S16E17 - Reasons To be Positive

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1:29it's a fight in cock it's a fight in cock oh come on that's what would be good about it sorry i thought you'd see the countdown as i pressed it i should have waited till you stopped speaking because uh that's generally how conversations work i just hit record i don't know why just thought let's get this shit show on the road yeah uh john bass mark nesbitt how you doing boys yeah good good good how are you uh i'm all right i'm all right i i've had you know sometimes when things are going badly and i still contest that things are not going that badly although we haven't got to go in four games now it's fucking horrendous probably our worst start in premier league since i don't know time began and we got relegated whatever it might be um i do feel like we're moving the right direction but i've been given the right direction but but i kind of gave that opinion after the game and I just realized sometimes people don't want to hear it like even if you feel like they you're going in the right direction people don't want to hear it after not scoring for another game in the Premier League and they don't they sometimes it's fine for people just to wallow in in their their their annoyance situation and it's you don't want to hear some sort of cocky podcaster telling the world what they think also you don't have to listen to it yeah so up to you guys that's that's the easiest way to get around it is you know like don't don't listen i mean do listen because oh yeah 100 listen if everyone was like oh yeah good point let's just pay it off don't moan about it yeah but i hear you mate because i'm the same i always give my actual like what i'm actually thinking at any given moment is what i'll talk about on this pod or any other pod right i actually just give my honest view i'm not trying to like wind people up or or or the other way right get people to just kind of like dismiss their own emotions so if you are feeling fuming about the situation that's completely fair i'm not trying to change anyone's mind by the way i personally am dealing with it but it is an interesting thing when people i think like people when things are going really well and i'm like well you know maybe that's not good because x y and z it's like you're a twat because you don't agree with me and when it's the other way around it's like you're a twat you don't agree with me so we don't have to agree like we don't actually have to agree we're all experiencing the same thing it was a goalless draw at home you can see that as like points dropped or you can see it as points gained you can see it as like progress and maybe we're improving you can see it as like we're absolutely shit and we're going nowhere like both those things can kind of be true and wrong at the same time and that's fine it's like it's fine but there's no there's no point in like turning on each other that's the one thing i i think is really interesting about this situation is regardless of which way you fall whether you go mental or you're like oh this is okay we're not in control of it the players and deserve you're in control and it's just whether or not you're prepared to give them a bit of time i've landed on the place and i don't know what you boys are thinking where i i have massively re-evaluated my own expectation i went into this season with the transfer window and thinking about spurs as this like club part of the big six has been in europe for you know 18 out of the last 20 seasons thinking right now we've spent this money we're just back there like immediately it'll be champions league worst case scenario might be like top six actually that doesn't make any sense right remove yeah if you remove your Tottenham hat from it and just look at it.

5:11Any team that's finished 17th twice, even if they spend 400 million, and especially if they get rid of 12 players and bring in a new 12, that's going to take some time. That's just the logic of life. And so I'm trying to reapply that and just think, okay, well, then that's going to take some time. How long realistically is it going to take? If you look at it over the course of a season, I'm like, well, it's probably going to take us like 10 games, isn't it? Which is like quite a lot. out of basically, let's call it 40 games, right? 38 games, but 40 games. So it's like a quarter of the season we're going to have to basically give up before we can really get started.

5:48And so I'm looking at that thinking, right, I'm just going to give it that before I start doing anything because it's too draining to just be like, we need to be in the top four. Why aren't we winning every week? Apart from winning games, what's the most exciting thing that happens in football? Streakers. Streakers. Streakers. female streakers or male whatever fights it's signing players it's signing players that's what it is right and we sign so many and it ain't about it's not often about the quality of the player it's about the number you get through the door that's the most exciting thing you look at them going Mahmoud Xavio Fernandes Tonali Van Hecker Robertson they're just fucking falling out we've never had a window like that as a Spurs fan and that creates legitimate and palpable tangible excitement and you're carrying that excitement into the new season, despite the fact that there has been multiple examples previously, and we all knew this, I knew this, and I have still said fifth, sixth, fourth, I said third, but I might have said, right?

6:50I knew that there were examples where massive transition, massive upheaval in squad has generally a negative impact, even if the vision overall about these players is correct. Time will tell if that's the case. I just keep looking at Liverpool, you know they won the league and then spent 400 million pounds which apparently was fine for them to do that and not fine for us uh and then had one of their worst seasons in which they lost their manager at the end of it so there is no guarantees in football but still at 45 years old who you know i've been watching spurs since the the late 80s and i understand the game and i understand my football club I couldn't stop myself in fact my subconscious wasn't even telling me to worry about this because I was so over I was so blown over by the the volume the amount and and I'd still say ambition of the club this summer and so now four games in and we haven't scored a goal drawn at home, won away and we got beat by Brentford and Newcastle.

7:57It doesn't look good on paper but I've seen, I've definitely seen, I think this is an objective statement, an improvement game on game. Mark, how are you? Yeah, I mean, I agree with all of that. You know, we sat here not so long ago with Alex and I was saying I'm definitely seeing improvements and so on. I think there is still improvements. I don't know if I saw as much of an improvement in the Everton game, but I think there's something in it when De Zerbi talks about the psychological block and that kind of mental hurdle that is almost that last thing we need. I mean, I will say the XG numbers don't look great, right?

8:47So the underlying numbers, and if you're talking about teams like Liverpool and so on, Liverpool had a bit of a funny, chaotic start as well. But their numbers look slightly better than us. I do think there is something to that kind of mental thing. We just need to get it over the line. And then I think things will start to kind of easen up. But that's not something De Zerbi has created. That was already there before he came in. And I think that the really big context in kind of, if you talk about these, but if you kind of caution it wider and you talk about your Chelsea's and your C's as well, because we've all had similar in some ways, new manager, all quite sort of young managers with fresh ideas, modern managers, high spends and so on.

9:35there's a lot of similarities. The big outlier is obviously us where the sort of behind the scenes that kind of football infrastructure context is completely different. I mean, we were in disarray and have been for a while whereas the other three clubs have had and certainly City who have hit the ground running. He's won every game, Resco. So I think that's one of the big things here that you can't really put a finger on and in a podcasting way it's very boring. But I think that's the big context. And that's the big difference, really. So I'm still, he's got a lot of work to do still. Like we need to create a lot more.

10:16But, you know, it's also, it's a tough hand he's been dealt, not just in terms of all that, like I said, the behind the scenes stuff, but also just, we just can't seem to keep players fit. More injury news today and so on. So it's just, it's challenging. And I think it's just going to be tough. I think like John, you said, 10 games. I think it might be double that until we start to see some consistency. You know, like I think if by Christmas we can see his kind of philosophies being stamped on the team, then I think he's done all right. We need to score goals. That's right. But I think he is starting to get his ideas across.

10:57I think we are seeing a lot of deserbi-isms and a lot of deserbi-ball. certainly in defence and in midfield high possession, baiting opposition all that kind of stuff, the build up and so on it's just that the final third just isn't really there, it hasn't really clicked yet but that's also the hardest thing in football is to score goals that's why it wins your game but again we'll talk about Liverpool and obviously that's a cup game soon so I don't want to jump ahead here in your podcast but like I think we need to get we need to put all eggs in that basket every game now is a must win I don't think we can sit here and go cup games because the cup game league game is more important or anything like that like we have to just we have to start scoring goals and winning games and then things will start to look better can you make can you just see is your mic on?

11:50yep no I know it's on is it is it on? is it connected? can you scratch it for me please? on to scratch yeah alright Could you just talk into it? That would be amazing because it's yours. One, two, three, four, five. It sounds exactly the same. Don't worry. It's fine. I'll sort it out in post. Yes. Yeah. I mean, obviously, going away to Liverpool, it'd be great to see a good performance. But going away in the League Cup at this stage where we're trying to sort stuff out, I agree every game is important. And we haven't got enough games to play, really, given the fact there's no European fixtures at all.

12:30Game time, players playing together will build chemistry and confidence and an understanding of each other's game. I fought against Everton while I was impressed overall and we had lots of good individual performances. Where it broke down was an understanding of each other. There was a moment where, I can't remember, it might have been Tosin or Van Hecker. Marmouche was in acres of space and the ball was misplaced or he didn't get the ball and he was very frustrated. That sort of stuff will become less of a commonality, if that's a word, when these players have played together. It's like chemistry.

13:09It can't be created on a training pitch. It has to be created through drills on the training pitch that play out in real match scenarios. And I think it will, I'm almost certain it will come. I was just thinking about some of the individual performances there I thought Van Hecker had an outstanding game I thought Bentancourt again was excellent Tenali was much, much better Archie Gray had probably his best game at right back in a Spurs shirt certainly in that first half and the first 20-30 minutes you just thought there's no chance we're not putting that ball away at some stage in a Premier League season where no one other than sort of whole is super compact.

13:53We made and forced Everton into that position.

14:00And I know ultimately that the result is what dominates narrative. But if we're watching our games, as Spurs fans, we're watching it. We're watching every minute of every game. You can see the highlights and see the performances from specific players. and you can hold on to those performances as improvement. No doubt the final third was a massive issue. I think Marmouch didn't work off the left, not to say we can't play him there, it's just he had a bad game. Or not a bad game, he had an average game. He just kept going past the player but overrunning it. And that probably is in part because Everton was so compact and defended so well that any kind of mistouch means that they'll pick it up because they've just got the bodies around the edge of the box.

14:50Solanke was okay again in the first 30 minutes, but pretty much out of the game. And I think it's difficult for him, to be fair, because, like I say, when Everton defenders are crowding him out, when Braithwaite and Tarkowski are having the sort of games that they had, part of the Zerbe's football is to play that ball into the centre forward for him to pull off his defenders and then lay off to one of his fellow forwards. And it worked when he had the energy, but when the energy started to dip, Everton had control. And again, Slanky isn't a player who's fully fit and up to speed. He hasn't been fit pretty much for a year.

15:33So yeah, the system is working. It's just we get to the final third and we came up against a low block that was very difficult to play against. and by the way even if you're playing superb football if you come up against a defense that played as well as Everton's did you'll find it difficult even if you're on top form so there's lots of caveats to reasons why we didn't win that game that's where I'm at and Fernandes in the 10 didn't work as well either that was the other criticism I had but yeah I think um like Mark made the point like the hardest thing in football is to score goals and there's varying degrees of how hard that is in any given game and like you just said Flav like teams who sit in really really deep that makes it even harder to score goals and one of the like sort of tried and tested ways to do that is to try and play quick intricate balls in and around one touch passes to kind of get round and get through the lines right if you try and go out wide and just pepper balls into the box they've got loads of men in the in the middle they're going to head it away so you kind of have to like penetrate those lines and that comes from like quick one touch one or two touch passing in around the box you can't plan for that you can't train for that you don't know whether players going to line up that does come from understanding and players being creative in that like final third and to a certain extent you know there's like pep sort of early man city teams who were just like they would play like a set routine of like trying to switch the ball from one side to the other until they could create space and try and deliver cutbacks and all that kind of stuff but generally speaking it comes from like creative spark in that final third and there were like lots of attempts at trying to do that right that's what we were trying to do but that's only going to really work and be in a position where you can kind of rely on it to some extent with a proper understanding from those players and they just haven't played together that much i mean we've basically had i don't know what the exact stat was but something along the lines of like it's the most changes to a spurs team start of a premier league season in terms of like every games had x amount of changes yeah and we know why because obviously some of that was you know injuries players come back from the world cup etc but if you're trying to gel a team the one thing you don't want to do is make changes all the time and i think there's part of it has been enforced because of like injuries and world cups and part of it is he's still trying to work out what's the best combination and how that's going to potentially look and feel and once he's sort of maybe landed on okay i think this is the best one then you still got to run that for like three four five games in a row to actually like see if that will will work and then you adjust from there and this is what i mean like i know that would always have been true but i just didn't consider it properly at the start of the season when i was going it's only really arsenal i've got a settled team maybe we could maybe we could have a pop at the title here like in real terms that's not the way it's going to play out and we've been provided with evidence now we we're not we're not absolutely shit like i don't i don't look at us and think oh god this is absolutely dross this is absolutely terrible i look at this and think this is a back five which has been the only part of the team that has been settled pretty much right that is keeping clean sheets and look solid you've got your center back in van hecke who looks like our but currently our sort of best player or one of them improving it all the time and then you've got like a midfielder which again hasn't settled can't figure out where to quite fit them those three in because ben's a cause just started the season so great when we all thought it'd be we don't have a natural 10 and so then and then the front line it's like well where do we get how do we fit them in to get the most out of what we got so the one bit that's the most settled is performing the best the next one that's the next best settled is performing the next best and the one that's performing the worst is the least settled if you just look at it from a logical point of view it's like just give that a bit of time for him to figure those bits out and i think that will that will come building a foundation a bit of times is four games four games in the premier league and and you can't say oh well no actually he's been here since uh whatever it was april may because we've made there was so much change in the summer so you have to give him time like people are talking about is there pressure on deserve absolutely not that is mental if you're if your solution to this situation is sack the manager after what we've done in the summer and all of that upheaval if it is right now i know people are disappointed but if the reaction is sack the manager you are out of your mind yeah no i'm not saying in the ground in in the fullness of time you wouldn't be correct but in the fullness fullness of time you might be absolutely incorrect you might and we might have missed out on what could be an incredible incredible season or several seasons in the future.

20:16You know, the only opportunity, the only possible candidate, if you're, it's not even worth talking about, but it's Pochettino. If he's available and it's not going well at the end of the season, then all right, something like that might be a conversation to have. But right now, give him a fucking chance. You can already see. So if you look at the, and, you know, Mark's much more into statistics than I am. But I am growing to, because they sort of suit the agenda I have currently. But we had, do you know how many touches we had in the opponent's box against Everton? Just offhand. You don't have to get it right.

20:57It doesn't matter. 25. We had 39 touches. That's a lot. Do you know what the Premier League average is? 25. 25. It's 25, right? So you've had sort of 40 % more touches than the average in the Premier League. Tottenham's average last season was 24.8, something like that. So we've made 39. And it doesn't matter if you don't score a goal, but we are getting the ball into the position. We are getting the balls into the final third consistently. The build-up is working. It's working. The evidence is there that it's working. The reality is that if we'd have scored a goal, we just won 1-0, this would be a completely different conversation.

21:40And so often, everybody, not just fans because we're emotional about our own football club, but pundits and Sky Sports and fucking Talk Sport and all of them, they don't talk about the performance, they talk about the result. And it's such a reductive way because you're not understanding whether or not a team's moving forward. And I know this to be the case because through some of the work that I do, I'm confronted with these conversations all the time. Surely De Zerbi must have scored a goal. Surely De Zerbi must be under pressure. And like you have not watched a minute of Spurs this season, but you know that you can go to that stat of not scoring a goal and go, that's my narrative.

22:21That's all I have to say. And you know that the people you're talking to, and I do this as well about other football clubs, because I haven't watched a great deal of Crystal Palace this season, right? If someone asked me a question, put me on the spot, I wouldn't fucking know. so you have to kind of phone some stuff in and kind of go with like a headline uh approach to things but the narrative shouldn't be is deserve you under pressure it is for total sport it is for sky sports but for us it shouldn't be that 39 39 touches in the box under thomas frank we were averaging three four five i don't know if that's 100 true probably sounds a bit low but You know my narrative.

23:00So that's good, isn't it? The buildup's good. Defense is good. Two clean sheets. One away from home, one against Everton. Everton unbeaten. Before the season even kicks off, soccer fans are already making predictions. Who wins the league? Who qualifies for Europe? And who's lifting the trophy at season's end? On Calci, America's number one prediction market platform, you're trading against peers in a live market, meaning there's no house. And as the probability changes, you can buy in and out of your position. For a limited time, download the CalShe app and use code cup 26 to get$10. When you trade 10 K a L S H I CalShe trade, the beautiful game 18 plus only restrictions and eligibility requirements apply.

23:37Event contract trading involves risk and may not be suitable for all investors. Prices, values and available markets may differ from those mentioned. For more information, see calshe.com slash regulatory. Van Heger looks like the best progressive passer in the league right now. Every time he gets the ball, I think something's going to happen weirdly from Saturday. So good. but like I but then I like I sit and I go on about it it's actually a bit reductive because he's he's just he's a really good footballer like some of the some of the ways that he would receive the ball like also just the way he makes people around him look better like I don't know if you've noticed it but Van de Ven looks like a better defender now like some of his the way he was receiving the ball as well some of his tackling like you know Van de Ven sometimes unfairly and usually mostly by non-Spurs fans, gets character bias as a bit of a one-trick pony, doesn't he?

24:32He's just a bit fast. He's just critical. He's a really, really good defender. He made some incredible saves in that Everton game, saves, tackles in that Everton game. And yeah, he's got raw pace, but he's much more than that as well. And I think we'll see more of him both under the Zerbi, but also with someone like Van Hecken next to him who will lift him. Whereas Romero is more of a, you know, he's a bit more of a kind of, I won't say selfish, but with Romero, a lot of it does centre around him. Like he doesn't really have the same kind of ability to lift people around him. But I think we're seeing that with Van Hecker.

25:09So he's been really excited. What I've seen, because I've been comparing him to Romero, one of Romero's best attributes has been able to find a player between the lines. but I don't think he did it as often as Van Hecker. And it's, you know, like people have, there's plenty of players have like a style of pass. Like Van Hecker's is on the, typically 90 % of the time on the button with pace just in front of the player that is receiving it. And it's consistently that way. You're almost disappointed when he can't fly in the player between the lines because obviously in this case, Everton are set up really well and he has to go to Van de Ven or he has to go to what was Archie Gray at the weekend.

25:53Because you're thinking every single time we can find space. And that's another thing we found is in between the lines, the first 20 minutes, Everton didn't know what the fuck was happening. There was two balls into, I think one was from Van Hecker actually, into Fernandes. He gets the ball, doesn't take it properly, takes another touch and in the Premier League, by the time that happens, you're caught up. You know what I'm talking about? He had acres of space. And that's pre-planning. He was there on purpose. Everton couldn't pick him up because of the work that had been done before. It's just that his execution, when getting into that final third, was poor.

26:29And that was the main criticism I had of Spurs at the weekend, was that the execution in the final third just wasn't there. Agreed. And that's the big thing that Zerb's got to sort now, right? and whether that's like he says is you know mentality or is it actually effort or is it ability I think it's a mix of ability and kind of mentality right like I don't think I think we just need to have the right players in the right position we've been trying a lot I don't know that Fernandes in the 10 is really the one it wasn't convincing was it I still think Mateus Fernandes is going to be if not the then one of the signings of the window I think he's a brilliant player but I don't think he's a 10 I think he was markedly better as soon as Madison came on I think he's the one that we need to play in that position but I don't think I'm just being Captain Hobbius again there

27:33Yeah I mean is everything I said do you agree with that John? Do you think am I being too happy clappy? Am I approaching this with too much positivity when we haven't scored a goal or? No, I don't think so, because like I said, I think obviously you can definitely look at it the other way, right? It's easy to go, well, this is all great, but we haven't scored and that's a major problem. I think we all agree that we need to score. We need to score. That would be good. But the way I look at it is like if you look at the game, the first, let's say, 20 minutes was complete domination by us. Was it an indication of the team we could become, do you think?

28:07Yes, and also I think it's an indication of what, put it this way, let's just say we score one in that first 20 minutes. The entire game then completely is set up for us to annihilate them. And that's like a 3 or 4-0 job. Because basically, if you don't score against them in the first 20 minutes, which is what happened, they do what they did. They just sit in, they build in confidence, and the risk is always that they're going to hit you on the counter and you're going to get done. And you'll end up losing 1 or 2-0, which is what happened against Newcastle. right they just sat in bided their time we couldn't break them down and then they had what they you know what they did what they did in the end the plan i think is like go out there and like get that goal and then they have to come out and once they come out then we have space in behind to exploit and it makes it a little bit like easier for our players to be a bit more kind of off the cuff versus like trying to relentlessly break down these like sort of two banks of four basically on the edge of their area and i kind of think about it remember like clop's liverpool team would do that all the time they just come out the blocks and it'd be just relentless for the first 20 minutes and they'd score and then teams would be like blown away and then they just sit off and then teams have to come out and kind of play and then there's just space for like Salah and Mane to run into and they've got these like you know very like physical midfield three at the time that were able to get around we're kind of set up to do the same thing but at this minute in time it's just that first 20 minutes we're not cutting through and that again I think comes down to understanding once you get to a point where when savio's beaten his fullback like he was doing relentlessly for the first 20 minutes he knows right let's say solanke frog he wants it wrapped at the front post just between the penalty spot and the six yard box i'm just gonna stick it there nine times out of ten because that's where he wants it to be or you know on the other side it's like oh well marmouche's playing left wing he likes to just hang at the back so i'll just hang one up every other one now all of a sudden you're like making decisions based on who you're playing with and it's not it's not just a case of like having to like look when you're moving at such speed a lot of the time if you like watch you know like top players are top sides when these players are going past but they're not looking they know they're aiming for an area they know that player's going to be in that position because there's an understanding there and i just feel like we don't have that so they are having to try and like do a little bit extra and at this level those percentages are what makes the difference you've got to take an extra like second to look what pass you're going to play, they're back at you or they can cover a cross or they cut it out.

30:36So it's those fine margins I think will come and that's when you'll see a different side. The minute we go 1-0 up in a game where we're blitzing someone for 20 minutes, I think we'll smash someone like 3-0 because they'll come out and they'll get done every time on the counter. We haven't seen any space in any of the games we've played basically for our players to exploit. We just haven't. And the only time we really saw that was that chance we had the other week where Mamouche just slotted it wide against Forest, where there was actual space in behind and Poro could pick a pass. And we were just in at goal.

31:10And so again, another day when he's not so rusty and he's up to speed, that's just bang, 1-0. And they've got to come out because they're at home. So I just think so much of this is just, and maybe this alludes to your earlier point around psychological barriers. Just one goal goes in when we deserve it, which is what we were doing against Everton, and maybe just opens up a whole different platform for us. What do you think of Savio's performances?

31:35Lovely sort of combinations with Gray down the right-hand side, first 20 minutes when we were really playing well. But I mean, the 1v1 take-ons are probably one of the most difficult things to successfully continually beat your man.

31:55Yeah, sorry, beat your man. 1v1 is a difficult thing, right? And he consistently does it, but does it with such skill and poise and beauty that I know there'll be question marks about his final delivery and can he find his man in the box? But I love him, man. I love watching him. I don't know if football's changed enough to appreciate a player like David Ginola anymore, but Savio reminds me kind of of him where he gets the ball and you're like, what is he? He just wants to make something happen. And so I've been super impressed with that. Even there was a moment on the touchline in second half, maybe.

32:35Maybe it was first half where he tried to do a dummy and go through the fullback. While it was a low percentage chance, if he had got through there, he'd been away. And it's that kind of bravery. And that's what Zerbi asked for, was bravery. And that's what you saw in that first half. There's a lot of bravery from the way we were trying to play. Just the final third where we started to be let down. um we're also up against ghana actually i've asked you a question and start to move past sorry savio boys what what do you make of his start to spurs

33:07yeah uh no i i'm i'm with you um i think he's exciting i think he everyone's like not everyone but a lot of people are like worried about this end product thing but he's 21 like he can that can be added later on um want you know Brendan Johnson had any product. Yeah. I suppose he did. How much did you fucking do? Did nothing. Nothing. So, yeah, I'm just excited by him. He gets you out of your seat, doesn't he? Like, as the old boys would say. And when we sort of start to get into a bit of a rhythm and we've got maybe him on the left and Kudas on the right, like, that is some good wing options there.

33:53There's a lot of quality there. So I'm not that worried about the end product thing. I think there's other players in the team that also need to kind of carry that. I think there was a lot of against Everton, and you're both right, in Everton defending deep and so on. But this isn't the best defending David Moyes side we've ever seen. But there was a lot of just players receiving balls with back to goal and then passing it back into midfield. and you just don't get that with Savio. Like he's forward phasing. You want to go forward and I fucking love that. As a fan, that's great. But also, like you said, for the Zerbi who wants to try and punish teams, that's exactly what we want.

34:39I still, I think there's Lois more to come. I don't think we need to be worried about it. John, I want to get your, if you were a manager of Spurs, I want to get your first 11 that you would play against Liverpool or whatever. If everyone was full of fit and there wasn't any other subtext to it, what our best 11 would be. But before you do that, I want to remind everybody that the Fighting Cock is sponsored by Saley. If we're on holiday or heading out abroad anytime soon, check out Saley. It's an easier map from the people of NordVPN. Basically, it means that you get mobile data in over 190 countries without getting hammered by roaming charges because that is what's happening right now.

35:17People are getting bent over by their charges and you don't have to. you can save money and protect your phone because there's inbuilt security and protection from NordVPN inside the Saley app. Just download the app, pick your plan before you go and you're good to go when you land. No messing around with SIM cards or desperately trying to find Wi-Fi, sex and misses. If you're out on a big lads holiday, like John has been on several this year, probably four or five, whereas Alex hasn't been on any. And so doesn't need Saley. But John, you know, I'm sure your wife is, I mean, you know, hankering for a phone call every now and then when you go abroad, when you went to Malta.