Andoni Iraola & the Premier League's Basque Revolution

0:02This is a Global Player original podcast. Football in this land is a little bit like a cartoon. Realistically, Haaland isn't going to go there. And this is the bit that's going to get clipped up when he does go there. And do you remember what Lisvigo did before the elections? Massive coma in Catalan newspaper sports saying, it's all a lie.

0:22Gabby:We're now in a situation where a fifth of the Premier League's managers next season will be bathed. You know, a lot of what I'm saying about the Basque culture feeds the Liverpool culture, no? So anyway, closest you've ever come to getting arrested.

0:47Welcome to the Sports Agents. Hello, chappers. Hi, Gabby. How are you? Very well indeed. So shall we just set out what we're going to be talking about predominantly today? and that is a Basque invasion of the Premier League.

1:00Gabby:I mean, in a slightly more friendly, in a slightly friendlier way than the noun invasion implies. But yeah. Jurajola has been confirmed as taking over at Anfield. Arteta has won the league with Arsenal. Unai Emery has brought European silverware to Villa Park and Xavi Alonso, which was something of a surprise to a lot of people, didn't go the Liverpool way. He's gone to Stamford Bridge. and that means 20 % of the Premier League is under Basque rule. I'm doing it again. You are. It's more and more aggressive. Climbing the ladder. I mean, Guillaume Balaguet will join us. Well, hopefully it'll be a friendlier chat than Gabby's implying at the moment.

1:42Gabby:But he will also talk about the Real Madrid presidency, which has gone to another level today. Today, in fact, one of the candidates claiming that a deal is in place to sign Erling Haaland, which has annoyed Manchester City, as you would expect. So Guillaume will shed some light on everything that is going on there. And you've already heard him in the background. You can probably see him if you're watching on YouTube. I do forget these shows are on YouTube. I haven't done my hair or anything. You're wearing your black jumper. Is that the same black jumper you wore for 10 match of the days in a row last season?

2:17Gabby:No, I mean, there are two things that are wrong there. I wore it for 34 days in a row. I wore it for every single one. And now it's a... A new one? It's not a new one. No, it's a golf jumper because I am... Oh, you're playing golf after that? No, I played early. Did you? I am that middle-aged cliche of playing golf before. You hit that point, yeah. I have massively... Congrats. Many people aspire to get to that level, yeah. The middle-aged cliche level. Yeah, yeah. 100%. Thank you. It's a pleasure. It's good to be here as well. You've not fully introduced me, but I'm here, yeah? You're just mumbling away in the background like Father Jack and Father Doug.

2:54I forget I'm supposed to say nothing. Excuse me. It's my bad, everybody. It's my bad. Nadim, you are always welcome, of course, and it's great to see you in person with Chappers. But today we're going to kick off with a Q &A. I popped some, well, I asked for some suggestions on social media from our lovely listeners, and they've sent some crackers in. A couple of really esoteric ones, actually, which we might get to. But the first from Jack Milton on Instagram, will there be, these are World Cup questions they're supposed to be about, right? It did go a bit left field with some of the questions, but this one.

3:26On the internet, no way, no chance.

3:28Gabby:You mean people didn't stick to the subject on your Instagram? Who would have thought? Jack asks, will there be any new tactical inventions by any coaches? And there are, and we've discussed this quite a lot in the Match of the Day office. I know you probably have two chapters in the Match of the Day office about the new rules. Darren Khan has kind of all season kind of touched kind of upon where things are going to change. Will that, do you think any of those rules lead to tactical changes from managers? I don't think so. I don't think so. Because I feel like a lot of the rules say, for example, the substitution one, you just got to be quicker and so on.

4:04So, yeah, there's a lot of time based ones. But I think the biggest thing for me about this World Cup will probably be the conditions and the nature of football that we'll see. because I think in probably calmer conditions overall, say if you're inside a dome or something, maybe you see a game with more light pressing, more sort of end-to-end type football. Whereas if you're playing and it's like 35 degree heat, I could see it just being not necessarily passive, but like probably not the most exciting game you're going to see. So I think the weather conditions themselves probably be a bigger factor in terms of a style of play for a game than say the rules here.

4:39Gabby:And that was very, to go back to the middle age point that was very much there for those of us who can remember the last world cup in america in 94 which had some i mean the republic of ireland seemed to play in the most ridiculous of conditions all the way through that world cup but back then if memory serves me right i don't think any of the games were indoors can you remember gabby i don't really recollect any of them being indoors i just recollect them all looking really hot and sunny wherever they played in that tournament and everything was in america and look there are going to be different conditions between east coast and west coast or south and north within vancouver to miami is i mean but this one is ridiculous is that i mean this is well we were just saying before we started recording gabby i mean you know england have got those two group two of their group games in Boston and New York, but then there is a chance that one of the knockout games in the last 32 or last 16 could be in Mexico City.

5:44Gabby:How on earth, and they're not the only country who are going to have this, how would you prepare for those two different things? You can't, can you? I think, I don't know, Nadam, as an athlete, you just have to take on the condition for that 90 minutes. As an athlete, it's terrific. Thank you very much, Gabby. Thanks. I'm glad everyone knows now. but yeah I think sometimes with football you'll say oh it's the same for both teams it's this is that you just got to figure it out but people's routes to the final for example are going to be so varied because yes you can be in Boston at Foxborough you can be in New York MetLife and say those three games are outside but then say you go to Mexico City and I think it's like over 2 ,000 meters elevation so how do you really prepare for that whilst also dealing with the other games as well I think it poses like this really tricky test and that's yeah I think with With altitude, you've got to be there for weeks before you're climatized, haven't you?

6:34Because I know when Kenny was playing against South Africa in Johannesburg, they decided, look, we're just going to go in and play the game. You know, we can't possibly do this. So it gets to halftime. He was playing at Ellis Park in Johannesburg, which is very, very high, up at altitude of about 2 ,500, 3 ,000 feet, I think. You go down the tunnel and it takes ages to get into the dressing room. And when he got in there, he said he couldn't breathe. and he grabs this oxygen canister and starts breathing into this oxygen canister. Didn't realise one of his teammates had asthma and it was brought in specifically for his team.

7:06Gabby:Oh, God. But joking aside, that's how bad, you know, it was that they were having to take on extra oxygen because it was just so hard. The conditions were so hard to breathe. But that, for Kenny, that whole tour would have been South Africa, wouldn't it? Yeah, but then some games were in Cape Town, you see. So then you're down at sea level and it's it's fine and then they played somewhere else durban or somewhere which is also by the sea right so you don't you don't have quite the impact you know at certain places so it's impossible when you're on a summer tour in rugby to acclimatize isn't it you come straight off the back of a season a bit like the footballers are now you go straight into like i saw marcus rashford going early to miami to train i'm not sure how much you know you can actually acclimatize and then it's I suppose it's not just the altitude side of things.

7:58You might be playing in Miami in certain type of conditions,

8:02Gabby:having just come from Atlanta, where you've played indoors in the stadium at Atlanta. Absolutely. To be honest, the more I think about it, the more we talk about it, the more I think this World Cup will be one where there's a surprise winner. Just because I feel like we're getting more of a level playing field now. Because in, say, perfectly, quote-unquote, fair conditions, the better teams, more often than not, will make it to those later rounds. but when things can vary so much maybe it's just the team that's most ready and prepared to suffer. We haven't really answered Jack's question have we?

8:31Gabby:Yeah nothing's going to change The other thing with all of that and again this isn't really answering his question is the first couple of weeks, I know we say this before virtually every World Cup but the first couple of weeks could be absolute bedlam I like Dave Lawrence's question and I'm intrigued so I'm going to ask it if it's alright The closest you've ever come to getting arrested Now, this is where I'm saying these questions went off piece slightly. But maybe what Dave is actually thinking about is the fact that we're heading into a country which has had a very well versed kind of philosophy on social media against its president and is going to be checking people's social media or potentially.

9:11I mean, I filled an Esther form in for somebody the other day and there's questions on there about whether your social media will be put up to scrutiny. Really? Yeah. Really? Yeah. Kenny and Ruben are going to watch Scotland Brazil and I did their Estas for them. I'm slightly worried for Kenny.

9:33So anyway, closest you've ever come to getting arrested. Closest I've come to getting arrested in the US was going to Disney years and years and years ago and trying to take the back streets back to the condo wherever we were staying at. it was dark and i was just driving back casually because i'm in no rush ever never in life am i in a rush no that's true yeah um and then all of a sudden flashing lights just appeared pulled me to the side spotlight into my mirror i am terrified terrified the person says i um i didn't stop at a stop sign never been more scared than all my life chapters i thought it's over i thought it's over but thankfully like i said they gave me a ticket which did you have your family in the car it was just me and my wife at the time but yeah i've never been never been

10:24Gabby:more terrified in all my life did you have mickey mouse ears on i don't know if i would have made it better or worse to be honest but it's the fact that it was in the it was dark the lights came on i pulled to the side and like i say this flashlight's just in my mirror so i'm being blinded by it mine could be less scaring or more opposite than that i was once had a big night out in fulham I think I had a Chardonnay too many let's say and I'd gone back to someone's house and there was a slight house party breaking out but it didn't seem to be mounting too much so I walked out in the street and there was a skip in the street and it had a ladder into it and for some reason I thought it'd be quite fun to go into a skip and just see what it was like to be in a skip and then a friend of mine decided to join me and we kind of sat there in this skip and then somebody on the road must have reported us because obviously there's two people sat chatting in a skip and the next police officer asked us what we were doing and um he said aren't you two from sky sports i don't think i was close to being arrested but i i did get i did get quite kind of worried that that might those were the days where you know the tabloids would have quite liked that story i would imagine though a skip in fulham is a slightly different oh there was also i mean i Probably a flower in it or something.

11:45It sounded like it had two armchairs and a table by the sound of it. Chesterfield. Go on, chappers.

11:52Gabby:Well, I did get arrested. When I lived in Paris, I got arrested for... Some bloke tried to start a karate fight with me. And before I knew it, the police had arrived and put us both in... Is there a mugshot of you going around France? No, I don't think there's a mugshot of me going around. No, but I mean, it helped my French no end, actually. At that stage, I would improve my legal jargon.

12:18Gabby:Stupidly, when you sort of have to phone to sort of get yourself out of it, I stupidly phoned my mum, which was probably the worst person to phone at the time. Instincts, though. Instincts, that's what you're going to do. I think you'd call that three degrees of arrest, those stories, wouldn't you? well yeah yours full of them in a glass of Chardonnay then made them with an actual sort of police which had his torture then me actually being in a cell who thought you'd be the criminal well not the criminal he wasn't convinced you thanks for that Dave I'm really glad you were we now know which one of the three of us is more likely to have a mug shot taken over the next seven weeks in the States don't we

13:09Gabby:I was then going to say like Hugh Grant, but Jesus Christ, I hope not. No, don't go down that road.

13:19Gabby:Moving on. Quick reminder that all of our past episodes are on YouTube, Global Player, or wherever you get your podcast. Make sure you subscribe or follow it and leave us a review while you're there. So we are moving on next to the Basque Country and finding out just why they are producing the top managers in the world at the moment. Guillaume Balaguet joins us. Guillaume, welcome to the Sports Agents. Before we get into Rayola, there is a story this morning which has piqued all of our interest. And it is around the presidential elections that are coming up for Real Madrid. And Enrique Riquelme has thrown the whole thing kind of wide open here with his claims that he's ready to bring Erling Haaland in from Manchester City.

14:01and they're now contemplating legal action over these claims. It's like another day in the ever unfolding drama of Real Madrid. How much truth, how much substance is there to this story, do you think? He also says that he'll give you his word, that Rodri is also coming to Real Madrid and he's going to announce before the elections on the 7th, the manager, which probably is going to be Klopp, or so he thinks. So basically, as you know, the elections in Spain for clubs that are owned by the season ticket holders, like Barcelona or Real Madrid, in these elections, they have two choices. They could talk about policies and what's wrong with the club and what they can improve, or just throw names around.

14:47And what Enrique Riquelme is doing is throwing two names that he's got confirmed and nobody's denied. Raúl as director of football, the legendary Raúl, and Hierro, Fernando Hierro, as director of the academy. So the idea is to make this Real Madrid more... a Real Madrid that looks like Bayern Munich, run by people that know what Real Madrid is about, instead of just by one single person, in the case of Florentino, which is, of course, the other candidate for the elections. When it gets to put in names that have got contracts to other clubs, again, two things happen. You can put those names out and really nothing is going to happen.

15:28If you win the elections, then you've got a lot of power and Real Madrid behind you to actually convince them. And I think that's what we're heading towards. If Enrique Riquelme wins the elections, which I very much doubt with the power that Valentino Pérez has, but he's making the elections quite interesting. And they are the first elections in 20 years. So if he wins them, then there'll be a call to Manchester City. and Manchester City will say no. And he will explain somehow that it's not going to happen, even though he said he would. So, you know, football in this land is a little bit like a cartoon.

16:03So as long as it keeps us entertained.

16:05Gabby:So is there still considerable backing for Perez, given the state of Real Madrid? Or are you suggesting that because he has this power already, he can be at his persuasive best to stay in power? Chaput, what's the state of Real Madrid that you're suggesting? They won the Champions League six times in the last ten years. They've got a new stadium. They had a bad year. Two. It's two years. It's two years and a disaffected fan base, don't they? Yes, I know what you're saying. And you can go even deeper than that, because Real Madrid perhaps is not the democracy that they would like it, that they're portrayed to be.

16:47is run by one man and his right-hand man, José Ángel Sánchez. And that's about it. So there is a lot you can say about a different alternative. But Florentino Perez has got a lot of contacts in the media, has got a lot of power. He's making life difficult to Enrique Riquelme, which means that he cannot just perhaps have the people that will vote from postal vote. He cannot have access to that. Florentino says he hasn't either. but being at the club allows him to just send, for instance, a postal vote with only his name in it. So he's trying to take advantage of his power in all different ways and he will probably win the elections.

17:29I think Riquelme is trying to win the next elections but this one is making a lot of noise. This just doesn't feel real to me at all. You know, like the elections, we're going to get this player, we're going to do this, we're going to do that. But then ultimately Florentino Perez has most of the power anyway. So what is the song and dance about? Why is Raquel May running against Perez this time? Is it just because Real Madrid have not won anything in two years, or is there more to it? There's more to it. There always is. This kind of thing that doesn't feel like something you or me would like to do, because it's a nightmare.

18:02But people in power, and sometimes they're not the ones put in the face, would like to take a piece of it. Because as Florentino Perez has shown through many, many years, more than two decades in the job. Paavo is very closely linked to those that sit in the stadium, in the VIP areas, and he chooses who sits in the VIP areas. For instance, I'm not implying anything, but when his company, his building company, was building a motorway in Turkey, he got Kedira Nozil for Real Madrid. Pure chance. He was building, his big company was building a motorway in Colombia, and he got Hamis Rodriguez. Few chance, maybe it is.

18:44But power is very close. Maybe you can get on board with HS2 then and you will get Sterling Haaland if you can finish that. What I don't understand though is if immediately Manchester City come out and say they're contemplating legal action, if Fabrizio Romano tweets that this is absolute nonsense, then that just discredits the candidate, doesn't it? And it's obvious he's just throwing names out there. So you'd think if you've got any kind of, you know, if you're wavering in your vote, you just think this is somebody who's just slightly disjointed and unhinged here in what he's planning. Do you remember how Florentino Perez won the elections by getting Figo, the captain of Barcelona, the icon of Barcelona, the symbol of Barcelona was about?

19:30he got Luis Figo to go to Real Madrid. And you remember what Luis Figo did before the elections? Massive coma in Catalan newspaper sports saying, it's all a lie. Oh. But equally, I mean, two-part question, really.

19:48Gabby:What could City take legal action over? And do you know if City's legal department is busy at the moment? listen you've got me in a corner there chappers you've definitely got me in a corner there in terms of what the legal stop it Gabby in terms of what the legal action could be I'm not 100 % sure but it just it kind of does feel ridiculous I think with the talk about how there's a release clause in his contract and this that and the other then Hoffinger and the agent are saying there's no release clause and so on it just feels strange but then also in the grand scheme of things for Real Madrid this is just my opinion It doesn't feel like Erling Haaland signing is going to solve a lot of their problems anyway.

20:29You know, we spent the last season talking about the issues, we'd say, having this whole team perspective, the attackers defending and so on and so forth. Let's just throw in another huge name, another huge ingredient into there. Just, you know, just figure it out as a team. But yeah, City are possibly occupied celebrating their successes of last season, Mark Chapman. And I'm sure there'll be availability for anything going forward. Nadeem is this the beginning of the unravelling of Pep's city though no Gabby stop it stop it you've just said yourself this guy's basically talking well to be fair Guillaume's trying to hint that maybe he's he's not talking sense but I'll say the Figo thing was a long time ago and I'm going to say that realistically Haaland isn't going to go there and this is the bit that's going to get clipped up when he does go there in August but I'm not a believer and I will stand on that

21:25Gabby:let's let's move on to Irola at Liverpool then but but just a wider one first Guillaume because we we've had a couple of discussions on Five Live recently about Irola and Alonso and the same represented by the same agency aren't they I think and this whole dynamic where now Liverpool waited to get rid of slot until Alonso was appointed at Chelsea. The fans were meant to be clamouring for Alonso and now they've got Ira Ola. How have you seen all of that play out? This is how it happened. Xavi Alonso would have been number one choice if Liverpool had decided to get rid of slot. At the time where Xavi Alonso was waiting for Liverpool to say that, it just didn't happen because Slob was going to stay.

22:18And that's the message that the agent got. So the idea from the family, Xavi Alonso and his family was like, well, we wait a bit longer and then see what happens. Or then he gets an offer from Chelsea. At first, the agent says, I don't think Xavi Alonso is going to go to Chelsea. And then they start looking into it and they start hearing what they're saying. They start finding out what has happened, but also how the plan is to transform things a little bit. And they start going like, oh, right, OK, well, this is London. And it's a big club and it's a historic club. And it becomes more and more attractive.

22:56And in football, Xavi will tell you that two plus two is never or hardly ever four. So, you know, you say to him, wait until November when Slott gets sacked, maybe. Yeah, but it doesn't always were like that. So then they start getting themselves convinced that Chelsea is a good idea and go for it. And then, a little bit out of the blue, the same agent gets a call and is like, how about Iraola for Liverpool? And of course, we know Richard Hughes knows him from Bournemouth and all of that. But I am convinced that if Liverpool had decided to get rid of Slott a month ago, Chelsea would also be the manager of Liverpool.