Ronaldo sees red, England see off Serbia + Nigeria strike

0:00The Athletic FC

0:30Playoff tournament. And we hear more about the betting scandal currently threatening to bring Turkish football to a halt. It's all in this Totally Football Show.

0:43Friday the 14th of November. We're a day later than usual. Listener, thanks for your patience. A day later to bring you important reflections on Thursday night games. Here to provide those and more. Duncan Alexander. Hi, James. Hello to you, Duncan. Colin Miller. Hello, James. Hi, Colleen. And also Daniel Storey. Woof. Hello, James. Hi, Daniel. International weekend. Are you having the weekend off? No, I'm going to watch Jack Wilshere's Luton Town play Rotherham United on Saturday. Brilliant. All right. Excellent. Has he been getting on so far, Jack Luton? Jack Wilshere. Yeah, Jack Luton Wilshere, as I'm calling him now.

1:24He lost his first game and has won four in a row in various different competitions since. So, yeah, I think he's getting to grips. Excellent, excellent. Colin, you've been having a very busy time, but you were on the news desk at The Athletic on Thursday night as the results came in. Yeah, you would expect an international break to maybe provide somewhat of a let-up from the relentless football news cycle, but not to be. Not this one, because this is the most important international break of all, I guess. The one where almost all of the remaining places at the World Cup will be decided between now and next Tuesday, All but six of the 48 teams who will be in Canada, the USA and Mexico will be decided.

2:06Likes of Scotland, Northern Ireland could be booking their spots. Even San Marino could be getting a playoff. All sorts of drama. Already, in fact, on Thursday night, one of the stories that Colin was covering was France booking their place with a 4-0 win over Ukraine and Paris. Kylian Mbappe with a brace. He's now up to 400 career goals. How old is he, Colin? 26? Is he 26 now? No, he's not. 24? Yeah, he's 26. He's 26? He's 27 next month. Wow. Veteran. So he's kind of 27 then, isn't he? I'm just playing. Anyway, so well done to France. Other teams on Thursday night. Norway pretty much sealed their place.

2:50They beat Estonia 4-0 with braces from Saul Oth and Erling Haaland. As long as Norway don't lose their final game away to Italy at San Siro by nine goals or more, they'll be through for the first time in, I think, 28 years. Portugal, meanwhile, blew it. For the second time, they had qualification right there, and they missed out after drawing against Hungary last month. This time, Roberto Martinez-Cerisau went down 2-0 to the Republic of Ireland. two Troy Parrot goals, and then Cristiano Ronaldo got sent off for the very first time in his career. Colin, I imagine this was a big story for you. Oh, yes.

3:45I mean, this was a game which, as you said, Portugal had the opportunity last month to qualify, but there was a last-minute Chobas goal for Hungary that denied that. And so they're sort of champions on ice. But everyone kind of expected them to come into Dublin and kind of, I guess, I guess, they're a gritty team, they're a defensive team who caused Portugal a lot of problems in the game in Lisbon and needed a last-minute winner despite all the pressure. Ronaldo actually had a penalty saved in that game. But this time around, there was a bit of build-up in the pre-match of this where the Irish manager was speaking to the press and he was saying about how Ronaldo and Portugal had, you know, he was subtly hinting that they were influencing officials.

4:24And that appeared to get under the skin, certainly of Ronaldo, because as he was walking off after this red card, it was sort of like an elbow off the ball in stint. A vicious elbow. Yeah, very much so. And it was upgraded by VAR. He had a bit of a head loss as he walked off the pitch. He was clapping the fans and he was smiling to himself. and then he went over to the Irish coach to have a few words on his way off. And after the match, Hal Grimson, the Irish manager, says that, you know, he said that maybe it was a couple of the comments I'd said before the game had gotten under his skin a little bit.

4:59So it does appear that that paid off. And I think the Irish crowd, certainly when they went 2-0 up as well and the mood that they were in, it created an atmosphere that clearly Portugal found quite difficult to deal with. Congratulations to the Republic of Ireland, who could still mathematically top the group if they beat Hungary on Sunday and Portugal lose at home to Armenia the same day. I mean, Ireland's campaign is pretty mad. They've lost to the team ranked 104th in the world and then go and beat the team ranked 5th in the world. But, yeah, that group, having looked, as Colin said, done and dusted, it's now a three-way battle on the final day.

5:39Right. I mean, it would take an unlikely set of events for the Republic of Ireland to top the group, but they could still book a spot in the playoffs with a win over Hungary. As for Portugal, assuming they do go through, they are still on top, Ronaldo could now be suspended for, would it be the opening two games of the World Cup? Yes, so there's a little bit of a lack of clarity around this. Obviously, when you get sent off, it does vary between one and three as a standard. This is violent conduct. So it could be up to three, it could be two. And that would obviously rule them out of the Armada game.

6:08That's certain. but if Portugal were to avoid the playoff system and qualify automatically that suspension would carry through to the World Cup if it was to be won in a match that FIFA hand down so yeah he would have won an impus in the first group games if that was to be played out it hasn't been confirmed yet and the regulations do leave a little bit of wriggle room for appeals and so forth but that is as it stands how it's looking like it could play out and he's a man who's never scored beyond the group stage at a World Cup so that gives him two games to get a goal. Right. Well, so much to talk about, listener A, as we get set for that World Cup.

6:49Loads of teams that can book their spaces over the next few days. We'll be talking about those and a little bit later on, of course, getting on to what England did Thursday against Serbia. This is the Totally Football Show with James Richardson, part of the Athletic FC podcast network. All right, 29 teams qualified so far. Another 10 from Europe will be decided between now and Tuesday. who can do what? I'm going to do this in alphabetical order. Group A, Colin. Who's in Group A? Northern Ireland. 40 years on, what are the chances that by Tuesday night you could be at the World Cup? By Tuesday night would be extremely slim.

7:26But... Well, three points separate, Germany, Slovakia and Northern Ireland with Germany and Slovakia on nine and Northern Ireland, as you know, three points behind. You're going to be tomorrow night... On Friday night? Yeah. Oh, we're on Friday today, aren't we? Okay, so tonight. So tonight, away to Slovakia. Who you beat 2-0 last time. Yes, albeit that was a month ago. Northern Ireland, I think it's fair to say, outplayed Slovakia in Belfast. The massive caveat to that is that Northern Ireland have a series of starting players who are unavailable for this match through injury, through suspension.

7:58Slovakia have gotten back their two star players, David Hanko and Stanislav Ljubljka. so that could sway things quite a bit as well. I mean, this group is blown wide open by that Slovakia win at home to Germany in that opening game. And Germany, albeit they beat Northern Ireland in both games, I've seen a lot of Germany-Northern Ireland matches over the years. They play each other a lot. And the results actually tend to be quite close, albeit the performance is not. This group has been different. This group, Northern Ireland, I think deserved at least a point against that game against Germany in Belfast.

8:32They had an early goal that was disallowed. It was a marginal offside call. There was only really one big opportunity the whole game that Germany had. The goal that Nick Walter Mata, the Newcastle striker scored. It came off his shoulders. Yeah, it certainly wasn't a convincing win from Germany. And I think the whole way through this group, Germany and Julian Nagelsmann, certainly haven't answered any questions about where they are going into the World Cup. I think they will qualify, courtesy of the games they've got left. But from a Northern Irish point of view, I think there's so much positivity in the sense that it wasn't very long ago that we were talking about there was no Premier League players in this team.

9:04Where are these players going to come from? Are they being produced? Now you've got Conor Bradley, you've got Dan Ballard and Try Hume at Sunderland, you've got Justin Deveni at Palace. You've got four Premier League starting players, essentially. You've also got Ethan Galbraith and Shea Charles who play for Swansea and Southampton, respectively. Now, they're two very young central midfielders who are technically excellent. They're both ruled out of the Slovakia game, unfortunately, and that's going to have to cause a little bit of a rejig in the midfield. But you are seeing a Northern Ireland team who, I think even if you're not Northern Irish and you watch this team, they're a team who are very easy to get behind.

9:39I think they're a team who, I think maybe Tim Spears mentioned in the poll about Sunderland and obviously you've got two players who are in both sides. But when you see that energy from a team and you see a game plan, it's very clear. And there's a bit of football about them as well. It's not like they can't play, but they've got so much variation. and when you see that sort of effort and the teamwork that they have and the work rate, it's very easy to buy into from a fan point of view. So even if they don't get to the, and I think they will get to the first cut even if the Nations League finish they had, even if they don't get that, this is still a campaign where there's a lot to build on from that.

10:11Excellent. Well, best of luck. So it's Slovakia away on Friday and then on Monday at home to Luxembourg. In Group B, Switzerland will probably saw up their place on Saturday. Group C is a straight fight between Denmark and Scotland. Denmark on Saturday host Belarus, who they beat 6-0 at theirs. Scotland will be over in Piraeus taking on Greece. They need to take at least a point from that game to set themselves up for a big face-to-face, head-to-head decider on Tuesday night when Denmark visit them at Hampton Park. Woof. There's some injuries there as well. Looks like 42-year-old Craig Gordon will be between the posts for Scotland.

10:52whilst they're talking about New England and all the sort of positivities from that Scotland's results are very good and they could easily qualify on first but there's still question marks about the style of play a lot of fans even with the results don't seem to be particularly happy with the direction of the team I don't know how much of that is a mark of how the expectations have changed but it is kind of worth bearing in mind in that if they were to miss out on qualification what would there be a change coming from that point of view and is that what the fans would like certainly sounds like it Spain on Friday if they beat Georgia they'll wrap up their place however if they don't and Turkey beat Bulgaria then we're set for a really exciting final day in that group because Spain and Turkey will be facing each other there's currently just three points between them that game taking place in Seville Spanish Football Federation meanwhile expressing its surprise and displeasure after Laminya Mal failed to turn up for the training camp Second one in a row that he's missed.

11:49This time he didn't bother telling them, apparently, until after the camp had already started. Group F, Portugal, we talked about them already. Group G has Netherlands all but qualified. They're leading the group by three points. They face the team in second place, Poland, on Friday. In Group H, you've got three teams in contention. Austria, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Romania. And also in that group, San Marino could get a playoff if they lose heavily enough. Colin? Yeah, this is a quirk, if you can call it that, of the qualification system, whereby the Nations League, which we've talked about quite a lot, and which I actually really like because of the competitiveness it adds and the sense that you get rid of all those friendlies that nobody really cared about.

12:33But San Marino won their group in Group D. They recorded, I think it was their first victory in about 20, 25 years in that, and they won two of their four group games. They won it, they topped it with Gibraltar and Lichtenstein. so what that means is that you've got I think it's 14 group winners from the Nations League and those are the teams if they weren't to qualify for a playoff spot automatically they would get a playoff spot based on their rankings if other nations have already qualified or reached those spots. So San Marino need Romania to qualify to not qualify from the Nations League but to qualify from their qualifying group?

13:10Yes what San Marino would need for them to stand a chance of getting a playoff spot would be for Romania to also make at least a playoff spot and I realize this one's very convoluted. This is all very Alan Partridge before the 1994 World Cup isn't that man? So what's the game that they need to lose and by how much? They need to lose against Romania essentially by as many goals as possible to ensure that Romania because Romania are three points behind Bosnia and Herzegovina who are second so it could easily come down to goal difference so it's within their interest for Romania to boost their goal difference as much as possible.

13:43They want Romania to get the playoff spot from the group so that they'll get the playoff spot from the Nations League as the next best team that hasn't qualified. Exactly. Alright. It's actually a pretty major flaw to have a team where they know that it's profitable for them to lose as heavily as possible. I don't know, Dan, we've got a whole bunch of games out there where everyone's trying to win. I think it adds a little bit of variety to have one where one team is trying to lose by as many goals as possible. I also like that San Marino have sort of set themselves up for this by routinely getting beaten for 25 years.

14:15Maybe this is sort of the ultimate long con, whereas they're actually brilliant. Well, maybe the goal they scored after eight seconds against England, that's the true level they have. But they were like, no, stop it. Right, we've got to wait. We've been training for this. Give us another 30 years and we'll trick everyone. One aspect of this very quickly is that the playoff system is tied into the Nations League. What that would mean is that for these groups, had England have lost every single one of their group games, they would still have made the playoffs courtesy of the Nations League finish so it kind of to me at least it adds a lot of sort of questions of like how much value does this system have surely there is a better way of doing it and funnily enough the English FA president Mark Billingham came out this week and he said that they are trying to push for an overhaul of this system no I actually think there's a very specific English point of view which means that oh you're qualifying easily and this is you know these groups are boring there's no value I don't agree with that but I do agree that maybe the process in which the outcomes are reached could maybe be a bit better.

15:14What's the FA's suggestion? I don't think they've actually come out and said, this is what we want, but I think one of the things that has been talked about is what we've seen at club level with the Champions League, EuroLeague Conference League, with that Swiss model of essentially playing multiple teams and then having one massive group table of what would it be, 54 teams in Europe, rather than having nine or ten different groups. Now, whether that could then encompass the Nations League games as well and different windows, so it's a longer period of time. I don't know what they would come up with.

15:43I actually think that would be quite good from an international point of view. It would add a bit of value and it would give a lot more variety to fans as well. Daniel? I was going to say, the kind of obvious half solution is to say that you can only get into the playoffs for the World Cup if you finish third or fourth in your World Cup qualifying group. So you can get in on the basis of the Nations League, but only that then pushes forward to your performance in qualifying. So it then drops down to the next best third or fourth team rather than the situation of San Marino, which, let's face it, great for them to be in it, but whoever plays them in the playoffs and the World Cup has just got a complete bye through to the next round.

16:25That's the reality of the situation. I like San Marino so much. Imagine if they got Italy. What a derby that would be. They could get Italy in the playoffs. Imagine if San Marino got to the World Cup and Italy didn't. I mean, that would be the greatest storyline football to come up with yet. I think imagine is the salient word in that sentence. Anyway, I'm going to crack up. Oh, no, sorry, Colin, you go on. Just very, very quickly, for the importance of balance, it was Georgia who qualified through that group, D Nations League, for the Euro 2024, and Georgia were brilliant at that tournament. Oh, yeah, that's true.

16:54So in terms of the actual overall theory, it has its pros and cons. I see. Like so many things, eh? Group I, that's where we got to, listener, Group I. Norway will qualify on Thursday if they don't lose by nine goals or more at San Siro. Group J, Rudy Garcia is Belgium leading. They need one more win. They could pick it up either against Kazakhstan on Saturday. That's a way, I think. Or Liechtenstein on Tuesday. Third in that group currently are Wales, who are three points behind North Macedonia. Wales, though, have a game in hand against Liechtenstein on Saturday. and they then face North Macedonia in Cardiff on Tuesday, which looks a lot like a direct playoff for a playoff spot.

17:39There's a lot of that going around at the moment. And even if they don't finish second, actually, checking the small print, they're guaranteed a route into the World Cup playoffs via their nation's league performance. Yay! Yeah, I'm going to the North Macedonia game on Tuesday. And it is, although they have that backup spot, getting in through the group stage, finishing second in the group is massive for Wales because their performance is at home in those playoff games. And, you know, I was there for the Gareth Bale inspired playoff win. It's just massive playing at the Cardiff City Stadium. It's huge for them.

18:14So they will be going all out to finish second. It doesn't seem any sense in the camp of like, well, we've got it anyway, so don't worry. You really want to be at home in those playoffs, particularly Wales. They are, to my mind, probably one of the teams in Europe who the home advantage seems absolutely massive. The atmosphere at the Carly City Stadium is incredible. It seems to inspire them. It's also the first qualifying campaign without the superstars, so there's obviously no Bale. There's no Ramsey this time. There's no Alan. There's no Gunter. So, yeah, it feels like a really important game for Wales to get second on Tuesday, assuming they beat Lichtenstein, which I'm sure they will.

18:53finishing second in the group will guarantee them a better seeding in those playoffs and a home semi-final should they reach that Aaron Ramsey won't be playing for Wales terrible story regarding Aaron Ramsey he's terminated his contract well he and his club in Mexico Pumas Unam they have mutually terminated his contract after just six games with the Mexican side following the disappearance of his dog Halo he left on a ranch I'm not sure of the details on this, but he posted, we've remained quiet trying to understand how you can leave your dog on a ranch and never see her again. This will continue to haunt us.

19:30So it looks like it's over for him there in Mexico. He will be with the Wales squad, though, in an unofficial capacity. Craig Bellamy's invited him along to get experience in terms of maybe head coaching in the future. So that's interesting, or at least taking part in the Wales set-up. Sorry, Daniel. Yeah, I was going to say, I think that's a kind of vice versa thing. I think, yes, he's there to get experience with the coaching set-up. I also think for both games, or certainly on Tuesday night, he'll be there to the, I've been there, done it, this is what you need, the kind of stirring team talk before the game.

20:04I suspect that will play a huge role because he is one of their superstars of the last 20 years. And it is quite an inexperienced Wales squad. So, yeah, I suspect that's part of the reason as well. Is he going to be doing the Michael Sheen speech? Well, weirdly with Wales, it's normally the kind of crowd that gets them going on that sort of thing. They sing Amahid before the game, which is a relatively new thing. And it's this sort of Welsh folk song, this incredibly stirring Welsh folk song. And the whole of the Red Wall behind the goal in the canton stand sings it as loud as they can. It's genuinely like a bucket list experience to see it and hear it because it's, yeah, I mean, I've got no Welsh blood, but I'm there sort of Michael Sheening before the game after hearing that.

20:49Daniel, what would be your top 10 hair on the back of your neck, standing up bucket list football moments? Top five. I think Superclassico, yeah, maybe top three. Superclassico definitely is a massive one. Hearing sunshine on Leith before a big Hibs game, ideally at Hampden, that's the best YouTube video out there. Obviously a shout out Muller Kintyre for a very biased point of view, But basically just any long-term established pre-football game song that everybody sings is, yeah, that's my ticket to my heart. There you go. Group K is England. Know about them. Talk about them against Serbia very shortly.

21:30And Croatia in Group L. They're all but set. Semi-finalists at the past two World Cups, the Croatians now need just a point at home to the Faroe Islands. Hmm. All right, then. Up next, let's get into England.

22:14And he comes up with an assist. England go 2-0 in front. And Averici, yes, scores again for England. England 2-0 winners on Thursday night against Serbia, with Albania winning 1-0 in Andorra. That means that Serbia's qualifying hopes are over. Not even a playoff spot for Serbia. Silvino's Albania will advance to the playoffs. England, of course, had already qualified. Seven wins out of seven now in qualifying and still no goals conceded for Thomas Tuchel's Tommies. No European side has ever been in a group with more than six games and not conceded a goal. So there is something to play for on Sunday in Albania.

22:54Right, one more game to go. What are the key talking points from the Serbia match? Did it help us in any way fill in some of the remaining blanks as to who Tuchel will be picking? Is this starting 11 in the States? Daniel? I think it was a night in which it sort of reinforced what we knew, but raised more questions, but with a kind of positive tinge rather than a negative. I think under the late Gareth Southgate era, those questions that came were more sort of, who were we? Yeah, the latter stages rather than... Yeah, the kind of who... No, like who are we going to fit in? Whereas now it's sort of how do we fit these in?

23:32So Nico O 'Reilly at left back, I thought was really good on debut. He looked really assured. We've now got this situation whereby a new left back comes in, whether it's Lewis Hall, whether it's Lewis Marskelly, whether it's him. And Omidia looks fit for purpose, but who do you pick? There's the question of Foden or Bellingham or Rodgers or how many of those you can fit in the side. And I don't think we got any closer to answering that simply because Morgan Rodgers, I thought, was pretty decent. And then Bellingham and Foden came on and linked up really nicely. And then the only other real spot in the team, I think, well, there's two.

24:05One is who plays next to John Stones, whether that's Concer or fit again Mark Gahey when he is. And then left wing, whether Eze has done enough. I think Thomas Tuchel would really like the kind of wide Rashford style left-sided player. But Eze is in better form and produced better on Thursday night. And I would really like to see Eze start against Albania to see if he can kind of nail that down. There's also a thing about, we've talked about this lots before, but about club partnerships. And that Rice-Eze link-up feels like a real kind of cheat code with Saka one side, Eze the other, Rice in the middle.

24:41Feels like quite a nice way to bring through a very successful club relationship into the national team. Both goals on Thursday night coming from Arsenal players, Saka. And Eze served up on a plate, Duncan, by Phil Foden. Well, he passed the ball. I mean, a slight over-the-top Phil Foden praise. I mean, the finish from Eze was tremendous. I actually thought Rashford did pretty well in the game. And to Daniel's point, I think we've kind of got at least two players in every position now, which is impressive strength going into a World Cup. and it does feel like Thomas Tuchel's just got his system and now he's just going to put players into that system.

25:22Even under Southgate, at points going into tournaments, we weren't sure, you know, was it going to be a back three? You know, he would change the formation based on which players were available. That doesn't feel like we're in that position anymore. I think Harry Kane sort of showed his buy-in form. There was one moment in the second half where he just appeared out of nowhere and did an incredible slide tackle in his own penalty area to win the ball like an elite right-back. So, yeah, I mean, obviously Thomas Tuchel complained about the atmosphere in the previous game. You could hear the rain at certain points in this game, but to Colin's point earlier, this is the issue when England are just, you know, cruised through groups.

26:01It's hard for fans to make paper airplanes and sing at the same time. So, yeah, it was another game that will just go into the memory bank or maybe not. The only other thing I think that maybe was pushed as an option is with no Ollie Watkins there. It was interesting without another striker there, you could argue, certainly not one of Kane's quality. It might well be given all these attacking midfielders that that sort of no striker, all the attacking midfielders jam might be the backup option if Kane's not there or if it's not working or if we need something else in the last 30 minutes. I don't think Kane will come off if England need a goal.

26:42But if we want to try and change it up, then that, I mean, he described Foden, I think, as a nine and a half last night. It's basically just, we'll pick you all. We trust you all. We'll trust you to work out passing triangles to pull apart an opposition. And I think, yeah, Serbia retired towards the end. But that's where Eze's goal comes from. It's from not knowing where the most advanced England player is going to pop up. I wonder as well, just, I mean, speaking about England haven't conceded a goal, they've won every match. like how much is Thomas Tickle really getting out of this if there's not a proper challenge within the group and this is a very low scoring group I think it's fair to say it's probably one of the lower quality groups overall it's just been from an English point of view it's been on easy street really hasn't it and you always do hear coaches talking about if there was a match I know there was a friend league in Senegal when England lost 3-1 but in terms of competitive games if you're not being properly challenged how much is he really learning about those players.

27:39And I get it. There's a lot of it. It's a case of, well, the benefit is you can rotate, you can bring players in for a couple of caps and see how they integrate into the squad, and that's all well and good. But obviously, it's a completely different environment when you're in a major tournament, and all it takes is that one match when you've got a high-quality team, especially one who are capable of keeping possession, which we've seen time and time again with England, that's what they would struggle with in those knockout matches. Although this coming World Cup, you could quite easily have a group with, say, Curaçao and San Marino.

28:08So, you know, who's to say that's any tougher than the qualifying? I'm slightly exaggerating there. But we'll get on to Curaçao and some of the surprising names that could well be present at next year's tournament. Just to mention that last Friday, Cole Palmer successfully trademarked officially his shivering celebration. So what happens now if Morgan Rodgers, his potential England teammate, does that again, as he did during the last international break. Is he now, is it a matter for the courts? No. Why not? No. It's a commercial thing. So if a computer game wanted to put it into their game, they'd have to pay.

28:49But I think Morgan Rogers is in the clear. So it's fine. Well, I'm not sure that's your opinion. Would it stand up in court? If you want to do it walking down the street, on the way to the tube, it's fine. But it's trademarked now. Yeah, but that's not how it works. I don't know. I thought that was how it worked. and it did seem a surprising decision on the part of Cole or his people. But anyway, I'm heartened by that news and I'm sure Morgan Rodgers is as well. Next up, there's more international news and possibly the most intriguing bit of all as we get on to FIFA's remarkable six-team international grab-back variety pack inter-confederational qualifier.

29:25Woof.

29:29Yeah, playoffs coming up next March. obviously will be all the European ones which could feature some big nations but going alongside all of that FIFA have got themselves together this inter-confederational qualifier with six teams in it split into two brackets and we know two of the six already one is from South America, Bolivia one is from Oceania, New Caledonia they'll also be the winner of United Arab Emirates against Iraq and two more teams coming from CONCACAF the two best runners-up from Central American qualifying. And then the final team in this six, this extraordinarily exciting-looking tournament will come from Africa.

30:11Who's it going to be? Well, that is being decided this weekend in another four-team tournament, which is taking place in Morocco. Jay Harris is there, and he joins us now. Jay, hello. Good morning. Good morning to you. Jay, first of all, well done on successfully pitching your editor that you had to go to this pre-tournament for the pre-tournament for the World Cup next year? Yeah, no, I'm not too sure how I pulled that one off. What's it like there in Morocco? Much more wet than I expected. I'm telling you, when I looked the other day, the forecast was nothing but glorious sunshine and it just hammered it down with rain yesterday.

30:51But otherwise, everybody's been in good spirits and it's my first time here and I'm really enjoying it so far. Brilliant. OK, the AFCON's coming up there starting next month, of course. Yesterday, amid the rain, there were the first two games in this little four-team tournament, which saw the Democratic Republic of Congo knock out Cameroon. And in the other game, Nigeria took on Gabon and needed extra time, but ended up beating them 4-1. Jay, you were there. That has to give Nigeria a lift. Maybe this will too. It's a good break. Oh, some end. Oh, what a goal. His time has come! My plan was to go to both games and maybe just see the second half of Cameroon Congo.

31:34But as anybody who knows anything about Nigerian football will tell you, they always have to do something dramatic. They can never do things easily. And it was just a crazy game. And I should mention that the build-up to this has been very dramatic. The Nigeria players decided to boycott training on Tuesday due to a financial dispute with the Nigeria Football Federation. And they only started training on Wednesday evening about half five because they resolved the issue. So ahead of a massive game, which is critical to their chances of reaching a World Cup for the first time since 2018, their preparation was poor.

32:14But the game itself, Nigeria were really good for the first 30 minutes, but they just didn't score. And there was a very weird situation with the stadium here where it was very empty at kick-off. And then on the half-hour mark, all these Gabonese fans suddenly stream into the stadium. And the momentum shifted at that point. And you suddenly saw Denis Buwanger and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang sort of come into the game more. And Nigeria looked a bit rattled. They get this gift in the second half, and it looked like that was going to be enough. Lamina equalises, and Ossumen misses a horrendous... It's a horrendous miss with the last kick.

32:53of normal time, and you just thought this is set up for a very dramatic, inelegant elimination for Nigeria, and they somehow just completely blew Gabon away in extra time. So I've tried to condense everything that's happened in the last 48, 72 hours into as smaller package as possible, and that's the best I can give you. That was a brilliantly pithy resume, but the story doesn't end there because now Nigeria will take on Democratic Republic of Congo in Rabat on Sunday for the big one a place in another qualifying tournament what do you think about the game I think Nigeria still go into this as favorites obviously DR Congo do have a really good team I think they reached the semi-finals of the last AFCON but missing Johan Visser is is massive he's a fantastic goal scorer but as much as I sort of not mock Osamen for his miss what he then did in extra time was exceptional and I still can't quite understand how he's playing in Galatasaray because when he turns it on he is an exceptional striker to watch his blend of skill power speed just look at the way he brings the ball down and the build up to I think it's his second goal it's it's truly exceptional and then you've got Adam Ola-Lukman who's a joy to watch Calvin Bassey but I'm going to give a special shout out to Benjamin Frederick he is a Brentford player on loan currently in Belgium with Denda.

34:17He's never played for Brentford. He's only 20. And I'm not just saying this because I used to cover Brentford. There's a Brentford bias. He was exceptional yesterday. He produces a fantastic assist for one of Osman's goals. But at 20 years old, to be thrown into a very tense and high-pressure game like that up against an experienced striker in Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, I don't think he put a single foot wrong. So he's a player to watch out for. So I think collectively, Nigeria have the quality to beat the Al-Congo. It's just a matter of, can they come together, continue to put off-field issues to one side and sort of get another win to go into the next round of these never-ending playoffs.

34:56Yeah, yeah. Which you're going to be at, I hope, Jay. You've already booked your place in Mexico where the Intercontinental Tournament will be taking place. Of course. You know, I've got another month in Morocco for AFCO and then Mexico. You know, I'm jet-setting everywhere. Excellent. All right, Jay, well, listen, thank you so much for being with us today. Hope you enjoy the game on Sunday and speak to you after. Thank you very much. All the best, guys.

35:19Other people hoping to be at that tournament in Mexico next March include Dwight York's Trinidad and Tobago. They hosted Steve McLaren's Jamaica on Thursday night in CONCACAF qualifying. A special 1999 Man United Triple Winners reunion game this. It was a 1-1 draw, which means that Dwight York's Trinidad and Tobago cannot now top the group, but they could still make those playoffs as one of the two best CONCACAF runners-up. There are three CONCACAF groups, and the winners of those three will be going straight to the World Cup. One group's going to be either Suriname or Panama. Another group's going to be either Honduras or Haiti.

36:00And then the other group, probably Jamaica's group, could well be Curaçao. Curaçao, currently a point ahead of Steve McLaren's Jamaica, after they, on Thursday night, beat Bermuda 7-0. Curaçao would be, if they make it through, the new smallest nation to ever reach a World Cup. How small? 156 ,000 people, I think. Daniel? Yeah, I mean, that's almost the point, is it's 156 ,000 people there, but there's a great shift in... It's not just Curaçao. Suriname are a really good example. These are, well, Curaçao is part of the Kingdom of Netherlands. The Dutch Antilles. Indeed, the old Netherlands Antilles.

36:50And two things have happened. Firstly, the World Cup has expanded and is being hosted in three CONCACAF countries, which means that inevitably there was a new rush of potential first-time qualifiers because it's just opened up for them in a way that will never happen again unless they expand the tournament again. And also what's happened is that Curaçao, amongst a few others, have gone for this massive recruitment drive, aided by FIFA's slight relaxing of eligibility criteria for dual nationality so you can change nationality. And they've really gone for it. And Curaçao, they're managed by Dick Advocar.

37:26In the last, I think, since August 2025 alone, five different players have naturalised for Curaçao. One of them is Tahit Chong, who's at Manchester United, now at Sheffield United. Sonja Hansen's now at Middlesbrough. You've got Obispo of PSV. You've got Sambo, who's on loan from Burnley in Holland. So there's this massive pool of players that they're targeting. And it seems to be working because results have been really good. They now, because of Trinidad's late equaliser against Jamaica, they now only need to draw in Jamaica in their final game to guarantee getting to the World Cup, which would be an absolutely massive effort, albeit in slightly asterisk circumstances with Canada, Mexico and USA qualifying automatically.

38:10But I think just in the case of them and Suenam, this sort of thing becomes self-fulfilling. Like if you recruit players, you target players with dual nationality or with only Dutch under 21 caps so they can therefore join you very easily, be naturalised very easily. And people see it working. It will only lead to more of it. And those countries can get stronger. Conquer Calf is the one section where you can kind of take advantage of underperformance in others and you can sort of sneak through, I think. So, yeah, good luck to them. Brilliant. Avocat and Curaçao is like a 70s drinks trolley. It's about the same population as Swindon, if people want to put it into UK terms.

38:51Good Lord. You're saying with this self-fulfilling that things could really snowball. Is that what you're saying? Very nice. I have heard a couple of concerns that teams like Suriname or Caracao or Cape Verde, who obviously qualified last month, could... You know, there's this thing about the expansion of the tournament. Does this weaken the tournament? I'm not really sure it does. When you look at the squad of players that these teams have, they are players who are pretty much at a level. It's not the top level of Europe, maybe the top five leagues, but it's just sort of outside of that. I'm not really sure that kind of detracts from a tournament at all.

39:24I think it's great having nations like that. It is, but it's nice when you have, I don't know, if you've got, say, Italy, maybe Turkey, Poland missing out, could well happen. But I do think the counterbalance to that would be that you have a European championship as well. Right. There's 24 teams, whereas a World Cup should be more representative. Well, that would certainly be FIFA's argument. And I think there's fairness to it. And I actually had a piece up this morning about how the biggest nations in the world aren't qualifying for the World Cup. Right. You've got like out of the 10 most populous nations, seven haven't qualified.

39:57Nigeria could make that eight if they don't get through. So you've got these massive countries who do struggle. One of those nations is Indonesia. Right. And they've essentially done the same thing that Kurosawa have done in terms of their sort of citizenship in the Netherlands, obviously through past colonial links. And they came quite close to qualifying for this tournament. But their squad is almost entirely based in the Netherlands too. Right. So you do have a thing where does that then, how much of an impact will that have in terms of a local sense, in terms of the sort of infrastructure and development of their own players.

40:27I'm not really sure of the answer to that, but it'll be interesting to see how that does play out. Okay. So seven of the eight most populous nations won't be qualifying? Seven of the ten. Seven of the ten. And those that have are obviously Brazil are in there and obviously the co-hosts of the United States who've missed out previously and Mexico as well are in there. Right. So the seven who are missing out are what? China, Indonesia, India, Russia, because, yeah. Swindon. Who are the other three? So you've got Pakistan and Bangladesh, who are in the top eight as well. Good Lord. The Philippines are in there as well.

41:08And, yeah, Ethiopia, the second most populous African nation. And they are Congo, or the third, and they are a nation who haven't qualified since they were Zaire in 1970. So even with this expansion of tournaments, it is almost a quirk that out of these nations, Vietnam or another too, that even in Vietnam, football is apparently the most popular sport in Vietnam. Not just in Vietnam. What's the population of Vietnam then? It's over 100 million. So it is a big, big country. And apparently 75 % of the population classify themselves as football fans. That's more than any other Asian country. So it's not as if there's not the popularity there.

41:47It's the fact that the infrastructure doesn't exist in these countries to develop players which can be competitive at an elite level. And that's why you have the likes of Indonesia turning to kind of, you know, the sort of the citizenship issue and kind of maybe a grandparent role or kind of maybe a formal colonial past and trying to be like, well, can we actually maybe exploit that to kind of get players who had no connections? And one of the things with Cape Verde, Roberto Lopez, who's a central defender for Shamrock Rovers in the Republic of Ireland, he only found out that he could play for Cape Verde after they messaged him on LinkedIn.

42:22And he ignored the first message because he thought it was a joke. And then it's like, well, actually, this is serious. And now he's going to be in a squad for the World Cup next year. There's an interview George Corkin's done with Roberto Solano today in The Athletic. And he's the manager of Pakistan at the moment. and he's kind of doing a lot of scouting in the UK to try and find players with Pakistani heritage. Sonny Perkins is playing well for Leighton Orient. He's thinking about it. He's eligible through his grandparent. So, yeah, I think it's definitely a big growth area for nations like that ahead of the next World Cup.

42:54Daniel? I think if you... Yeah, I was going to say, I mean, I think in terms of the fairness, I think if you're a country that has been under colonial power and had all your natural resources taken and then quite a lot of your people taken to help the colonial power. I think getting quite good at football 100 years later is quite a low reward, but it does sort of suggest we shouldn't really have a problem with it. So kind of all power to these countries for doing what they can, I think. Excellent. Excellent. Lovely stuff. All right, well, that's how things stand in terms of international qualifying today, Friday.

43:29Of course, we'll be rounding things up further next week. To finish off today's show, though, we're going to turn to a story of a very different nature currently bubbling away in Turkey

43:44you're listening to the totally football show with James Richardson now with you four times a week keep up to date with us on insta and enjoy us in glorious technicolor on youtube at the totally show big story that's been building in Turkey for over a month now concerns the number of players and officials who have been placing bets on football matches, which obviously is something which is banned for anyone connected with football. Last month, there were stories that hundreds of match officials, 371 of the 571 referees working in professional leagues, indeed, had betting accounts. 149 referees have now been banned.

44:27This is in Turkey. So the Turkish authorities have acted on that and now players as well. Over a thousand players across the country's divisions have been suspended, including 102 players from the top two divisions. Twenty five of them are in the Super League, the top flight in Turkey. Bets placed on everything, even on the color of referees jerseys. apparently no word yet on if people were betting on matches that they themselves were involved in but colin this is a huge story and one which currently means that the second and sorry the third and fourth tier in turkey are going to be suspended yeah um yeah james it's one of those that's they could have wider implications in just turkey because essentially what you have third and fourth divisions have been suspended because this is so many players implicated in this that the suspension matches aren't possible.

45:24Top two divisions, there's been 25 players from the top flight have been suspended. They've been handed suspensions I think it's between 45 days and 12 months. That's quite substantial. 77 players from the second division. Now those leagues will be continuing on during these investigations and these suspensions, but what the Turkish FA have said is that they have made a request to FIFA to extend their transfer window for January. So not just for that 31 day, but they've requested an extra 15 days in order for these clubs essentially to recruit players and to replace these guys who have been suspended for this length of time.

46:01And again, it is an important distinction that this isn't, the Turkish FA are not saying that matches have been fixed or that things aren't legitimate. What they are saying is that the players and the referees have breached their contracts of not placing a bet at all, right? That's against their contracts. And that's why these suspensions have been handed down. So I suspect there could be quite a bit more to come out from this. And, you know, Turkish football as it is, it's incredibly passionate. It's incredibly, there's a lot of, there's a lot, I guess, suspicions between clubs to begin with.

46:36You see these stories all the time. So I think this feeds into an environment where what the Turkish FA would say is, this is us, we're being completely transparent, we're cleaning up our act and we're making sure that everything's above board from now on. And if we have to go through this process and sort of take this medicine, then we'll do it now and we'll clean it up. OK, because two years ago, around this time, actually, they actually suspended Turkish football after the Ankara Qud's president punched a referee at the end of a game amid, as you mentioned, that climate of distrust of the match officials.

47:10Jose Mourinho, unusually for him, was often hinting at dark forces in his spell at Fenerbahce. But yes, so as you say, there's every chance there's a lot more gas left in this explosion. Yeah, look, I think so. And I think that there's a lot of questions in terms of there's two Galatasaray players who've been suspended. Now, Galatasaray's position would be, well, one of these players who's a Turkey international, Aaron El Mali who was taken out of the Turkish squad because of this suspension this week essentially this was they say that this was Judy Abette placed five years ago nothing to do with the club he's like well I admit this I shouldn't have done it but you know we kind of want to be completely transparent and fair about this how proportional are bands and everything else in this context so it's important to get to the bottom of all that and it's important to say that not every player who's suspended has necessarily done something that's necessarily completely egregious and has broken every single rule.

48:10However, that is the case that these suspensions have been handed on and it will have very real implications. And you can see from the feedback of, you know, obviously fans of Fenerbahce, fans of Basiktas, fans of Gattas, there are a lot of, as you say, potential conspiracy theories always brewing in that heated environment. So, yeah, let's see where it goes from now. But obviously for Turkish football, this is a bit of a bombshell. Absolutely. pretty extraordinary that almost two-thirds of match officials had betting accounts that seems like a lot you you mentioned that this could spread beyond turkey though what how would that be well in the sense that um well well well first of all there might be other places looking at this and say well what what about our situation at home and you know there's it's it's easy enough in like oh look at turkey and you know that that's a bit of a mess but could that be applicable anywhere else but also for the actual very real thing if this was the case of so many fish suspended transfer windows potentially being extended and so on and so forth, that that can mean a greater flow of transfers, clubs maybe being open to that and so on.

49:09So let's see how it goes. There could be more fallout from it as well. And it is one that has continued to sort of pick up and gather momentum. Investigations aren't closed, they're ongoing. So, yeah, there could be more to come from this. There's also been eight people arrested by the police. It's not just suspension from football matches, I believe. Yeah, and there's also the, and it's so-named, named president of the Top Fight Club, has been suspended for this investigation as well. So, yeah, there's a lot to it. There's a lot to unpack, and I suspect there's a lot more to come as well. Crikey.

49:41Okay. Thank you, Colin. Many thanks for that and all the other nuggets that you've provided us with today. We now wait a fresh set of qualifiers, and then we'll be back on Monday to round up everything that's happened to that point. Duncan, many thanks for your participation today. And you too, Daniel Story. Enjoy your trip to, are you going to Luton? Is that right? Yes, Luton versus Rotherham. Luton-Rotherham before that emotional night in Cardiff. Yes, I'll speak to you before then, I think. All right, excellent. Very good. Listen, I hope you'll be joining us before then too. As I say, back on Monday with you sometime Monday afternoon.

50:24There's a brand new, totally extra though, in the meantime, which is and we've done two this week I think it's the Eden Hazard the title of that one Edenism nice, that was from Christophe Theroux do enjoy that at your leisure for now many thanks to Jake and Charlie in the booth and have a great weekend and we'll speak to you soon

50:57For more great podcasts just like this one, including The Athletic FC and our dedicated club podcasts, search for The Athletic on Apple, Spotify and all the usual places. We're also at The Totally Football Show on Insta and at The Totally Show on YouTube. The Totally Football Show is an Athletic Media Company production.