that the Spurs board have bought into or wanted from him because the ideal situation, like with Pochettino, is that you turn a squad worth, you know, £400 million into£600 million based on improving the players. Some of those players are going to fall by the wayside because they won't be able to do what he wants them to do. But it was earmarked that players like Archie Gray, like Baraval, like Kudus, for example, who he wanted to sign to Brighton from Ajax, these players are perfect for his system. and I guess the kind of the more sort of abrasive part of the Zerbi will be the will be seen by players that get kind of cast to the side yeah um yeah uh Spook what did you what did you make of the training session did you think it's just kind of propaganda from the club which effectively is you want to get people on board did it stir you in any way I mean it did because it looked like it was a proper training session in the middle of it wasn't he yeah he was just everywhere talking like Ricky said um but this is the you kind of naturally do this like when Tudor took his first press conference you thought ah this guy's not fucking about this guy gets it and then you see the football and you think fucking hell what the fuck it's just like Ricky said again like we've all said it was like Thomas Frank the fucking Scooby-Doo mask over his face you know what I'm saying it's like it was the same fucking football it's like what whereas we've got a manager now who who has premier league experience and he's he's worked like you said with with young players with potential and he's worked with experienced players with a lot of talent and and and you feel that he's the right type of appointment so yeah the training session is always propaganda it's always the stuff that social media do it's just footballers training with a manager you can't read too much into it until you actually see the formation, the lineup and the application and the football.
20:07It's just, it just still makes me nervous guys. I'm sorry. Like we've got these seven games and they feel like seven huge games. And every time, every time you go into these games, you're wanting to see something that we've been unable to produce. So like a good performance away to Sunderland and it's the Brighton game for me, which I'm not therefore but ironically um that's the game at home new belief the the play that supporters will probably turn up again like we always do and it's just the reaction um and if it's the same kind of kind of like subtle aggression that he he's implied in the training sessions and the way that he's spoken about it you know when he said if we need to defend i want you know 10 players defending.
20:53He's not saying we're going to fucking defend and counter. He's saying we're going to aggressively defend when we need to defend as a team and then collectively attack as a team which is not what we were doing under Thomas Frank. Under Thomas Frank we were fearful to go forward so we played this strange cat and mouse game that was not befitting to the players and the alleged philosophy this football club is meant to have which I don't think is a fallacy at this point in terms of identity I think we lost that a long time ago. It's fascinating, man. No doubt, Spurs, it's fucking not boring, is it, for a single second, but it's not good for your nerves and your heart and the rest of it.
21:35Boys, have you ever been in a meeting with your manager and your manager started telling you something about a new project or something, maybe they're changing your roles to some sort and they're talking, they're using jargon and stuff that you don't really understand, but you're just nodding and going, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, that's exactly how I'd feel would deserve he giving me instructions like i was listening to him saying i don't know what he's talking about it's going well one two you hold the second then you pass and you pass and you find the angle and someone will be there who who's gonna be there i hope you don't mean me because i don't know where the fuck i'm supposed to stand it was and then he shouted and then he shouted uh one two two passes all you need and he's like there's two v five you can't lose the ball you can't it's two v five and he was like enjoy enjoy enjoy enjoy yourself playing football don't lose the fucking ball.
22:19Because there's five of you cunts and there's two of them. Don't be shit, but enjoy it. Two suchies. Enjoy it. Enjoy it. Enjoy it. Yeah. Relax. Relax. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's like, I can't relax. This is enjoyable. It's like them times when you're on the, you're watching players come in and he's like, the managers are talking about the tactics and they're showing them on the board. And for some reason, I'm just thinking of Papsar looking down at it and nodding like that. And he goes on and talks to one player and all the messaging he's just heard on the touchline has then gone to one player and suddenly what?
22:54It's supposed to spread by like osmosis through the rest of the squad. Like some sort of virus in the air that all the players now understand exactly what it's all. I think a lot of it's nonsense. It really did. There's loads of questions here.
23:10Gwap93rd says, I was kind of expecting a mass exodus this summer. Do you feel like Dezerbi might be able to hold down a few of our more talented players who have been looking for an exit.
23:23If we stay up, I genuinely think it's less about worried about who we might sell and more about supplement the football club, the players. There were some players that won't probably, I doubt Paulineau will probably get renewed. There's talk, I don't know, did you see what Romero's dad said? there's a little release little release dog in his contract for around something 47 and 58 million dollars in dollars as well which means like about 40 grand he said they're looking to recruit and I'm like what are you on about yeah almost certainly has a release cause in his contract because they all do and when he signed the contract with Spurs you're like why have you done that like even I was happy but I was like I was confused like why would you sign a long term deal with Spurs look at look at you you can go anywhere you don't have to do this with us but you did so there must be something in there yeah there was something about like he he was unsure or he didn't know or didn't think there was a like a la liga release clause or something like that like if someone comes in from there um the money was quite low in what his valuation was but um i think yeah he was kind of alluding to the fact that his son, he says, I don't know anything, but he'll probably leave.
24:48I don't know anything. I don't know anything. I don't know anything, but he desperately, desperately wants to leave. I think. I don't know anything except this crucial bit of information that other clubs need in order to get you out of the football club. But I don't know anything else.
25:04Yeah. I mean, do you anticipate big exits from the football club either way, Spookerbrick? Yeah, man. And I think we're like, the squad is like, so how many times have we rebooted and then brought in a manager and then supposedly bought plays for that manager only for that to fail? And then you bring in another manager and there's always been, there's meant to be this like succession plan with one coach to the next where it's like, we're going to appoint the same type of football coach. So the players that we sign will fit into their plans. And it's like, no, that's not actually what's happened at any point in time.
25:44Like it's pure desperation, pure disorganization. You don't really know what you're doing. You're just appointing managers at this point reactively because you're fucking everything up behind the scenes. So it does feel, again, that's, I mean, how many times have we said this? We need a reset, one preferably in the Premier League, but one where the manager is actually backed. in a way. And I do think, why has he signed a five-year contract with no relegation clause? Exactly, right? And that's really basic. Here we go again. But there's nowhere else for the Lewis kids, you can call them, and everyone else.
26:26There's nowhere left for them to go. Like, they've... I mean, they should all go, basically. The bald, everyone. But that's not going to happen until we sell the club. So we're in this... Again, we find ourselves in this position where we don't really know what's going to happen and we don't have faith in how the club is being managed. And then it comes back to the players. It does feel like we need to completely start afresh and maybe pluck a few of those players in the squad. Likes of Archie Gray, the younger players, and say, look, this is our future, but we need top-drawer, finished product players to kind of help them along the way and help us along the way.
27:05if you're not committed fuck off it's as simple as that if people like Van de Ven and Romero want out sell them bring in players that want to play for this football club bring the creation lad back just start building something that just feels organic and feels like we can connect to it because that it'll be organic in in for the Zerbi it'll be organic because it'll be exactly what he wants yeah like typically you'd want a director of football making decisions about who the manager will be and they'll build out a kind of transfer plan to fill that squad with players that a manager or a similar manager that might follow him can use.
27:46Whereas we've gone about this a bit arse about face in that we've brought in a manager who probably doesn't really want a director of football in place, but does fill the kind of gap that's been left or that kind of, you've got an uninfluential sporting director who doesn't seem to have the authority to make the correct decisions at the football club to move us forward. I don't know how you guys feel, but I have no real confidence that Langer can grab hold of the football club and craft it in his own image. I just cannot see that. Whereas, certainly now Deserby's there, but even before, whereas Deserby's come in and he's apparently been promised, you know, decision-making over players that are coming in, players that fit his system, and players sold, the type of contracts being offered, that kind of thing.
28:31that is an old school manager position that's the kind of thing that wenger would do that was you've said it yourself on on on many pods that you know the reason it falls apart for for for him is because he he gets the point where he wants even more control and he's not given that control in terms of the influence over you know player acquisitions and the rest of it we have tried we have tried every single template every single blueprint to try and be successful and we never seem to be able to stick with someone longer than two seasons. Like I hope that the catalyst for us to find stability again comes from this absolute fucking mess of a season, you know, and it's just Tottenham, man.
29:19It's surreal. It feels like if I close my eyes, I can remember the parade and how we all felt. It's like we won a trophy and that just is completely redundant right now because we're looking at a football club and we don't really recognise any of it and we don't have an affinity with the players at the moment, most of them, because we're not winning games. It's just as simple as that, win games. And then the rest of it will fall... Yeah, and everything will fall into place after that because the thing is, the sting that we feel every weekend when Tottenham play will go, suddenly we won't really care because, like I said, football is a fickle sport.
29:56You start winning games, you kind of forget. You kind of push all that other shit. or the politics as well. You even forget about that. We've done it with Levy so many times. We would not bang on about the chairman when we were winning games because we were focused on how we felt, how Tottenham made us feel. We just want that back. And then we can worry about everything else. Once we're winning games again and we're safe, we can look ahead and we're going to the summer and we start signing players and we feel like we're moving in the right direction, everything smooths out. And then it's kind of back to normal, as normal as Tottenham can be.
30:30I'm going to take this moment to remind you that Tottenham Hotspur should be backed by NordVPN. I think they've got another VPN that they use. Don't use theirs. Use this one. It's much better. NordVPN.com forward slash the fighting cock right now. You can get four extra months of a two-year plan. There's no risk with Nord's 30-day money-back guarantee. The link is in the podcast description below. You can watch sporting events, TV shows, films which aren't available in your region. switching to your virtual location to a country which is showing the event protect your private data like bank details, passwords and online identity and if you're travelling across the world or Europe not that Spurs will be doing that next year so we'll probably get a holiday you'll be getting a holiday at some stage won't you?
31:22and if you're like spooking you're like frequenting we're finished the sentence but cam girls brasses right I wasn't expecting you to join me in that no no no you said the exact same exactly the right thing exactly the right thing you don't want cam girls getting your private information then protect yourself with NordVPN thefightingcarts.com post that NordVPN the link is in the description below and as ever I think the reason genuinely think the reason why NordVPN and continue to sponsor the fighting cock. One, they're all legends. But two, I think we just stumbled across the best selling point for this piece of software that there has ever been.
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32:05And that is, it gets around child locks. So you keep your children safe, but you don't have to be safe. And moreover, the wife doesn't know that you're not being safe. She just thinks you're fucked as well. She probably thought, when I'm putting them on, I don't want little Bobby to be able to see this, or Jennifer to be able to see all this smut. but most of all i don't want my husband wanking when i'm not around yeah yeah so like a friend a mutual friend of ours um ricky he's a wife all the ways assumes if he isn't in eyesight of her that he's masturbating that's what like he could be doing the washing up but if she's in the front room she just thinks he's wanking so probably is as well to be fair could be could be yeah so nordvpn.com support the podcast protect yourself and see all the things you want to see without getting in trouble um
33:05edgic rhcp1291 he says would you rather keep van der ven or romero next season feels like one or the two will go if you had to keep one who would it be ricky oh that's a question isn't it I don't think it is a question I'm pretty sure my answer would be straight away. I would probably, I'd still, I'd probably say Romero, to be fair. Agreed. Certainly in Deserby's system, where he specs a lot from these defenders to the ball. Yes, exactly. And imagine like if when Van der Ven's running through the, you know, he's gone past five players, but he's taken seven touches as opposed to the two he's allowed.
33:47Exactly. And Deserby runs on the pitch and grabs him by a throat and pulls him down when he's through on goal. I don't care. Call your agent. He won't be playing here again. What about you? Is that Romero? Yeah, Romero, even though he's a liability. It's a tricky one, right? Because one's always red carded. The other one is always injured, if you lean into the stereotypes for both players. But Romero's the more complete player. And he does get forward and he scores. And he can be a leader. I just think he needs to be motivated, you know, in terms of believing that the players around him are on his level and for him not to get frustrated.
34:30And I think we're just a team of misfits at the minute, you know, psychologically and physically. I went out for some beers over Easter with a couple of Gunas, Scouser. I can't remember who the other guys supported. But anyway, we were talking about football, obviously, as it came up. talking about Romero, and they were all scathing. How can you call him a leader? How can you call him a captain? Suspended all the time. He's not even that good a defender. He goes way too much on his aggression. And I was sitting there, and I was like, am I doubting myself? Or is it that they've just, they're watching Tottenham games.
35:12They're not really, you know, it's on in the background, and they're listening to Sky, Gary Neville. Ooh, Romero, he's gone in later. and that's what that's that's all they know in their brain not that they've watched it it's just that that's what's flashpoints right okay yeah like you know that they don't know anything about football and they're all morons right you know that they're your mates yeah we all do it like i've done the football between the lines podcast and sometimes a subject will come up and i'm like i don't fucking have a clue about this oh what do you think about matoma's form this season i don't know who knows that like unless you're into fbl or you're a brighton fan or some dork who watches every game in the premier you're not going to know about so what what do we know about romero we know that there is this broadly you know widely sort of believed idea that he's a liability because he's constantly being suspended it's not actually true as i found out as when i said it on overlap and got absolutely destroyed.
36:13It's not actually, only this season he's missed four games when we desperately need him, but generally across his time in the last four years at Spurs, suspensions haven't actually been an issue. Injuries, there. Right. So people just headline everything. No, don't doubt yourself, Rick. If you like him, you like him. Don't listen to him. Yeah. They're more old. Bigger boys. 10 men says, Flav, would you rather us get relegated but your house gets completely paid off or stay up? do you know how big my mortgage is would you feel less of me if i if i said i mean total debt 350 grand so i'll go it's 350 grand but we get relegated i said rick i'm really sorry mate we're going down i mean i'd if you and you have to click that button yeah i press the button i press the button and it's suddenly my bank account just go full of cash.
37:08Right. You click the button, I'd be, I'd be happy for you because obviously you're happy. Yeah. I'm not happy, but I'm sad. But there'll be millions of people that will be like, well, our club's just been relegated. Our life is infinitely worse now forever. It's true. And you'll be sitting there like king of the castle, king of the castle of your house. Ooh, this lovely money.
37:32Yeah.
37:35yeah at the moment you're yeah i just saw you then i saw a glint in your eye you had a little daydream didn't you like oh the problem is you're asking me a question that's so real generally you say if someone said i have somebody give you a million pounds of spurs get relegated and it's like it's never gonna happen yeah this is never gonna happen either but you're what you're asking me is is are the greatest is the greatest stress in your life going to be removed by clicking your fingers yeah i think we'd all we wouldn't mind a little couple of seasons in the championship would we if i got to pay my house off jelly come on we're not doing this together are we not well if it was the same the same season as the goon is winning the league and us getting relegated i wouldn't be able to take that but if they were you know if it was guaranteed they weren't going to win the league and we just slid out of the league yeah no i I wouldn't take the money.
38:27I wouldn't take the money. Yeah. Absolutely. I wouldn't do that to everybody. I would never do that. Never do that to anybody.
38:42And it's Jeltsky who says, why are we always optimistic when there's a new manager? Because we're here for pins. We're fans of our football club. It's what we want. It's better to be optimistic when there's no evidence that suggests that we shouldn't be. I feel robbed. I feel robbed. we had no new manager bounce with Tudor. So it's like, where's my bounce? Someone better give me my fucking bounce. Deserve me. Give it to me now. We didn't get a bounce, did we? No. Well out of order. Frank didn't give us a bounce, really. A couple of decent performances were at the beginning, but I can't tell whether Spooky is optimistic or it's hard to read him at the moment.
39:17I know. Yeah, man. It's the apathy in it. It's just how many times over the last couple of seasons have we had those conversations around let's just fuck this off like it's like it's not that serious is it and you'd like you it's that it's you kind of pretend that because again that is definitely a defensive mechanism right then you have these realizations like it's just better to go by evidence and evidence this season is we are we've been in relegation form for most of the season so that that's to go back to the start of the pod when you both jumped on me I've just I've given everything like emotionally and now I'm numb I'm fucking comfortably numb we've like even when when we appointed the new manager I was like okay let's see what happens now it's like there's no there's no like there's no internal buzz I've got it I've still got it I don't mate I think I think it will come down to I'm looking forward to the Sunderland game and I can't say that I've said that about any Spurs game for a long time even games I have to go to I have to go to not because I want to go to but the Sunderland game I'm really curious to see a reaction because if there's a spark that ignites in that game I am fucking fully back in like I'm like relegation fuck off we're not going championship mate we're winning seven on the trot and that's how that's how football should make you feel like invincible because it isn't, it's serious, but it's also not that serious and we shouldn't allow it to be a conduit to make us more depressed.
40:51Most football clubs will never be in the position Tottenham are in. Do you know what I'm saying? We just kind of like fuck things up and make things uneasy and just overly entertaining for every other fan base than our own. But I'm still apathetic. I'm still like in that classic Tottenham purgatory where, okay, what's going to happen now? And no doubt I will hurt as much as anyone else if we did go down. As much as we can like romanticize it. Oh, it'd be fun. It'd be like Lincoln at home and all this kind of shit. It's going to be fucking dog shit. Yeah. Top four next season. Top four Premier League next season.
41:29Guaranteed. 17th, 17th and top four is probably the most Tottenham-esque thing that will come out of all this. We are finishing top four next season. I'm guaranteeing it. Anything less is a disappointment. Okay? we're all on board let's get on board this deserving train alright I'm on board two two okay alright enough sort of apathetic sort of pontificating spook it's time to get excited again yeah give yourself a shake yeah give yourself have a tug get out of your system liming yourself up a bit maybe get a breath and then and then that's my hope next time yeah next time I want to see a bit more like a new like the old spooky we used to know because the old spooky He was full of optimism.
42:13I remember. I remember. I know what happened. I know what happened. It happened to us all, mate. This is Wolverine in Old Man Logan. I'm just fucking tired, man. I'm just tired. That's a comic book reference. I just don't think it's going to land to me. But I think maybe, I think maybe, I think like everyone knows about the Vietnam War, don't they? Yeah. We've been in there. We've been in the jungle, right? And a couple of us have been walking and one of them traps have come up. fucking, you know, wooden pegged us through the chest. We've seen friends go that way. We've carried the legs of babies to them decapitated mothers.
42:53Right, we've seen them. We've seen it. We've gone through the lot. I speak, I get it. You're hurting. You're hurting, right? But I'm the reason it's coming along. I've got all the morphine and I'm going to stick it in your mangled leg and give you a little bosh and you're going to feel better. And do you know, and Deserve is going to deliver three wins this season which are going to keep us up boys and then we start looking forward this whole mystery about a relegation what would it be like wouldn't it be fun all that bullshit would be out the window no it wouldn't be fun categorically it'd be hell yeah right and deserve he's come now he's going to save us from this hell and we're going to live again and breathe again and we'll forget the jungle and then we'll go back next season then maybe the maybe there will be jobs for the veterans maybe we won't be forgotten maybe i've taken this too far now um so we've got another question here uh wj14 says have you enjoyed the past two weeks with no games and the constant maybe good maybe shit conversations or are you looking forward to getting back to the games and confirming it one way or another I'll be up for another week, Rick.
44:02Yeah. That would be four weeks of half of all. I mean, I've forgotten what it feels like to feel really good. After the Liverpool game, that was about peak. And the Atletico Madrid, you're like, oh, we're fixed. But it's not normal what we're going through. No, I'm kind of ready to go back now. You know, at the end of the season, I can't fucking wait to the end of the season. and I can't wait to stop traveling to London each week and this and that. And you're like, fucking hell, thank God. And then it goes two weeks. And then on the third week, you're like, I can't wait till August. Protein is now at Starbucks and it's never tasted so good.
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45:09I can't wait until August until it kicks off again and you get a renewed energy for it. And at the moment, obviously seeing Deserby, the type of football he plays, seeing the training videos, hearing wisps in the paper that the players are excited. Some of the players are excited. I heard the wisps. Yeah, I know. And some of them are like looking forward to the training sessions and everyone's getting involved and there's a bit of hype. And, you know, so it just, maybe I'm just, I don't know, just wanting to believe, but it has given me a renewed sense that I think that we are going to go on. Well, it's just, you know, the players are excited to play under De Zerbe.
45:56They're excited about his brand of football and his training methods as well. Whispers. Whispers. Whispers. The best training session in the history of Tottenham I've had. Yeah. Those whispers. Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. There's a couple of them just walking around in directions, not sexual at all just engorged to the point where they just took so much information on that there's no room for the information to go in their entire bodies that just went to their dick. What's off with an erection? When Speaky said earlier Information erection. When Speaky said earlier and he was talking about something and then he said and when we're safe as soon as he said the word safe when we're safe I'm like oh my god what the fucking hell happened there?
46:40What was that? that's the sound of my erection I got an erection when uh Speaky said that we're safe where's that coming from I don't know I've got a little but I can actually create a soundboard for the pod I'll never do that I'll never do that uh got a question here from uh Joshua Almeida says did you make ben go on the overlap so you didn't have to answer the deservey questions if so well done you've played it brilliantly uh categorically i don't make ben do anything he's his own man all his successes are his own i couldn't make it because i had a job in listen to this i couldn't i had a job in london which i've sort of worked out that if i was up in manchester i couldn't get back down to london in good time to do the job so i was like ben i can't do it if you fancy the overlap and they call you i'm not available so i'm just giving you a heads up yeah so obviously they called ben and he was like yeah i'll do it ben was also booked for the job that i had in london so i decided not to do the overlap he decided to take my place on the overlap and we'd both been booked for the job in london at 4 30 who was waiting an hour and a half for ben to make it back from the overlap what a legend me oh I turned the overlap down before this job Ben was like no I can do both and then I had to wait an hour and a half why did you have to wait an hour and a half because Ben it took Ben ages to get back from fucking the overlap when I knew there'd be issues getting back I had the foresight I had the foresight Ricky you should have just gone ahead with that job did you need but you should have just cancelled it it wasn't I mean I cancelled the job no cancelled Ben you just gone ahead hadn't done it yeah took ben's pay as well i thought he was i thought the reaction to his what he said was pretty harsh i don't want to bring it up again there's no point but he's just making a point it was like why does everyone have to pile on to just the point that someone's making ridiculous and i would happily have filled in any questions about deserve you on the overlap or anywhere else um and what else have we got someone said here why do my balls smell of balls even after I've washed them?
49:09Interesting. Don't know. You haven't washed them. Yeah, definitely not mate. I don't think it's the end of the world. No? No. Your balls smell a bit of sweaty balls. Yeah. That's what they're supposed to do. Pete says Hey Flav can you eat a full cake on your own or do you share stay away from the vecos uh so pete sent me my i met my brothers for easter my bro my wife my wife jesus my brother's wife um she's a cake maker that's what she does for a living and pete had paid for a cake for me from my sister-in-law oh and they came and showed me the cake and on it it says stay away from the vecos which is like the thinly veiled joke that i might run in front of one if spurs don't get better what and you got a cake for it was this guy just paid for a cake for you yeah it's nice isn't it that's nice yeah um yeah it's uh yeah it was a lovely thing so thank you very much pete legend um bro heinous he says i like many of my fans been conflicted with the hiring of conflicted with the hiring of r d z but i need to know did your cock move a tinge after watching the first training session to.
50:23We already answered that. Yeah. Twitched. Twitched. Global and genuity. He says, do you ever consider packing it all up and calling it a day? It must be tough at a time to continue to do this. Nah. People listen definitely carry on doing it. It's not a real job, is it? Talking about Spurs for a living. It's very lucky. So, no, definitely not. It's harder to do. Do you know what I mean? Like a couple of wins and be buzzing. Be front flipping to the office. But it's tricky to do do you find it harder talking about spurs rick or do you find um do you find there's a kind of lever of cathartism to doing podcasting to this day definitely the latter sometimes when ricky turns up i can see on his face after a bad result he's just there's nothing there we haven't won in 2026 mate like honestly it's like we won in champions league doesn't fucking count yeah it doesn't we're gonna win it so it doesn't count and uh I don't know how many games we've won at home this season.
51:23Two. There you go. So, yeah, it's tough. It's tough, Gary, at times, right? When I get a message saying, pod, question mark. Pod. Oh, fucking hell. I have noticed that there is a sort of waning enthusiasm in the group now. And I appreciate it. I get it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So God bless everybody. God bless you, Spook, for turning up today. I know Spook's got now like a high-flowing job that he likes, prick. Yeah. He's got a job that he enjoys. So... It's not all my time. Stop recording at 11 o 'clock on a Tuesday, mate. It's just a cheeky little 8 o 'clock evening pod, and I might be on it before.
52:08What am I saying? Oh, God, no. If the question was, if Spurs were in this situation, we're losing, but you have to record at 8 o 'clock every night, with my enthusiasm weighing then I'd be like yeah alright maybe not I'm getting ready for bed I'd happily be bed my key like prime bedtime is like 9.30 quarter past 9 if I can get away with it I got in bed quarter to 9 last night well what's yours then 10 10 o 'clock when I'm working I reckon I'm up at like 5 half 5 listen to this little creature's plant that have sleep and had a bit quarter past 12 half 12 you're a fucking piece of shit Ricky hold on what Say that again.
52:45Exactly. I go to bed about quarter past 12, half 12. Every single night. Yeah. He feels like he's cheating himself if he goes to bed too early because he loses, he needs his me time. Yeah, my downtime. So what time do you wake up? Quarter past six. Listen to that. Fuck me. He's not going, he's going to bed at quarter past 12, Spook. How long does it take to get down typically? Half an hour maybe, 45 minutes? No, I'd probably say within 15 minutes, easy. I don't care what you're saying, Rick. I'm asking you to speak to. Oh, sorry. Yeah. Yeah, if I'm tired, mate, I can go down within half an hour, but normally it can take me fucking hours.
53:21Like, it's not good. So you have a sleeping issue, whereas Ricky doesn't. Yeah, yeah. He's only giving himself six hours a day, which is not enough, I don't think, Rick. No, it's not. I think you'd feel better if you put yourself to bed at 10. Yeah, I would. But the thing is, my fucking kids are still up, fart-assing around, and I can't bloody, I feel like I can't go to sleep if my kids aren't. Until they're gone. Yeah, until they're gone. you know what i mean it's so strange the person who would always his wife has always think that if he was out of eyesight he'd be masturbating it's almost like he was listening to this podcast because he's just messaged me out of nowhere really in months just says hi can you stop talking about me on the podcast oh i know who he is now i thought yeah okay right okay i don't know what you said don't you hate it actually when someone starts a whatsapp conversation with hi Flav or hi Ricky or hi Nick and but they don't just ask what they want they wait for you to reply they're waiting to get to you basically why do that once you respond you're in the conversation I mean what happened he talked to this guy he knows that we've spoke loads Carl Finley says when you're watching matches at home what should go to drink and snack choices does Valerie make lovely little sandwiches I never eat ever eat while the football's on ever no people sit down with a roast dinner while the football's on like what what kind of animal does that anything at all yeah imagine what sitting down with a full Sunday roast nah no or the football's on and the dinner's being plated up and so you sit down at a table and you have to watch the football at a diagonal nah no do you know what my dad does fucking psychopath listen to this if the food's made and it's on the table he'll pause the live game and come back to it and unpause it oh god no way sometimes right I'll go out for a wee and he'll pause it and then I'll come back and it's like pause and I was like dad what are you doing and he goes I paused it because I didn't want you to miss anything oh bless him no it's lovely but I ain't you my phones we've got fucking phones dad they ping and shit just fast forward it I don't care what I've missed.
55:39In fact, I'm glad I missed some of it. Fast forwarding, get out of my life. Get it out of my life. Oh, bless him. I know, he's a legend. A foremost, but a legend. I never, never eat. Never. And I barely drink. I'm not sitting at home kicking back, drinking a few cold ones. What, you're not having a beer? Watching the game sober is almost impossible for me as well. I need a drink. A rum or just an ice cold beer, depending on the season. Have to. Beer is like a celebration. I think rum's coping. Yeah, yeah. That's a good point, actually. Yeah. Yeah. Sometimes Valerie will bring veggie burgers at halftime, maybe.
56:30If we're winning, I might quickly eat them, but typically. But you know I've got this ongoing problem with Valerie at the moment. do if you heard about this she just don't understand I don't want to talk about Lego 10 minutes into a Champions League tie I don't I don't want to talk about that I wish you could hear this so I could say honestly to you I don't at that moment care about the lining of the curtains I don't honestly there's nothing worse than watching your team lose the ball in the final third and then break the opposition break you're like your heart's in your mouth but you can hear, you know, have a properly seasoned a Brussels sprout.
57:13Yeah, I mean, I can improvise. My missus, all daughters, they know I'm watching Tottenham. They can hear noises in the front room, right? They know something's going on, right? And then it'll be, they'll come down to go to the kitchen, but then they'll put their head in the front room to look at the score. Oh, Dad, how we get, oh, we're losing 1-0. Did you need to say that? You can fucking see where your eyes were losing 1-0. Yeah, what are you doing? Do you need to repeat it, Dio? Just get the fuck out of my front room. What's the score? You can see it. It's been like this on Sky for 20 years.
57:44The score is in the top left-hand side of the screen. You can see it, make your opinions, whatever it is, but keep them inside and just leave the room. You don't need me to tell you the score. Oh, how's it going? I told you my mum. She was so upset. She thinks like, I think she thinks I'm going to be in, if spurs go down, I'll be financially ruined. I told her that she saved up 200 quid in the savings account. And she offered it to me. Oh, God. I'm like, you fucking idiot. What am I going to do with 200 quid? What am I going to do with 200 quid, mum? No, I didn't really. She genuinely offered it.
58:22And I was like, you are so lovely. Oh, bless her, man. I know, she's lovely. I don't know. In fact, maybe it was like a weird joke. I'm not sure if I couldn't quite tell. But yeah, she's a legend, mum. All right. Let's do one more.
58:41Big Andrew Myra is not Australian fan. I fell in love with Bal and Modic and the rest of the squad all those years ago and have been an avid supporter since. Perhaps not as diehard as you lads, but I feel it's even all the way down here. But how can this club be truly fixed? The coach after coach after coach, changing philosophy, philosophy changing players changing the face running the club and getting the blame poch coming back i don't see as a real solve even though he gave us some of the best times of our lives and coming in top for me personally of course but seriously v night and land out then what a new style a new set of staff it's really rough out there to imagine the world where we bounce back stronger whether we go down or not i love spurs and you two a class i should mention also the boo boo ben boo man um and that's saying you to a class because i said both you guys are going to be on the podcast so oh yes that's a lovely thing good uh i mean i think the key thing about that is that the idea of pochettino ever returning to spurs is likely done now i'd imagine did you see a lot of the news coming out yesterday how's that what's he saying there's quite quite a few uh quotes from uh spurs aggregators and stuff and it was that very much so of the wanting to go for a new coach roberto deservey and that poch was discussed internally but senior management or some senior management weren't keen and didn't want poch because it's a throwback to the Levy era.
1:00:16So they didn't want to go for Poch. And even though they knew it was going to be a quick win, that they didn't want to go down that route because it's a throwback to Levy. What they need, all of them need to understand is we don't care what you think, right? When you listen to the fan base, it's not about Levy. We don't look at Pochettino and think Daniel Levy. In fact, we look at the positives that Pochettino had at Tottenham-Motspur and we think that he did those in spite of Daniel Levy. What can he do with your support is how we could review this. Yes, yes, yes. It's too late, you've gone for the Zerbi.
1:00:53Yeah. That's how I feel about it. Yeah, same, exactly the same. Like I've said many times, mate, things really change when the club is sold. there's no guarantees yeah of what that looks like but i think we've earned that risk of finding out what it would be like with new ownership it could be fucking worse right and knowing tottenham it probably will be but we need we kind of need we need we need that disconnection from the the history of of levy and the history of enic and and trying to fix things even now it's about doing things the right way not the way levy did it it's still in the shadow of everything that's been built up and for all the good that he did obviously he was very much distorted with what he what he thinks success looks like you know like fucking the stadium hotspot away all this stuff amazing well done mate but it's football it's the football it's always been the football and you haven't got that these guys are coming in and they're trying to make out that they get it it's to football, but so far they've fumbled the bag badly.
1:02:05I'm glad the little leg's gone though, isn't you? Hey? Yeah, yeah, without a doubt. That was the first step, right? Like, what is life like after Daniel Levy? And I think you might, again, you might have said it, I mean, a few people have said this now, probably just copying you, but the vacuum left by Levy is the thing that's crippled us because he did so much. Everything went through him, and now you've got a bunch of people that can't make decisions because they don't have faith in their own decision making whereas levy did not give a fuck he'd make the decision whether you liked it or not and you could respect him for that but yeah it all comes back down to new ownership it's like a clean slate and maybe just for us to believe that everything that the club does outside of football really does feel like it's for the football whereas we don't really we never believed that with levy all the concert money f1 track whatever else it's like like Tottenham Hotspur is this entertainment entity.
1:03:02And there's that guy that cancelled his TED Talk or whatever the fuck it was, that was going to talk about that as we've transcended football. We're not a football club anymore. So what the fuck are you talking about? What guy cancelled his TED Talk? What do you mean? There's this guy, it wasn't a TED Talk, but there's a guy that works at Tottenham that was going to talk about marketing and talk about the sports economic of modern football. So a football club has to be more than just a football club, that kind of thing. I forget the guy's name. If I knew his name... What's he got to do with Spurs?
1:03:40He works for Tottenham, right, Rick? He did a podcast, yeah. It was interesting. The one with the yellow logo. Yeah, there you go. I think the lad who did that interview, he listens to the podcast. I think Ben Bowman knows or goes for Spurs with him sometimes. And it was quite a heavy podcast, but we're much more forward thinking as a club. Mate, I'm not saying that isn't necessary. It is. We're never going to... Okay, relegation aside, we're never going to be threatened by the finances, right? we fucking make a lot of revenue and we could make even more revenue if we were champions league every season and we were competing for the title i don't know why this really obvious thing is is not the priority and hasn't been the priority for this football club as much as they say so they've never done enough to prove it like become a juggernaut in football and the revenue will spike even more you will make even more money through merchandise and marketing and sponsorships and winning fucking trophies.
1:04:48Make that the priority and then we forget about that history and we won't bother about you have to sell the club. But again, we're in that... There's too much going on, man. No wonder we're all fucking exhausted. There's just so much with Spurs. It's not just who we're playing this week. Are we going to win? Probably. And then you move on to the next game. I want us to be a bit fucking boring for a little bit so we can just stabilise the experience. but that's not really going to happen, is it? Because it's just not in our nature to be boring. Anyway, I'm old school spooky. I'm just going off on one here.
1:05:26I think actually this period, certainly in the short term with the Zervi, is actually going to be quite exciting. I think the kind of brand of football can only demonstrate one thing and that will be sort of in keeping with the brand of football we expect at Spurs, which is front foot going after the game and not being afraid. whether it's sustainable I don't know I kind of often for some reason Robbie Keane's been coming into my mind quite a lot in that he was a striker of obvious talent who bounced around football clubs without ever finding a home until he came to Tottenham and become one of the best that we ever had top 10 for sure maybe top 15 but he just went to Inter Milan he was at Coventry he was at Leeds Wolves and was sort of great wherever he went without ever being able to leave his imprint anywhere fair enough.
1:06:15Maybe Deserby will be able to do that at the time. All right. Nice one. If you want to hear more from Ricky and I, you can go and listen to Lads Anonymous, which releases every Monday. It does. It does indeed. And Spook, he's moved into much more sort of highbrow sort of fashion type malarkey. So, I don't know what you want me to say. Periodically find me on this podcast on a bank holiday maybe. next bank holiday right okay so next time you see Spooky it'll be in a year or so or Beaver Town at Tottenham if you wanna yeah why don't you go actually that is a great thing why don't you go to meet Ricky and Spook at Beaver Town before any gay home game good one Spooky you fucking bad end the moment I said it mate I looked at you and thought fuck what have I done right good bye bye
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We’re back with Spooky making a rare appearance and it quickly turns into therapy. We talk De Zerbi, whether we’re already down, and why a 12 minute training video has us believing again. There’s debate over Romero, summer rebuilds, and whether any of this club actually makes sense anymore. Same chaos, same hope, same Spurs.
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