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This is The Guardian. Hello and welcome to Guardian Football Weekly. In any normal world, you wait for Conca Caff on the FC coming together to accuse the FIFA president of trust broken through deception, which will immediately end for Gianni in Fantino. Will the latest pressure on the FIFA president make any difference, Donald Trump says he's a great guy. Speaking of great guys, Jeff Bezos is after a bit of Liverpool, does that mean they stop paying tax? We'll do the more interesting. How will Liverpool do this season chat? We'll talk Josie at Real Madrid, we'll talk Josie's Netflix documentary, amazed someone so shine retiring. Agreed to be the subject of such a thing, there's the haphazard attempts to get a new Italy manager, Paul Watson's World of Football. And ladies and gentlemen, the first ever Lars Sivitz and Quizz, could this be our chance to break into shiny floor Saturday night TV? We'll take your questions and that's today's Guardian Football Weekly. On the panel today, Nikki Bandini, welcome. Morning. From the excellent sweeper pod, Paul Watson, Hi, Paul. Hi, Max. Don't tease it too much. Lars Sivitz and Quizz show host, all that's all the information I have is Lars wants to do a quiz. You don't have it. Max, that worries me. I mean, it's a slow week, but we'll see what we can do. Okay, excellent. Charlie says is the plan now to give us loads of podcasts so that in Fantino will leave just after you've recorded one. The latest on Janie, basically, as we finished recording yesterday, there was this joint open letter from UEFA at the AFC, the Asian Football Confederation and ConquerCaf calling for leadership that says football, not seeks to command it. They accused in Fantino of trust, broken through deception. They've started preliminary discussions about organising new competitions further to UEFA's repeated threats to boycott FIFA events. Nikame has reported that next month under 20 women's World Cup could take place without European teams, alternative options are being sought. So that letter was signed by Alexander Shefferen, UEFA president, the AFC counterpart, Sheikh Salman bin Ibrahim Al-Khalifa, and the ConquerCaf president, Victor Montanliani, who is Matt Hughes mentioned yesterday, is a candidate to replace in Fantino. The three presidents called for an independent review conducted by a body outside of football into the affair. Like I said in the intro, Nikki, in any normal world, this will be a huge deal, but I just can't work out if it is a huge deal or not. I think it is a huge deal, but the threats being made by the confederation is a huge deal. The fact that there's serious talk of boycotting events, it's certainly a huge deal. And I do feel like this is the part of the story that's suddenly being brushed over sometimes. It's suddenly huge deal for all those players who are looking forward to playing in the under 20s World Cup coming up, and part of me, I think, unfortunately, would this be being treated the same way if that was men's players, not women's players. It's a frustration of mine. I do think that's being a little bit brushed under, but it is a big deal where it's going to end. I still don't know. I think lots of us still don't know. And we do feel like, God, this goes beyond football, doesn't it? We're in an era where scandal just doesn't necessarily mean anything anymore. Scandal for prominent individuals, doesn't necessarily mean they're going to end up out on there. It doesn't necessarily mean that they're going to fall in their sword by the setting. In fact, he has shown absolutely no inclination that he's going to fall in his sword. And so where it's going to lead in that picture, I don't know, but I think it's a big deal. I can't remember any point in my time watching football where you've had several of the biggest, richest confederations so openly at odds with the leader of the body that notionally represents, well, football. Yeah, we're so far away from that comedy sketch, whatever, the old Tory MP standing outside his house with his family going, I made a terrible mistake and I must resign, aren't we? I guess, Lars, what I mean by, is it a big deal? As Nicky said, will it make any difference? For me, it's a big deal. If eventually Johnny goes, hang on, people, you know, maybe for the good of the game, I should, I should walk, but clearly, he won't. Yeah, that doesn't seem to be happening. What I think is significant is that UEFA are really like not letting up on this. Like there is this sort of steady stream of punchy statements and there was the mistress allegation and there's also, it's clear that the cheffron and whoever else, but probably just cheffron at the top of the way if I've decided that we're not having this anymore. And I think they're, they seem reading the tea leaves, being devoid of actual insights in this case, but just reading the tea leaves, it does seem that they're very insistent on not letting this drop into a situation where it's just business as usual. Like we've made our stand, we've said our thing and then football just continues because that's what tends to happen. But they seem to be coming up with things and being very punchy about stuff and intending to follow through. It would be very unfortunate if something like the women's under 20s, World Cup ended up getting stuck in the crosshairs of this. And I have made the suggestion that they should make some kind of arrangement that underage competitions should just kind of not apply when it comes to the boycotts and the whatever is. Let's just keep the sort of the underage stuff out of that. I think that would be a good and pragmatic solution for it. But even so, you have women's World Cup qualifiers coming up in not that long. So that would be a very temporary fix anyway. But I am kind of heartened by the fact that there seems real determination behind your AFA's push to just kind of dislodge this man because I do think he needs to go. Hmm. And he says, can Paul give any insight into the stranglehold that FIFA and Infansino have have of the smaller national FAs? There seems to be the key to FIFA Infansino controlling the game for their own ends. And we sort of touched on this yesterday, Paul, this idea that if you are a tiny nation and you have, you know, you have a vote that's as big as vote as Brazil's or England's, and you get money, which in relative terms means so much more to you, that all these smaller nations are probably happy with the status quo. Yes. So the smaller nation's thing is a weird one. This whole, like, one member, one vote, it sounds like it's brilliantly democratic and it gives this amount of power that's equal to the likes of the Samarinos, the anguilas that they're all out there being treated as equals. But the reality doesn't quite play out that way. They actually don't necessarily have a lot of choice to themselves. They're effectively kind of whipped into line by a continental powerhouse who tells them, this is our stance, you will go with us on this stance. So theoretically, Montserrat could break the concave stance, like I think Mexico have, haven't they? But they don't have that same cloud. So they would probably just be ostracized, they'd lose a lot of their beneficial relationships they have with their neighbors. So I think really for the smaller nations, this has been quite a good sign of how little they can break rank. None of them can just go, we'll take that 40 million, sorry everyone, we're going to go with it. Because actually, they're kind of just being told what to do by the bigger powers. And if they piss them off, they're in real trouble in that confederate. And so because the sort of the general vibe from people I speak to is that this one country one voting isn't really democratic because Samaritan have the same power as Brazil. You're a member, say your Samarino, you're in UEFA, you naturally are going to spend most of your time in meetings with people in UEFA. You're going to need beneficial relationships with the other people within your confederation who are more powerful, who can help you with various aspects. So you're going to build that kind of relationship. It's a massive thing to then cross the picket line in a moment like this. There's also a sense that maybe if they did try and do that, it wouldn't work anyway. And they'd be left in this incredibly awkward situation where they burnt all those bridges and then the rest of your AFA just sort of trams them out. And then they're just those guys, you know, I just don't, I don't think it's a problem that it's one nation one vote. But like anything else, it's only as strong as those nations can be, you know, in saying I'm going to stand up and they just can't. Can I throw out as someone who is, I think, instinctively on the side of the underdogs? I think regular listeners will know this. I tend to think that the big clubs and the big money and the big stuff is the root of all evil and football. I have to say, my stance on the one country, one vote is being challenged, I feel, because especially watching in Fontino describe it as, you know, perfectly democratic, it just kind of gets my brain working and I'm wondering, is it democratically logical for Montserrat to have the same pool in the world of football as Brazil? Like, does this actually make sense? Isn't this the equivalent of like the smallest city in the UK having the same number of MPs as London? Like, it just doesn't make any sense from a democratic perspective. Even though that is the case, they don't have that power. I mean, I'm minded to agree with you, Lars. These clusters of tiny nations ended up having massive amounts of power, which is even worse. The problem with all of this is when you start throwing these sorts of ideas around what is that affair and shit, what's your alternative? And I think it's worth reminding ourselves that if we wanted to talk about confederations and how they act, your way for is no beacon of moral purity. We've had plenty of issues with how that's been run down the years and I'm certain if my attention was more focused on the different confederations, I'd probably find similar things elsewhere. It's, you know, my work is mostly in and around European clubs. What is certainly true with the current setup is when you have this wild disparity in notch the size, but frankly just the wealth and the earning potential of different nations representatives, it does leave open the possibility on the nefarious side and to be clear for our lawyers, I'm not suggesting anything specific in this case. But it also leaves open the possibility for things that are short of corruption, such as when in Fantino is talking about whether if we sign this private equity deal, we get to give everyone X amount of money. Well, that amount of money means a huge amount more to a poor small country's football confederation that does to a rich country's confederation. And therefore you can certainly manipulate people's intentions much more easily when there are less wealthy representatives who have an equal vote to the wealthier representatives. That's a very complicated thing and that's why I'm trying to dance around it, but it's because I don't think that equal, I don't think that it should be, might makes right, it shouldn't be, oh, like you're the rich country, so you get to speak loud as that's not how it should work either. Basically they're being asked to, as a playground squabble and there's two big bullies fighting it out and they're being told to choose one side or the other and not being told, you know, you get free rain here, you know, go and pick a third side, they really are just being whipped into a line one way or the other. I think you're totally right, Nicky, there is this real powder keg here that you have nations where their development budgets are tiny, we were talking about the Comoros in Africa and their budget, their entire sponsorship budget last year was 150,000 euros. So then you're looking at 40 million or whatever it is. That means a different thing to what it means if you're Belgium or wherever, you know, Italy. But on the other hand, this is the only time these nations actually are courted by people. If you start to allow the rest of the football world to say, let's just push these guys to the sidelines, they're not really ever going to be heard from again. So I remember talking to a guy who was a president of a small federation, he said, the only time we ever feel like we have any say, any voice is when a big vote is coming up and then that's basically what happens and it's where you draw the line, isn't it? What's the action and what's looking out for your nation? Are you missing Montserrat? If you land in Montserrat, there are just suddenly 50 amazing 5G pitches by the other examples of where the money has really made a massive difference. This idea that Infantino has given money to smaller nations to court their power, are there examples of amazing football academies in the Northern Mariana islands or whatever it may be? Not in Mariana and have done brilliant job development. They're actually being kept out of FIFA at the moment despite their full consental member of AFC, they're doing a brilliant job. So no, I won't tell them with any of this, but what I will say, I mean, there's countless examples of FIFA projects that have just never existed. The latest one I saw, Pietro was in Djibouti where huge amounts of money was put towards a facility it just literally never got built and if you look at it, it's just fences and so there's the question of where do these millions go? So there are lots of examples of where money that is given to these kind of nations to disappear into a black hole. But I will also say there's this assumption that this money couldn't be spelt, spent well by lower ranked football members and I think that is unfair. The head of the Bhutan football federation came under a little bit fire because he was one of the few that's really come out in favor of Infantino's proposal and someone said to him, I think it's very good journalist John Durd and BBC journalist said to him, what would you do with his money? And he basically said it would change every single facet of football in my country. I could draw you up a plan. I could tell you exactly five, six, seven, eight, nine departments of our nation that we would change immediately and all these amazing things we would do. So there is this assumption that yeah, you couldn't do anything with 40 million in Bhutan. I'm sure you could. And I'm sure if it was properly regulated and this is a lot of where the problem is FIFA pumps this money out, it doesn't keep an eye on where it's going. That is right. FIFA is fault too, right? So I don't know. There is more complexity and nuance to it. Sure. And it all comes down to our people good or not. You know, picking other tiny, tiny kind of error tray in F.A. is a great person. Then they don't squirrel a bit of the money away from themselves. And if the head of FIFA is a great person, then he doesn't try and sell the world cup for his own end. Like, you know, there's a story about life, I guess. And maybe we're all corruptible. It's just nobody's offering me 40 million to do something. Yes, Lars? I am particularly intrigued by Montserrat, which as Paul Watson will know is the tiniest FIFA member nation with a population of around 5,000. And interestingly, a total GDP of around 85 million. So if you add another 40 to that, a third of all economic activity in the country is handouts from Janine Fontino. Oh, yeah, it's incredible. The funny thing about Montserrat, as you mentioned them, is Montserrat are currently under a normalization committee. So their F.A.s failed so badly they've had to bring in a FIFA-appointed normalization committee to get them back on their feet. So the vote that Montserrat were being asked in cocaf, will you back this proposal was being made by a FIFA designated group. And they voted against it. So in a way, a real like a real sign that normalization committees kind of can be trusted because FIFA have put these people in and said, look, you're independent. Do what you think is right. And they all voted against it. We did something on Trinidad and some really lovely secondary school teacher who'd sort of, it's almost like a movie. Someone had just said, look, someone needs to go for the head of the F.A. against the FIFA stooge and he did any one. And then they instantly bought an normalization committee because he wasn't their guy. But so that's really interesting that, you know, these guys have had the, you know, that they've managed to vote against it. Anyway, it's fascinating. And I'm sure this story will not go away onto the consortium, including Jeff Bezos, reportedly close to a 1.35 billion pound 30% stake in Liverpool. The owner's F.S.G confirmed last month that expressed interest in a minority investment in the club. The group is led by the British Indian Millionaire businessman Amit Batia, who I used to play squash with. And also includes Facebook co-founder Eduardo Savarin. Bezos is first investment in football. He'll receive equity as part of the deal. And Amazon has live UK rights for 20 Premier League games each season for six seasons until the end of last year, broadcast the Champions League in several European countries. I mean, I don't know. And I look at you and by all means answer blankly. I can, I can talk about how Liverpool are going to do this season. I think that's a much more interesting conversation for our listeners. Does anyone have any thoughts on what this, what this means beyond somebody with lots of money investing in Liverpool? This is the real romance, the game podcast, isn't it? We're going straight in for the things that make everyone love football. All I had on it was, does it mean Liverpool get players to live a faster if they get bezels? It's a very good point. Well, it depends if they've got prime. You imagine that be annoying. Can they get barcola tomorrow free delivery next day? Or do they have to wait until Monday and pay $6.99 for a delivery fee? I don't know. We can do Liverpool itself. Ronald Arrajo joined from Barcelona in a loan deal yesterday, 55 million euros with an option to buy. Is that good? Can I say, can I say, go on, lots of that good thing for them to have done? I'm a big option to buy enthusiasts. I think that's like when you can get those deals done, then you have a chance to sort of try, does this work? Is this good or no? And then if it doesn't, then it's not a total disaster. So Arrajo at his best is an incredible defender. He's very physically capable, very assertive, at his best, very confident. But he seemed to lose his way a little bit. He has always been a little gaff prone. And he's made some high profile errors at Barcelona that's kind of destabilized him there a little bit. And I think someone, yeah, new beginning at a new club, certainly someone who has all the tools to be a very good defender in the Premier League as well. And the fact that you're getting this try before you buy deal means worse case scenario, if it doesn't work out, you're stuck with a season of his wages. And that's fine. And I think they are one of the many actually interesting sides going into this season, in that there are a lot of unknowns. How Eriola will begin if you can cope with the pressure, because it's obviously different. Those players that were there last year that didn't have great seasons, but are really good footballers like Roy and Verts, etc. When you're trying to predict what happens this season, they are one of a number of clubs. It's quite hard to have any certainty to. Yeah, Jonathan Wilson's been writing hasn't he about there. The end of the big beast era for different managers and who's going to be the next one, who steps up and establishing himself. And I really like Eriola's coach. Obviously, he did amazing work before the suborma. And I think he's a great appointment, but you're right. We don't know exactly what's coming. And I'm certain to bring it to the actual news. It's a very natural fan reaction to when you hear about your club getting new investment from extremely wealthy person, that extremely high valuation to wonder, well, what else could there be done? What else who's going to come in in this in this window now? And it feels like, do you know what? I was going to say it feels like we're a bit late in the day for that, but maybe we're not. There's still quite a lot of this window left. I've definitely heard in the last couple of days, Daniela Gerrassi was calling. I think he used the word abomination about transfer window going two weeks into the season. So who knows, maybe this deal does yet mean things in terms of the the squad building that will go on at Liverpool as well. Yeah, I'm Barclay coming in, I guess. How big a sign in with that belas. I mean, it would be big in monetary terms. He'd be very expensive. I think he's a player who fits English football because he's a he's a winger, but he's quite tall. He comes from the French leagues. He's used to being kicked around. He's quite direct in his style of play, like he's got good, sort of, saring straight line pace and likes to just go straight at it. So I wonder if one of the reasons Lewis and Ricky kind of likes Deseret Dua a little bit more in that position is that he's just a little bit more delicate and a little better in small spaces, whereas Barclay kind of exceeds when he has space to run into also Barclay PSG has can kind of get been undone by the arrival of Quaroscale and the success of Quaroscale X Barclay is definitely better on the left. He's not being bombed out of PSG for being bad. He's he's a very good player and I think he would suit English League and I think he would suit Liverpool. I only wonder a little bit about is the attack where you're spending 100 plus million right now because you do have some good attackers and I worry I worry more about what's going on at the back. I mean, Araho is an interesting one. That could be a solution. They also have, I mean, the young French defender Jeremy Jacquet and the young Italian defender Giovanni Leone who unfortunately missed all of last season with an injury, but they've spent big on two young defenders, hoping I guess that one of them will turn out to be the Van Dyke replacement that will be needed at some point. But there are question marks. I think more in that end of the field that if I was a Liverpool fan, I'd be hoping would be addressed. And they do need wide players as well, I guess, but yeah, is that where we're spending 100 and something million? It feels as the one I feel kind of good about. Gravenberg, Soba Sly, Callister, McAllister, still there. Harvey Elliott is back. I don't know if he's going to be playing football hard to say. Sure. Curtis Jones and Bert's complainers. Curtis Jones is a really good player. Yeah. Curtis Jones is that. I mean, again, transfer stuff. He's been linked a lot as new with them. We're going to Italy, actually, we'll see, but, um, yeah, we didn't even miss the friendly deal against Monica. I'm not certain. He walked off a pitch, looking annoyed about something at some point. It when I was having my sort of break from football. So there's too many friendly and I'm not going to act as though I've seen all of them. So I'm just going to be realistic about that. I've watched all of Tottenham's one-all training ground friendly with Gatafe. If not, get out of here. All right. That'll do for part one. Part two. We'll talk about Jose Rammadrid's. Welcome to part two of the Guardian Football Weekly. As anyone watched any of Jose's Netflix documentary, Merinio, as anyone, because I had the chance when I watched Death in Paradise, New Seek and Death, instead. And a man had fallen off a roof. But did he fall at the time? They all thought he fell or not. And did lots of people say, sure, I had my beef with Darren, but do you know, I think I'm capable of murder. Anyway, that's what's the different podcast. Lars, you look like you'd raise your hand about the Jose documentary. Well, not that just I'm intrigued by the Jose documentary, because when I saw the trailer, I rolled my eyes so hard they went all the way around because I'm like, I don't know if I need three hours of Jose telling me his version of events in my life, you know, he's such a, he's just one of the least, he's an incredibly fascinating character because he can be extremely charismatic, but I will see he's also the least reliable narrator in all of it. I really, I'm including Johnny in this. So like I think doing a big documentary on him puts a lot of pressure on the people making the documentary, like in, because this is clearly with his cooperation, so you can fully piss him off, but you also have to have like some relationship with the verifiable truth and not just the Merinio narrative. And it's very interesting because we already have this one of the stories that are already coming out is this idea that he had an agreement to go to, to unite his, when Israeli struggles and step down, whereas previously what had been reported by someone like Diego Torres, the ever controversial Spanish journalist, was that Merinio at the time cried about not getting it, you know, that he was rejected in favor of noise, and this was just infallible to him. Here we are, almost, there we are 13 years later, and Merinio is claiming that the deal was there, you know, I could have gone, and I'm, who knows what to believe. And this is why I'm fascinated to see this, because I do know the guys who've made it are good people. It's, they're the guys who did the FIFA uncovered documentary on Netflix, which I thought was much, much better than I had any anticipation of it being. So I mean, treat to watch it, but I haven't gone to it yet. Yes, Fergie was interviewed, and he said early evening he phoned me, Joseph O'Mean, he was crying. This is what Sir Alex said, and he said, Alex, I can't take it. I've given my words of Chelsea. I'm not going to break my word. A man of honor, Joseph, the reason he gave to me, I could understand, but I was disappointed. I mean, I don't know if there's, if you want to do that, you know, I wonder how different it would have been in the sliding. And I did, it's not like that it was, that that happened, to be gone. That was true. I missed that. Kind of airbrushed him. I mean, literally, can't remember anything that happens. Been the UEFA Cup, some eat it with something that Manchester United, didn't he? Maybe he won more than that, but yeah, so three years later, he took over from Louis Van Hal. He is at Real Madrid for his second stint, and this poor will be so fascinating, won't it? Just like, yeah, that's the thing about him. As Lars says, he draws you back in in a way that perhaps he shouldn't. But he met Real Madrid is sort of perfect for like a casual football fan who isn't invested in Real Madrid. Yeah. And if you've got a dressing room that is notoriously explosive and toxic, the man you want coming in there is definitely chosen Merino, isn't it? I mean, you mentioned death in paradise. I'm pretty sure that's what the Amazon, you know, whatever the documentary is going to be, it's going to end up being a murder mystery. I think they're going to find them bappies body. And Merino is going to have to be the one who unpicks who it is, who's done it. Yeah, I mean, honestly, you couldn't have a better recipe for, I guess for just chaos, really, especially when you look at the way that teams built, the team just isn't built like a football team in some ways. It's built like a collection of all the people you would name if you didn't really know much about football, but you could name a few footballers. It's like death in paradise. They've just got some famous people from old other shows and you've got, oh, look, they were in that and they were in that and now look at them together and now they're going to put them under the trusty hands of Merino. I think it's really likely to implode, isn't it? I think it's really likely to go horribly and nastily wrong, but I have to say as a complete neutral, I would love to watch that. About as much as I'd love to watch a documentary where Merino keeps missing out on jobs to David Moise, I think that would be a great sitcom, wouldn't it? They keep turning up in prestigious places and David Moise is being unveiled in heaven. I cried outside the London stadium when they unveiled David Moise with my dream. Is the set up of their squad laws? We've always talked about how unbalanced it is. Is it getting more balanced or not? I don't think so. I'm very confused by recent events because earlier in the summer, not just a couple weeks ago, there was like, Venice's junior is flirting with Arsenal. He's thinking about leaving and I was like, that makes sense because as much as you can play them in different positions, you can play in Bapé of front and Venice's on the left, they do occupy a lot of the same space. They both do their best work sort of coming in from that left channel and it's been very clear that since Bapé joined, as much as in Bapé have scored a lot of goals in a real Madrid have won no trophies and I don't I'm not convinced that those two will ever play their best football in the same team. I'm not sure how you get that to truly work. So I thought him moving on, Venice's moving on to be the main man at Arsenal was like, yes, this is logical. I also saw Real Madrid linked with Rodri and I thought, yes, because the other reason that's happened in the last two years, I mean two years ago and Bapé joined and crossed retired. So you lost the sort of strategist in midfield and look a monitor to instantly have left as well. So you went from having two of the most high football IQ midfielders of the last couple of decades to having none of those and instead having a lot of extremely gifted players don't get me wrong, but you don't have that sort of strategic brain to control things in the middle. So you have this problem, two galacticals that don't make sense together, no massive brain in midfield and you're thinking about selling one of the galacticals and bringing in a big brain. I was like, yes, I can see it. It works. And then what happens? Venice just signs a new contract and apparently Rodri is going to Barcelona now. So it's not, it's not making sense anymore. Yeah, and Roger was such a good idea to them. It would make sense, but I mean, he's going to make sense for Barcelona as well. I mean, maybe that's what Barcelona realized. And it was like, oh god, if he's willing to go to Spain, we should we should make sure we get him instead of those guys. Well, I haven't seen this latest radio documentary. By the way, I feel like I've watched up in radio documentaries or at least documentaries about his teams. And I've heard his his opinion on on why things went in certain ways before. So maybe it's still you never know. He's got new opinions things to say. But I do think one of the consistent themes of Merino is that he pretty much always finds escape go within his teams, right? He finds someone who's going to be the villain. And that person is then becomes the the enemy within around whom some sort of competitive tension can be built. He did that and intated ever, oh my, he did it at Madrid last time. He's done it everywhere. And the only question is with this Madrid team. And you like you say they're all superstars. Who are you going to do it with? You can't hand Vinicius a new contract and then make him into the bad guy. You can't make him into the one. You can't go out and sign to your man day as this hugely expensive wonder kid and make him into the bad guy. I mean, maybe you can because you're Merino and you'll just then make it into somehow somebody else's fault and somebody else's problem. But it does raise that question to me because there is this unresolved tension and of how do you get the best out of him back by and Vinicius when they're in the same team? They want to do some of the same things. They're both brilliant footballers, but how do you make it work? And so the obvious thing is to make one of them into the bad guy, but then how? How do you do that with two of the world's best players in absolute? So presumably it isn't. Presumably it's someone else. You know, I do think it's worth just throwing into this conversation because it hasn't been said yet. And yeah, I'm big on people having chapters in their careers, having different moments in their careers. And maybe Josie is about to turn around and prove that he's got old dog can learn new tricks, but it is a long time since we knew Prime Josie. For me, Prime Josie, of course, Italian lens, but winning the travel with Inter. That's 2010. You look at what's been won since then. Yeah, there was there was a Premier League title at Chelsea. There was, I mean, that's 2000 and 15 Premier League title at Chelsea. So that's still more than a decade ago. There was you mentioned when you invited Max, it was 2017, they won the Europa League with with Reno. Then there was at Roma, a Europa conference, which this and I talked about at the time. That was a big deal to that club at that time, but it's not, it's not what Real Madrid are going for, put it that way, it's not, it's not in that ballpark. It's really slim pickings for more than a decade now. For someone with this reputation, maybe you could say it's not slim pickings by generic managers reputation, but by a manager with a reputation that Josie comes in with. I do think he's got, he's got a lot to prove. He's got a lot to prove all over again. Not that he's, won't be remembered as a great manager because he did incredible things earlier in his career, but I don't think we've seen it for a while. Yeah, Steve Evans would take those trophies, you know, Michael Duffwood, but you know, you're right. A big fan of Michael Duff, of course. Am I a big fan of Steve Evans? I think he's done all right. Anyway, meanwhile, Barcelona have bought Anthony Gordon, Adi Amies in as well. They want Roderie. I thought they pulled all the levers. There's always another lever, my friend. What happened? In fairness, they have sort of completed the redevelopment of the Spotify Camp Nou as it is now known, and that has given them some more wiggle room and some more levers to pull. I mean, Robert Levantoski has left, so that's a big chunk of salary off the wage bill. So there's stuff to do. I do think the Gordon deal was a little wild in terms of transfer fee. I'd be intrigued to see if there are any sort of business dealings between Barcelona and the Saudi public investment fund in the next two or three years. That's something I'd be interested in keeping an eye on. It seems like a big number to me, but the football inside of it, Anthony Gordon and Adi Amie coming in, certainly tells you that Hansi Flick wants guys who can run, because Anthony Gordon God bless him. He's a hard worker. He does a lot of, he has a good movement off the ball. I think he's a good player. Adi Amie is a guy who has had a lot of talent when he was young, came through at Arby Salzburg and sort of moved to Dortmund and was seen as the next off the production line there, has never quite reached those heights, but good Lordy can run. He's extremely fast. So I think this is sort of Hansi Flick wanting more energy and more running power on his front line to maybe cope with the sort of high intensity of the way they play going into a new season. And there was logic to that, I think. Nicky, can we talk about the Italy manager situation? So it's obviously failed to qualify for the third World Cup in a row. Giovanni Malago was named a new president. Multiple board members were brought in, including Paulo Maldini and Leonardo. Maldini then told the press he'd spoken to Carlo Ancelotti and he and Pep Guardiola were their main targets. Pep ruled himself out. Ancelotti staying at Brazil. Maldini over the weekend said Pep was close. He said they had lunch and we're talking about details of stuff right down to the under 17s. The new board then attempted to replace Genaro Gatosso with Andrea Pirlo at a like for like midfield. Pirlo's appointment was then blocked because of ties that he has to a Russian betting firm called Fom Bet. Two weeks after their appointments, then Leonardo and Maldini both left. The following day, Roberto Mancini was announced as the new head coach agreeing to be Italy manager for a second time. Claudia Ranieri replaces Maldini as technical director. There's so many different threads to it. So to wind it back to a tiny bit before the start of your time in there. Of course, Malago only took over the role as the head of the Italian Football Federation this summer. There's been this pause after the work of qualifying failure with the old team all stepping down. There was this wait for this election and Malago who's got a lot of credit in the Italian system because he's been the head of the Italian Olympic Committee for more than a decade. He was the one who got the successful bid to have the Winter Olympics in Manacore Tina and then delivered it as well, which was by most feelings quite a positive, successful Winter Olympics. People were very happy with it. It felt like it was a nice moment for Italy especially when we talked constantly in football about dilapidated stadiums and all the rest of it. The fact they put on this grid, Winter Olympics and it all went off well was really seen as a success. He comes in with a lot of credit and he goes out and he gets Maldini. He's almost increased his status by losing his job at Milan. Obviously he's got a certain status just by being who he is. Of course, iconic Italian football player, iconic member of an iconic family whose father was also a kind of football player, someone who's perceived already as having a very strong moral compass and firm ideas and being someone who the country could get behind and at Milan because he was a director there and a huge part of their last title when brought in or certainly credited with bringing in a lot of the players who helped them win that last that last Serie A title in 2022 with players like Raphael Elm, Mike Manian. He was credited with building that squad and then he left Milan about a year later with the general telling of that story being basically he gave some public comments saying we need to make a couple more signings and we'll be ready to compete to win the Champions League and the perception was that then basically Milan's owner said you two big few boots now we're not spending this money for you and you go and so Milan fans have held on to this idea that Maldini was the chosen one who was sent away and he had it all right and everyone was wrong chasing away and it feels like Maldini has now had this moment with Italian national team where he comes in and he's had his idea of how things are going to go which of course initially was Guardiola and as you mentioned they did have lunch with Guardiola and apparently he drew up his starting formation and everything for them he was very into it but just was to not the right moment tired from his sabbatical in the telling. Maldini himself them throws out the the name Vantilotti in an interview which was not officially on the table only for Angelotti to be well you know I've already said I'm staying at Brazil I don't know where this has come from then there's the Pirolo situation which you've you've already touched on and yes I mean there's a whole tangent to go into about the the Russian betting federation and certainly a lot of talk in the Italian press about the hypocrisy of betting adverts being sold for football matches but then also players getting these bands for betting on legal sites and then this separate thread of okay but this isn't just betting a company it's a Russian company and and where business ties are and out loud there is a lot in that which I think I shouldn't get into because it's a lot but suffice to say a lot of people go hang on Pep Guardiola wow one of the best managers in the world Carlo Angelotti one of the iconic managed Italian football has won the Champions League over and over again Andrea Piro who's not done a PhD though hasn't he's done a football PhD if I remember hmm all Italian managers who great hair they do of course of course of course um but Pirolo who ended the events is run of nine consecutive league titles not by being someone else on a different team by being the manager who was in charge of events when he stopped winning at nine league titles I don't want to completely you know I think sometimes we can go too far as well Pirolo it wasn't just his fault they didn't win that year and he made some bold choices in his next managerial steps which were which were wrong ones um but certainly a huge step down and then basically after the Pirolo move collapses with this story about the Russian um Federation Maldini flances and quits and the version and you know what happened essentially is Malago again this guy who's now in charge of the football Federation said basically said you've had your go now I'm going to pick the manager and just over the weekend Maldini has given this huge interview to Coyo de la Sera really big interview which he's you know his version of events this is like the merino three-part documentary this is um it's a really long interview um and uh and and in Maldini's telling he'd basically been promised not just um some small role of you know picking the manager Maldini was going to be the head of club Italia he was going to oversee like a decade-long overhaul of the whole system and he's really pulling on that thread of what all Italians every time you speak to agrees with us the whole system needs some reworking and he named uh Kreyf and and mentioned how the Spanish system got over all the he's positioning himself as the Kreyf that the that Italian football needed and maybe that will fly with some people especially given the Milan fans already had that feeling about him I think some of us and this was put really well in a piece I was reading by um I'm in where I threw it off from ultimate warm-up great writer if you're saying if that was really like how you felt the important thing was a decade-long project then why would you flounce than leave just because you couldn't get your manager right now okay if it's a ten-year project fine suck up that you can't have your manager right now and and and think about the ten-year project so there's there's a whole thing going on with Maldini and whether or not he was the right the right ideas they've ended up on a manager Mancini who probably isn't the worst choice but certainly isn't it's not the testimony all you want though isn't it it's not going to put that on his poster yeah well isn't he won the euros and Italy have failed to qualify for three world cups it's a pretty huge standout success in that chapter um but it certainly doesn't feel like anything systemic has been done to fix at the moment what we've talked about for a long time these systemic problems can I just ask you about Frank O'Barrési you know we paid you to Kevin King in yesterday and we talked about sort of legends of the game and he passed away at the end of July and just I don't know in my mind and I you know you have this image of this the ultimate Italian defender and it is Frank O'Barrési and I and his record for me I was just reading he didn't see football till he was ten that's amazing story isn't it when you think about you know you know kids now being handed a ball at two and you have to be doing keep you up on Instagram when you're four or you've got no chance and you know sort of born on this farm and never saw a game until he was ten but what an amazing career he had extraordinary um extraordinary football extraordinary individual um actually it was one of the things that that came up in the end to of course Mardini was talking about Barrési and and their connection on the pitch and uh and I think that could he could be seen as a bit cynical and trying to link himself to Barrési but I think it wasn't I think that was just genuine human connection and and and what they meant to each other but um yeah I it's it's hard to think of something to say about Barrési that hasn't already been said in the in the last few days of all the the beautiful writing that's been done about him but he was um a defining defender in an era when um Italian football went through this evolution actually of moving away from just having man-marking everywhere and and and the the the the free player behind two zonal marking and this different interpretation of how you even defend and then became this core idea for a Milan team that completely dominated and then of course a well cup uh win as well he's he's uh he's an absolutely um towering figure in Italian football and yeah no age at all again uh 66 years old yeah great shame uh may he rest in peace all right that'll do for part two part three uh we'll begin with the big last sivitant quiz welcome to part three of the Guardian football weekly I mean if this was a radio show now last I'd have five spent all morning putting a big theme tune together maybe production can do that feel free uh to bring in something eighties and something shit as we go now ladies and gentlemen for the last sivitant quiz and here's your host last sivitant take it away last hey hello yeah so the idea for this came to me I was um I was looking up some things you know it's this time of the year when we're been in a world cup bubble and lots of things have happened in European football that we have not noticed I was terrified of coming on here today and having my Barry search your apples moment so I spend some time looking up like where people are because they've been transfers and we've said what you've done is now you're going to try to do it for the first edition of the quiz where am I okay we should go through some European players some English players that have left this summer where are they all right I'm going to start anyway with I'm Julian Brant because I have a long last left Dortmund after never really living up to my potential date with Julian Brant with a gun Julian Brant I've now find myself as he gone up all down I am Julian Brant where am I I X I'm I X did you look that up no damn it you're right that's got one that is amazing there we go I'm quitting top quiz I shouldn't like because I didn't get it but that is that is a great advert for the quiz right that's okay okay it's gone better okay okay right here we go could I get all five so I I charmed a lot of people here in England during my spell at New York out of the United because my name is Ellen sent Maxima and then I went off to Saudi I played in the French league last year for longs but now I'm somewhere else I'm Ellen sent Maxima where am I I reckon he's in Liga Mexico but I don't I don't know any teams that okay no okay he's at the Colorado Rapids that exists it's a very good shout he is a Charlotte FC but I'm always inclined to give you half a point for picking him up out of the bag there you're doing pretty well yeah surprising and a lot of my time doing terrible quizzes Nicky on various on various radio shows of podcasts okay here we go yeah I have a surprising number of England caps because once upon a time I was the coming man but my name is Harry Winx and I am not no longer the coming calioremo caliore yes he's a caliore very good very good okay you guys are doing too well at this let me show some one you might not get okay speaking of guys who used to be big deals on in the Premier League Pierre Emmeric Obamion you're still knocking around he has left Marseille but he's still part of the European football sort of from Tiala store oh something spore good shout but it's not correct okay have I managed to stump you at long last he's that deportino which is a very cool transfer I'm a huge fan of it deportino La Coruña back in La Liga and Obamion has gone there love that okay one we're running out of time I guess but we have one of the sort of big sort of maybe not surprises but the positive players from the World Cup Ismael Saibari from Morocco scored three goals look really really good he has moved somewhere this summer my name is Ismael Saibari where am I severe he's going to buy in Munich and that was actually arranged before the World Cup by and for clever they saw that this guy could have a big summer and they got the the transfer wrapped up early as the County Germans they are son Lars it's a good quick look it's hard to run it through the season because you know by March we should know where everyone is I'm going to come on okay I got on I'll take two more go on okay maybe people have forgotten this so Antoine Griezmann has left Atlas coming red at long last and he has gone somewhere but this happened a little while ago some people might have forgotten my name is La Liga Griezmann I've got great hair where am I La FC it's not correct anyone else want to try nope this really is a hammer blow for the idea that's signing these guys is amazing PR for your ambulance for instance he's gone to Orlando FC yeah big Disney enthusiast maybe I don't know okay last one last one there's a sneaky one I I used to be another one who used to be a coming man in European football until things took a wrong turn and and kind of bottom out that's one Z I think my name is Renato Sanchez where am I I mean I don't know where Renato Sanchez is and I'm trying to think it are enough people interested that they're gonna because you wouldn't switch off would you be like the thing is I'm not enjoying the quiz but I still want to know where Renato Sanchez he passed to an advertising hoarding didn't he I think he is uh set piece coach at uh al Ali so the reason I bring him up is that he is technically at Paris Sanchez Matt which might blow your mind a little bit they took a ponte on him in 2022 and have really regretted it ever since he's been out on loan to Roma Benfica and panatine icos but he is as we speak back in Paris so I thought I'm actually going for another profession here I thought we were like you know yeah Trishin in Watford or he's a tree surgeon in bay so anyway I don't need an AK my name is never know for this whole season where Nathan AK is uh boy you wanted to talk about uh obviously the extent sweeper pod does all this uh uh the football that we don't cover are you want to talk about Sam Pierre and Michelin and the Coup de France I do I do I love the Coup de France I love it because all the nine they have nine overseas territories that send a team to the Coup de France and they just get entered in alongside the kind of provincial French teams and one of these nine places is Sam Pierre and Michelin which is tiny archipelago of Newfoundland just off the south of Canada it has only 6000 people in the entire entirety of Sam Pierre and Michelin but there are only also three clubs in Sam Pierre and Michelin so there are there are three clubs they play a tournament every year where one gets a buy and they play a final and the winner goes to mainland France to play in the Coup de France and there are as you might imagine two main islands Sam Pierre and Michelin the team that has gone ever since has started uh in 2018 the team that has gone has always been from the the the more popular silent which is actually the smaller island does we all know uh Sam Pierre whereas Michelin has never sent a team until this year when Michael S Michelin is uh one on penalties great on a sandwich isn't it I know the big piece there we go I don't they yeah one on penalties uh to book their place and it was just lovely they were um just lovely scenes they won seven six on penalties players piling on on the pitch and all the fans were in their cars honking their horns because apparently it's just so windy and cold that actually the fans tend to just watch from inside their cars which reminds me reminds me I've told this story before it's so good of an amateur ref uh who used to ref the Manchester leagues and if it was raining or cold he'd just park his car on the halfway line and then he would beep his horn for a free kick and indicate who which side it was to which does a nice image isn't it um what about musk ox hunting season wreaking havoc for green land football yeah and this is this is the scandal so as you know most people will be aware there's there's two main musk ox hunting seasons in Greenland each year um I mean it depends what you classify but I don't want to make this into musk ox weekly like this is then but basically there are two main seat uh I mean the biggest ball we know you do want to turn this into yeah but I've pitched that but it haven't had a response yet um but basically yeah there is a hunting season really important to the start of August that is also the only time of the year where Greenland can have an outdoor football season so all the teams from the island get together for this one week in August they rotate the location around Greenland um so what it means is a lot of players are absent from tournaments because they're out hunting musk ox and also to a lesser extent reindeer I think your whole hand's up there um and so that's great in a WhatsApp group isn't it you know is anyone around tomorrow because Dave is hunting mux musk ox musk ox yeah and so this is this has been a problem a bigger problem arguably uh is that it's really really hard to get flights anywhere in Greenland they get cancelled very regularly they're incredibly expensive so the the problem they had this year the tournament was being played in Menitzok which is uh off the west coast it's about 140 kilometers north of Nukh the capital of Greenland there were supposed to be 10 teams because of these hunting seasons but mostly because of transport issues and the costs they actually ended up ended up with four teams turning up for their tournament and what it's done is it's caused a bit of a crisis point where they're saying look how are we going to keep doing this because there were no roads between settlements in Greenland so you either have this option of yeah really hard air travel which often flights get cancelled or boat trips which can be pretty harrowing so I spoke to the um the captain of the winning team they are the like the powerhouse of Greenlandick football B67 they're captain Patrick Patrick Fredrickson said he was actually delighted this tournament uh was being played in Manitzok B67 from Nukh and he said it's an easy six hour boat trip and I was like Jesus god you've got a different idea of what easiest they all on the all the all exercise bikes you know as you go on the boat round exactly just keep warm lads well the recently said this I think is because in 2022 so 222 there was the only recent title B67 didn't win was in place called illily sat to which means icebergs in Greenlandick is beautiful one the most beautiful pictures in the world you sometimes see pictures on sites that uh take content from sites like the sweeper and don't give it any credit and they put photos up of illily sat's pitch because it's just so beautiful um and the problem that B67 coming from Nukh had is that their flights were getting cancelled due to the weather again and again so he had to captain Patrick's sort of had to scramble players on to various different flights they only actually had 10 players when the tournament kicked off and Patrick Fredrickson the captain was the last man to turn up because he's sorting everyone else's flights he turns up in a taxi mid-game yes kit in London to the field 35 minutes in this is a national championships are really and they ended up losing in on the in the final on penalties in this tournament and it felt like everything was against his team but yeah Greenlandick football has hit a crisis point and they're going to have a meeting very soon where the president Kenneth Kleist is going to outline what he says are extensive changes to the tournament structure so it feels like Greenlandick football has hit a bit of a crisis point over the last so many listeners will have been in kit late for a game on the game changed on the train you know running out um always remember um playing for the poly before rolling subs and we only had nine and three of our best players were arriving late and so our skipper Dom we started with eight and Hunter on the bench and he was like okay this is a sign if i'm not if i'm not starting because we're waiting for three of our galactics goes to turn up we start with eight and one on the bench that is harsh what is ruthless management ruthless management at the amateur level isn't it for old hunts anyway uh that'll do for today um thank you everybody thank you Niki thanks thanks Lars thank you max cheers Paul thank you for more muskock stuff of course the sweeper pod go and listen to it uh football weekly is produced by Rory Simon at Jesse Howard our executive producer is Danielle Stevens and we'll be back on Thursday this is the guardian
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