Modern Football's Friction: Steamrollers, Olise's Persona & Solanke's Fitness Crisis

It's Tuesday on Football Social Daily and that means for this season it's time to get in the sea our opportunity to mow and win and win and complain about anything that's annoyed us across the Premier League weekend. Sometimes it's a little bit petty but that's what it's all about. Welcome to the show, my name's Nile McCorn joined by Marley Anderson. Today you're ready Marley, you're ready for another week's therapy session. I'm ready. Yes, I had a stressful weekend but yeah, nice to get something off of Jessie who has to be in a football in sense. Well, what was stressing you out? You can open yourself up on this part if you want to. I know you do that on extra times sometimes. I do. I tried to, I did some gardening that weekend and I've had a stressful weekend and then your first sentences, I've done some gardening at the weekend but those two things don't generally tend to go together. Yeah, I've done some gardening and I absolutely fucked it because I looked away for a minute and I didn't realise the hedge trimmer's business. I've got this hedge out out front and because it's been sunny and then pulled down like the hedge has gone mental. So I had to trim it with some hedge trimmer's and I looked away for a second and the the wire went in the hedge trimmer's and I turned the hedge trimmer's on and it just cut the wire. Oh, yeah, that's bad. So yeah, and these hedge trimmers are like communal hedge trimmers like not communal but like in our sort of family. There's like it's there's a group there's a group chat and it's like who's got the hedge trimmers. So like we've got one set of hedge trimmers and they just moved from house to house. These hedge trimmers, I looked at them when I broke them and they had on the thing 1997. These things are 30 years old and they are they are taped together they've been sliced before but I think I've I've I've titled them and really put the final nail in the coffin. A couple of minutes have said no we can fix it don't worry but that's no good for my bush which has been hand trimmed. My bush has been hand trimmed ladies and gentlemen don't worry. I do mean that in the literal secateurs sale way rather than pubes. Okay, we're going to have to keep that in because we don't have time to edit it out. Anyway, that guy that's trying to wait until Manchester United won five games in a row. You kind of had to go on his head. That's what you need some hedge trimmers to sort him out. Actually you glitched a little bit. I thought you're going to go to that hedgehog to start with when you glitched out there but no. No, no hedge trimmers. Yeah, they are probably well they're they're hanging on. They're literally it's it's like hanging on by an inch. Well less than an inch a millimeter maybe your hedge trimmers may be broken but I tell you something that isn't broken and it's my getting the sea. Andross Townsend's legs. What the fuck that was hilarious. I've sent you boys a text in our group chat saying have you seen Andross Townsend has been run over by a steamroller. It's a sentence that nobody in human history had ever said until two days ago where for some fucking reason a steamroller is on the football pitch during the warm up. And if you haven't seen this video then I'd just not convince you a football fan because that must have gone viral all around the world. And just Townsend these days, former England international play for Crystal Palace play for Tottenham. He's in the tie Premier League or the top division of Thailand football. I'm not sure what it's called. I can't even remember the team he plays for now. But he was doing the warm up on the pitch and some tie bloke on a steamroller drives onto the pitch clearly daydreaming doesn't see Andross Townsend in front of him and runs him over. It's like something from a fucking loony tunes cartoon. It's absolutely crazy. I couldn't stop laughing. I was watching that on Saturday night. I was just pissing myself. I could not stop watching it. I mean it's you sent it and I hadn't been really on social media much and I said send a link and you said you just go on Twitter and you'd be the first thing you say to sure enough a lot of Twitter and there it is. And I couldn't believe it. I couldn't believe it. I know there's some wild stuff that goes on in like you know far flung foreign leagues and you know health and safety is something of a myth. But yeah I just saw that was that was crazy. Like how is the guy? How is he on the pitch? How is he allowed to just drive the roller on to the pitch? Like what's going on there? Well that's my get in the sea. That's my get in the sea is yes it was hilarious and gave me great entertainment and thankfully Andross Townsend has been able to see the funny side of it considering you could have walked away from that with a potentially career ending injury. It's a fucking I presume it's a steamroller. I mean it's it might be one of those super sopper things that soaks up water you know those weird they get them at cricket grounds where if the if the outfields where they're kind of like steamrollers with sponges for wheels that kind of soak up wet ground it might have been one of them because it's monsoon season in Thailand at the minute. Yeah maybe. But still it's going to be a fucking heavy piece of machinery heavy piece of kit. Yeah I mean the guy the guy just isn't looking man. He's just completely he's away with the fairies man. What's the need for a steamroller at a football ground. I've never seen that before so that can get in the sea like what what are we going there. It's hilarious. I'm watching it as we speak man. It's just can you imagine him going home to his misses you like you wouldn't guess what happened to me today at football. You know what happened you score a goal you get a bad tackle no love I got run over by a steamroller. That's not what happened. It's absolutely bonkers. It's so funny like it's to the point as though well the guy the guy hits him and he's halfway up his body like it ends up on the top of his style on his hip before the guy bales out and obviously pulls the motor and you know kills the kills the power but Jesus Christ that is hilarious. The only thing that could have been more comical and cartoonish and slapstick would be if he slipped over on a banana skin that's literally the only fucking thing that could have been funnier as if Andrews Townsend stood on a banana skin and slipped over. I mean being run over by a steamroller that is literally wily coyote road runner tweety bird daffy duck stuff in it. It's mental that that's even happened. But yeah steamrollers at football grounds in Thailand who knew and that can get in the sea because I'm glad Andrews Townsend as I said a steamer funny side of it he's posted about it on a social media because that could have been a whole lot worse. Yeah that it's on a serious note that could have if there was more weight behind the vehicle whatever you want to call it that would have just ended his career that could have been really bad but obviously we can laugh about it now because it's it's all sort of okay it did make me pissed there was a guy he's a new castle guy on Twitter he's called it calls himself Dobby Salano which is funny funny in itself but he put the bloke spends his life eating raw meat and looking directly into the sun for health benefits and he was nearly just written off by Fred Flintstone's car while warming up. Oh you've got a laugh he can get in the sea but it's also superb I mean maybe whatever the shallowist sea is we can put it in there I mean I just have to bring it up on the pod this week is it's funny that funny man it's so much so that I actually brought a smile back to my face sometimes Premier League football can be too serious and not overwhelming but it can bulk you down a bit where everything's just so extreme isn't it like every defeat is turned into the the worst thing on earth and then you log on to social media and you still watch it it's hilarious you log on to social media and some guy getting run over by a fucking steam roller it's just yeah really it's it's like he goes down obviously his leg gets pinned his ankle and that's it you just just nothing he can do to get out of the way of it man yeah at the time he's trying an extravagant backflick to try and keep the rondo sort of situation going and Jesus Christ it's yeah that is that is so funny that is gold it'd be one of the quiz questions how do Andreas Townsend get injured in a warm-up and it'll be on big fat quiz of the year in there at the end of the year on on Channel 4 but yeah my my my getting to see it also comes from another league I've got two once in the Premier League which is sort of the rules of getting to see but we also love pissing you know pissing away with the rules sometimes and doing our own thing so my thing is at the weekend Michael Elisei scored a hat trick for Bayern Munich obviously unbelievable hat trick typical cutting and twat one in where you left foot and wish the best for the goalkeeper I think Bayern Munich won 8-0 against Union Bullying in that game so everyone had a great time my issue right I think Michael Elisei is one of the top five top 10 best players in the world genuine ball on door level player like unbelievable and I can't stand his character I cannot stand this performative nonchalant behavior he puts on as soon as he sees a camera I hate it I'm not asked that's what he sort of gives so at the weekend the clip that pissed me off was he walks off the pitch and the social media guys is filming and he's got the award in front of his front of his face and he goes Michael this is for you and Michael Elisei before he gets his name called is laughing and joking with his teammates and as soon as he hears Michael and sees the camera he instantly goes deadpan and just goes thanks and that's it and I'm just like you you love football you cannot get to your position in world football is one of the best players in the world without loving football and giving up all your spare time all your sacrifice in you know you spare time relationships whatever to get to where you are you cannot not love football so this whole oh god the media's after me again oh god I'm not gonna sign a boot deal because I don't want to do commercial I'm commercialising myself and I can't be asked so that stuff I just as yeah it just gets on my tits I understand that the reasons why does it sometimes with like with the boot deal for example no not football wants to to do a shoot for Puma or I did that so whatever but it's part of the game like just crack us mile like you know stop being a miserable bastard basically is what I'm saying no footballer really wants to talk to the media not many of them relish it but yet as soon as they finish their careers they all want to get into the media don't they they all want to be part of the pun that you've seen and they want to be involved and they want to be relevant again the best way to do that and to put yourself into consideration is to be front and center forward facing with the media now maybe Michael at least say doesn't want anything to do with the media but you see the point I'm trying to make in a wider context someone like Conor Cody for example was very forward facing and approachable so now that he's coming to the end of his career I'm seeing him pop up all over the place TV stuff he's doing radio stuff and James Madison it'll be the same with him James Madison will seamlessly become a pundit because he's a good interview all of the media respect the fact that he respects them and I think that that's absolutely huge and Michael at least say if that is to be the case and that is why he's acting or nonchalant as you're saying because he has a bit of a gripe with the media with all due respect he plays for the French national team so actually he's not a matter of national interest in the British media when it comes to football reporting and secondly your place is football in Germany which isn't exactly widely reported on when we've got the Premier League here in the UK which is absolutely dominant in terms of the sporting headlines so he's not even in the spotlight in the UK the only time he's ever in the spotlight is because he's done something incredible on a football pitch and to add another layer on top of all of that the players yes we know they don't like speaking to the media most of the time but a lot of them seem to forget the reason they get paid three hundred grand a week is because the broadcasters pay the money to show the games and as part of that deal clubs have to put players forward and I think the players forget that sometimes I am defending this quite passionately because part of my job away from the podcasters to speak to football players and to commentate on football matches and to work for broadcasters you know the broadcasters pay top dollar to show these professional games top dollar they're well within their rights to expect more than a couple of lines of a miserable Michael Alisa in my opinion yeah I hate it I see him after after games doing interviews and he's he just purposely makes it awkward he purposely sabotages the interview and I feel really bad for the for the interviewer because they're saying like you know he's got three great goals there you know how you know how do you expect to sort of you know like where's your game now he's that sort of happy with it they try and keep it as open-ended questions like when you taught in the media you were taught it I was taught it when you're doing an interview never never give the opportunity for the answer to be yes or no you only leave it open ended you want to you want to get them to talk unless you're interviewing a politician and then it's the exact opposite and you want a yes or no but you never get it with Alisa it's like you can be asking an open-ended questions like what you hope so the rest of the season or even if it's just a shit question like that and he'll just you'll answer it in two or three words and I just hate it I just think like you're just mugging everyone off here you make yourself look like a dickhead and you're there like a play in this whole or look at me I'm not really asked type of character we all know that you fucking love the game so and sometimes those blunt interviews those one-line interviews can be really entertaining if there's some context behind it well Harlan does it really well early Harlan does it really well where he says some funny and if it's a bad question he answers it in a funny shut you down type away yeah and those who and I am re interviews when Emmy Martinez was left out of the squad last season and he just responded to every question with Marco B's up and it was entertaining because it was rare you don't see it very often and maybe that would have been the case the first couple of times Michael Alisa did this but he does it every time even when he's played well you know there's no context behind it for him to give her an interview that's so dour and actually someone's dug out some old interviews when he was at Reading before even signed for Crystal Palace much more affable much more engaging it seems like that doesn't exist within him anymore and you know people are allowed to change but it just feels a little bit like if he's doing it to make a point and he's made a point and whether that point is to not be asked to do interviews anymore then he's probably gonna get what he wants yeah I hope he doesn't I would purposely put him forward for stuff if I was a broadcaster every like a else week to Michael and just apologise to the reporter in advance but but yeah it the whole thing reminds you of like when a when a band gets cool and like gets mainstream and decides to change you know like Alex Turner with Arctic Monkeys everyone knows Arctic Monkeys unbelievable when they were 17 and then he gets more famous and starts to try and change his voice and change his album he discovers real cream and everyone knows Arctic Monkeys aren't as good now as they were when they were 17 but it is what it is yeah that's a conversation for extra time maybe but um but yeah you know anyway Michael East is an interview technique and getting to see that's that's my first one just a little one from this weekend Dominic Salanki come on mate come on there was a time at the weekend where I think it might have been Andy Robertson it could have been someone else it it's kind of irrelevant across comes into the box and Dom Salanki is roughly on the penalty spot essentially waiting for a tapping and the one thing you've got to be as a striker is alive and ready and the ball comes back takes a slight deflection about five yards in front of him and hits him without him getting a shot away it hits him in the shins and bounces off and he's in a position where we take if he takes a step back and sort his feet out he slots it in from five seven eight yards whatever it is and it's just it's ridiculous it's it I just think you are you I know you're low on confidence and I know you're doubting yourself because of the situation at spurs and your injury situations and all the rest of it you've not played much you cost a lot of money you've been criticized and whatever but also like you're not helping yourself in situations like that these are the ones where you've always if you're not scoring goals that you're at least saying right if I'm in those if the ball drops to me I just needed to drop to me and I'll put it in but it's it's dropping to him in the right in the right positions and he's still not doing anything with it so yeah this is Salanki's third Tottenham season this season just started as his third campaign in the Premier League with spurs he's not even played 50 games this is your main center forward this is your main center forward and he's not played 50 games that's shocking how many goals does he got in that time in the Premier League ten twelve goals twelve wow okay across two seasons and the first few games of this campaign yes he's been injured so hasn't played all of the games but that's a problem in itself he's unable to stay fit and this is a conversation we had about Martin Erdogan on the podcast last week look how good he's been for Arsenal aside from the weekend against Brighton of course but in the first few games leading into that superb they need him to stay fit desperately because if you spend more time on the sidelines than on the pitch doesn't matter how good a player you are you become a liability and spurs fans will know all about that because they had the most famous liability of all time in the Premier League Darren Anderton managed to earn himself the nickname sick note because he was injured so often I'm starting to wonder whether he's one of those players that's played for big clubs but produces his best form at smaller clubs that ridiculous Chelsea team the youth team that Chelsea had at the time in I think was it 2017 or 2016 where they won everything there was to win at youth level and pretty much all of the players from that squad have gone through to become top professionals at Premier League level he then didn't make a first team appearance for Chelsea in the Premier League went to Liverpool was there for two years scored one goal in the Premier League didn't really get many games and then he went to Bournemouth and that's when he had the majority of his success that's what earned him a movie was there for five years at Bournemouth and then gets the move to spurs and he's not shown his best form at spurs you're largely down to injury but if you look at the big clubs he's played for or not played for as often as he should have done Chelsea Liverpool and Spurs between those three huge clubs of which he spent seven seasons of his career at first team level he has played a grand total of 67 Premier League games for the big clubs on a more serious note I think he struggles with self-belief and his sort of mental side of things I think he's a player who if he's got a bit of a knock he goes I don't want to break down for you know I worry that if I can't sprint after a ball and then the crowd get on me and you know I'm dead they're just going to kill me and part of me thinks okay I kind of feel sorry for him in that situation but also then another part of me thinks stay where you're comfortable stay at Bournemouth and there's no rush to leave Bournemouth but he scored 19 goals in a season in 23 24 19 in 38 1 in 2 prolific and then he goes I'm going to spurs and the thing is you have to look at you have to look at spurs and go there's a lot of pressure there they haven't been getting it right for a while and if any if ever a crowd was likely to turn on you it might well be there so if you do have doubt about yourself and it's fine to have doubt about yourself stay as the big fish in the small pond you still get in generational wealth you still get in mad money and opportunities will always be there for you and as long as the goals keep coming the money will keep coming so stay where you're comfortable but spurs was was a strange move from spurs to identify him off the back of one good season when in reality you know of those he scored 19 38 season before he got six in 33 and the season before that he was a bit part player at Liverpool obviously he said there 21 appearances Liverpool the Premier League no goals or one goal sorry and then these other Premier League season was Bournemouth where they got three in 32 and went down to the championship so like there's not much there for spurs to identify but at the weekend again it was just like you can't you can't keep expecting to get these chances and get get starts like the ball came to and just hit him in the shins and it was like Jesus Christ mate you've got to you've got to work with me here and try and get yourself a goal from somewhere nine goals in 27 Premier League games two seasons ago when he first cypher spurs that was his first season where they spent the money on him to bring him in from Bournemouth nine goals that campaign he missed 10 matches that season with injury or illness he only played 15 games in the Premier League last season scored three goals one in three well there was wasn't there a point last season Nile where he missed a game with with a sore throat I'm not sure but the he didn't play the last four games of the season when spurs desperately needed some goals because they were trying to stay up that's the problem I don't think he's I don't think he's tough enough I think he thinks he's injured more than he is like he he thinks when he's not 100% that he's injured well it's someone like Bruno Fernandez for example do you remember Daniel Sturridge when he was at Liverpool and Jürgen Klopp said this exact same thing that Sturridge is waiting till he's 100% fit because he just stopped playing Sturridge was one of the best strikers in the Premier League for two or three seasons on spin you know at the back end of his Chelsea career then he went to Liverpool for this partnership with Suarez and Sterling it was superb it got Liverpool to within a slip of the title didn't it and he was excellent and then Jürgen Klopp came in and said this fella he needs to be 100% fit to play matches Klopp even said I think in a press conference I don't think I was ever 100% fit for the last four or five years of my career you just have to fight away through don't have to get yourself fully fit just fit enough to play yeah I think this is something to do with the younger generation coming through now and the amount of sport science and stuff that going on you know you've been running too much going side now because don't stay out and do extra training because you might get injured you hamstring might go you've got you've got a lot of minute in your legs this this month and we need to manage you a bit maybe maybe it all seeps in I think there's a lot of players in his situation with with Domslanke it's not just him I think mission mounts one of those players where he waits until he's 100% fit before he to says yet I'm available boss and I just mentioned the last sort of sentence where I said to you look what about Bruno Fernandez is until was it until the last season he'd never missed a game through injury in his entire career or something like that or he'd missed something like seven games in 11 years you tell him he has 100% every week is he no way he goes into he goes into games probably 68 70% maybe some weeks and he trusts he's good enough to get on the ball create a pass see it create a chance have a shot scorer goal whatever just wants to hit wants to play wants to help the team some some players don't whether it's mental whether it's financial I don't know but I don't think Salank is one of those players where if he's a big fish in a small pond there's nothing wrong with that going to be a legend at a club he could be he could have been a bomb of legend by now but people people chase they think the grass is always green right just it isn't sometimes the grassy goters just not there this is what I mean though he's play for three huge clubs didn't get a chance of Chelsea but then again how many youth players do truly get a chance of Chelsea so I don't think you can hold that against him Liverpool that was going to be the Dominic Salanky the guy that scored all these goals for Chelsea youth level 21 games one goal in the Premier League that's not going to cut it and that's why Liverpool shifted him on and then Bournemouth finds his feet finds that goal scorer in touch becomes the player we know he is goes to Spurs makes a great start but misses 10 games in that first season but because of the nine goals he scored that season you know he's kind of giving himself a chance and then the last two seasons he's not even played 20 games across the last two seasons in the Premier League for Spurs that's not good enough for a Spurs team that finish in 17th again you know so maybe he is unfortunately for him even though he's played for three big clubs one of these players that produces better form at a smaller club like Bournemouth where the pressure is slightly less that is it for today getting a C on football social daily don't forget subscribe or follow what you need to do to make sure you never miss an episode 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