Yamal stars for Barca + who’s going to win the Europa League?

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1:57Pol Ballus: Totally Football Show, European edition.

2:05Pol Ballus: Today, nice to Metra. Borussia Dortmund's free-scoring Felix has them joint top of the table. We hear from Italy, the Cess, Catalan-splaining at Como, and the old lady vanishing. Spain, where La Masia is rolling out yet another teenage star. France, and we get into the wide-open Ballon d 'Or, and its very crowded lobby. It's the Totally Football Show.

2:30Pol Ballus: Monday the 14th of September, it's a brand new Totally Football Show European edition. James Horncastle is with us. Hi, James. Hello, James. So is Tom Williams. Hello, James. And we're joined from the continent by Paul Belous. Paul. Hello, James. And Seb Stafford-Bloor. Hello, James. Hi. Tom, you were just saying about when you were a kid, you begged your parents to buy you a Heinz, baked bean pizza. We were talking about how annoying it is when you temporarily lose your sense of taste. Some would argue that wanting such a pizza... I wasn't going to say. Some would argue that wanting such a pizza in the first place was perhaps an indication that I had already lost my sense of taste.

3:12That might be good. But I beg my parents to get it for me. It was an official Heinz baked bean pizza. Oh, it was official then? It was official. It was legit. It had the logo on. and they were relenting. So what did it consist of? Did a pizza with baked beans on. As basic as it sounds, I'm like, oh, can we please get the baked bean pizza? No, it looks disgusting. And then I fell ill and I think to try and cheer me up, they relented and they bought the Heinz baked bean pizza. But because I was ill, I couldn't taste it properly. Or maybe that's just how it tasted anyway. Perhaps it is. But I remember having a very full on experience sitting there sobbing into my beanie pizza.

3:47Wow.

3:47James Horncastle: I'm so glad the beanie pizza hasn't reached Italy. Because given how they react about pineapple. I mean, do they though? Well, they do performatively, yeah.

3:57Pol Ballus: Yeah. Who else is intrigued by the notion of a flatbread with Heinz, official Heinz baked beans on top? Just me? Yes. Thank you, Seb. Poll 2. Come on then. Weird.

4:11Jimbo: I mean, baked beans. I lived seven years in the UK, but it was one of the things that I could not get into. I mean, there's just no way that I'm just having this. And just the thought of having a baked pizza, I've tried to think like the worst things I've had in my mouth, but that should be on top of it. That would be on top of it.

4:32James Horncastle: Wow. Wow.

4:35Jimbo: Can we rank the other things that you put in your mouth, which are the worst? You do a top ten for next week. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Good job. Okay.

4:48Pol Ballus: But yes, thank you, Tom, for that. You're welcome. Oh, Tom, by the way, Tom was joining us on our live show on Sunday in which he, who shot was it? Was it Lewis Dunk shot? Lewis Dunk. Lewis Dunk's Marvelous Goal, which you described as a Sontag Schuss. Yes. A Sontag Schuss, Sebe. I asked him what that meant. And Tom opened a copy of his book, Do You Speak Football? What did you say, Tom? Well, so in the book, I talk about the existence of the phrase, but I don't explain where it comes from. And I think I thought when I was writing the book that it was kind of self-explanatory, like it's kind of a Sunday thing.

5:28As it turns out... A Sunday goal is from Tagschut. A Sunday shot. Sunday shot. And this expression exists in both Dutch and German. And as it turns out, and thanks to commenters on last night's pod...

5:42Pol Ballus: Odracky... Odradek99. And there were a few others as well. Were there others? really stirred the hornet's nest with this. It's because there is this idea in Germany, and I guess also in the Netherlands, that there's something lucky about Sunday. So a lucky person might be described as a Sunday child. And so a Sunday shot, shot that sails in from 35 yards from the big lummox of a centre-back, is therefore a Sunday shot. Isn't that interesting? Isn't that interesting? Seb, did you know about the Sontag shoes? yeah i did i would have probably used tram tour for that one because well yeah it translates literally as dream goal but it's also it's intended to mean like one of a kind like once in a lifetime goal and that's probably better for dunks finish because it's just a kind of i'm going to go forward and i can't be bothered to do anything with the ball other than shoot so i'm just going to have a go and in it flies which felt kind of like kind of once in a lifetime brilliant um well why don't we have a moment of the week see if anyone's been doing any tram tours around the continent uh this weekend seb you go first i'm gonna pick noah atabalu's penalty save from nadimi amiri so uh frankfurt played mince in mince on on saturday and a 1-0 frankfurt amiri had the have the opportunity to score from the spot saved by atabalu that is his sixth straight penalty save and i looked it up and nobody nobody in the bundesliga has scored a penalty against him since January 2024.

7:10And if you include European competition, he saved seven of his last eight penalties faced. I think Olivier Giroud scored one against him in the Europa League earlier in the season, right at the beginning of the year, sorry. But yeah, it's an incredible record, an incredible record.

7:28Pol Ballus: Six saves in the Bundesliga, is that right? Six saves in the Bundesliga, and that's a Bundesliga record. Yeah, it's amazing. Wow.

7:36Jimbo: All right, Paul, what's your moment of the week? So I'm going to Sunday afternoon, which I don't know what were you doing by then, but I'm sure that you had a quieter activity than Valencia Club de Football because the club improved it, basically. And in one statement, they got rid of their CEO of football, which was the Scotsman, Ron Gullet, and their manager, Carlos Corberan. Valencia had lost on Friday against Sevilla, 1-0, and they are bottom of La Liga with one point after five games, which is pretty bad. The situation was difficult to sustain at this point. And I think that we spoke about what happened the previous week against Barcelona, when all this tension at the stadium with the visit of the ownership.

8:21Jimbo: Well, one of the most incredible things is that what happened in that statement when basically Valencia restarted their whole project is that all the decisions were taken because of Rodri Hernández. I don't know if you're aware that in Monday last week there was footage that emerged from the game by the Spanish broadcasters Maurice Darb with Rodri being souped off from Stalya he goes to the bench and he starts speaking with Pao Cubarsi who is on the bench and he starts saying Jesus, how bad are Valencia? How bad are they? They are so bad they have not even managed to go beyond the halfway line Jesus but how did they finish last season.

9:05Jimbo: So he was basically amazed by how bad Valenti looked. This all blew up in social media. It went wild to the point that Rodri had to apologise to the Valencia captain, José Gaillat, and he also spoke, I think it was on Wednesday after the Champions League opener, apologising, basically saying that he was not right on this, that he was not aware that he was being phoned, and that he had to be a bit more respectful towards Valencia. But basically If you read the local report in Valencia, they said that the ownership felt so humiliated by that, that they decided that, OK, that's time just to pull the trigger.

9:43Jimbo: And after the defeat on Friday, it was like the perfect moment or excuse, you call it how you want, just to pull the trigger, restart the whole project. Now the sporting director is Braulio, who has done a really good job at Osasuna over the past nine years. And the temporary manager is the beating manager, Oscar Sanchez. So let's see how Valencia moves forward from this. But yeah, Brodery will be fondly remembered by all the fan base.

10:15Pol Ballus: Crikey. Tom, what about you? What's been your moment of the week? We've already spoken on this pod about Paris Bruner, a young German centre-forward who Monaco have turned to in the anticipation that following Balagun was on his way out. As it turns out, he was not. But Brunner is still starting matches for Monaco, still doing the business. Scored a lovely goal away at Strasbourg on Saturday. It was a Brunner stunner. It was indeed. Stunner. Monaco 1-0 down. He has the ball played into his feet just inside the Strasbourg half, rolls his marker, drives towards the box, and hits this glorious shot into the top left corner, hits the top of the post and cannons into the net.

11:00and then he runs off to celebrate in front of the strasbourg ultras uh and the ub 90 the kind the most hardcore strasbourg fans they're behind the goal that he scored into and he kind of runs over he's giving it you know giving it a bit of that anyway his teammates come over and like come on mate let's get you know back into your own half uh and he kind of like you know calms down the celebration a little bit but just before he's about to go and turn back and heads back to get ready for kickoff he does like a cutthroat gesture which he's since apologized for said he was being you know kind of insulted by the strasbourg fans but i would be very surprised if he didn't end up with some kind of suspension for that because they take a dim view of cutthroat gestures of cutthroat

11:47Pol Ballus: gestures in ligand so rightly so rightly so good lord james well it's definitely not uh ruben amram

11:57James Horncastle: giving a press conference on the 25th anniversary of 9-11 and deciding to use a plane crash analogy to describe modern management. So I will go to what happened in Venice on Friday night, where Fiorentina, having got rid of their coach Fabio Grosso after three defeats in three, finally got their first win. And they did it with Franco Mastuanto scoring a hat-trick and becoming, you know, as a 19-year-old, the youngest player to score a hat-trick for Fiorentina since, well, ever.

12:32Pol Ballus: But I think he's the youngest since Messi to do it in the top five leagues.

12:37James Horncastle: Well, that's certainly what Fiorentina and Camiso Social was kind of putting out there. He has been putting himself out as well, hasn't he, Camiso? He went before the travelling fans and was sort of telling them how much he loves them. right the best fans the greatest um so so uh yeah delighted for jesse giuseppe b uh come so that he finally gets the win that yeah he has been looking for make fiorentina great again we're on the way

13:11Pol Ballus: yeah so good so good and oh yeah what a what a win as soon as vanoli comes in boom big victory in that bottom of the table battle. Crikey. Alrighty. Well, loads to talk about today. Let's get into the stuff and let's start off with a quick look at the Europa League. The Europa League. You're excited, Tom. I'm excited. Wednesday, Thursday this week, the bookies have the favourites to win it as Juventus and Milan. Bookies don't watch much City, huh?

13:43James Horncastle: Well, I mean, Ruben Amarim has taken a team to a Europa League final. It was one of the most memorable Europa League final. Certainly was. And United Tottenham. So who's to say that he can't do it again? But I looked at those betting odds with some surprise. Yes.

13:59Pol Ballus: Juve and Milan at the top, followed by Bayer Leverkusen, Bournemouth, Celta Vigo, Real Sociedad Marseille, Palace, Sunderland and Benfica. This week, Benfica began their campaign away at Milan. That's on Wednesday. Milan, who will subsequently be taking on Sunderland at San Siro. Sunderland on Wednesday are in action against Alkmaar. That's their third European game for 53 years. Of course, the Milan-Benfica game is Ruben Amirim against Marco Silva. So that's a thing.

14:30James Horncastle: Yeah, obviously. Man United against Fulham. They've come up against each other. Amirim played for Benfica as well.

14:39Pol Ballus: good low scoring low scoring

14:42James Horncastle: look I mean Milan you know came back at the weekend from 2-0 down against Lazio scored a couple of goals and if they play like they did in the second half against Lazio then it should be a fun game because finally got to see some of their better attacking players on the pitch that have been weirdly sort of sidelined so far by Amarim

15:05Pol Ballus: alright

15:06James Horncastle: for example Diego Moriera Well, Moreira played against Juventus and obviously came on at halftime, triple substitution. First time in a long time that Luka Modric has been subbed off at an interval without an injury. It was kind of like, oof, you're just not having it today, are you, Luka? You're giving the ball away. It's not a possession-based game. You're being asked to run around, not your strength at 41. one um so brought on yunice musa brought on diego morrera brought on christian pulisic pulisic had not played at all so far um this season and all of them uh had an impact and morrera took both of his goals um really well um from kind of acute angles one on the volley one from outside the box and uh given how much money that milan have invested in him how much sort of minimum 50 million um then they need him to be the difference maker as he was when he came on against Lazio the weekend but it was it was also encouraging to see Pulisic play very well because he was in the matchday squad for their first game against Torino having not done any pre-season not played in any friendlies and he didn't get on he didn't he didn't figure in any of their other games um and then he comes on at the weekend and you know he was the boy who put the ball at the back post for from Herrera to finish so um I think gave the team a different look okay you could say Milan were 2-0 down their pride was stinging there was a sense of urgency they had to get back into that game but I think with with those attacking players on the pitch hopefully it points to you know what Milan will look like in the future hopefully that is the Milan we'll see more than the one in the first half.

16:57Pol Ballus: All right. Well, they'll be up against Benfica on Wednesday. All sorts of games coming up on Thursday. Celtic are up against French Varos. French Varos, not a French team. Hungarian, of course. French Varos. They knocked out Trabzon's ball. Mo Salah's Trabzon's ball. To the tune of 5-0. So this will be an interesting one. Celtic got beat 3-0 by Rangers in the Scottish League Cup at the weekend. Real Sociedad are up against Bournemouth. That's going to be a game, eh, Paul?

17:25Jimbo: That's going to be a massive game. In a big week for Real Sociedad, we just started badly for them because they lost against Atletico de Madrid. But yeah, Real Sociedad, for me, the best Spanish team, possibly, in that competition. So let's see how they can handle this.

17:41Pol Ballus: Excellent. Marseille, listed as one of the favourites, will hope to turn their dismal start to the season around when they visit Besiktas, who had a 3-0 win over the weekend. One of the goals scored by Leandro Trossard. His first former Schick, so that's where he is now. Yeah, hard to have too much faith in Marseille this season. After several years of just frantically buying and selling players hand over fist in every transfer window, they're now embracing this age of austerity. They didn't qualify for the Champions League. They've racked up some fairly significant debts. Their finances are being very closely scrutinized by both UEFA and the DNCG, French football's financial watchdog.

18:30And so they went through the entire summer without signing a single player, which hasn't happened at Marseille for a long time. The squad is very thin. They managed to hold on to Igor Pichao, Brazilian left winger who was being linked with Sunderland. that was sort of the the one kind of very sellable asset that they managed to hold on to but their domestic form has been poor they've lost their last three on the spin lost one nil away at ren on uh friday there is obviously a european pedigree at marseille they reached the europa final in in 2018 um and you know if you can get everyone on board and the team are playing well and the fans are all onside, it's a fantastic place to play and watch football.

19:16But it does feel like the club is at a bit of a low ebb at the moment. It's hard to imagine them making a massive impact in Europe. I mean, they're already down in 13th in Liga. And I just think kind of, I mean, as ridiculous as it sounds, qualifying for Europe again next season will be a bigger priority than doing well in Europe this season, I imagine.

19:37Pol Ballus: All right. What are the Germans' prospects in Europe, Seb? Well, I suppose you probably favor Leverkusen, although I'm not sure really what I think of Carlos Martinez's side yet. They're growing, they still have a few familiar names from the past. Patrick Schick is in good form, Ibi Mazza, the Algerian playmaker, who started the season pretty well. But they look very ropey at the back. You get a chance, Jimbo, have a look at their 2-1 draw with Augsburg over the weekend and take note of the goal they conceded or they allowed Mikhail Gregoric to score from a corner. It's as bad set-piece defending as you could possibly imagine.

20:14And this has been an issue for Leverkusen for a couple of years. And it's very difficult to imagine them going through Europe and facing some of the teams that are left in that competition and being able to survive at least a way leg against them. So let's see. Don't write off Hoffenheim. Hoffenheim, they're not going to be explosive. They're not going to be, they're not a hugely attractive side, but they're very functional. They're very obdurate. but they're going to be a pain to play against. And actually, there's some interesting storylines. Do you remember Adam Hojek from a few years ago, one of the great hopes from Czechia?

20:48He obviously moved to Germany, joined Leverkusen. Didn't really work for him. Went to Hoffenheim on loan, then got injured, is now permanently there. He started the season really well. He's now 24, so he's not really a wunderkind anymore, but scored twice the weekend against Stuttgart. Played very, very well. Walter Berger, the former Stoke player, has emerged as a like a credible uh bundesliga force um leon abadulo is is an excellent midfielder too so there's some interesting things there and they're very physical they're very hard-working christian eiser has built a unit in capital letters and with an exclamation mark so you

21:27Pol Ballus: don't really want to face them all right final is going to be in frankfurt great stadium great great stadium loud like a furnace walk through a vald obviously as in as in forest so val stadium you walk through a forest to get there very atmospheric oh beautiful that's a nice touch isn't it a forest forest walk yeah frankfurt forest yeah you also you get to go past the uh the tony yoboa house on the way to it you know about the what the what the tony yoboa house i will um i put in my social yeah there's um there's a big mural of tony yoboa on the train out to the stop where you get off to go to the stadium.

22:06So if you're going there as an away fan, make sure you look to your right about 10 minutes outside of Frankfurt Central Station and you'll see Tony Ababa. Brilliant.

22:18Pol Ballus: I wonder which sets of fans will be enjoying that spectacle come May. I don't think it's going to be Leverkusen. I heard the odds. I don't really, as with James' reservations about Juve and AC Milan, I'm not quite sure Leverkusen deserve that billing. But we'll see. All right. We're doing a great job of ruling teams out. No one is in contention for the Europa League as it happens at all.

22:40James Horncastle: I've only seen one Italian team win that competition this century, which was Atalanta in Dublin against Xabi Alonso by Leverkusen. And from what I've seen so far of Juve and Milan, I kind of don't put them on the same level as that Gasparini Atalanta. We'll see.

22:55Pol Ballus: Do you put them on the same level as Sunderland, for example, who they'll be facing?

22:58James Horncastle: See, I would back Premier League teams over Serie A teams, is just because of the amount of investment, how far they are along in their projects compared with Juve. This is Spalletti's first full season. Had quite an incomplete transfer window, got loads of injuries. And then with Milan, this is still, I think, the beginning of whatever the Ruben Amarim era becomes.

23:24Pol Ballus: All right. There you go. It begins Wednesday. Benfica Milan, one of the first fixtures. Looking forward to seeing that one. Seb, I know you've got places to be So let's move on next to a quick word on a key game from the weekend in Germany and one or two other headlines as well. Your chosen game is Borussia Dortmund's 3-0 victory over Paderborn. Paderborn. Really interesting because obviously over the last couple of weeks Dortmund have suffered a series of catastrophes. they lost constantelius to injury kos koretsis had a circulation problem last week and had to come off we're still kind of waiting to see what the sort of the way forward is with that and that is the that is the the crux of all their summer spending and the kind of great hope of new creativity within the side so nika kovac has been forced into a bit of a rethink has brought fabio silver um into the side silver who has been sort of having a little bit of an internal rivalry with Sarah Garcia.

24:23It's been one or the other for Kovac. And Kovac made it clear in preseason, hey, Garcia is my first choice number nine. Fabio is the sort of the contender. And Fabio's not taken it all that well. He hasn't enjoyed being a second choice. There were some noises about him potentially leaving during the summer. But he's come in, he's playing a sort of a, almost kind of a number 10 role behind Garcia alongside Ethan Noir, who's on loan from Arsenal. And it's working. Dortmund are five wins from five games. They played pretty well against Paderborn. Might have been three goals up by a half-time, were it not for the offside flag.

25:02Ended up winning 3-0. Two brilliant goals from Felix Mecho. The second one, just absolutely perfect bicycle kick. Reminiscent of that, do you remember the Van Basten bicycle kick for Milan all those years ago? The perfect motion at the top of the arc.

25:16Pol Ballus: In the Champions League. Exactly, that. It was very, very similar. and i think what's interesting about dortmund this season is the depth so okay it's not kind of a tuchel clock style of play but in midfield look at the options in the match uh um joey firman who was signed from psv over the summer he's in there marcel sabitzer is still at the club joe bellingham is still there like there are some options niko schlatterbeck made his return from from injury at the weekend so he's back in the back three jean godot who they signed from salzburg looks like a phenomenal prospect as a center back and yes all roads eventually lead to allianz arena and by munich of course they do but this is a dortmund who've probably for the first time in a couple of years look like they might have a bit of resilience to them and hopefully no one plays this clip back to me in like six months time when bion have a 40 point lead but it's interesting it's interesting and at the moment um Bayern look ever so slightly off it not quite sure why a few few competing theories might just be a world cup hangover but this might be one of those situations where a slightly less than excellent Bayern makes for a slightly more interesting Bundesliga we shall see Bayern who took on the fairy tale story of the opening rounds Elversborg and were being held for quite a while by the new boys.

26:44Yeah, I mean, Elvesburg are going to be a problem at home for a lot of clubs because they're a good side. Like, you know, their humble origins aside, there's been a decent amount of money spent on their infrastructure. They've got some good players there and they're well coached. So they're going to be difficult. And factor in this slightly under-par Bayern at the moment, and there was a contest for a long period. It was ultimately settled by Harry Kane. Brilliant, brilliant, really well-taken goal to win it. 2-1. Lennar Karl got himself into a bit of trouble, Jimbo, so he scored the first goal of the game at the back post and then kind of ran off to the Elversburg fans and shushed them.

27:19I don't know why, but anyway, it's kind of one of those things like it's a young person celebration, right? It's something you do without really thinking about it. Anyway, Lennar Karl had to apologize afterwards, he didn't mean anything by it, sorry. Very, very strange moment, but yeah, great game, good goals. and we'll see but Bayern not quite there yet which is interesting because they've got a few new parts so we talked about Nathaniel Brown who's being used in a few different ways even though he's a fullback Ismael Sabari created the first goal of the game for Karl he's still finding a role so Kampany might take a little bit of time to kind of weld all these different new parts together as exciting as they all are so we're not quite there yet so interesting interesting times Okay

28:07Pol Ballus: Harry Kane With the With the winning goal His first goal Of the season In the league For Bayern Munich Very similar to the one He scored against D.R. Congo In the World Cup In the way that he was able To bend it round The very close marking Of a Elversburg player Dortmund 50th Bayern goal Wasn't it I believe 150th 150th Is that right 150 It's already I think he's already 7th in the all-time Bayern scoring At Milan Which is incredible That's madness. Dortmund, with their perfect start of the season, are one of two teams to be on maximum points. The other one are Freiburg, who beat Mönchengladbach 5-0 on Saturday.

28:48Pol Ballus: They scored 10 goals and conceded just one so far, Freiburg. Gladbach, who are second from bottom, subsequently saw their manager resign. Yeah, and rightly so, because I think the wins have been blown in this direction for some time. Igen Planski did a good job last season of steadying a really, really uncertain club who were going through enormous difficulties and looked like they were heading for relegation, actually. But in terms of where their future lay with him in charge, I don't think it was terribly convincing. And this was so poor, Jimbo. The quality of the goals they conceded to take nothing away from Freiburg's performance, which was excellent.

29:27Igor Matanovic in particular played ever so well. but but it's just nowhere near good enough for a club of gladback size and historical standing and their inability to compete in the small areas of the game uh it was just shambles and i think there was really only one outcome and better to do it now better to do it now at least you have more more season left to uh to rectify the issues sounds like they'll be glad to see the back of him

29:52Pol Ballus: oh glad back nice can't even respond to that nice uh i see that rb leipzig who got absolutely tonked beside lake como on thursday night responded with a 5-0 win over hamburg what a result that was i know it's not i mean but it's bundesliga related just want to say it happened since our last show como's debut in the champions league how good was that and how how upset were they back in Germany what happened to Leipzig there what was it 4-1 4-0 4-1 4-1 4-1 yeah I mean

30:30James Horncastle: didn't really come as a surprise um to me on the back of what we've seen from Como for the last two years um I think uh they are one of the the best run and best coached clubs um on the continent at the moment. Very striking how easy they made that game look because I think some of their compatriots would maybe have not made as light a work as they did with RB Leipzig, which just, I think, goes to show how cutting-edge Como are. And it was quite funny because Cesc Fabregas has come up against quite a lot of cultural resistance over the last couple of years in some of the comments he's made which have been sort of misinterpreted to be sort of catalan-splaining football to italians and and so after that win there were a lot of the old headlines that like yeah this this upstart Fabregas you know he's so arrogant you know trying to tell us how we should do our football.

31:44James Horncastle: And it's just like, well, I don't know, maybe you should take a leap out of Sesken Como's.

31:48Pol Ballus: Yeah, the only Italian Champions League side to win.

31:52James Horncastle: Yeah, and the biggest win of an Italian team making their debut in that competition since Samp beat Rosenborg 5-0 at the beginning of the 90s. Wow. So.

32:05Pol Ballus: Samp are currently on the bottom of City of B, by the way.

32:08James Horncastle: But yeah, it was, that is, in its own right, James, quite a tragic story. But quite a lot of people remarking on, oh, look, Como, no Italians in that team that smashed RB Leipzig. Yeah, isn't this a shame? But, you know, it's a far greater shame that Juventus field no outfield Italians in their team against Sassuolo and then lose to Sassuolo. I think you should just look at the fact that Como do a lot better job when it comes to putting teams together regardless of whether they're Italians or not in it. That can at least keep the tricolor flag flying high in Europe.

32:49Pol Ballus: Absolutely. All right. So just before you leave us, was that a bit of a shock for Leipzig? Yeah, I think so. It was also unhelpful because Leipzig are now coached by Martin De Michaelis, who got the job with really no coaching record whatsoever in Europe. And it was seen as Jurgen Klopp's appointment, which you know um Marcel Schaefer who's the MD for sport at Leipzig he was very loyal to to Oli Werner before Oli Werner left the club De Michaelis replaces him and yeah that wasn't a particularly good look but things have improved because as you mentioned Leipzig thumped Haas on Sunday really really good comprehensive 5-0 win not quite sure how much it means though because that's back-to-back 5-0 losses for Hamburg um who are yet to score a goal this season and have now conceded 13 goals in three games.

33:37So, turns out Luka Vyskovic was a much better player than any of us realised.

33:42Pol Ballus: Wow. Making mincemeat of the hamburgers, Thomas, you would know that. Nice. Nice. Anyway, all right. Well, Seb, listen, you enjoy as much as possible whatever it is you're heading off to do. And, Paul, let's hear a bit more from you next.

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35:52Pol Ballus: Pobolus, let's do a little more Catalan-splaining. Barcelona continued their rip-roaring start to the season, putting four goals past Levante on Sunday. That's now five wins from five. They're top of the league, of course. They had a massive win in the Champions League as well. And they've got yet another bright young thing coming out of La Masia. Tell us all about Xavi Esparte.

36:18Jimbo: Yes, that was one of the main intentions I had at picking this game, just to speak about Xavi's part, which is the last gem that Barca got from their academy. A lovely player. He's one of the best. He's a midfielder that back in the day, he was repositioned to a right back because of the necessities in his team. And now he's playing as a left back at FC Barcelona in the first team. And he's taken the spot by store, basically. Alessandro Valde doesn't understand the chant. And Joron Cancelo is his backup at this point because he's playing so, so good. He scored the first goal, his first goal, in a Barcelona shirt with the first team.

36:57Jimbo: You could see in his face how happy he was in the moment. So, yeah, and he's part of that generation, of the 2007-born generation, which includes the lives of La Miquel Al, Pau Kouarci and Marc Bernal. So this has the numbers and the potential to be one of the most prolific generations ever assembled in La Masia since the 87-1, which had Lionel Messi, Gerard Piqué and Cesc Fabregas.

37:26Pol Ballus: You'd call it an extraordinary stroke of luck, except that they keep doing this. And players from this generation contributing three of the four goals on Sunday because Lamin-Yemal got his third brace of the season.

37:39Jimbo: Remarkable. That's another good point, another fun point. Lamin-Yemal said recently that when he entered the World Cup, he was not fully happy because he believed that his performance was not good enough in the World Cup and that he could be better. He couldn't wait for the season to start. And he's sort of proving that. He scored two goals again against Levante, best player on the pitch. When he was taken off alongside Pedri, basically Levante revived and they managed to score two goals and put a bit of emotion into the game. Then on the late stages, Karima De Iemi as a super soup basically killed the game.

38:18Jimbo: But yeah, Lamin-Yamal, one of the names of the weekend here in Spain. Even more, I don't know if you've seen this, but there's an interview coming up with him and Jorge Valdano, which is a household name as a commentator here in Spain, in which basically, Yamal is loving for himself to win the Ballon d 'Or, which is the saying that we mentioned about Kylian Mbappe a week before. And there's this tendency in Spanish football of the biggest names, in this case, LaMigiamal and Kylian Mbappé seeing that Ballon d 'Or is wide open and trying to lobby and make a campaign for themselves basically, LaMigiamal said that he believes that he's one of the best players in the world possibly among the top two and that next to him, there's Kylian Mbappé I don't think he said possibly

39:05Pol Ballus: I think he just flat out said there's only two of us that can win this it's me and Mbappé and if you compare the two of us, what we've done this year which, to be fair, he's not wrong about in those terms the award should be his i don't know is that a new thing players coming out and

39:20James Horncastle: saying i should win the ballon dora i think ronaldo changed this at real madrid i think at the height of the rivalry with messi it became important to to lobby and now it's almost become normal right i do think it feels more accentuated this time around because it feels like the ballon d 'or races is wide open um or it's more open than it has been in other years i don't think there's a consensus for one player um and but it seems particularly spanish uh actually no it doesn't seem particularly spanish because i mean you know to give our listeners an impression we we had a triple interview with psg players last week um one of one of which was with cavara and so so all of this is is sort of putting putting their putting players in front of the media at a time when you probably wouldn't ordinarily have access to them uh and it's keeping their profiles high keeping them in the spotlight presumably with a view some of the people voting for the Ballon d 'Or.

40:37James Horncastle: It's not an open vote, you know. Jimbo doesn't have a vote. Tom doesn't have a vote. Paul doesn't have a vote. That's a disgrace. So,

40:44Pol Ballus: if you did have a vote, Tom, let's have our own Ballon d 'Or right now. Spoilt ballot. It's too hard. You reckon? I like it when there's a really obvious one. You just put, yeah, he's won everything. He's the best in the world. You kind of want to give it to the best player in the world, but it'd be helpful if the best player in the world had won all the trophies Who's the best player in the world then, Tom? I think it's probably Kylian Mbappe. But Harry Kane arguably had a better season. But then neither of them won the World Cup, although both did great things at the World Cup, Mbappe in particular.

41:15It's difficult, isn't it? It's a head-squatcher. Who'd you vote for, James?

41:19James Horncastle: Well, we did this on The Athletic last week, and we all had to choose a player, and I chose Kavara. Yeah. but I chose Guevara because he kind of stood up in the biggest Champions League games and the game of the season for me was that first leg in the semi-final against Bayern Munich and he was the best player on the pitch but it's not a it's not a convincing, compelling yes, we almost go for Guevara it was kind of a it's very hard to pick one this year, I don't think it's as obvious as Laminya Mal makes out that it's between him and and Killian um and you know I think one of the things that Killian suffers for is he left to go to Real Madrid the team that always wins things and always wins the Champions League and in the meantime the club he left has won the Champions League twice and his team has last year came out of it winning nothing yeah uh and so he had a great World Cup you know as Mourinho says in every press conference this guy's stratospheric you know when I was not a translator for Louis van Gaal and Bobby Robson I was with Ronaldo at Barcelona he reminds me of Ronaldo he's unbelievable Bellingham is great but Mbappe's made history and all these things it's like yeah over what seven games Mbappe was fantastic for France but are we condensing it to seven games in the way that I'm condensing my Kavarov to four or five games you know that's that's what it feels and that's maybe why Kane is is perhaps the more compelling argument because it's you're taking into a fact the season he had with Bayern uh and going to a semi-final with England where he often dug us out of a hole um so basically it's it's it's very hard so you can understand why people are lobbying um you know kane really tried to get to seb stafford bloor uh and umir from the bbc yeah as part of his subliminal lobbying i imagine well they're all

43:33Pol Ballus: at it all at it trying to come on the show no jimbo said no again we can't if we have to if we have one on gotta have the yeah it's not enough space in this in this studio it's not a good tool Yeah. Paul, so how has Mbappé responded to the pressure coming out of Catalunya? He scored a brace himself this weekend in the Real Madrid's 4-1 win over Raya Vallecano. Has Mbappé been similarly vocal? Have his people been moving in the shadows?

44:05Jimbo: Well, I mean, he's been given interviews. I think he spoke to L 'Equipe, if I'm not wrong. I think there were more interviews planned. I'm not sure if yeah if I can disclose something in that regard but I think that there were more interviews planned in that direction but yeah I mean I think that he was pretty clean in his pre-match press conference before the Champions League and then in that interview in L 'Equipe and then yeah on the pitch I don't envisage Mbappé for example like leaving any penalty to Vini which is something that happened last season at some point. I don't think that it's that time of the year now.

44:45Jimbo: And just starting up to what James was saying about the loving and seeing a wide-open prize, I also think that there's a financial element, maybe in that sort of intention to win the Ballon d 'Or, as in a lot of players having a lot of bonuses attached to this award. I know for a fact that Laminya Mal, his salary has a big part attached to sort of individual awards. So I guess that this plays a big part.

45:08James Horncastle: Would that bankrupt Barcelona if he wins it? Will they deliberately lobby against their own player to stop the clause? Hansi, stop playing him.

45:18Jimbo: I'm going to draw Laporta next time again. But yeah, that's like a good question.

45:24Pol Ballus: Well, those two with good weekends. Elsewhere, Atletico Madrid had a victory 3-0 against Real Sociedad with Julian Alvarez not available because he had muscular overload in training. huh no feature in the champions league in the defeat at anfield yeah and yeah true well but

45:45Jimbo: this game was away from home as well so um simone was really crazy to julian albred after the anfield game as in saying that he did almost the perfect game that he did everything that he asked for that he carved in the whole front line uh apparently the overload is true and the aim atletico have is that he's available to play the madrid derby which is after the break after the international break, so he's potentially going to miss the next game. And yeah, I just wanted to highlight that a good friend of James Horncastle scores his first goal as an Atletico Madrid player which is Jonathan David.

46:20Jimbo: He came in from the bench and yeah, he scored in a really composed finish, which is something that he didn't have the luck to see quite often in this area, I guess last term.

46:31James Horncastle: Yeah, and Juve, their goal scorers are not scoring goals. And so, incredibly, last night they were like,

46:40Pol Ballus: do you think Juve may regret sending Jonathan David on loan? And Duzan Vlajevic is scoring goals as well. Vibha Sigtas, yeah.

46:50James Horncastle: Kolomouane is struggling big time. I've seen some terrible memes on the internet. Really?

46:56Pol Ballus: Because that's saying that he was hiding in the game. Oof. Which is strong.

47:02James Horncastle: Spalletti said that they couldn't find him in the game. Right. that they should have played the ball up to him more.

47:10Pol Ballus: I know we're slightly interrupting your Spanish roundup poll, but this was the quite remarkable game between Sassuolo and Juve, which was, I think, goalless until about the 65th minute. Sassuolo take the lead, and then Edon Zagrova, who's one of the bright prospects of the Juve squad, equalised once. And then you have Kieran Bowie putting Sassuolo back in front, and then Zagrova answers again. and this is in what minute was that that's in the 91st minute so it looks like it's going to be

47:40James Horncastle: points shared but no no because um saswolo went up the other end with a player that they have on loan from juventus another player that you very like yes and uh and adzic seems to be caught in two minds of like oh this is a really good opportunity do i want to do this and he's like waiting and waiting and waiting to take the shot. To the point where Juventus defender has a chance to block it. But summing up Juventus' evening, so inept, can't get the block in and Adzic takes the shot and scores. And Sassuolo win. But that final 10 minutes, James, it felt like it was May 13th rather than September 13th because it felt like everything was on the line in that game.

48:26James Horncastle: The way they threw everything at it at the end. It was very... I think anyone who was tuning into that game with stereotypes about what Italian football is supposed to be about would have been like, what am I watching here? Because both benches were spilling out onto the pitch. You had that kind of classic cage where coaching staff and substitutes are like kind of walking up the sidelines, following the play as it's happening and sort of encouraging and stuff like that. and there was no desire to sort of defend and see it. There's that kind of old adage that if you can't win a game, don't lose it.

49:05James Horncastle: And neither of them seemed to think about that. And it made for a chaotic and very fun ending, particularly if you're a Sassuolo fan. But it did leave you looking at Juventus thinking, oh my God, what is happening here? And some of the defending on the goals was horrendous. I mean, they have an injury crisis at Juventus, but their defense is not really hit by that injury crisis. Their best center-backs were playing yesterday, Bremer and Lukumi. Kaloulu was playing. Both Bremer and Kaloulu made mistakes that you would look at and think, you're supposed to be the leaders on this team. What are you doing?

49:47James Horncastle: And then in a game in which they looked like they could score more than the two goals that they did, their striker, Randall Colomani, he looked like he couldn't score any calls. Zegrova scored twice, but Zegrova in 14 months at the club has never scored for the team and has been this kind of unfulfilled promise, you know, that fans kind of love Zegrova because of the idea of Zegrova, you know, this kind of socks down, kind of Kosov an Albanian player and he's never delivered. You then have Alas Begovic, their big signing from Bayer Leverkusen in the summer. Alas Begovic does all the right things, beats these Sassuolo defenders with a tremendous bit of skill, lays the ball right across goal, and Kolomuani doesn't do what a striker is supposed to do.

50:38James Horncastle: He hangs back rather than sort of attacking the far post to get the tap in. And so, look, Juventus have lots and lots of injuries. Yildiz out Kefren Turam out Manuel Locatelli out a lot of their sort of big names which in the context of Juventus history are not big names but for this team are important but still kind of no excuse really for that defeat

51:08Pol Ballus: Right, we'll come at this because there are some interesting questions as well about Colomwani and Juve's decisions regarding him but Paul, sorry, what was it you were saying about La Liga?

51:18Jimbo: Yeah, no, Hermann, I don't really remember. I wanted to highlight a couple more things, at least. Just one of them is that Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang scored again. Yes. Fifth game in a row. Have you seen the stat that he's the first player to score in the first five La Liga games of a season since 2009? And that's my question to you. Can you guess the footballer who scored in the first five La Liga games in 2009? Yeah.

51:49James Horncastle: Is it Lionel Messi?

51:50Jimbo: It's not Lionel Messi. It's not David Villa. Was it Ibrahimovic? It was Ibrahimovic. Zlatan Ibrahimovic. Yeah, yeah. It was a season of Barcelona. Yeah. One and only season of Barcelona. Yeah. He started really well. Yeah.

52:04James Horncastle: Ora Brahimovic.

52:06Jimbo: Ora Brahimovic. Exactly. Yeah. Exactly. And then the last thing I wanted to mention, and that's a bit to Tom, if he can develop that. One of the biggest names at the start of the season, beyond Aubameyang, is the rushing Santander striker, Yassir Zavidi, who scored against Alaves. He's scored five calls in five games, and he's on loan from Rennes. He is 21, and he's branded right now as a great hope for the future and a player that a lot of teams are monitoring. And yeah, rushing fans are just loving him. a newly promoted team who is enjoying the nice start-up position a fan team to watch as well and a fan striker which deserved a mention here in my opinion

52:52James Horncastle: So Yassir another Moroccan 21 years old Yeah He's Moroccan they keep producing players It's incredible And he barely played at Wren Yeah So he joined just looked him up now because his name didn't ring any bells He joined from Femalikau I'm guessing midway through last season six appearances, no goals so yeah, I can't claim that he really made much of an impact at Roison Park but clearly finding Santander more to his liking

53:25Jimbo: Lovely place to go by the way

53:30Pol Ballus: Alright, well next up let's finish off James' bit and hear about Ligue 1

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56:17Pol Ballus: So Colin Moani, we're just retracing the steps here. How long ago was it that he had that brilliant start at Juve?

56:23James Horncastle: Well, he joined in the January... Two seasons ago? Yes. And he did start well. They wanted to sign him on a permanent basis. He wanted to stay, but they couldn't get a deal done with PSG. And so they waited and waited and waited, and they thought PSG would blink and come down on their valuation. It didn't happen. And so he ended up going to Tottenham. In the meantime, Juventus signed Jonathan David on a free transfer from Lille. But you have this kind of curious case, and it's not just at Juventus, of players that Italian clubs have sent on loan somewhere else, usually to the Premier League. And they have crossed their fingers and hoped the Premier League clubs would buy those players.

57:23James Horncastle: And it hasn't happened. So you've got loads of players who have presumably in their heads thought their careers at these Italian clubs have finished and they're back here. And that's true of people at Milan like Chukwese. It's true of Pavard at Inter. At Juve, you can go back to McKinney going on loan at Leeds and then coming back and being their best player for the first half of last season, signing a new deal. And yeah, there are lots and lots of examples which kind of show that I think one of the reasons why some of these leagues are suffering is not only because the Premier League is so much richer than they are, it's because this summer feels like it's different in that Premier League clubs bought from each other rather than buying from these clubs.

58:16James Horncastle: So they're like, yeah, we're just going to... we've ordered these players from you. We haven't liked what we've seen and we're returning them to sender. But Columwani, you know, at Tottenham, I mean, Spalletti kind of buried him on match day one after the game against Frozionni where he said, yeah, if this guy hasn't scored or done well for the last two years, there must be a reason.

58:41Pol Ballus: Right. Well, this is what I'm curious about. What was it this summer that made Juve think, we're not going to take him on loan. We'll actually buy him outright from Paris Saint-Germain?

58:50James Horncastle: Well, I mean, Spalletti said he was produced, well, he was given a list of players that the club had decided to target. Right. And he was like, okay, then, whatever. And I think Juve have been quite limited in what they could do because of these financial fair play parameters that have been put on them. But at the same time, it's quite expensive deal for them to do, to sign a player that their coach doesn't seem entirely convinced about. A lot of the players that they've signed for that position over the last few years just haven't worked out. So, you know, Vlajevic was the end of the Agnelli era.

59:28James Horncastle: They spent, you know, 70 going on to 90 million for him when you include bonuses and agent commissions. Camoli came in last year. What did he do? He signed Lois Appenda from France. Oh, no, from France on loan. From Lens on loan. He's now back in France, I think. At Lyon. At Lyon. Having them... No, so he didn't come straight from Lens, did he? Because he had, you're right, he went to Leipzig. Yes. Yeah. So they... David is another one. Jonathan David is another one. And now they've gone back to Colomuani. and it's just, it seems at this moment to be quite a big waste of resources. Now Speletti's had to walk back those comments that he made after the Frozionna game and said, look, there's a Colomuani bandwagon and I'm still on it.

1:00:21James Horncastle: And then he's sort of, here are all the things I've said that have been nice about Colomuani in pre-season. You should focus on them as much as you focused on that comment that I made after the Frozionna game. and he was quite defensive after the Sassuolo match as well. But overall, there's this sense that Juventus cannot and have not got that position right for some time. And look, there would have been a time where they would have invested in the best young Italian player in that position and built around that player. The problem is that outside of Pio Esposito and dare I say Francesco Camada, both of these talents who are seen as the future Italy goal scorers already play for Inter and Milan.

1:01:08James Horncastle: Italy has struggled to produce strikers for the last 10 years in a way that Germany has struggled to produce strikers and other, Spain has even struggled to produce strikers even though Ferran Torres keeps scoring for PSG at the moment. With both feet. Yeah and the best young talents in Italy now, they go to the Premier League before Juventus and Inter and Milan can get hold of them. So So they're in a... Yeah, the top Italian teams are in a position that I don't think they've ever found themselves in in the moment.

1:01:38Pol Ballus: Well, let's hope it works out for Colomuani and Juventus. He wasn't the strike having the worst weekend in Italy. A shout for Daniele Maldini, who started the weekend, I think it was Friday, wasn't it? That Cagliari beat Atalanta, his former side, with a goal from the penalty spot by Maldini himself. subsequently was involved in a car crash and all sorts of stories going on about

1:02:04James Horncastle: tests that the police may or may not have done is he all right he seems to be james i mean callery put out a statement saying that he was going to train uh as he would be expected to

1:02:16Pol Ballus: right because initial reports were that he'd failed various tests that the police given him which i imagine would involve then a lengthy ban there were initial reports um claiming

1:02:27James Horncastle: he had failed a breathalyzer but then Caleri put out a statement on Monday morning saying that the toxicology tests came back negative so some conflicting reporting well he'd had quite a good start to the season Caleri had been a bit of a revelation there are two revelations in Serie A this season Lazio who again finished this weekend at least going into Monday night and we're recording before the Monday night games, but Lazio, top of the table, looked like they were going to win their fourth consecutive game against Milan when they were 2-0 up. And then there's Cagliari. Cagliari have won three of their first four games for the first time since the great teams of the 1970s with Gigi Riva.

1:03:13James Horncastle: They've done it even though they've sold some of their best young Italian players. Daniel Maldini scored in their last two wins and they've got this other kid from Roma, Romano, who's Swiss. Who's Swiss, but he's Italian. Right. And the Swiss were trying to call him up and make him a Swiss international, but Roberto Mancini has got there first. Yay. And so it looks like he will be in this first new-look Italy squad from Roberto Mancini for this upcoming marathon of Nations League games, which I'm sure will creep up on all listeners to this podcast who don't realise that this international break is essentially about to hit them in the face.

1:04:00James Horncastle: Half the time of the World Cup that we've just had.

1:04:04Pol Ballus: Yeah, it's a long one. We'll be there with you throughout. So, okay, very good. Very good. Should we move on to Ligue 1 to wrap up today's Totally Football Show? Absolutely. All right, Tom. So Paris Saint-Germain went and got a win. 1-0. Hold the back page. Aweight of breath. How convinced were you? We've won a league game. Not convinced at all. And Luis Enrique said afterwards, we've won. But it's the day when I've been the most annoyed. PSG went ahead early on. Ferran Torres scoring again. That's six goals in five games in all competitions. Best start in goal scoring terms by a new PSG player since Zlatan Ibrahimovic.

1:04:48Him again. There he is again. Really nicely taken goal. and this is off the back of him scoring a hat-trick against Slovan Bratislava in the Champions League on Wednesday. Yeah, five minutes in, ball gets played into Dembele's feet and he backheels the ball into Torres' path and he kind of strides onto it just outside the penalty area and curls it first time. Lovely shape on the shot with the inside of his foot into the bottom right corner. And you thought, OK, here we go, PSG, you're up and running. but you know despite pressing with a bit more intensity they they gave breast a lot of opportunities and matve safonov who's been in the crosshairs of late ended up being psg's savior i think he made six saves in total a couple of which were really impressive there was one after about an hour cross goes into the box from uh the psg right and kamari dumbia Marley international attacking midfielder who's playing in the number 10 position for brest has had a really good start to the season like plants this header towards uh the bottom right corner from his perspective and safonov leaps to his left sticks that hand turns it behind so pierce do you finally get their first win on the board which i think moves them up to seven seventh yep in the standings five points off the lead yes uh but not all that convincing um And then some interesting comments post-game.

1:06:17There was Luis Enrique saying how annoyed he'd been watching his team and how unimpressed he'd been by their performance. I mean, invariably, he has talked them up quite a lot when they haven't been winning. And on this occasion, even though they had, he was not pleased with what he'd seen. Usman Dembele gave quite an interesting interview to Ligue 1 Plus, the in-house TV channel. And this is off the back of the Kylian Mbappé interview with France Football that we've already mentioned. And towards the end of that interview, it's quite a long interview. And basically, you know, Mbappé making his case to win the Ballon d 'Or.

1:06:58right towards the end of the interview he was asked about about the fact that usman dembele has won it before he has and how if you told people that 10 years ago or five years ago people would have struggled to believe it and mbappe said something slightly curious he said you know usman's always been like a really talented player um but you know i've always been the chosen one lelu and basically saying i've had all this pressure on me all this time people have been waiting for me to get there and i've been kind of at the top level all this time and it just hasn't quite happened whereas Usman who you know has been on this real journey you know Dortmund and then Barcelona and all the injuries and then finally arrives at PSG, Luis Enrique comes in and the planets align and Dembele you know speaks after the game at Brest on Sunday and he said I can't remember what the question was it was being interviewed by former PSG striker Guillaume wow uh but he just basically comes out with uh you know i've always been you know working hard at the back of the classroom head down not making any noise you know i've never been the chosen one uh but i've kind of got here and it just seemed very pointed that he had chosen to use that expression lelu the same word that mbappe had used so that has raised eyebrows i mean the context to this is that mbappe and dembele are really close and have been for ages um you know they came through the French youth ranks together.

1:08:25They played in the national team for nearly 10 years now. They're very close. There was that footage that emerged over the World Cup of Dembele referring to Mbappé as Mobut, short for Mobutu, a reference to the Kylian Mbappé dictator meme. And Dembele's not the only guy who can get away with that kind of thing. So I don't think there's any suggestion that this is the beginning of a rift. But it was interesting that Dembele... Wow. Because he knows himself that he's not really in the running to win the Ballon d 'Or again, I think, if he's honest with himself. But it was just interesting that he, you know, seized that opportunity just to kind of, you know, put out a little comment.

1:09:09Pol Ballus: There you go. PSG with a win then, albeit not a convincing one, a game which began with a lovely tribute to the departing Brest manager, Eric Roy. Yeah, it was lovely, actually. I mean, there have been a lot of tributes and a lot of homages to him, but this was the real kind of set-piece moment. And before the game, Marquinhos and Luis Enrique and Luis Campos laid wreaths at the side of the pitch. Eric Roy's daughter addressed the crowd, really moving speech before the game and talked about the miracle that had happened to Eric Roy when he became head coach at Brest. A guy who's not had a coaching role for 11 years, plucked from obscurity by this kind of ailing team.

1:09:59Would you say he enhanced Brest? He certainly did enhance Brest. It leads them into the Champions League. Incredible. And yeah, I think Luis Enrique and Eric Waugh, they were always quite close to seem to get on well. We've seen various images of pre-match cuddles prior to games between the teams over the last couple of seasons. And then in the 58th minute, so he died at the age of 58, all the fans sort of lifted up there.

1:10:31Pol Ballus: I mean, he didn't tell anyone. Yeah, he didn't tell anyone. So it was known within French football circles. And there were times last season when he appeared on the touchline and he looked quite unwell. But he never publicly spoke out about his diagnosis. It was pancreatic cancer. And he was diagnosed with it about, I think, three and a half years before he died. And his daughter, Victoria Rose, she gave an interview to L 'Equipe this morning and talked about that. And he was basically told at the time, this is a very aggressive form of cancer. You're looking at six months, basically. And he held on for three and a half years.

1:11:08during which time he takes this club from the most remote corner of northwest france who've never achieved anything of note in their entire history and takes them into the champions league and gives them these incredible moments um and and the interview was actually very moving and she talked about you know when they said goodbye to him um and you know he was at home surrounded by loved ones and he you know he wasn't in pain and it wasn't traumatic and she said we all said everything that we wanted to say to each other before he left and then that was that and so this i mean okay just you know despite breast losing that it matters all that much but this felt like you know the kind of very fitting very fitting send-off there you go there you go very nice

1:11:53Pol Ballus: stuff tom uh elsewhere you mentioned some of the stories that have happened paris brunner in that one more draw between strasbourg and monaco who are now in a three-way tie on top of the table with Lille and Rennes. Rennes beat Marseille. Lille defeated Troyes 2-0. Oh, Paris FC are a couple of points off the top. Still up there. They had a 0-0 draw with Lyon. Still unbeaten under Liam Rossini. Loved the images of him emerging, doing his pimp roll onto the field. He's living his best life. He is, yeah. And for all that he was quite widely derided during his blink and miss it tenure as Chelsea coach.

1:12:38He really impressed people at Strasbourg with the quality of the football that he played and the buy-in that he got from all those young players. So I think when Paris FC brought him in, it was widely seen as a real coup. And as we've said before on this pod, Paris FC have more financial muscle than the majority of clubs in the French top flight. And at a time when traditional heavyweights like Marseille and Lyon and Monaco were having to really count the centimes, they were able to spend a little bit more freely. And yeah, they've got a really interesting group of players there. And it looks like they are, you know, they're going to be in the mix for European qualification.

1:13:16Crikey. Early doors, of course.

1:13:18Pol Ballus: We shall see how it all pans out. But well done to him and Paris SC in the meantime. Excellent. So we've got another round of league actually coming up before the international break next weekend. Subsequent to that, the European show will return to round up all of that. Paul, look forward to seeing you for that.

1:13:36Jimbo: It's going to be a pleasure.

1:13:37Pol Ballus: Excellent. Tom, thank you so much for today. And Mr Horncastle as well. Many thanks to producer Xavi. And to you as well. Do join us next week for more European fun and games for now from all of us here. It's adieu.

1:13:54Pol Ballus: The Totally Football Show podcast is available three times a week, bringing you all the football news you could reasonably be expected to care about. We've got views, we've got stats, we've got analysis, we've got some of the best football writers around, and the whole thing is absolutely free. So have a listen on Spotify or Apple Podcasts or all the usual places by clicking on the link below.

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