Copa/Euros Roundup: Klopp to US Men's Soccer? Inside the Berhalter Backlash!

Join Ryan and Derek on this action-packed episode of Football Yanks as they break down the Euros Quarterfinal with their sharp insights and lively banter. They kick things off by dissecting Saka's standout performance, noting his versatility and game-changing contributions for England, and addressing the controversial substitution of Harry Kane and his perceived lack of impact.

Listen in as they express their collective frustration with the current state of international soccer, critiquing the negative, risk-averse styles of top teams like England, France, and Portugal and the contentious issue of deciding matches with penalty kicks. The hosts advocate for more progressive coaching, drawing inspiration from Jurgen Klopp's mentality, and touch on the challenges faced by the US men's national soccer team under coach Greg Berhalter.

The conversation turns global as they dive into the Copa America and Euro clashes, highlighting the most thrilling moments and upcoming games. The transfer rumor mill heats up with potential player movements at Chelsea involving Cucurella, Lukaku, and Osimhen, examining the complexities of wage structures and negotiations.

Expect passionate critiques of the Spain vs. Germany match, marked by a dramatic extra-time finish, a slew of yellow cards, and an unimpressed reaction to the lackluster Portugal vs. France encounter. Through it all, Ryan and Derek maintain their signature humor, even touching on lighter topics like Vega's appearances and technical broadcasting quirks.

With anticipation building for the upcoming Euro and Copa America finals, this episode promises an engaging mix of tactical analysis, transfer speculation, and light-hearted commentary. Don't miss their invites to join the Football Yanks community on Discord and social media as they keep you hooked with every twist and turn of the beautiful game.

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Transcript

0:01

Hey, everybody. This is Derek and Ryan, the football yanks for the week of July 8. Here covering the Copa America results for the US. No, this is not a repeat episode. It's going to be talking about how much we hate Greg Berhalter and how screwed we are. And in terms of new developments, we'll also be covering the euro quarterfinals, talking about some insights into where we think that's headed coming into the semifinals. And like any great episode at its foundation, we're going to have Ryan's transfer and transfer updates and rumors to wrap things up. Football Yanks podcast? Yeah, we're american, but we're talking about soccer here. Hosts Derek, Ryan, and Luke are all football fanatics tracking our fellow Yanks in the EPL and abroad. Enjoy today's episode when the baseline drop. So how's your weekend going? Man, it's too hot to do anything. So it is. Forecast. And so I'm never leaving the house again. Except Luke and I are playing soccer tomorrow night, so that should be interesting. I don't believe Luke exists. He showed up last week. We had an extra sub because he didn't respond, and we added a person, and they disappeared out of thin air. And I said, I can't believe what I'm seeing in front of me here. I don't. His life just seems like complete chaos. You see him when he drops his dog off at your house, and I see on the occasion that he dropped, that he drops. Tessa drops the dog off. Oh, so you haven't seen Luke in, like, three months? Yeah. I could not tell you the last time I saw Luke. Okay. Yeah, he. Count yourself as lucky, I guess. But. Yeah, we thought we were gonna have him this. This week, but he. He texted us. Just, like, this progression of, like, him getting home later and later today, and so we finally just said we gotta record. Yeah, we didn't tell him we're recording. But I guess we could tell that afterwards. No. Yeah, we can. I don't know. We can. What would the equivalent be? Just not tell him? I don't know. Just until tomorrow or I see him at soccer. I'll let him know what happened. Yeah. His whole life. I mean, it's. It just seems so crazy. I think he like the punchline, too. Right? It's like I won't be around for the next several weeks. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. So that's the other news, is he. He was like, I'm. We're get. We're getting home. I might have lost you. Are you there? Anyways, like, we're getting home after eight now, and also, I'm out for the next several weekends is what he said. So, like, who knows? Let's see. Well, maybe he's coming back with some. Good Birdman for us, but I doubt it. Yeah, we're gonna have to save. Yeah, we're gonna have to save the late season recap that you wanted to go through with him until. Until he's back around again. Yeah. Yeah. I don't. I have no idea when he'll be around again, and it doesn't sound like he does either, so. Yeah, I mean, I guess we're just gonna drag this bitch through the. The summer and. And then maybe he'll be back in the fall. I have no idea. It, like, the. The way it sounds, like, so last. When I last saw Tessa, she was like, this is our last trip, and then things should get a lot more normal. It's starting to get to me, too, but that does not jive with what he just said. Who's scheduling these things? Yeah. Yeah. And a lot of it seems to be like, I. I don't know. I think, like, who's actually in charge. Of this scheduling since neither of them seem to know what the schedule. Right. But, like. So he's in Vermont, right? That's where his family is from. And. And then his in laws were in town last weekend, and they. They, like, always seem to be in town, like, it seems like every two months or something. And where I'm going with this is like, I guess some people like their extended family a lot more family. Yeah. Then, like, you, me and Shannon. Yeah. And did you mean immediate family or. Extended family or do both? I have no idea. Yeah. Yeah. I just know the in laws were a couple weekends ago. Anyway, we don't have to sit here and, like, audit Luke's schedule, but. Or discuss all of our familial issues. We'll save that for a separate episode. Yeah. The punchline is that we. We have no idea when Luke will. Will be back, so. So everybody will be egging you in anticipation. Sorry, it's just us again. And we don't. We don't have much good news. Really? Yeah. Like, what's the good news? There's like. I mean, I got some good naps in extra time of these quarterfinals. Yeah. I think these euros have been. I mean, in ways, they've been exciting. In other ways, they've been extremely disappointed. And I think the lows outweigh the highs for me. But we can dig into that copa, you know, we have to talk about that. We may as well kick off with that. Okay. You hurt yourself early today. Yeah. So. I hadn't thought about this for like 72 hours or so, to be honest. Yeah. So we, we lost to Uruguay. I'm trying to remember the exact details. I also haven't thought about it too much. So we lost. What did it end up being? One. Nothing. All right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. And then, so we needed a result on the other side. And yeah, there's Panama, be Bolivia, which was going at the same time, which it looked like they were tied at one point and we were going to be through, and then that kind of. Bolivia was ahead at one point, which, which we also need to talk about that. So. All right, where do I want to start with this? First of all, the broadcast. What the fuck was that angle? No no no. So those are, those are the. Yeah, those are the custom camera settings I use on FIFA 24. Yeah. You like that? Well, if you got a 77 inch tv, it works. But these little minifigures running around, that was a, that actually is a worse camera angle than what I would use to, like, juice my, my, like, field of view playing. Playing a video game of soccer. I don't know what. What we were doing there. I guess they ran it, ran it up the flagpole at the top and that's where it was. I was trying to explain to Jess that, like, not, not every game is broadcast at an 80 degree angle down on heel, because that's fucking weird. Yeah, yeah, that was, and also not. Every game has this many injuries, including traumatic brain, like traumatic head injuries and like, CONCACAF bullshit. I was like, no, this is just concacaf. Soccer actually isn't like football where like five players are leaving the game every. Every game. Yeah, it, yeah, so the angle, like, not even the announcers could cover for that angle. They, they were like, what the fuck is this? Yeah, I don't know. They had the, the camera mounted on the roof of the stadium or something. This is, you know, honestly, it's probably the football, or one of the football mounting positions. Yeah. This game was really arrowhead for, as for. Yeah. Some perspective on why that was the case. The Chiefs stadium. Yeah. Which equally or not equally ridiculous, but contributing to the outrageousness of this. This match was that it was played on a football field and so the, like, the width, the pitch itself was right up against the wall. Yeah. To the point that there was, there was no room to run up for a throw in or a corner, really. And it was just a completely outrageous look for a country that is tapped to host the World cup in two years. I'm trying to find. Is this it? Nope. So there was someone on Reddit. I'm just, I'm gonna be all over the place with, with this game. But the officiating in this match was something special. Did you just like go to your happy place? That was Derek's doing breathing exercises. I'm going back to the week before where, like I said, everything I would say today. Yeah. About ConCaCaf and the location of these games and the rafts and injuries and bullshit. Yeah. Yeah. All of this, everything that you've been complaining about, I guess, or pointing out is maybe a more generous way to put it. That was on. Yeah. Yeah. Full display and it was actually worse because it was impacting, like, us being eliminated from the tournament to an extent. Yeah. Directly. Yeah. So. Oh, I found it. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Anyway, well, all right, so this, this fucking ref, the, the standout. So first of all, the goal, what, what had we, no, so what happened first in the match was the, the ref giving the yellow card while also playing on. Yeah. Which is the play on. Signaling the playoff. Signaling it. Yeah. Which is like if you're giving a yellow card, you've stopped play. He also blew his whistle. Right. Blue, blue is whistle. Yellow card presumably. Luckily tim ream, like heads up play by him. He didn't, he didn't stop playing the ball even, even with the yellow card being brandished. But yeah, I mean, ridiculous. The, the announcers ahead of the game indicated that the ref had six professional matches under his belt or something like that. And he lived up to that billing. Yeah. So on the refs, there's a user on Reddit. This is on the us soccer subreddit. They went through and they looked at the fouls per yellow card or fouls per card brandished by the referees for comnobal in the, in the Copa America. And it's pretty shocking actually. The three teams that were most frequently shown the card, shown a card are Canada, Mexico and USA, averaging four fouls per card. Given the fewest are Argentina, Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru. I'm trying to see where's Brazil? Yeah, I mean it, to me this looks like a scandal. Uruguay, 36 fouls per card. Given. They, I'm trying to, I can't sort this, but anyway. And as it pertains to this game, right, like among many frustrations, that was one of them again, because I feel like the refs let these things get away from them. They allow a tone to be set for the game, namely where we're getting the shit fouled out of us. And people like Baligan, our best players, are getting hurt and taken out of the game. And there's maybe a yellow shown. I mean, yeah, they took one yellow in this game. I mean, it's like, give me a break. They took one yellow in the group stages. Yeah. And Ugarte is dirty as fucked. There's no way that. Dude, what? I mean, I shouldn't say no way because I didn't watch these. Like, I didn't watch all of Uruguay's games, but he. It would blow my fucking mind out of the back of its skull if. If he didn't deserve a yellow card. I don't even think. I think it was Nunez who got carded in this. So, like, it wasn't even like, yeah. Anyway, so the reffing was tragic and a tragic at it. With the most generous interpretation of what happened, with the refping and corrupt. With the least generous interpretation of what happened. The ref wouldn't shake Pulisic's hand at the end of the match. Did you watch the full clip of that? I did, yeah. It's context for everyone. Basically. Pulisic, you know, who isn't sensed for the last ten minutes of the game, not with good reason, basically starts gesturing at the refs to go join the Uruguay celebration at midfield, which I think is great, and then goes, you know, goes to shake the refs hand. The first linesman shakes his hand. The ref wants nothing to do with it. And, you know, to your point, up until now, I think I've always looked at it as just like gross negligence in these, these games, the Concagav games. Now, this was a mixed referee field, right? Because it wasn't. So it's. It's south american and Concaff refs to your point, right? So it's just interesting to see how that dynamic played out, which is basically the Kangen calf teams continued playing very physically and taking a ton of cards. But it is interesting because it's not like if you watch any of the other games. I'm trying to think. I watched a little bit of Ecuador versus, um, maybe that was Peru or piano I was watching. I had to look at what game is. But the point is the rest of these games were pretty physical as well. And so to see that disparity in cards is pretty shocking. Well, I don't think you're. The first part of your statement is accurate. So, like, total fouls to that point, like in the group stages, total fouls committed. USA was last with 24. Yeah. Second to last was Mexico and they took the highest rate of cards. Yeah, like, it. I. It looks just like the, the fix was in. It really does. Like, it's. It's hard to interpret this any other way, but, yeah, anyway, so. And then you've got the goal. Right. So what's his name? Olivera. Yeah, yeah, I just. He plays like, in Italy, right? I think atheists. Olivera. Yeah, he plays for Napoli. Anyway, he, he scored a goal. What was it? It was like a set piece or something, or was it just played in. I'm trying to remember. All I remember is that it was definitely off sites. Two things. One, yeah, I think the ball was. I believe it was a set piece. Maybe I'm wrong. I forget whether it was recycled or as a set piece. Well, yeah, it was like close to Turner and he punched it. He did a really poor job punching it away. And it basically, like, was left there for Oliveira to score now. Or was it. It was like a flick on. So it was like it came off the head of another player for. I don't remember exactly. But what's important about this, this goal is that the. It was absolutely offsides to the point that the first time the VAR sent the picture in to the broadcast, it showed the lines were drawn such that it showed that Oliveira was offside, like. And the broadcasters were like, I don't know what to make of what I'm looking at. And then they sent a follow up picture where they rewound the footage so that it would make him appear on side, but it wasn't exactly when the ball was flicked on, I think, is what it was. And I don't know, just the whole thing was a circus. And I think the viewing angle played into that because that's like, var didn't have a shot down the sideline to judge that by. And it wasn't automated. Var and, yeah, I mean, this whole thing was just a shit show and. And the US wasn't good enough and. Yeah, I don't know. So here we are. We're. We are eliminated from Copa America. Canada is through. Are you. What are you reading? I was trying to look at this damn angle of this off site because I never saw anything that, to me said. It was definitively offside. I didn't think. But in typical fashion, ESPN offers an opinion without, like, actually offer, like, stating it, like, make giving an answer. So, like, basically, in summary, it's like, well, if we had more accurate offsides technology, like what's used at the euros, then it probably would have been rolled offside. Like, okay, then what? Then why are we sitting? And then the counter argument is, oh, well, with the crosshair bullshit that we use for these games, you know, it was onside. Well, it's either one of the other, right? Like, I don't know. Did you see anything beyond that that suggested to you one way or the other what it was? Well, like I said, the first photo that came into the live broadcast showed that he was offside. Well, I think that was misaligned. Yeah. So then they rewound the footage to, prior to the ball coming off, it was like a flick on. Right. Are you looking at it right now? Yeah. Yeah. Because it was off. Yeah, you're right. It's a flick on. Yeah. Yeah. And prior to coming off, like the other Uruguay players head, they rewound the footage to make it look like he was on side and like redrew the lines and sent that in. Anyway. It. It doesn't matter. I don't think, like, us, the us team had to beat them because of how the other game played out and they could not score. And they seriously underperformed expectations. And the nightmare scenario for the federation is that Canada is through. Jesse Marsh's Canada is through. And it's. This is a bad look all around. And Berhalter hasn't been sacked. The federation says that they are making a decision by the middle of this week. Yeah. Do you think they'll sack him? I do, yeah. I mean, that's the feeling I get more and more like. It sounds like there's these proponents that there's some proponents that want to keep them. So that's why this is dragging out. But. Well, the director of football wants to keep him. Like, the leaks out. Was that the guy that wasn't even around? Yep. Yeah, Matt Crocker. So we've, we've like hired shit. Yeah, we've hired this welsh director of football who I guess is like never in the fucking country. And he. They had a meeting after the elimination and the leaks that came out of that meeting were that it was basically everyone against Matt Crocker who was trying to stick by Greg Berlhalter. And I do think that they will sack him. There's a lot of talk and I don't think this is real, but it would be fucking wild around the idea of Jurgen Klopp coming to coach the us team. Tim Howard proposed this. He said that he thinks he could convince Jurgen Klopp to come. Like he went so far as to say that. I don't. I don't know why he would want that job, other than. I guess. I don't know. There is. I mean, it's an easy job in terms of the level of commitment, time commitment. So if he wanted to remain in world soccer, but not have the commitments of running a club, like. Like a day to day basis, it should be less stressful and less onerous than. Than running a club. Yeah. And then there is a. I mean, the commercial value if he were to come here, period, would be. It would be huge. Like, he'd. He'd be an instant hero, I think. And then if he were to perform, if he were to figure this out, then, you know, sky's the limit. I mean, Emma Hayes wanted to come here, like, specifically wanted to come coach the us women's team. Now, that's different. That's, like, among the best programs in the world versus, like, where we're at with the men's team, but, yeah, we'll see. But Greg, like, this was obvious. We've complained about him for as long as we've been doing this podcast. He doesn't seem to have a clue. And. And the thing I wanted to bring up about the score was when Bolivia went up one nothing. Berlhalter was shouting onto the field and score and hand signaling the score of the other game like a fucking clown. Like that is immaterial to what is going on on. On the pitch. You. Your way to control your destiny as a team was to go out there and win that match. And he should have been spending his energy figuring out tactically how to set up for that. And, I mean, they just shouldn't have been in that position at all to begin with, but they were. And there's been a lot of talk about. About Greg and, you know, the players love him and when the players are interviewed, they don't want him to go. And a comment that was made, I think, by Carly Lloyd, who was one of the commentators, was that the players shouldn't universally love the coach. This is like, it's their boss. And she was saying that they hated some of their coaches. Yeah, one anyway. Yeah. Yeah. So, like, there has to be an element of respect between the players and the coaches, but it's not a friendship. And that seems to be what Greg has. Like, he points. Like, he's quick to point to the vibes of the us team, but the product on the field is really underperforming the level of talent that we have on the team and the fact that the players are okay with that is. Is a problem. And. And hearing her say that, it actually made me think of the Pochettino sacking a little bit because the players loved Pochettino. Come the end of the season, when it, like, it was widely reported that the players were really upset with Pochettino sacking and they were interviewed, but the club just went another way. And it's because they looked at the data and they determined that it was unlikely that they would progress. Basically, they felt they had hit the ceiling what they could achieve with. With the tactics that Pachatino wanted to employ. And the players love a really fast and loose manager that allows them to be expressive on the pitch and doesn't have, like, a rigid system and plans and tactics and, like, you know, all of that is, like, very boring when, like, you presented with the opportunity to just press and vibes, you know? Yeah. And, yeah. So, like, I was pretty shocked by the Pochettino sacking, but what Carly Lloyd said about Berhalter, it made me. Yeah, it made me reflect, I guess, on, like, what happened with Pochettino. And, like, it's obvious, like, like, Greg has to go. He is not the. The man for the job. I also don't think Jesse Marsh is the man for the job. I think he's a dog shit coach who is catching fire. I mean, he ran leads into the ground and he's. He's catching fire in a bottle right now. Yeah, but just Jesse Marsh is a dog shit coach, and I. We need to be aiming higher than both of these guys is my. Yeah. I think a little bit of what we're seeing with Canada is that this read, neither of these regions actually are as good as we thought they were, which is. Which is depressing in its own right. It's interesting because I do agree that Greg has to go at this point, like, whether he is the root cause or not, but even just all the. The environment that's around the team at the moment as a result of this. But it's tricky looking at tactics if we suspend disbelief and say that the result of the Panama game was an individual mistake and not a coaching mistake. Looking at this game similarly, it's tough to point out too many, like, smoking guns. Right. I think, though, to your point, like, telling them the score of another, unrelated, you know, another game during the game is not the right approach from a world class leader. Right. And. But, you know, it was in a tough position in terms of lineup. He could feel. It's clear in hindsight that playing Musa probably wasn't the right move in this game. Part of me feels like they could have played Tillman or somebody out wide to start the game, dropped Rena back because right, wrong, or indifferent, it didn't. Didn't work right. But ultimately, the result of this game, for me, was very much on the players. But sometimes that's what costs a coach their job anyways, regardless of whether it's the players or the coach. And in a specific scenario. Yeah. Because I don't know that anything stood out to me from a tactic standpoint. You know, I thought we were. We were trying to play progressively. I thought that in a. The players were up for it. They seemed like it, but the class just wasn't there to go win this one. Yeah. But, yeah, we got it. Pretty frustrating. I was pretty frustrated watching the game, as one might imagine. I was frustrated the couple days after. But we've got to figure out something before. Before 2026 at this point to progress things, because there's too much talent. And you saw the pundits in the us, former players, going on about this, and there's too much talent for us to have this kind of result at this stage in the game. Yep. Yeah, we, um. We need to figure it out, and we need to figure it out quick, because I don't know when we'll get another opportunity like we'll have in 26. I mean, what would. The last World cup that was held here prior to this was in the nineties, right? So, yeah, you've got a good generation of talent, and you get to host the World cup, you get to automatically qualify because you're the host nation. So the pressure is off in terms of qualification. We need a coach that can put it all together, and he's not. It just like, he seems so stupid, too. Like, his fucking press conferences. Mandy. Yeah. I can't watch the clips, to be honest, because. Yeah, like, they're like talking to a cardboard box. Yeah, they're cringe. Like, they trigger that, like, internal cringe thing that, like, you get watching Michael Scott on the office. Like, why did anyone put this guy in front of a camera? And then you're like, oh, wait, he has to go in front of the camera because. Yeah, coach. Yeah. Because otherwise you wouldn't want him talking to anyone. Yeah. What did they. They asked if his job should be on the line, and he acted like he didn't understand the question and. Yeah, I can. I found a friend, please. Yeah. He was like, excuse me, I don't think I understand the question. Oh, let me clarify. You just bombed us out of the Copa America. Do you think we should fire you? If I did this poorly at my job, I would be fired. Yeah. Anyway, I guess that's probably it. I think they, like that tournament's over now, right? Like, nothing else to talk about. Brazil got. Yeah, Brazil got eliminated by Uruguay. Right. Last night or maybe earlier. Canada plays Argentina next. Yes, Canada. Argentina might be Tuesday, and I think the next other game is Wednesday. And that'll be Columbia, your way. See, it feels like Argentina largely has a free hit here. They could very well go through and win the cup. Yeah. I mean, Uruguay is, like, good two, but. Yeah, I think probably one of those two. Yeah. I mean, Columbia. I mean, it was Panama, right? They beat the fuck out of them if I. What was the score? That, like five nothing. Yeah, they beat the absolute shit out of Panama. Two penalties awarded in that one. Yeah, I didn't even see that score. That's pretty bad. But, I mean, I don't know. Panama is outclassed in that one. Yeah. Relatively. Even on the score sheet in terms of. Not score sheet, but, like, the stat sheet, I guess. Yeah. Panama, 14 shots to Columbia's seven. Columbia, five shots on target to target to three for Panama. And possession, like, virtually even packet pass accuracy. Virtually even. I. I don't know. Like Panama. Like, if you're just looking at the. The game stats, they. They were up for it, but just got fucking mowed over. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. I guess that's enough Copa talk and let's move on to the euros. What was your favorite euros match of the weekend? Dare? Oh, Portugal. France. Because that had. I got. I got basically got a nap during regular time, and that was pretty cool. That that match was. Was really uninspiring. I'm gonna take them in order. So let's. Let's talk about Spain and Germany first. So this one required extra time. Yeah. Germany came out looking like they. At least some part of their strategy was to be really physically opposing against Spain, I guess. Spain has a pretty young squad and maybe a slight squad in terms of physical stature, and they came out and were really putting in a hard. They were. They were stuck in, like, from the very beginning. And crows put in a tackle on Pedri that clipped his knee. He went down and immediately flagged to come out of the game. That happened at the eight minute mark, I think, and that's significant. Pedri has already been ruled out for the rest of the euros. I saw that. Yeah. Let's see if there's any further update. It just says left knee injury, but he has been officially ruled out. What is this? FC Barcelona is set to receive money from Pedry injury that earn money from the injured midfielder Pedry if he's out for more than four weeks. The number eight tweaked is right quad in March. I don't know. I don't feel like reading. Yeah, yeah. I don't know. So anyway, yeah. Pedri out for the rest of the euros. They bring on Danny almo who scores the opening goal of this one off. A really dude, the way this is, it's weird. They have the who scored as the Lamina mall assist at 51 minutes and the Danny almo goal at 52 minutes. Very bizarre Lomenium all assist. It was a beautiful ball in to all know who, who scored and there. The comments after the match were that cruise injuring Pedri was like the best thing that happened to Spain. I think almost sisted the second goal. Yeah, he did. Yeah. So almost the second goal to Marino, Florian Virt, he scored at the 89th minute, like right at the brink. So Germany ends up having to. Alright, so there were a few interesting things that happened. Spain subs out their really dynamic wingers. Lamina Mall comes off for Ferran Torres at the 63rd minute and then Nico Williams at the 80th minute. He is subbed off and it really looks to me like Spain is playing for a one nil win. And a lot of the width is gone, a lot of the threat is gone from the wings at this point and at the 89th minute. So the field at least the attacking threat from. From Spain becomes really narrow and I felt easy to defend. And Germany was allowed, was able to get a lot of attacking pieces on the pitch. And flurry inverts scores a pretty, pretty wonderful goal in the 89th minute. Sends it to extra time and notably in extra time. Danny Carvajal, he takes two yellow cards leading to a red. They will be missing him next match. Who else are they missing? There's like a whole host. I think Rodri's out in the next match. I could be wrong about that. He's taken several yellow cards. He may have taken enough to get an accumulation and have that wipe clean and I don't remember, but I know that a story of this, this fixture was how many players were already on yellow cards heading into it. And then. Yeah, a Danny Alma assist to Mick Mikel Marino to win the game for Spain. Did you have any other thoughts on this one? Yeah, I mean, I think it's interesting. You call out them. Spain going a little bit narrow or less attacking that early in the half. And it's interesting because Kim Hoslu ends up from a fullback position getting the assist on that, that game tying goal. But for me, this was the. I'd say that the best game I watched, obviously the late goal made it pretty exciting and actually having a goal and extra time rather than going to this PK bullshit or playing Southgate ball for. We're going to get there extra time. Yeah. So, no, I think it was a great overall game in terms of quarterfinals. Probably the highlight for me. I think it could have gone either way in a lot of ways. Yeah. Jeremy was a really talented team. I don't think they played poorly. I think they created some chances and just the out, whether it was going off the post, just not finishing kind of left one or two out there and that was the difference in this one end of an era for Krositive. You know, you saw the impact he continues. He continued to have on the game. So, you know, he'll be missing that squad. Mueller, I think, announces retirement. Right. And so another one, it's gonna be messed. But you see some of these younger players coming into the fold, not the least of which King Kai up there. You know, King Kai, he was pretty. I mean, he has a 6.6 on who scored, so he couldn't have been that bad. But I didn't have. I didn't see him get in the mix too much in this one. Yeah, I don't know. Yeah, this was for sure the most exciting of the matches. It lived up to the billing for. For me, but, yeah, to that. To the point on Kai. Right. Like he had an all right game, but I don't know that objectively you'd look at that game and save. Full crew couldn't have done better having. Full crew nearly scored the equalizer at the end there with a wonder what. Would happen with, you know, a full run at it. Yeah, I. Yeah, I definitely prefer fulcrum up there versus Kai. There's something. Yeah, there's something that, like every manager season, Kai, that I just don't see happen often on the pitch. Now, the back half of the season, he played for Arsenal. He looked really good, borderlining on spectacular. But I don't. That's not consistent enough for me. We'll see how he plays next season. And I don't think he looked that great for Germany and I. And, yeah, I think I'd rather fool crew out there, especially for like, international soccer. That's the thing, right? Like it's. It's weird to play with somebody who's less of a striker and more of, like, a false nine or a center forward in. In modern soccer, especially in the international, where there's less time for preparation and, like, you know, I'll just, you know, put a bluntly, like, tactical acumen. Right. And, like, the minutiae that, like, a pep team drills on day to day. So, yeah, I think the fit is a little bit weird in that regard. Right. You see similar things with Joe Felix. You know, I think, in a way. We should talk about it. All right, so let's. Let's get. Let's go to Portugal. Portugal, zero. France, zero. This was a tragic, tragic game. Yeah, I did think. I mean, Portugal looked bright at times, but these managers. I think I made the mistake of saying that Deschamps was more progressive than Southgate, that he was more willing to let his good players shine. I think I said, that's not true. But, yeah, but it's. It's alluding to more credit than he deserves. Um, this is. Yeah, these teams, um, especially in extra time, were just not interested in trying to win this match, and it was challenging for me to watch this one, especially once the subs started rolling in, because both managers, it seemed like they were taking off. Like, where is the wizard? So I think Roberto Martinez is, like, one of the biggest frauds in. In soccer management. Like, he completely squandered Belgium's golden generation. Like, couldn't get a tune out of them. And now he's at Portugal, and I think his first sub. Where's the list of subs? I think he subbed Bruno off first. Oh, no, he subbed Giao Cancello and then Bruno, like, a minute later, maybe that was all in the same sub. They're listed back to back Bruno Fernandez, who is a huge set piece threat, very creative, and practically automatic on penalties. And then you're leaving Joe Polina out there until the 91st minute. Yep. And then Jao Felix comes on, which I guess that you could argue that that's a progressive sub, but he pulled Raphael Yao off, who was by far the biggest threat on the field. Yeah, he looked like he was trying to make a point in this game. Yeah. So, yeah, I mean, just, I. I didn't understand. And then on the other side. Right, like, Antoine Griezmann offered them Bailey. Fine. That seemed to be a. A good change. Dembele added a lot of width, had. A huge impact on the game, I think. Have all the substitutions made in this one had the biggest impact on the game, in my opinion. Yep, agreed. But then he brought on Fafana for Kamavinga in the 91st minute. Kamavinga, I thought, was their best player. I think the refs called him the best player for France, looking at the. Yeah, Kunde had a really good match. Teo Hernandez had a very good game, too. Yeah. But, yeah, Chuameni played well. Kamavinga, magic Mike had a very good game. How on earth does Mbappe have a seven on who scored? That's shocking. I thought he was just largely absent from this one. He got on the ball, he got some shots off. They weren't great shots. Yeah, but not, not world class number nine. I mean, Dembele looked like a more dangerous player for one at least, right? Yeah. And that was, I like, part of what was important about the Dembele substitution is that it made it spread the threat out on the field. Yeah. So that bought some space for Mbappe. I don't know the make of Griezmann starting over Dembele in the first place at this point. I mean, granted, like, Dembele's like injuring kids in the front, front and second row regularly with how bad his shooting is. But other than that, I don't know. Who started as their nine. Durham. Right. I was. Sorry. No, he was sub done. Uh, who was in the middle? I thought it was Griezmann. They must have changed formation, basically. And, like, maybe it was just Griezmann and Mbappe at top. Yeah, they have Milani up there. Oh, okay. Yeah. Anyway, this one was one to forget. Went to penalties and France won. France, notably. What is the. It's like they've only scored two goals from open play and it's the first time a team has progressed to this point in the tournament with only scoring two goals from open play. They are really, really boring to watch. Now, it is worth mentioning that the next match we're going to talk about England, I think that France has created, like, an order of magnitude more. I don't have the stats in front of me, but an order of magnitude more good opportunities or big opportunities on the pitch. Their XG, I think, is significantly higher than England. So let's, let's pivot into England. So the next match we were treated to was England won. Switzerland won, England advancing on penalties. And this game was interesting for a few reasons. To me, the formation that England came out with was, was interesting, just as we prescribed it. Yeah. That's why people listen in, right? Yeah, yeah. What's going to happen? We know. I mean, certainly we know tactics better than Garrett South? I. Yeah, I can say that. I could say that much. I don't know it better than most, but I do know them better than Gareth Southgate. Yeah. Anyway, they did look. England looked more threatening in this match than they have in any of their previous matches, but that's not saying a whole lot. Switzerland were definitely up for it. It is a case. Well, especially the way they ended this match was interesting. So Bellingham ends the match, dropped back next to Rice, which I think we had brought up here as something to be explored. The issue is, I think, that Bellingham's ego wouldn't tolerate him starting there from the beginning of a match. And the big issue is that, like. So I don't. I think that you are, like, more of the philosophy of getting your best players on the pitch. I don't. I think that that can work to a point, but you basically have, like, Foden, Bellingham and Kane just stepping all over each other because they all want to occupy the same space in the middle of the pitch and it's just looked. It's looked real clumsy. I tried watching for it more because you've called it out and, like, there are times where, like, it looked like they were literally, like, stepping on each other. Yeah. They were looking around confused because nobody knew who to, like, lead the line, who to, like, come next, who to drop in, who did then run into space. Like, they had no clue what that dynamic should look like. And granted, like, whatever Southgate's drawing on, the etch a sketch on the sideline isn't going to tell them how to operate that either. Yeah. So, anyway, England, get it done. I'm trying to think. Shaqiri looked really bright when he came on. I thought he had, like, sort of a clumsy pass right after he subbed on, but other than that, he looked pretty good. Jacques looked really good. The cross in from. Who did the cross come in from? I know Char was. Was finished. Right? Yeah, they don't have the. I guess it was unassisted because it touched. I think it touched stones or stones got megged. I thought. I'm trying to remember the goal. Anyway, the. The build up to the. The goal by Imbolo was really good. Like, I don't know, it was fun to watch. I think stones got megged and then it was off another, like, an english defender and then just punched in. But Kay Osaka's goal was like, world class. The only place he could have put that, just put the team on his back and got a goal for them. Relatively late in this one, the 80th minute. It was. It looked like they weren't going to get a goal. Right. Because it was the same bullshit where like, they couldn't create good chances. Yeah. For somebody to go finish and to your point, like, that wasn't a high probability position he was in. He decided he was going for it and. And someone had to do something. Right. Yeah. And Sokka was a standout in this one for me. He. Yeah, I mean, he just looked. Looked like a threat the whole match and. Yeah, not only that. Right. Putting his ego as. I mean, forget about where Bellingham wants to play. Like Sokka was asked to play both wing back positions in this one. Right. Yeah. Getting the game. Game saving goal. Game tying goal. Yep. And putting away his penalty too. Yep. What a. What a weight lifted from him after what happened in the last. Yeah. I mean, good for him. Right. Yeah. It's good to see that, you know, to your point, the way the fans treated him after the World cup. Yeah. I did see a lot of people praising Palmer after this one. I think that this was the least interesting or least convincing displays from Palmer coming off the bench. I think it's tough, man. Like, he is. He is very. He's such a different profile from everyone else who is in this England squad and he. He really just doesn't give a fuck, does he? Like now, like they. They're. They'll just be in the trenches and they'll throw Palmer on and he's just immune to pressure. It's. Yeah, that. That part is. It couldn't be more obvious. Like he really. And I. He was getting in. I forget who it was. One of the swiss players face. Like he was just not. He just doesn't care. He's not standing down to anyone. I wouldn't say that. Have off the bench. Right. Yeah. Like this. We're looking for something. Yeah. Felt compelled to put him in. Yeah. I wouldn't say that. He was like the other matches where he's been thrown on to like, try to save something. He's. He's looked like a real. Like a big game changer and I think everybody has called him out and people have been pleading practically with Southgate to start with him on the pitch. This one, I don't think he was as impactful, but he, I mean, he, he switched it up. I think another thing to point out here is that Kane was subbed off in this one. Kane looks really out of place in this squad. The. I mean, that chemistry issue that I like that I was just talking with you about it is. It is a profound issue that is having an impact on Kane and where he feels he should be on the pitch. He has been devoid of ideas. He's not a threat. And it was to the point that Southgate Kane has a good penalty record. Yeah. Right. That's. Kate subbed him off like ten minutes. Ivan Tony. To try and win it. That can't really be. I mean, it's not like they were trying to really win it anyway. So basically you're saying, oh, I want Trent to take a penalty over Carrie Kane, which. Yeah. Yeah. As an indictment on one of the best strikers in the world to say, I don't want him out there taking a penalty. Yep. Yeah. Or like, to put it another way, and Kane has. Has been so detrimental to the run of play in this match that I'm not even get. Like, I need to make. I need to yank him with ten minutes left and we're probably going to penalties. Like, I just need to try something. So England and I have. I have a point to make. I guess. I guess I can make it after like, sort of combining how I felt about these. These two fixtures that we've just talked about, the Portugal one Portugal France and the England Switzerland match. Oh, we supposed to develop and recognize themes on this podcast now, too? Is that something? Well, I'm gonna try. Okay. So I think this is a good. Role for you, potentially. Like, the thought I had. I, like, went for a walk after having to watch this. This fucking. Yeah. And like, is. Is the thought I had was. Is, like, by definition, is international soccer boring? No. And. And so, like, because every team, or especially the most successful teams, I guess, like, when you think about France. Yeah. Like England. Um, I mean, Portugal largely played this way. Yep. Um, they play this really negative style. Yep. Where it's like we're just going to hang back, play for set pieces. We're going to risk nothing and we're just going to hope you make a mistake and we capitalize on it. And you're taking some of the. The best players in the world. Yeah. And turning them into just robots. Like, just like. And I. I watch this. I like a good, like, technical, like a jiu jitsu match between coaches. But, like, that's not what we're seeing. And soccer is entertainment. Like, and I'm not entertained. And I guess at the end of the day, winning is all that matters, but. Well. Right. And so I think part of it comes down. There's a couple things because I thought about this as well. Right. Part of it comes down to the rules and I think it's too late in the history of soccer probably at this point to do anything to change it. Right. But like the notion that if you get through extra time, then you go to pks and just incentivizes you to play, not to lose rather than to win it to some extent, because then everybody feels like, oh, pks, I have the advantage because, or whatever, they just don't want to lose it. I think PKS is a terrible way of deciding a winner. And I, real part of me wishes that, you know, they had thought through that better at the inception to come up with something, but now it's just such, it's part of the history of the game. I don't know that's ever going to go away. I think you have a lot of coaching influence, right. You have people like Southgate and Deschamp who, again, are playing not to lose. Right. And so I think with more progressive managers, there would be something more positive to come out of it. Klopp being an example. Right. Like, Klopp is never going to go into any game, international or club wise, and play to not lose. That's not his mentality. And to your point, it's not the mentality that leads to entertaining soccer, which is important, too. What really stood out to me, I think through all of this tournament and a lot of the international environment at the moment, especially with the skeleton of Ronaldo running around the field, is we don't have that crop of like, world class strikers leading the line. You know, it's not like, you know, I don't even know who was in the comp set back then, but like, you know, you had Ronaldo and Rooney and Podolsky and all these, these great scores or strikers, you know, people playing striker at least we just don't have that. And Boppe was supposed to be that. And, you know, he had his boo boo and had to go ice it, you know, most of this, this tournament so far, he could prove me wrong here. Dude, I still think you're downplaying how bad a broken nose is. Have you ever had your nose? Because I'm. I'm. Yeah, I don't. I don't put my nose anywhere where it's gonna get broken. Like, I'm. I'm all talk and no walks. Yeah, okay. Yeah, I'll be the first to admit that. So, yeah, I. Okay, it. It sucks. And you can't breathe, I'm sure didn't feel great. And he took another hit to the nose in this match. I mean, he got blasted. Yeah, he's lucky that. Yeah, he got blasted in the face. Like, the noise it made, I was like, what the fuck was that? Like, yeah, and then, like, in the replay, you saw it hit the mask, dude. Yeah, dude. Calling it a boo boo is a little. I know you're being demeaning, but anyways. I wish we had better strikers that could play through pain. That could play through pain. Yeah. Instead I've got his body crying. Ronaldo's crying. You know, everybody's just sitting there crying. I don't know. Oh, my God, Mandy. Yeah. Well, we still have Netherlands turkey to talk about, which I was entertained. Turkey a. Turkey changed it. I don't. I missed the press release, admittedly, myself, but retrained my brain to start saying turkey a. Now, is that just what it always was called? Probably, yeah. We were just, we're just ignorant. Ignorant english speaking countries. Just mispronouncing stuff. Yeah, but now, here's what I don't get though, right? Am I supposed to start calling him Deutschland? But I don't, I don't know who. Is the guy that was suspended? Let's talk about this first. Did you hear about this? Wait, what are we talking about in Turkey? I don't think so. They're the turkey A. He was. Is he a defender? What is. I don't know how to say this guy's name. I'll be honest. I had never heard of this person prior to this tournament. This what? Oh, no. Okay. Who is this? Uh, Mara Demerol. I don't know. Anyway, he plays in the saudi pro league. Used to play for Farina Bache. Looks like he was at Atlanta and then went to Ali. What position does this guy play? I thought he was a defense. 6th. Yeah. Center back. All right. Can we end up this lead in. So it makes it sound like I'm less clueless than I am about what we're talking about. Well, I'll catch you. I can't even pronounce the fucking guy's name. Let me see. How do you pronounce plays for Turkey A? Can I play this? Mary Demaral. Marie Demerolization. Yeah. All right, so Marie Demerol, that's the last time I'm gonna say his name. He scored two in Turkey's previous match. To send them through to this match. I forget who they were playing, but he. Dude, my memory is just fucking going with age. I swear to God. I used to be able to, like, recall everything I done. Like, watched and. Yeah, anyway, I do know this dude. He's a center back. He scored two set piece goals, and after one of them, he made a alt right turkish alt right groups, like, signal, like, they have some kind of, like, hand gesture, and he made that to the crowd, and it was captured, obviously, on, you know, tens of cameras and broadcasted all over the world. And it turns out that in Germany, at least, this is, like, this alt right group is. Is sort of considered a, like, terrorist organization of sorts. I guess it's worth noting that I think they are, like, an actual political organization in Turkey. So they're not like a. Underground. They're not like the. What was that weird group of incels in America? The Proud Boys. Yeah. Yeah. So they're not, like the Proud Boys. This is, like, an organized group, but it. It was still a really dumb thing to do, and UEFA came out and banned him and I for two matches. So he. He missed this match, and he would have missed the following match for his. His idiocy, I think, interestingly, he was. Or the. What UEFA had to say about. It's UEFA, right? UEFA organizes the euros. Yes. Yeah, they do. Yep. Anyway, UEFA had to say that it was. What did they have to say? It was like a. They had to say, like, they had to dance around this, because they couldn't say that, like, politics. Political statements aren't allowed or whatever, because Mbappe has been out there popping off about La Pawn and how the alt right wave needs to be stopped in France in his press conferences, and so they had to sort of tiptoe around what they were punishing him for, I guess, is the interesting thing about that, because they're allowing him bop a to state his political opinions, but not. Not this dude. Does that make sense? No. Does it make sense to you? Did I lose you? I might have lost Eric. I lost your. Your cameras gotten choppy in the mic. Cut out for a bit. Yeah. I actually didn't realize that guy was suspended, so that's interesting. Yeah. Oh, it does look awful. It's also weird, cuz, like, it's. I'd have to read. I need to read up born more. It's interesting. Is a huge turkish population in Germany, obviously, and it'd be. It's interesting because that's a. You know, typically alt right policies are pretty anti immigrant, and so that's obviously how a lot of turkish people ended up in Germany. So for somebody be coming out from Turkey, calling for that is, I don't know, interesting, but I know there's been a lot of, like, you know, going back to Otzil and some of the other dynamics around players that have crossed those lines in one sense or another. There's certainly some angst there. Yeah. So, anyway, trying to. I don't know what is up. Can you hear me now? I don't know what's been going on with my Internet. I spent some time looking into it between the last episode and this one, but, yeah, it does look like it's just crapping out on the stream. I don't know. I'll have to spend some more time on it. Yeah. So, about the match, I thought, I mean, everybody was gushing about art of ghouller. He had the assist, just a beautiful assist to who scored for them. That was their center back. Yep. And, yeah, anyway, it looked like Turkey. Turkey looked like they grew into this match and they definitely ended the first half on the front foot. And I'd say, like, the first, maybe five to ten minutes of the second half were a little bit cagey between these teams. And then it was all Netherlands from that point on. It felt like. So Netherlands ends up winning this one two to one. I am not convinced by Netherlands. I was really hoping they'd get eliminated. The orange army can suck my dick. I think that they will be eliminated by England. Somehow. I just don't. I don't believe in this team at all. That's my assessment. I think they finished third in their group. Like, they just. Speaker three. Yeah. I think they had the advantage of the easiest path to the semifinals, in my opinion. And I do think it's an interesting matchup with England because the Netherlands tends to be a more progressive team, though they're not necessarily a great finishing team. Depai being kind of at the center of that. Although you saw with a different look when begurse came into this game, which I think the lead with, they looked more dangerous. And Depai ends up with the assist. Yep. I'm also not sure about burgwine coming back from the dead. I'm not sure what that was all about. Versus, like, friend Pong coming in there to start, but, yeah, you know, that backline's pretty, pretty sick when you think about Ake and Devry and Van Dyke. And frankly, having Vanderbilt coming off the bench. Right. Gives him something different, too. So he made a great block there at the end of this one, if I remember right. He sort of bailed them out. Yeah, he was kind of all over the pitch. He was making runs forward and stuff. Like, he's kind of. He's an interesting substitution at defense late in a game, if that's where they end up, if he ends up getting that used that way again. But yeah, I mean, otherwise, you know, I think Turkey was somewhat overmatched from a talent standpoint overall in this game. And so it'll be interesting to see if Netherlands can really do anything in the semifinals against, you know, if nothing else, a very defensive mindset that doesn't give up a lot of good chances. Yeah, I. I'm pretty sure it'll be boring, but we'll see. Yeah. And that sort of wraps it for the euros. So we look forward to Netherlands versus England and France versus Spain this weekend, then the finals next weekend. So we'll be recapping all of that in the next episode of the Football yanks. But before that we've got transfers to talk about. Did you have anything you wanted to talk about? No. Aside from transfers, I like. I have news for Chelsea and I have news for Tottenham. So the tot, I think that's all I've got. Were there other moves? Surely there were other moves. Excuse me, I have to edit that out. Dest he made us move permanent to the dutch league. I think that that's something I forgot to talk about last week, so I wanted to shout that out. Chelsea made some interesting moves and potentially have additional interesting moves to make. But first let's talk about Archie Gray. He did confirm his move to Tottenham and it was for quite a pretty penny. I don't have that written down here, but he is for 40 million pounds. Archie Gray. Wait, I'm seeing 40 and 30 million pounds. Maybe it's 30 with like bonuses or something like achievable bonuses, I don't know. But yeah, this is a dude who really cooked against Chelsea in the. It was the Carabao cup. When did Chelsea play lead? Leeds. He came from Leeds. It might have been the FA cup. Boo. It was the FA cup. And he looked. I just remember him really standing out. He did not look out of place against a Premier League squad. If at that point in the season you could call Chelsea a Premier League squad this February 28, that that occurred. So that was before Chelsea really started turning things around for their season. But anyway, he looked. He looked very, very bright in that match and that was the only time I had ever heard of him until now. But he apparently viewed to have a very high ceiling and he is now a Tottenham player. Which probably ends the Connor Gallagher to Tottenham possibility. You would think that like that fee that they paid was about what they said they were willing to pay for Connor Gallagher. So that makes things interesting in Chelsea's midfield, especially because they have signed Kieran Drewsberry Hall. I think I'm saying his name's right, who comes from Leicester, and that was made official this week. And, I mean, Chelsea just have so many midfielders at this point. I don't know what they're going to do. They're going to have to be very busy finding loans and things like that for the rest of the transfer window. But they have Cesare Cassidy, they have Andre Santos, they have Leslie Yugachuku, they have Romeo Lavia, Enzo Keiseido, Connor Gallagher. I'm probably missing some. Yeah. I mean, I think a handful of them probably go on loan, some of those more obvious than others, and then I don't. I get the sense there's still a possibility we sell Gallagher, given where his value is and what the expected playing time would be. I just don't know who the takers would be, but. Yep. And then we also signed, we being Chelsea. We signed Renat, Renato Vega, who I had never heard of before. He is from the swiss league. Basil, I think, is where he came from. Yeah. Yeah. So this, this is an interesting move because Chelsea were rumored to be in for California Fiore Califiori, California. Is that the italian guy? Yep. He. Yeah, Ricardo Califiori. People say, I don't say this, but people say that he had a very good euros. I don't know how you could say that for anyone on that italian team, but I will trust other people on this call because, I mean, there are lots of teams in for him. And Chelsea and Arsenal were attempting to make this happen, and Chelsea appear to have backed out of that, instead signing the player that Basil replaced Califiori with in Renato Vega. Apparently very similar profiles. Very versatile player. I guess he can play as a DM as well. Not that we need that. We have lots of that. He can play out left and he can also play on the left side of a two center back pairing. I think he can also play in the middle for a back three if we're ever in that sort of system. It's a very, very versatile young center back. He also has a very old face. Have you, have you looked at this guy? He did look for you. He's like 18 or 20 going on like 40. Yeah. I thought he was like 35 when we first saw the picture. Yeah, yeah. Rugged looking dude. Yeah. So he's seen some shit in Portugal. You might. So, yeah. So that, I mean, that's interesting. For a couple of reasons. It could mean that one of Chile and or Kukurea go. They're among the highest earners at the team, and we know that the owners and the directors of football are obsessed with driving the weight structure down at Chelsea and have been pretty successful at that. And so I think this probably means that Chile is available and he'll likely go, yeah, but we'll see Kukure. I mean, it's hard to. I think Chelsea paid, like, €70 million or something like that for Kukureya. It's hard to imagine that he's driven his value to even equaling that with, like, half a season of good play under podge, like the back half, and then, like, a very good euros. Objectively, he's been excellent at the euros. Yeah, but. Which makes it tough to move on, move along, move on from just. Just by virtue of that. Right. Recent form in the euros. But you'd have to believe that there's, like, more of a market around him right now than Chillwell, who's played, like, 30% of the last four seasons or whatever, three seasons. So, yeah, I mean, that, you know, that happened. And then Chelsea are. I mean, there are still some pieces, I guess, they're looking to add. They say they're still in the market for a striker. Omarodian, I guess, is still. They're still trying to negotiate that. And then Osaman, apparently, I don't know what's going on at Napoli, but Conte. Don Conte came out and he said that he rejected all transfer requests except for Osaman, that there was nothing he could do about acumen, that that was an agreement that was made before he got there. And so there's some sort of expectation or requirement that they move Osimhen on. And there does not appear to be much interest in Asimon services. Now, he has been quite injury prone the season. He was able to stay fit. He was the golden boot for Syria, but he has objectively had a very down season this past season. Napoli as a whole did. And he is now on very high wages. I think I saw, like,€245,000 a week or something like that. Like, Michaela Mudrick is on like, 70 or something like that. So I think that the highest earner, like Osimun's wage packet, currently exceeds that of the highest earner at Chelsea, which I think is Lukaku at 230. So that will make that deal tough. But apparently Chelsea are still trying to make it work, especially with Don Conte wanting a swap or really wanting Lukaku he's on record saying that he thinks Lukaku is the perfect striker Lukaku likes working with and for Conte. So we'll see. There might be something to be done there. I don't know, but. Well, when it's literally the only shoe that fits, it would behoove us to make it happen, wouldn't it? Yeah, but it is hard to bring in a player. Like, if you're knocking the wage structure down and you're getting everyone to buy into these incentive based based contracts, and then you bring in a dude who, like, you break your whole wage structure for. That's. That's tough. Like, you know, so I don't know. I don't know what will happen there. My gut says that it will not happen, but they do need to move Lukaku on, so who knows? I don't know. Arsenal is also rumored to be in for him and so is PSG, but I gotta believe if PSG actually wanted awesome and that they would just have him. True. That's a good point. Right? Yeah. So anyway, that's all I got. Did you have anything else you wanted to cover? Those are all my transfer rumors. Yeah, it should be heating up here through the soft deadline, like I talked about last week. And we are heading toward, I mean, preseason for a lot of these clubs, so the next month should be quite busy. Yeah. Because, you know, you want your team relatively well established by. By then. We saw what happens to a world class player when they get no preseason. Took I saito till about like, February to look like, you know, fit for the PL. So that would be a lesson learned, at least for Chelsea. And. And other clubs have probably long learned that lesson. We've got new cowboy owners, so. Yeah. All right, well, that's a podcast. We will catch you guys next week. There will be no Luke ever again. We are on discord. We are on YouTube. We're on most social. I've been talking shit on Twitter a bit. Yeah, come join our discord. Like, and subscribe all that stuff and. And we'll catch you guys next week with the euro final, a wrap up there, the Copa final, and I don't know what. I guess the Olympics are coming up if people want to talk about that. I don't watch the Olympics. A bunch of fucking c lists. Sports. Basketball, ryan, basketball, I don't care. All right, we'll catch you guys next week. Bye, everyone. Thanks for tuning in to the Football Yanks podcast. Be sure to subscribe wherever you heard this podcast so you never miss a future episode. We'll see you next time.