Hey Soccer fans! Here's a weekly bit from our show, dedicated to the beautiful game that we call, Football!If you enjoy this episode, subscribe to the Football Is Nice podcast, where we house the weekly episodes: https://podfollow.com/1686460793 This week: Is Luton Town’s 10,000-seater stadium about to make its home in the Premier League? Alan Shearer's eloquent writing, Declan Rice being nice, predictions for the relegation battle and upcoming fixtures. Plus, your comments and new invitations for us to do stuff!For a bit more from us join our Stay Free Community here: https://russellbrand.locals.com/ Watch Stay Free with Russell Brand on Rumble: https://rumble.com/c/russellbrand Come to COMMUNITY - https://www.russellbrand.com/community-2023/NEW MERCH! https://stuff.russellbrand.com/
The narrative itself can be found in football As someone once said, the world is not made of atoms, the world is made of stories.
And the stories that emerge from football are some of the greatest stories available.
It also gives me and Gareth an opportunity to make predictions in a game that I'm sure to win, where we have to predict the scores of certain fixtures.
We get three points if you 100% get it right, one point if you get the general result correct.
That's our system, isn't it?
Got lots of things to talk about.
Who's going to get relegated from the Premier League?
Are West Ham United, the football club that I support, going to reach a European final?
Albeit one that Simon Jordan of Talk Sport calls the Papa John's, meaning it's sort of a low-rent... Papa John's is a sort of a pizza parlour that sponsors sort of low-rent domestic competitions.
Still a European competition.
It's a nice looking trophy as well.
And if you can get past AZ Alkmaar, I would say.
They've got a good AZ Alkmaar of Holland.
The big thing is that they're one of those moneyball teams.
The press likes to go on about it.
Are they moneyball?
Don't get seduced by the glamour.
There is my football team, West Ham United.
Jared Bowen, that used to play for Hull, which is a team Gareth supports.
Then in the background is Paqueta, a Brazilian World Cup star.
Zouma is in the very middle there.
He famously kicked his own cat.
Sucek, a brilliant, tall player from the Czech Republic, who's really good in the air and strong.
Maybe he's the Eastern European Fellaini, maybe.
Declan Rice, who's like a hero of West Ham, too good for West Ham and will soon be leaving.
And Mikel Antonio is second from the left.
Alright, let's have a look at our predictions.
We can't tell how it went just by analysing the numbers.
I always lose.
Gareth got five right, but I win because I got one exactly correct.
Well done.
Actually, we both did amazing.
That's the best we've ever done, and I actually have got ten points.
If you want, you can add it to where we were up to last time round.
No, let's start fresh.
Just like two more games?
Is there three more games?
Two, three more games, yeah.
You could do it, Brand.
Listen, which ones did I get 100% right?
I must have got some 100% right, mustn't I?
You must have done.
To win, because I only got four right, you got five right.
That's not bad, is it, really?
What ones did I get 100% right?
You need to mark it up in some way that makes it clear.
Colour code it.
That's too difficult to look at for a stupid person.
So, hold on, there's a few things I want to talk about.
Luton, I want to talk about Luton.
Yes.
Like, Luton beat Sunderland.
That's right.
Didn't they?
In the playoffs, in the championship.
Yeah.
And you might have Luton coming back into the Premier League.
I want Luton in.
I do.
That's the antirexem.
Yes.
Because Luton is an old school football team.
Like, I think, I don't know this and I don't judge you if you're a Luton fan, but I have a sense that Luton still has what you might call traditional 80s fans.
Don't you think?
Yeah, I guess, yeah, I mean, like, Luton conjures a lot of memories, doesn't it, from when we were younger, like?
Yeah, because you think of David Pleat.
Yeah.
And you think of the AstroTurf.
AstroTurf, yeah, that's the one.
That AstroTurf.
Maybe you think of Paul Walsh.
Paul Walsh, yeah.
I think of, and I want to say someone's a bit like Lou Fablicit, but not Lou Fablicit.
Someone I'll tell.
Those three brothers, we'll get it in a minute.
The amazing thing about Luton is that their stadium is 10,000 people.
I love that.
10,000 people.
What, a Man United are going to have to go there?
It's incredible.
It's brilliant.
So like Bournemouth, I think Bournemouth is about 12,000.
Everyone was like, how ridiculous that Bournemouth would come up with a stadium the size of 12,000.
Steyn.
It's them Steyn brothers.
Luton's even less than that.
It's like, where are we going with this?
Yeah, yeah.
Also, they're like Bournemouth, like Luton are not, I would say, I'd call them unreconstructed.
It's gonna be weird there.
And even like when they won against London, there was a pitch invasion and it felt like a bit... It doesn't feel like a sort of a friendly pitch invasion.
I'm not criticising Loot fans.
I don't want to do that.
I'm not trying to do that.
I'm just saying, this is the point I'm trying to make.
Football has had to become sanitised in order to commodify it to the degree where it could become an innocuous global brand, even though it is still full of the glory that football will always contain and present.
That's what you can't do.
You can't strip football somehow of its magic.
It's too potent.
But as it becomes more and more commodified, more and more detached from the fans that it's traditionally associated with, the gentrification of the game, something that began a long, long time ago, really, sort of with the advent of the Premier League, most notably, in our country, it's sort of certain aspects of the game, the sort of eating a pie, drinking Bovril, getting punched in the face by a stranger, All of the things we are proudest traditions.
I think it's like that thing with stadiums.
It's like, I think we want to retain, we don't want all football to become, as you say, sanitized.
We don't want every stadium to be one of those new, all look exactly the same stadiums.
And so when you get a stadium like Luton's that's 10,000, you know, I guess it's the difference between Optum Park and the new stadium.
Exactly, the perfect example.
Because, right, at West Ham you used to have to walk down Barking Road or Romford Road or Green Street and you're walking through, like, communities.
Communities.
Houses.
Bengali people and shops full of saris and little pie and mash shops and pubs that have had generations of West Ham fans there.
The statue of Martin Pears and Bobby Moore and Geoff Hurst and it's sort of full of real ritual.
The inconvenience of arriving at Upton Park or maybe getting out of Plastow because there'll be too much people.
Upton Park, gonna get off one earlier on Monday.
And now you're in a Westfield shopping centre at Stratford.
You're moving for a place of commerce.
If you look at the sort of the economic class that are represented by the walk along Green Street versus where the kind of tax arrangements probably enjoyed by the unit proprietors in any Westfield.
Who owns Westfield?
Where's Westfield registered for tax?
Like all of those kind of, if you were to look at that, it would tell you a story.
There's information in that story about the way that the game is being co-opted and changed.
It's impossible not to regard it through a political lens.
So whilst I'm not glorying in like the aspects of football in the 1980s that were obviously prejudicial, violent, what I'm saying is it was something that was clearly owned by a particular community and that there was something, I feel a kind of nostalgia about that even though at the time I was Probably quite frightened.
Well we know where these massive stadiums and franchises lead us to.
It leads us to something like the Super League, doesn't it?
That's the trajectory of the way football is kind of going and we don't want that.
So retaining something like Luton being in the Premier League would feel like a kind of resistance to that.
You can have a look now at the entrance to Kenilworth Road versus the LA Galaxy entrance, just to sort of see for yourselves.
So that's on your way into Luton, and then what's it like to go into LA Galaxy?
Wow, amazing.
That's all that Royal Road tells you a great deal and almost you can feel they'll come a point where people almost welcome a Super League because they'll say oh well you know what's the point Man City always win the Premier League Bayern Munich always win the league in Germany yeah once it's we're doing it already then why why not you know yeah And once every stadium kind of looks like that and Man City type teams and franchises keep winning all the leagues and all the trophies, then it'll be like, well, why not?
Why don't we just do the Super League?
Yeah, that's right.
It's harder.
And then before you know it, you've forgotten your own history.
And this kind of amnesia and disassociation, I think, are deeper themes of what we continually talk about in our show.
You don't talk about the fact that you're forgetting your heritage.
You're forgetting your connection to the past.
You're forgetting your connection to your grandparents, your community.
It suddenly just all feels like, did any of that happen?
Does any of that matter anymore?
And I think that football is a great representation of that.
And if you lose touch with that, you lose touch with a lot.
That's why it's always been exploited, I think, politically, whether it's Rishi Sunak, WEF stooge and Prime
Minister of the UK never elected, attending a game at Southampton, the first
team to be relegated at the bottom of the table, there he is, being a
normal person, being a normal man at Southampton. Or things like Tony Blair
playing football with Kevin Keegan, the then England manager, because he,
for reasons I've never fully understood, it supported Newcastle.
And...
Newcastle were amazing then, perhaps, as now it's like an exciting time to be a Newcastle fan.
And I still remember this moment of watching Tony Blair exchanging headers with Kevin Keegan, and I still, for all the war crimes and all the dead Iraqi children and all of the globalism, this still in part informs my impression of Tony Blair favourably.
Like, for example, if, like, some world court arrested Tony Blair and were about to execute him as a war criminal, let's face it, that's no different to what happened to Saddam Hussein and Colonel Gaddafi, and unless you're making the argument that it's more right to do that to brown people than white people, then why would that not happen?
It's not a great argument.
Like, this would be what I would say in Tony Blair's defence.
Not that he would need it, he's the whole family's lawyers.
Also, I don't think he'd call you up as his first witness.
Well, you know, get Russell Brand, he's always been making cheap jibes.
When we were doing the trues, he went, like, I literally don't know what he means.
I don't understand Russell Brand.
What he means.
What is he?
I don't think he was talking about a thing that you were saying.
I think he just meant you.
What do you mean?
Your essence.
What do you mean what do I mean?
I don't mean a thing.
I am a thing.
Let's check him out doing edits with Kevin Keegan.
Witness Blair's head tennis with Kevin Keegan.
The symbolism was clear.
Back in 1995, New Labour, just like Keegan's Newcastle, seemed to be a breath of fresh air set to topple the established order.
Unfortunately, it didn't quite work out for the tune.
Or the country, or the people of Iraq, or really anyone.
Margaret Thatcher famously said, when asked what's your greatest achievement, she said Tony Blair.
Yeah.
Because then politics became sanitised, centralised, the idea of an alternative, a challenge to the relationships between corporate power and the state.
It was gone forever.
We can look at a bunch of things now, Gal.
We can either look at Boris Johnson elbowing a boy.
We can look at... Oh, we can watch Rishi Sunak.
No, not Rishi Sunak.
We can watch Roy Hodgson.
Little gangster, Roy Hodgson.
And Ancelotti doing sort of keepy-uppies.
There's two things we can talk about there.
Yeah, we can talk about any of that.
I'd love to know what your thoughts about the football was, though.
Well, I can tell you this, that Alan Shearer's writing on The Athletic is like David Foster Wallace or Proust or something.
Listen to all this.
For no apparent reason, Antonio Rudiger is crouching.
His head is nestling inside Erling Haaland's right armpit, close enough to check the strength of his deodorant.
And then he switches to the left.
His arms are extended, but he's not really using them, nudging rather than pulling or grabbing.
One of Haaland's hands rests on Rudiger's shoulder as if hugging an old mate, but this is not a particularly friendly encounter.
There are swats.
Elbows up.
That's unbelievable.
The moment is captured on Twitter.
A funny hypnotic clip taken from City's 1-1 draw last week.
Taken out of context, it's like an interpretive dance or a human version of Whack-a-Mole.
The ball is an irrelevance.
Haaland, who has his back to goal, is staring at it, never allowing his gaze to flicker,
but it is elsewhere.
And yet this peculiar little interaction was also central to a Champions League semi-final.
You know, like it's incredible the way that Shearer is constructing this pro...
Incredible, and I would argue, somewhat unlikely.
Who knows?
Let's get him on.
Brown vs Shearer.
I would like to see if he can reliably produce prose of that standard.
I suppose, yeah, what do you like... Well, the big news, obviously, is that Man City have basically won the title now, haven't they?
Yeah, because Brighton are too good at football, inexplicably.
And like, now that, this is what I think, now that Spurs aren't going to have Nagelsmann as their next manager has been confirmed, I think they're getting Deserby.
That's what I think.
Yeah, that's what I think is going to happen.
I think Spurs are going to get Deserby.
Oh no.
And I think that he's got, there he is.
Hmm.
Do you think he shaves those bits?
He's pictured here with a beard.
Right.
And he's got sort of a, like, he's got a beard that's, I would say, a little too General Zod.
Yeah.
A little too managed around the middle of the chin.
I don't know.
I mean, I've got places in my beard that don't grow.
Yeah, I've got a couple of bald bits at the extremes of my mouth there.
Yes.
Maybe it's just, yeah, who knows?
Maybe he does that.
I mean, he's very exact with his football, so maybe he is with his beard as well.
Exact with his facial hair.
Because I thought that what deservedly looked like is the sort of least popular member of a boy band.
You know, like they have one that's sort of like, you can be in the boy band, but we know that you're struggling with your weight and we're not going to let you be near the front.
You know, he's like that and he deserves it.
But he's taken over from Graham Potter and he's fundamentally improved.
Why?
Like, it doesn't make sense that, like Brighton, Southampton used to be like that.
Just like, they keep being a bit too... Right, when they brought in Pochettino, for example.
Yeah.
They're not deteriorating as a result of the transitions.
I always think that's surprising.
I was listening to a podcast the other day that was saying that there's never been anyone like him in the Premier League in the kind of effect that he's had on Brighton.
Never!
Never!
That's what they were saying.
This was on a BBC football podcast and they were saying there's never been anyone who's done what he's done.
I guess in the fact that he's come in like midway through his season.
He's changed Brighton in terms of the style of the way that they play.
He seems to have changed massively under Graham Potter.
I mean it's amazing.
Apparently he's a lovely, lovely guy as well.
Potter got the job at Chelsea on the basis that what he'd done at Brighton was incredible, as well as his previous employment in the game of football.
He eventually ascends to one of the top positions in British football, manager of Chelsea, albeit a position that's understood to be quite temporary.
Then De Zerby's come in and sort of been a bit better, a bit better than him.
Quite a lot better.
When you go on holiday, you want people at home to say it's raining.
Of course you do.
People go, it's raining here, you're having a good time on holiday, it's raining here.
You don't want to go, it's brilliant weather here.
It's great here, we love it.
Potter must have been looking at Brighton and thinking, oh no, I've got all these too many good players here at Chelsea on contracts that are too long and Brighton are better now.
He must have experienced some self-doubt.
Yeah, you would think so, yeah.
I mean, it's got to be hard.
I think you've got to turn to your character at that point, don't you?
To kind of get you through.
Because there'll be another job for Graham Potter.
Yeah, but what happens, because I think that there's a sort of, there's an upward trajectory, say Hasenhuttle of Southampton, there was a minute where he was looking like, oh he's in the ascendancy.
Yeah, he's new clop at one point.
He's gonna get a new, he's gonna get a brilliant job, and then it sort of doesn't, if you don't, there's so much timing, if you don't jump ship at the right moment, then you go back into descent.
Like, other than this peculiar anomaly of Frank Lampard being given another job at Chelsea temporarily, what can, and I like Frank Lampard, But he's seemingly can do no wrong in the managerial sense.
Doesn't matter how many times he fails.
Gavin have a go.
Have you worked it out?
What can he realistically be trusted with after this?
That seems like a genuine representation of where he is.
Well they're getting poached now aren't they at Chelsea?
Chelsea are getting Pochettino, that'll be... So like, I suppose the main story is this.
Here are some main actual football stories.
Are West Ham going to win a European trophy?
Are Man City now unstoppable?
Of course they are.
Will Arsenal be, like, in the running next year?
Or will Chelsea be better?
Yes.
Will Tottenham be better?
Probably.
Will Liverpool be better?
Probably.
Will Manchester United be better?
Probably.
And like, I think if I was an Arsenal fan, and I know it's a kind of peculiar curse to bear, an Arsenal fan.
At least if you're a West Ham fan, you've got no, you don't expect anything.
No expectations.
Do you know what I think will happen?
AZ and ACMA, they'll beat us and we won't get to the final of that mad, stupid, made-up competition that we're doing well in.
That's what I expect.
No, I think you'll go through and then you'll face this other Fiorentina or Basel, isn't it?
Basel, yeah.
And Basel, I think, one up from that.
Or 2-1, one of those.
I don't know.
Are we going to go to a 22,000 seater in the Czech Republic?
The answer is yes!
Let's go to the Czech Republic to a final.
It would be amazing.
It would be amazing to watch that.
And then are Arsenal going to do well next season?
I don't think so.
Because I think Man City are just an unstoppable sort of killing machine now.
And perfectly embodied by the red helmeted Ireland.
There's nothing that can realistically be done to stop them.
The Man City thing isn't it, is like, you know, in terms of like from a footballing sense, people were like, well look at the size of their squad, they're able to like, you know, rest certain players and bring in other players who are just as good as those players.
But there is another, and obviously with Arsenal, you could point to the injuries that they got at the wrong time, in a Saliba got injured at the wrong time of the season.
Yeah, but like Gary Neville says, you can't just have one injury and then say that, oh well, the whole project doesn't work anymore.
Well, exactly.
So there's got to be something else, hasn't there?
And that's when people start saying, you know, phrases like Arsenal choked it and stuff like that.
Bottled it.
Bottled it.
That's what they say.
It's a mentality isn't it at that point and it's always a fascinating thing for me in football that you know as many tactics as you've got and as many like amazing players and everything that's something like you know personality and character and that.
A clear example of that is Fergie's last title like in his final season as manager they managed to win the Premier League within retrospect looks like a team that shouldn't have been capable of that.
Certainly on the basis of what they did for the subsequent, is it 10 years now?
And immediately afterwards, it's like, oh, that person was able through will and belief.
And I guess that's why, when I've really, my fascination with football, even though I'm fascinated with many aspects of it, the game itself, the moments of drama it can produce, transfers, the history of the clubs, the behavior of the fans, what it really comes down to, to me, I think, is the sort of power of belief and thought.
That's why I sort of fixate in particular on managers, So I think, like, can individuals create meaningful change?
Now, look at that team, mind you, it does look like quite a good team.
You've got Patrice, you've got Wayne Rooney, you've got, like, I mean, yeah, I'm Percy.
Rio's still there.
There's me on the left.
There's you.
I mean, he looked more like you then, didn't he?
Even more.
Like De Gea still regarded as a good footballer before West Ham ended his career with that gently rolling blunder by Benrahma.
Like that, yeah, that somehow, through belief, You can create something.
And it's like with Guardiola, obviously there is a kind of a genius in him, but it must be, I think, the power of charisma.
It must be.
Like if you took, if he just relayed all of his information into an AI device and it dispatched that information, like I don't think the results will be the same.
There is something human and interpersonal.
And I think as we continue to see the power of commerce and technology and dehumanizing us and stripping our culture of meaning, Even when enhancing superficial beauty or efficacy or safety or convenience or whatever the claims that are made by commerce are, the idea that something about human beings can't be replicated, that amounts to sacredness, I think, in the world now, that they have a sacred role to play.
I heard someone say the other day that if like there were certain managers that you'd never would see them on the pitch I think well you know like like sort of like a Fergie you wouldn't see it like you'd know you're in trouble if he'd come down or that they'd ruin things like their ideas will be annoying you wouldn't want them it's left to the coaches that kind of stuff right that it almost is a totemic and talismanic power that these figures have And I suppose there's many ways of doing that, whether it's Roy Hodgson's presumed avuncular sweetness or, you know, what is it they're bloody well doing?
Yeah, I mean, look at Allardyce.
I mean, Leeds the other day, that was an amazing game.
I actually watched that and it looked like Leeds were going 2-0 up at one point and then Bamford missed the penalty.
And I mean, that would have been a massive result for Leeds.
They ended up drawing 2-2 and they look good.
Like, Leeds look good.
Leeds have looked so, so bad.
And then Sam Allardyce comes in and I just thought, what a joke of an appointment.
I really did, I thought.
No offence against Sam Allardyce, but it feels so long ago that Allardyce had anything to do with the game.
And yet, evidently from the way that they played, and what a lot of pundits are saying is, it hasn't had an effect on them.
And what's he doing?
Sam Allardyce isn't there playing, he's not getting involved like De Zerbe does with Brighton.
It's something else, isn't it?
He said, didn't he, that he knows as much as Klopp or Guardiola.
And then afterwards when they sort of went, you can't say that because of their achievements in the game.
Like you've not won the competitions that they have won.
He said, I was doing what Fergie done.
Like I was taking attention away from the players and putting it on me.
So he sort of actually made yet another claim while trying to... yeah I saw that and I thought like with Sam Allardyce I wonder if he could sort of say like is it that they can instill in the Leeds team, listen you're in the championship next year this is about you're playing for your lives you've got two games Otherwise, everything's going to change for you.
You don't know what it's like yet.
You ain't had that experience.
You don't want to have that experience.
I wonder what it is you say to people.
The way that in their style of play, it literally looked like they were trying harder.
I know there's that joke that we say pressing is trying harder, but they were chasing everything down in a way that Leeds haven't done maybe all season.
So if that's one of the results that Allardyce has had, then I don't know.
But something's changed.
We got some stuff here.
G Held said, I just caught episode one's barbecue with a neighbor story.
It was priceless.
Has Gareth seen the neighbor recently?
Has Gareth been to any other social events recently?
Have you?
No, I haven't been to social events and the neighbor I worry about every time I drive back to my- In case he hears this.
Well, no, I worry about bumping into him because I think that, I think now as a result of telling you this story that maybe he's feeling awkward about this as well.
Cause it was a bit of a, it was a strange night.
It was a strange night.
Why don't you go round there tonight and secretly record yourself making sexual remarks in his presence and then we'll play it on the show.
Like you're just round there going, I enjoyed that barbecue, you know I've charred my chops, you know I've smoked my bacon, or the tip of my sausage.
You want me to ensnare him, do you?
Yeah, ensnare him with innuendo.
I call it sexual barbecue entendre.
Nice.
I don't think he'll respond well to it.
He was a very matter-of-fact guy.
He'll fart you straight out the door.
His arsehole will be gaping wide open like Arsenal's defence without Saliba.
And it'll stink about as bad.
And he'll say, hold on a minute though, the man downstairs, by which he means his penis, seems to want a lot more from me.
I've kept a very low profile in that flat.
I really have.
Sneaking in and out most mornings.
Primal Collin, my mate from the chat, Primal Collin2, you didn't say what position you'd be in at Fiverside.
At Hammy goes, did you play Fiverside?
Did you play well or too anxious?
I didn't go.
I went to the cinema and watched Guardians of the Galaxy 3.
Well that's not the same thing.
I ate some really bad food and I felt really bad about myself because of it.
I went with my children.
They got bored.
I did a U-turn on a dual carriageway in a camper van like there was proper mental.
Oh my good God.
You know what that is?
That's karma, that is.
That's the universe telling you you should have manned up and played, sorry to use that phrase these days, but you should have personed up and played football.
Adulted up.
I should have done, because here's the chat for the group, the five star chat.
You're in the chat, you can't be in the chat.
I'm in the chat, I'm contributing to the chat!
You haven't even played, you're not allowed in the chat.
Alright, I'm saying I'm coming.
Hi guys.
Good.
Good start.
Can I see whether your willies and my willy can be bound together with scotch tape?
No, that's not... Oh no!
Delete!
Delete!
Oh no!
I've said it!
Different text.
Guys, why don't you and us... No, no, I'm not going to do that.
I'm not going to send that.
Look, I will.
I want to do it this week.
What day is it on?
It's very revealing about my personality problem.
Thursday night.
Thursday night, okay.
Yeah, so essentially tonight when we play this out.
Got it, alright.
So I could be going.
Should I go?
They play every Thursday, do they?
Every week.
Oh my word.
One Thursday, I'm dragging you there.
You're going to drag me there?
Yes, yes.
You've told me what to do.
Play at the back and focus on distribution.
Right.
Keep my head up.
Yeah.
Be confident.
Just think of it as exercise.
Don't overthink it.
There you go.
The problem is vanity.
Yes.
Isn't it?
It's like I only want to do things I'm good at.
But increasingly we're finding out... Like this!
I know!
It's extraordinary.
Like, look at the standard I'm holding myself to today.
You'd think, why would I expect to go on that pitch and be Franz Beckenbauer when it's something that I'm due for a living.
Imagine if you do it and then everything changes for you.
You just give up the rest of your life.
About five a side now, with my mates.
At Sharon, I love the gerbils story, peed myself laughing.
I hope not at the death of my little gerbils.
Those little guys.
I've had a lot of tough times with animals.
I've got a lot of scars from rabbits.
Rabbits?
What about, didn't you have little mice that all ate each other?
Or was it the gerbils that ate each other?
So I had some rats that ate each other.
I had a mouse that lived in my hair.
I had the gerbils of course.
Rabbits that bit me.
For a while I had that.
I had those little shrimps that all jumped out of the floor.
Then I backed them up with Henry the Hoover and they burst out the bag.
What's all these shrimps doing in the Hoover bag?
I wish I could tell you about that.
Why is Henry the Hoover crying?
That's between Henry and myself.
Why did your mum keep allowing you to have pets?
I was trying to... She had a chequered history with them.
She thought it would be good for me to socialise with you.
Did she call them friends?
Go on, go upstairs with your friends!
You'll be alright!
They're not friends!
They're no friends of mine!
Predictions.
I thought Russell was spreading misinformation.
How could Russell proclaim Everton had any sort of chance against Man City?
Turns out he didn't.
If Man City then become actually invincible to the romance of the underdog, that's when it's all over.
I don't want City to get beat by Raoul.
So, you know, that result's done now, isn't it?
I want City to do well in the Champions League to establish dominance of the English game over our European competitors.
I see.
I think it's a shame if they... Do you want them to do the treble?
I mean, they're just going to.
It's either going to be this season or next season.
Well, in the end.
There's an inevitability about Man City.
I think that's the slightly depressing thing.
That's why I wanted Arsenal to win.
The inevitability of Man City.
I don't actually really like Arsenal, but...
Man City.
And nothing against them.
Again, I like Pep Guardiola.
I like a lot of those players.
It's actually not about the individuals.
It's not even actually about the team.
It's about, it's impossible to extract it from the fact that there is, it's currently the most obvious example of how outside factors are influencing the game.
Chelsea used to be that.
Man United used to be that.
And But when people sort of make arguments about Nottingham Forest being it, I think that's when it's right.
Because Nottingham Forest, that's the ingenuity of individuals and the cohesion of a team, yeah, Clough and Taylor.
And then, like, and now it feels like we are sort of moving towards, like, whilst it's always appalled me that in American sport franchises like the LA Raiders have come from somewhere else and they've gone somewhere, like, they'll just move about.
Like, what do the fans feel?
They've just took their football team and put it somewhere else.
I like but like now you sort of in a way have that like the fans are in a sense set dressing for an Abu Dhabi enterprise like you could as we learned during Covid that you can extract the fans from the experience albeit it does massively diminish the entire spectacle it does hollow it out it is weird to hear the ringing shouts of players talking to one another And the expletives.
It is difficult to be denied things like this.
There's a TV show called The Chase.
Have a look at The Beast first, actually, guys, to establish the idea.
There's a TV show called The Chase, and there's this guy in it called The Beast, and The Beast looks like that.
And have a look at what fans... I don't know what the game was like.
It's Cambridge versus Stevenage.
Look at that.
Like, there is that guy.
Look at him in the high-vis, the big guy by the post.
Listen to the fans shouting this thing.
It's funny.
[Chasing the Morning by The Beatles]
That's funny that.
You've got to chase in the morning.
I've got that anyway.
As much as he's got to just sort of stand there and listen to that.
It's enjoyable.
It's fun.
And one person will have just said it and other people join in.
It's incredible.
That's what's beautiful about it, it's one of the things that's beautiful and also I don't feel like what's underlying that is, yeah, let's destroy this guy and hurt him.
No, it isn't.
It's playful.
It's fun.
And the amazing thing about that, just to kind of come full circle, is when you have these modern grounds where you can't get anywhere near the bloody pitch anymore, you don't have situations like that.
I just want to see this thing of Declan Rice, West Ham captain, presumed to leave at the end of this season, being so beautiful to a child that I shuddered and quivered and nearly wept.
Like someone who's in love with Declan Rice, Mike.
Let's have a look.
Are you good?
Why are you crying?
Come here.
That little child's crying.
I'm not sure what game this is after.
Do you think West Ham lost that game or is it after?
It's BBC Sport.
I'm not sure what the context is.
I don't think he's crying because they lost.
I think he's crying out of emotion.
He's overawed.
He's overwhelmed by it.
I'm coming!
is over is overwhelmed by me and Declan Rice. Now what surprises me is Declan Rice is what
24 years old he's very adept at dealing with this young man emotionally he's very sort
of emotionally what would I say he's lucid and sort of present like he's not embarrassed
by the little boy crying and he's kind to him it's really sort of lovely isn't it?
I'm coming, good lad.
That lovely cuddle.
Oh, I love Declan Rice now.
He's worth £120 million just for that.
You know what?
In a lot of other contexts these days, that would probably be frowned upon.
Why?
Well, people would probably say, like, it's a child and we shouldn't be getting that close to children.
I'm just saying, like, unfortunately, or however, I don't know, people think about it.
I guess within the context of football, things like this, kind of, oh, it was after Man United, after you beat Man United.
That's a lovely moment.
There's no other way of...
Thinking about that.
What do you want to look at now, mate?
Do you want to look at Roy Hodgson?
I want to see Roy Hodgson talking more, really, but here is Roy Hodgson failing to control the ball, much in the manner that I might at a five-a-side game that I'm participating in this very evening.
Let's have a look.
There's Roy's touch.
Look, come on, Roy, you're better than that.
Not one of Roy's finest touches, that one.
But Carlo Ancelotti... Back to Roy Hodgson as cuddly old lovely old grandad rather than gangster Roy.
Let's have a look at Carlo Ancelotti.
Still got it Carlo, look.
They haven't had to do anything special, admittedly.
Still got it, Carlo. Look, suited and booted.
Oh, class.
That's some Italian class right there.
He really is in a lovely suit and a shiny shoe.
He looks amazing Ancelotti.
Don't you think?
He doesn't seem to age.
He just looks like that all the time.
He's a gentleman.
He's a gentleman.
He's so classy.
He's a great great manager.
Underrated I think.
I don't think people put him up there.
You've got to think what he's achieved.
It's pretty amazing.
Right, there's somehow not the kind of fanfare that someone like Mourinho... And maybe that's to do with his style and his demeanour and manner.
Rather than his style of play, his demeanour as a manager.
What type of style is attributed to Ancelotti as a footballer?
I don't think as a football, but as a manager, he's calmness personified, isn't he?
That's what he's kind of known for.
And I guess maybe the headlines go more towards your Mourinho's and your Ferguson's and Guardiola's, but actually what he's achieved, he's got to be up there.
Why did he manage Everton?
I don't know.
That was a weird moment that, wasn't it?
Strange time.
I think they'd been taken over, a lot of money put into the club, they spent a lot on wages and I guess he was kind of between clubs or between managing Real Madrid and they managed to persuade him to do it.
It was sort of an extraordinary time.
Everton might go down.
Who's going to go down?
Leicester or Southampton are down.
Leicester look like they'll go down now.
Leicester can only get 36 points I think.
The way that Leicester are playing, I saw some of the game against Liverpool.
They started well the other day and then Liverpool just kind of blew them away and they just, I don't know, it doesn't feel good at Leicester at all.
So really it's between those.
West Ham have got 37 points I think.
And we've got to play Leeds and we've got to play Leicester.
Leeds can get 37 but Leicester can only get 36.
So mostly it looks like it's between Nottingham Forest, Everton and Leeds.
And Leicester.
Those are the four teams that it's possible to go down.
I don't know.
Forrest, you know, Arsenal maybe have kind of given up now.
And Palace, you'd think they'd get something out of.
Everton, you'd think could get something out of both the Wolves and Bournemouth games.
Leeds playing much better, but there's some tough fixtures with West Ham.
I guess West Ham, obviously with the European game, might rest some players.
Spurs will be difficult.
And then Leicester, Newcastle and West Ham, I don't think they'll get any of that.
I think Leicester are gone.
I think it's between, for me, Everton and Leeds after that.
I think that Forrest have been playing a little bit better.
They've gone on a sort of upturn.
They're all big clubs, I suppose.
Now there's no version, there's no one that goes downward.
It'd be a shame if Forrest went through all that trouble and then just goes straight back down again.
All of it's sad, as you know.
The relegation is sad, yeah.
It's awful.
I mean like, as we both know, as a whole fan I've had various relegations, they're awful.
West Ham, you've had a few in your time as well.
It's a horrible, horrible feeling.
It's one of those things where you think, it's only football, it's only football.
It hurts.
I absolutely hated it when Hull went down.
But then you can just get into it and think, I'm going to pay attention to this level of football.
Yes, that's true.
Oh, it'll be like Wrexham.
Yeah, right.
Oh, I'm just going to go things now as ever, Erdog.
The thing is, I love to say, oh, the Championship, it's actually the best division in the world.
I'd love to be back in the Premier League.
Every fan wants to be in the Premier League, surely.
Yeah, because after you've spent time out of the top flight of football, you're like, oh my god, we're playing Manchester United!
They're actually going to be able to touch them!
It becomes sort of exciting.
I'll just read a few of these things, then we'll do our predictions.
I think here's our prediction thing.
Yep.
Here.
I'm just going to mention some of the superstitions you sent us.
Giangio Danish, I yell Susanna every time the country is attacking.
I do the horn sign with one hand and grab my balls with the other.
I wink with my left eye, keeping the same place and position.
I'm from Argentina and we have many caballos, which is superstitions for luck.
That's a lot to go through there.
Yelling Susanna and grabbing your balls and doing the horn.
Rebecca Broome, I have to wear exactly the same thing I wore last time my team won.
I sit in the same place, I eat the same food.
It was one time long ago when I still smoked that my family wouldn't let me back in the house because the Packers scored when I went outside to smoke.
I wear red undies, said Dean Wilson.
I wear my team's shoes.
I back them to lose, works a fucking treat.
Alright, let's predict these results.
Big games.
All right, Tottenham Brentford.
I reckon it's going to be a 1-1 draw.
Okay, I'll go for a Spurs win.
2-1.
Liverpool v Villa.
I'm going for a draw.
I'm going for a 1-1.
I'm going 2-1.
Wolves v Everton.
I think Everton are going to get an away win.
2-1.
Come on, Everton.
Yes, I'm going to say 1-0.
Bournemouth v Man United.
3-0 away.
Fulham versus Palace.
2-2 draw.
Forrest v Arsenal.
You think Forrest is going to beat Arsenal, do you?
No, I think they'll get a point.
Alright, I think Arsenal too little, too late, 4-1.
2 Arsenal away.
West Ham v Leeds.
Allardyce back there, axe to grind.
Axe to grind against the Hammers.
But I still have to predict that West Ham will win out of loyalty, or will it be a draw?
Draw's not enough.
Is it gonna be a draw to all?
Brighton versus Southampton.
You've got to say that Brighton on current form are gonna run away with it.
But Southampton, maybe they want to play for a little bit of dignity down on the coast.
Brighton won Europe.
Huh?
Brighton won Europe, so.
A European place, sorry.
Oh right, so they're hustling for a place in... Will they have to get into the top 7 really, or they won't?
It's now top 8 if West Ham win the European Cup as well.
Oh yeah, if West Ham win the Papa Johns, as Simon Jordan calls it.
Alright, so 3-2 to Brighton, I'm predicting.
Man City versus Chelsea.
To win the title.
Oh, they win the title?
Yeah.
If they win that, they've won.
Yeah.
They can't slip up, can they?
No.
Against Frank Lampard's hodgepodge of giddy billionaires.
Not a chance.
Raheem Sterling.
That's what the thing is, is it denies the imagination.
You can't think of any outcome other than Manchester City winning.
