Anatomy of a Premier League Fracturing: Tactical Extremes, Imbalance, and Institutional Decay

You're listening to the Men in Blazers media network. Subopt a more radio. Massive Premier League weekend, the Hoi Arsenal, who's shabby Alonso's also perfect, yes, some have deeply imperfect Chelsea, a listing Liverpool. Look for their first winner of the season and tremble a little bit because Czechs notes, Ibswitch Town, the opponents who are Tottenham, self-screwing their first goal of the season against Nottingham Forest, baby steps, you can always be worse, you could be Everton. This is Big Weekend Preview, the table setter for the weekend's football feast, I'm joined by new haircuts, Rory Smith. It's done a bit too short, Raj. You're not like the first day at school, baby, and look who's back. It's posh Valtemarder, it's Mr Humphrey Carr. Here we are. How do everybody? We're not used to not sweating on the back of a bus somewhere outside of Atlanta, but we will soldier on. Go right into Northern Ireland, Arsenal, a Kings Chelsea Sunday 11.30 AM each time USA. Let's start when McKellar Tet is Arsenal, two wins out of two. Joyful attacking against Coventry, Monday's 1-0 victory against Villa, a little more control, but kind of grimly attritional. Look, they've only allowed one shot on target across the first two game days, leaving Tiereon re-saying, quote, I don't see a team that can challenge them to terrible Tierean pressure and roar, but you agree with Kate, he was with us. And then for a second, that felt like a kinesh slide into that corner flag. Do you agree, Rory? Yeah, we've tried and been here before, haven't we, Arsenal? It looks ominously familiar. They weren't thrilling, it ain't it's Villa, to be honest, they weren't especially thrilling, it ain't it's Coventry, but they are grinding through the gears, they're picking up speed, they look maybe not untouchable, but certainly kind of more untouchable than anybody else. That's kind of what I expected Arsenal to be this season, not a different order of whatever they were before, but themselves, but better. Have you seen Inevitable, you've seen Rexim in the National League? Care to comment? Well, I'm going to be, I'm going to state my enormous reputation on the line by saying that it's early days, that's my controversial, that's my very controversial observation. Yeah, hot, the hottest of hot takes, because I tell you this, you look at the two teams we've played, obviously Coventry, who rumps to the championship title last season, it's quite a sort of interesting thing as a, as a championship man, as I consider myself, that usual kind of mental dissonance when you see the team that was so dominant last season, step up and be like, oh yes, they've been out playing with the bigger boys, and the bigger boys are pretty good aren't they? And then Villa obviously, a lot of disruption, a lot of players going out the season, rumours of some frustrations from Uniamari with the hierarchy at Aston Villa, those are two teams to which you would expect last season's champions to perform well against. The city has started, you know, fine, well, they've signed a lot of incredible players, they'll probably be very good, but it's just a bit early, I think, to be, to be labeling Arsenal as ominous. Well, to be fair, this stage of the season last season, Liverpool had won the Premier League, so that is, you know, there is, there is historical relevance there. We always say, in the olden days, they did not use to print a league table until after four games of the season, we are utterly knee-jawed, we're burying teams after one game, we're, we're, we're calling them title winners after two, it's just who we are now. If I see a knee, I'm going to jerk it. I loved jerking knee. Why is that? I'll go the knee-jerk, but what you're saying is, essentially, is attack wins games, defences win championships and stability will probably win this title. From a Chelsea perspective, transfer deadline day Chelsea, confirmed $169 million sale of that elite wrestling heel, Enzo Fernandez, he's now at City, a big club will get to that, but Monaco did what they do, they undermined another Premier League team, they're mad bastards, by last second psyching them out of selling them Lumin Camaro as a replacement. So this game is very much a moment of truth for Shabby Alonso's new Chelsea, six out of six points so far, but man, as breath-taking as they're front three, they're, they're JP Morgan, Goal Lord G years, their midfield, 26% possession in the last game against Brighton, 146 successful passes. Jonathan Wilson wrote that Chelsea have a perfect start, but an unserious one, which I love. We joked on Monday that Chelsea are phenomenal to watch, but they're also like known to virus, they've got it going on with both ends. What are you making them? For the first time in a while it's, it's probably quite fun to be a Chelsea fan at this moment in time, you know, it's been such a, you know, the phrase, Barca case club gets thrown around, but it has been an environment which has felt fundamentally unserious, and now it feels as though they've gone from being a comedy to a comedy drama, you know, they're there, they were, they were previously, yeah, I think so. I think they've gone, you know, they've gone from being Friday night dinner and they've become Ludwig, they're a little bit more of a serious prospect. So that's a good one for British viewers, they'll know those two TV shows. Are you like paid to push Britbox? Yeah, 100%. That's, that's actually, I'm going to be throwing in loads of references to Quarro to Rosemary and Time, all the popular British shows that are available right now on your Britbox subscription. No, but I mean, I think they are, they're not a full-blown drama, they're not a serious operation, you know, they are not yet the West Wing, they are still a, they're a work in progress, but that, but that work and that progress is probably really exciting if you're a Chelsea firm. This is a great idea that we should, we should be thinking of Premier League teams in relation to what sort of prestige television show they are. Our Chelsea, the newsroom, it's sort of good, but at the same time, it doesn't really work. Yeah, you don't know if it's going to run for seasons upon seasons. Never mind the newsroom, ever turn of the room. I mean, that's where we are, but by your arm off to be the newsroom, guys. Can I defend Jablonsa? Please? Please. Because I'm a, I'm a Jabl loyalist. I think Jablonsa is an elite manager, he's a wonderfully handsome man and I would do anything for him. I think to an extent, we are, we are knee jerking around a Lonsa as well. Yeah, their defense looks really shaky, they've translated five dollars across their first two Premier League games, the distances aren't right, their relationships aren't there, all that stuff, as normal. He's been in charge at Chelsea for like three months. He's signed seven or eight players or had seven or eight players delivered to him. He's seen another like 12 go, five hundred million dollars plus in sales. At one point in pre-season, they had his first team training on one pitch and another sort of shadow first team that was absolutely not a bomb squad. I cannot stress that enough. A non bomb squad? It was a group of players they didn't want and who would go into leave, but it wasn't a bomb squad, stop crawling at a bomb squad. They were training like next door because there were complaints that Chelsea were kind of creating an unpleasant workplace environment when they had an actual bomb squad. That is total chaos. The fact that Alonso has kind of managed to get his team playing some sort of football with some kind of identity this quickly, I think is amazing and you could see it ain't bright and there were there were little glimmers of the sort of football he played at Labour twoson and to do that in in those circumstances in this short space of time, it just feels a little bit cruel to be like, well, you've not sorted out the defence, have you? I'm also a jabi Alonso ite and I would like him to kiss me on the cheek. I think a thing that people that we collectively often assume about pre-season is, oh this is a great time for, you know, this is where they start to work on patterns and work on this and the reality of the modern pre-season for Premier League clubs, there's something that I've seen at Rexham as well is that so much that is, you know, actually travelling around the world, fulfilling commercial obligations, was putting the brand, isn't it, it's not the best way to prepare your team to play football. You're telling us something that making Chelsea behave like the Savannah Bananas for a month is not a great way to prepare mentally for a season ahead? That's my, listen, that's the Humphrey Car Unified Theory of Pre-season and maybe I'm wrong but I do think that, you know, again to Rory's point, to have achieved what he's achieved in this space of time with the amount of disruption that goes on around having to fly to, you know, wherever it was, Singapore all over the place. Did we play them this summer? I can't remember, I think, I think maybe Rexham played them, I can't keep up. We never stopped playing them. Rexham, by the way, Rexham against the Savannah Bananas was peak football, I loved it. I know, I know, I know what the purist didn't like it, I'm a vitalist, fantastic, yeah, well thank you, that was very much my, driven by me, my fine commercial brain. But yes, I think, to always put, I think, yes, this is why I say, I think if you're a Chelsea fan right now, you should be very happy and excited. By the way, I do love and I feel for all the Arsenal fans who like, when we do 26% possession, everyone calls it anti football and Shabby Alonso does it in, like, peak perfection, this game is going to be fascinating and there are so many levels to it to finish. There's of course, I mean, you've talked about dramas, comedy dramas, there's almost rom-com level human support of the managers being lifelong childhood friend, Michaela Tetta and Shabby Alonso, famously two men born in the same bass region, just months apart. Actually talked to them both about this, they're different perspectives in our preseason conversations, which I'll link below in the show notes. But they grew up as neighbours, on the same street as kids, played together on the same team in the academy of the Basque amateur club, anti-gore core. And now, managers of London's most powerhouse teams, it is like, I mean, it's like house of dragons in bread, boyhood friends turned for 90 minutes, turned honestly for a season into fierce, fierce rivals, it's quasi-shape spirit. Humph, it can surely only end with one of them dying in the other's embrace, right? There can be nowhere there option, can that? No, I mean, and look, you know, God willing, metaphorically speaking, one of them, yes, will collapse into the other's arms with a dagger in his back, very much like Daenerys and John Snow at the end of Game of Thrones. That feels like a spoiler. Oh, yes. Well, hang on, I don't think it's a spoiler of show that finished 10 years ago. Oh, whatever it was. Yes, yes. Okay, so the first game of the season, it's the battle of the, whatever it like, the one in the dark, and then all the bad, and that goes really badly and they lose that one. But then after that, so that's the first game here. And before you do more damage to the brand, Britbox, always be selling. I don't know how you say, I wish I knew how to quit you in Basque. I'm guessing it's the same with a lot more X's thrown in their role. My fascination with the Arthetta Alonso subplot roge, which is, it's incredible. And I think, here, I all had grew up very close to them and played in the same youth team as well. That story has seemed, seems to have added extra layers as, I guess it's as Alonso has become kind of more relevant as a manager. So initially, we kind of knew they'd grew up in the same town, and then it emerged that they grew up on the same street, and now it's that they played in the same team. I am looking forward to the denue onto that story being that they are actually brothers. I think that is the only way that it ends. That their babies were swapped at the hospital and their children turns out their secretly brothers. Let's get on talking about spoiler alert to your predictions of the game. How is it going to go down? What's the final score going to be raw? You first. I think this will be a very good game. I think Chelsea are going forward. I think Arsenal are due as hungry kind of a lose too. Someone to challenge them at the back. So I'm going to say, and it's sighting early season 2-2. Crazy tour. Come put us right. I have gone for also an exciting early season 3-2. However, I think that home advantage will see them see them through. Ewins again, Johnny Snow. Look, I see this being a statement 3-1 victory for Arsenal. I really don't just kind of feel in Califurie and Ben White will revel in that space behind Chelsea's midfield. They're going to contort that backline. But their clean sheet record comes to an end at the hands of my best mate. It's like exaggeration there. Cold Palmer. Remember people. Buyer's eyes. Buyer's eyes. Put some money in my pocket. Let's charge North to a team close to both of your hearts. Loveable. Travel to Traktorland to face. It switched town Friday 3 p.m. Eastern time in USA. We'll get to the new star signing Bradley Barclay in one moment. Transfer the low key, cold my eye. Signing of 18-year-old Belgian goldkeeper Luga Brugman. Look at the size of those paws. It's beautiful, man. You know what they say, Humph. About big hands, right? Big gloves. Big hands and you could be in a ludicrous music video. To the game, I'd love to hear honestly both of your opinions here, because you're both for your sins, mad reds, raw, livable fans of and grimaced is that possibly the right word, two-and-one-year-old games in which the squad screamed of desperate needs for at least one new fallback, probably two in a midfielder. You know, who knew how to do defensive things, needers arrived. But let's forget needs. Let's go on once and behold, shiny new speed-free. Bradley Barcola. Pluck from PSG for 166 million. He'll charge up and down the right wing. Dewake. Fat and-one-year-old. I love that man. He already looks like he's in Perma indigestion mode on the sideline, as he digs deep for what can only be patchwork solutions. What single thing makes you both most optimistic about Liverpool until January? What single thing makes you most terrified about all the rest of them? My optimism is based on, I think, last season was such a kind of harrowing experience in many respects for livable fans. That I think there is a sense of in each time. And I think there's a recognition that last summer's business didn't go to plan, and that that has nothing to do with Eriola. And so my hope is that Liverpool fans will have quite a sanguine outlook on how this season goes. For those of us that didn't go to Cambridge, just tell us what sanguine is wrong. I didn't get a Cambridge either, Roger. It means chill. Yeah. Everyone's just being honest. Everyone's just being honest, just sanguine out, boy. Just sanguine out, guys. Don't worry, Deliveroo will deliver the beers. It'll be fine. My lack of optimism is that football fans are football fans and want success yesterday. Liverpool looks like an extremely unbalanced squad at the moment that is lacking players in key areas and hasn't solved the issues that were pretty glaringly obvious towards the end of last season. Just sort of signs some cool other exciting players. There's some sanguine players. Look, I love this. So what makes Eriola's optimistic? It's all about the fan mentality. Either everyone chill out or football fans are going to football fan. Roger, I don't know if yours are anything to do with what can happen on the field of play. It's just about our vibe. I think what we're seeing is how hard it is to transition from, I mean, the best period in Liverpool's recent history to whatever comes next. My source of optimism I guess is that it is possible that a player is good as barcola. My unlocked various other things that he is an extra threat. I think he's a player of real quality and it's the sort of quantity that should be transferable and should be relatively quick to manifest itself. My concern, I think, is in the times today that the London Times, not the New York Times, is a great comparison with the Real Madrid policy of about 20 years ago, which was called Zidanzi Pavonis, where Real Madrid is set out to sign superstars, like Zinedine Zidane, and just filling the gaps with squad players like a guy called Francisco Pavon. There is a slightly better English term for that, which Humphrey will be familiar with, you might have forgotten it, Roger. But that phrase is all fur coat and no knickers. And I think that may well be what Liverpool end up being this season. I don't know how to explain it other than all fur coat and no knickers. All top-out and no trousers would also work, I think. It means that they've got the kind of show done. The fancy bits are fine. But all of the actual groundwork you need, trousers, underwear, for example, are not there. And I think that's what will kind of mark Liverpool this season. I think at times they will be really good to watch under a rye older with that talent on the pitch, but at times they're going to be a bit of a mess. I lost myself from a moment because when I went for a university interview at a very, very prestigious English university that I thank God did not get into and would never have prospered that rule, not like you. I was so nervous before I went in that took my, you know, heavy coat off when I went in for the interview and I looked down and I forgot to put my pants on. But anyway, at that university, they normally liked that kind of behaviour. Didn't work well for me. But when I hear you do that coat, do you work wearing any trousers? No, I've been so nervous. Like, you know what I mean? Getting ready. I was just like, and then I got there, took my heavy in England, you used to wear so cold, you were a heavy like formal overcoat, I took it off, I looked down, I had no pants on. Good news on papers, it's not about me and papers doing a lot of heavy things. That's about you. That's definitely about you. You can't do that. I mean, that's an HR offense. You can't do that. My life changed in that moment forever and thank God. What are you wearing now? Yeah, have you remembered to put your trousers on now? I've got a fur coat on, of course. I'm leaving the rest of the imagination look. Oops, which working progress. Got hit for five against Bruno Fernandez in the United last week, which was a bit unfair for you to watch the game. Gents, predictions, what do you say in the crystal ball tomorrow, even, Humphrey? I have gone for this, I may be wearing reds into glass here, but I've gone for it, switch town one, Liverpool three. Bradley, and when he goes to that big, bad box, I suspect he won't start, and therefore none. Raw, I also suspect he won't start. I have gone for, I think, sometimes this is obvious, I think it'll be Yipswitch two, Liverpool two. We're going to see a lot of them. I've got to say, John Oliver has a theory that Liverpool only sign players who sound amazing in scouts. Bachel, just like that. Have you seen the video where a fan refers to him as Bradley Broccoli? Does a guy called Broccoli? Is it not, might it not be barcola? Like that, like stick it along on the, is this barcola? You're not that barcola. Barcola, barcola. I love that broccoli, that kind of stuff that sticks someone, a fan somewhere will get his shirt number with broccoli on there, just for the bants, you know, get about 20,000 likes on Instagram, let the two twos roll, I agree, if you roll another draw, Liverpool can see the early, equalised late only way we know is pain. Remember football fans? It could always be worse. You could always be an Everton fan to me. I've always said for bants, it's now true we blues experiencing. Honestly, Agony's I only thought were possible for New York Jets fans and now we have to welcome Manchester United, 9am Sunday, USA Network. I was looking forward to this game, I am now not Everton in shambles trademark flow Balican and man I love. I think it's kind of destroyed us. Possibly on off, very, very off player did something pretty well. I think every Everton fan wishes they could do right now, which is walk out on Everton. I was in shock the night happened. It's crazy. I thought nothing bothers me. This felt like a death hump. I went into bed and I kept hearing your voice in that horrible word that you love to use. Can I get a ruling? Did Balican cook us? Here's the fun behind the scenes anecdote. You and I obviously spoke to Flow Balican in New York on the day of the World Cup Final and you said to him come to Everton and he said, he did a joke and he was like, oh yeah, I'm very happy in Monaco this sat in the other and then so my eyes pricked up when I heard over the ticker tape that he was in for a potential deadline day moved to Everton. I just wonder whether as his pen was poised over the thing he thought, what do I know about Everton and their fans and your face flashed before his eyes and he snapped the pen in half and went send me back to Monaco. I think he found out at the very last that I say it's at every player just as a band, you know, come to Everton. I think he found out the last oh my god he was joking. Yeah, why were you wearing any trousers? Yeah, I think yes, I think yes, of course Roger as per usual was in his fur coat with no knickers on. So I'm like I didn't say. I've done the business. I said come to Everton Lads. I said come to Everton Lads. I said come to Everton Lads. I said come to Everton Lads. I said come to Everton Lads. I've got you got to come to Everton Lads. I've got you got to come to Everton Lads. I've got you got to come to Everton Lads. Oh, one big family. We shook hands and on the deal and then I calmly took my coat off. Oh, it's me. God, Roy. I can't tell you. I mean, this is dark man. I am feeling like Tracy, Chapman, Faskar levels of pain. I did a piece yesterday on Instagram. I did. I feel like a groom, you know, a beautiful destination where are all my family and my friends there. And then the brody just jilts me at the altar. That's where we are just to Everton fans is just a shot. Didn't we almost have happiness? Happiness is the night to us. It is hello, darkness, my old friend. We now have one striker, one right back, one left back, 18 players total in the squad. I've got to say David Moise has all the power suddenly in his cold war against the owners, all the leverage fan group, the incredible 1878s has announced it's stopping its choreographed support immediately. If we go one little down and make Gaines Manchester, you know, he said on Sunday, the anger, the fume, the sense of mutiny at Hill Dickinson, it's truly going to make it feel like goodness and right and not in a good way. Yeah, not in a good way. I think, I mean, I think the best illustration of how bad it is at Everton is the fact that on transfer deadline day, Tuesday, you sold your best player, Illiman and Jai, to Manchester City. And that's really far down the list of the things the fans are upset about. That is not, that is not something the fans are talking about. When it should be in normal circumstances, that would be, you know, there'd be being accused of a lack of ambition, of a lack of organisation, a lack of planning, not just a sell in Jai, but to leave it that late, like get that money in early in the window, get that deal done, rip the bandaid off, move on, replace him. They got Jack Grelish in, I think on loan again, but then last season, the plum was in Jai and Grelish. Now it's just Grelish, that isn't an upgrade. As you say, that they're short of right back, Kenny Tete, a kind of full-arm squad player was meant to come in and didn't. The farce around the ballad and thing, I think, is really kind of telling it to use your parallel range. It's not just that you're the groom at a destination wedding and the bride doesn't turn up, you're the groom at a destination wedding who left his previous wife to marry that person. That is kind of wrong. And that your previous wife wasn't that great, it was better, but still, you were happy. My wife's name, out of your mouth. This analogy's got all got a bit. I agree, the metaphor did not work, but the fact that they let Beto go without having a replacement done and in the building so that they are exposed to now going through certainly the first half of the season with Tiano Barry as the only recognised centre for without the club. I just want to say quick hello to all American fans who became Everton fans for about 12 hours. I'd just say, you're dodged the bullet. I do want to quickly touch upon why? Why do we do this? And also Everton, why does this only happen to us? Other teams, every other team can have fleeting moments of happiness, even spurs, you know, when the European thing. We have points, deductions, boom in the down below. We have Sean Dyche, I mean again, like that martial artist meme where the guy is just smacking his genitalia with a brick, Jake Tusson, what is the thing that keeps us coming back, that thin line between love and hate, between pleasure and pain? I genuinely tried to think it, I realised, are Everton fans? Are we just a club for auto-sphyxiateers? This is an absolute masochist convention. Go to the hill Dickinson and it's just a lot of people, you're like, what do you do when you go home? Why do you have such a, why do you keep getting whip-shaped objects wrapped up in Amazon delivery packages arriving at your house? What is happening? You know from the medieval period, people would sort of walk from Canterbury to Rome, flagellating themselves with a whip the whole way. That is everybody that used to do that. It was basically packed into the hill Dickinson every week. From Manchester United perspective, first time since 2019, United have resisted the siren song of a deadline day signing, kind of incredible $200 million rebuild at the midfield, didn't bring in any kind of left back, that's going to come. Cobbimano is the great hope despite all the new arrivals, incredible statistic. They have lost just once when Cobbimano starts. Problem is, he's only started 17 games in that period. It is fascinating whether Michael Kerrick tries to build those foundations with the new players or lets the young prince shine through. Tell us though, predictions, predictions, predictions, how's it going to be? I would go one all on the grounds that I think in adversity, Everton will find strength. Yes, I've got, I've gone 1-0 united for sort of similar reasons. It feels there could be a bit of a back-backs against the wall. We'll show you. And then once we've shown you, we will roll over and get pumped by everybody else for the rest of the season. That word, that word pumped is just so dark. Look, there's two narratives here. There's Everton precedents and one under David Moise, 2005. We played without a striker for much of the season and Tiny Tim Kayhill, all like four foot three of him, stepped up and led the line. Good eleven times we got into the Champions League. Last time we had this level of outrage was right after the points deduction and the very next game we played was united at home. You'll remember that as the moment gone at you scored that Puscus winner five minutes in. I think this is going to be three, one Manchester United and a world of pain. From Everton to the Everton of the South, Notty and Forest against Tottenham Hotspur, Saturday, 10 AM each and time on Peacock, Plucky Spurs, put all their belongings in a little red handkerchief, tied it to the end of a stick hit, the road in search of the first point in the season. I believe the industry term for that bag on the stick is a bindle. What a week for Spurs. League is not won or lost in the transfer window. It's not won or lost in the first two games, but it have any element and die. At the end, Snatchum under the noses by City. That hurt, having the transfer strategy publicly crapped on by that famous public critic, Rich Ellison. And then winding up with a McKino Mudrick, a very curious player, flopped at Chelsea, hasn't taken a field since 2024 after being provisionally banned for doping violations. Only cleared to return to action by the end of July at Chelsea. It was a lonely figure. It was fast, but he wasn't furious. Ro, can you explain this? Does signing Mudrick make any sense at all? It doesn't enlighten the fact that they'd missed out on and die and I think couldn't get a deal together for Cody Gattbroke who I think had been their first choice target for that left win all summer. The connection for Mudrick is Roberto Deserberi, who was his coach at Shachtar Dinesd, who knows him, who trusts him, who brought him through in that year. I think after the war and you train started when suddenly Shachtar had to rely on its Ukrainian core. So I think that there is a connection there and look, Mudrick, there's a sadness to his story and it would be nice to think that he could rest you his career to the certainly point where it looked like he might be done. I guess the lightliest scenario in which that happens is under a coach who knows him and trusts him. It will take him a while to get fully fit, Mudrick. I know he played, I think, in pre-season for Chelsea once, but he's not get to ball for two years. So it will take him a little bit of time. There is a player in there somewhere, Deserberi's kind of backing himself to get it out. I mean, Deserberi is backing himself very much, trying to desperately put on a calm face, few men do calm faces worse. This is his quote, I am not angry. There is no panic. I know where we're going and what the plan is, which I think is his version of Kevin Bacon's line in Animal House, remain calm all as well. Reality is, Arsenal, you know, they've won something. I don't know if you heard. So the world can no longer laugh at them anymore. It kind of feels like Spurs, and they've become like the new meme club or meme clubs that every fan of every team savers knocking down any potential to aspiring to change is get scrapped on. I think of you as a lover, not a fighter. Can you come up with anything positive in this moment that you'd say to Spurs fans? Yes, I mean, look, I do think it's, you know, again, to re-heat my piping hot, controversial, Arsenal's take. It's early doors, and yes, they look crap, and yes, I've picked them to get beat this weekend. But I do think, you know, they brought a lot of players in. They, you know, it was a team that fundamentally looked at and went, oh God, what is going on behind the scenes? What is the mentality there? And I think some of those that they've managed to get rid of that will help them out. I can see them romping, like actually flying up the table to 15th, 16th the season, and, and, you know, really reveling in and around there. I do think we're going to be laughing at those who laughed at Tottenham by around mid-season. I've got a big soft spot for all of you, Tottenham. And I think I feel empathy for that kind of pain. A opponent, not even forest, all of a glass, there's mob. Going to say a lucky not to come away against leads on opening day, possibly unlucky, not to come away for three against Liverpool. By the way, all of a glass that did have something beautiful to say. And I love this take on the chance for a window opening. Let's quickly hear it. Wednesday evening, I will have a pint of beer and celebrate transfer window is closed. Definitely one, potentially two, and probably three. You and me both, all of a God bless, chance for a window, have another conversation for another time. It does bring out the most base side, makes a monster out of all of us right now, that window. But Roar, tell us how this game goes. Tell us how it's going to go down. I'm a little bit more bullish on Spurs than both of you two actually. I think Spurs were all right. I think it's a new castle. They looked, I thought they looked pretty good. They, they seem to have a little bit of sort of spark about them. My moosh made a bit of a difference, I think. It will take time. Deserby isn't a kind of instant fits touch. I think Louis Stone, his captain at Brighton said that they took them a little while to work out. One of them he was talking about. I think this is the weekend it clicked. I think Spurs win 3-1. I have gone precisely the other way. I've gone for 3-1 to not see him for us. Raj goes 2-1 to Forrest, just called myself the person I apologize. Just a hang in there, Spurs fans. Just one more game until that first winner of the season comes in. Check your schedule. Next week you play Everton. That brings us one last big thing. Where the bus boys tell the world one other thing they're looking forward to about the weekend ahead. We're all you first. Full and palace I think is really interesting. These are the two teams who are closest to Wolvesing, which is the process by which established Premier League teams forget they have to keep trying and they assume that they exist there by right rather than because they continually are doing what they do. It's too early to call it a relegation six pointer, but it's kind of a relegation six pointer right. So I think that one is a low key really interesting game. I'm looking forward to new castle versus Bournemouth because Ichliever Herr Jaisler or Jaisler or however we pronounce his name. You know what he's injected into into Newcastle in a short space of time into a club that you know again had that air of sort of crisis at the start of the summer is remarkable and he's extremely smartly dressed and I'd like to bring him home to meet my mother. By the way we all painted him a little bit. I will say with the Liam Rossignia brush, but you know I'll take to get more and more nuance for every example. My last big thing this week is Manchester City against Coventry. Manchester City re-talled. First chance to look at that spanking new midfield, Elliott Anderson, Enzo Fernandez. And Ibu Buard, the trio which incredibly alone cost $435 million, which is nearly $200 million worth more than the entire Coventry Squad Delphage. Matt Grimes, you got this. Okay, to wrap up we've got our predictions for all 10 games this weekend. Statistically we've got to get one right, producer Ben. Reveal the table, guys which one are you most sure of? I am going to also stick my neck out and say that I have gone from Manchester City versus Coventry 5-0 as well and that one feels, I don't want to say nailed on, but I mean I look I would truly love to be wrong. If I'm going to drop points anywhere in my predictions I would love Coventry to get something out of that game because as fellow championship heads of last season it would be great to see them go up and stay up and achieve something. But yeah, it feels like my triple captaining, Erling Harland, and my fantasy frivolity is a good big good idea. I'm pretty confident that Ipswich will not lose the Liverpool, but I'm also quite confident that Brighton will beat Leeds. Whoa, we could do a whole show on that crazy last clubfanding prediction. I also think the city result is nailed on. First time we've ever used a word nailed on. We borrowed it from Talksport for a Men and Blazers podcast. This year will be keeping your running telling of our predictions. We're tracking which one of the three has the strongest powers of prophecy at the end of the season. There is a prize for the winner, whoever has the most correct predictions gets to become Everton's director of football. That's the way we do it, Humph. Before you go, just leave us with a word of wisdom from Epic Greek poetry. Look, Britbox has got everything you need, guys. It's got it's got. No, I've really should stop doing this Britbox. I have no affiliation to Britbox. What is what's my, here's my Greek philosophical approach. It's going to be another bloody, great fun weekend of football. That's in sparta. Come back next week to see when we won. That's this week. Big weekend preview. Love it if you drop your own predictions in the comments. Any questions you've got for Raw, for Humph, put them in the chat too. We'll be back on Monday to break it all down. Raw Humph, it's incredible to be back with you. Bus boys forever. Courage.