Scuffed | USMNT, World Cup, Yanks Abroad, futbol in America - #335: Leeds madness, Pulisic with Nippa, Weah at fullback

Episode Date: November 7, 2022

The Monday Review with Watke, Vince and Belz. Leeds 4 Bournemouth 3, Adams and Aaronson playing well, Weah at fullback, Gio's cold penalty and the AB dance, Pulisic with Nippa and his crew in the bowels of Wembley, no new injuries other than Sam Vines, Pax to Frankfurt, etc. etc.----Scuffed is an ad-free podcast. Support that and get exclusive episodes (more than 50 this year so far) by signing up for our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/scuffed Skip the ads! Subscribe to Scuffed on Patreon and get all episodes ad-free, plus any bonus episodes. Patrons at $5 a month or more also get access to Clip Notes, a video of key moments on the field we discuss on the show, plus all patrons get access to our private Discord server, live call-in shows, and the full catalog of historic recaps we've made: https://www.patreon.com/scuffedAlso, check out Boots on the Ground, our USWNT-focused spinoff podcast headed up by Tara and Vince. They are cooking over there, you can listen here: https://boots-on-the-ground.simplecast.comAnd check out our MERCH, baby. We have better stuff than you might think: https://www.scuffedhq.com/store Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

From the USSF approved territories of Georgia and Kentucky, and also from the FIFA approved territory of Brooklyn, this is the Monday Review. Vince Waki and Bell's here. First, I want to congratulate my sister Gina and my brother-in-law Cameron on the birth of their second child. They're both good athletes. They both got that dog in them.

So I've got high hopes for Hazel, born this morning around 7 a.m. Excited to welcome Hazel. We'll be, you know, following her bruntletes. progress. Yeah, thanks. Right. Or his, I suppose his.

Hazel's a girl, yeah. She's a girl. She's a girl. Okay. It's loaded. So you, hold on. You said they're both good athletes, right? Cam in particular is like he's just good at all the sports and extremely competitive, you know.

So that, that goes for, that counts for a lot for me. Okay. Yeah, I think we get it. We'll be tracking Hazel. So the Uncle Coach Bell's over here. Yep. We'll be doing Rondos. We'll be doing Rondos next week when I see him.

Let's get it. Let's get it. Good. You start those early. So how are you guys feeling about the whole, the action over the weekend? What's the, what's the big picture? Vince, what's the big picture takeaway here? I mean, really at this point, performances are, like, are what they are.

I'm just, I mean, we're on injury watch, right? Like, we're here. We're here now. We got one more week left to matches. But yeah, that's all. Go ahead, Wack. The measure is, did you walk off the first? field successfully at the end.

Did you walk? Simple as that. Simple as that. And it was a really, really solid week. There was some excitement in there, too, but that's kind of the headline. Yep. No injuries that I know of. And all the guys who are sort of injured, there's just a strong sense that they're all

basically okay. They're just not playing right now. Other than Chris Richards. What's going on there? I think maybe he's probably not going to be a starter at center back in this World Cup. Yeah. Yeah, that's a stressful thing. Yeah.

It's a damn shame. It's a disappointing thing. I don't think we need to be stressed, though. Yeah, I'm not going to stress about it. You know, I mean, at this point, it is what it is. But damn, man. You guys cannot be stressed. I'm sitting over here grinding my forehead like it's going to turn it to dust.

Well, Burhalter's in the press talking about how he's not worried about it. He's got options at center back. He even named checks too. M-Rame. That's good. That's good. By the way, by the way,

Greg and I are going to do a roster episode this afternoon, a really quick one. Burholtter? No. No. Velasquez. No. Still haven't got Burrhalter on the pod.

We'll see what 2023 brings. All right, let's talk about Leeds Bormouth because it was frigging unbelievable. The story of the week. Marsh Adams and Aronson get a 4-3 win. It came back from 3-1 down to win it

with the counter-tech goal from Gnanto and Somerville with the crowd at Ellen Road going bananas. What incredible television that was. It's a lot of fun for sure. Part of me just wants a boring soccer game from now and then, though. But I just think Martian, particularly when he combines with leads, do not produce boring soccer games. So that might be a lot to ask.

Yeah, you're not going to get it. And this is the reason that I don't know if I saw my tweet this weekend, but I said it was something along the lines of like, as American soccer fans, it is our responsibility to get at least one person to watch a leads game. Because, you know, you just, you got it. You got everything you need. We're not going to have a better, we're not going to have anything better to leverage than this. I mean, we've caught lightning in a bottle here.

So we really got to take advantage of it. I agree. It's the perfect intro to soccer. But I so far have failed in getting anyone to watch. But yeah, because, you know, like I've had some friends watch like Champions League Finals and stuff before. And they like the game ends up being kind of ass. Like ain't no such thing as an ass leads game, bro. I've never seen one.

Right. There's never been one. I mean, you even look at it, like compare Chelsea Arsenal to Leeds Bournemouth. Right. Chelsea, I mean, Arsenal was good in the game. I'll give you that, Vince. For sure. But still, it was, uh...

Now, there are games where Leeds is ass themselves, but the game is not ass because they alternate between being ass and whatever, I guess, the opposite of ass is. Right. I mean, like, Chelsea almost rolled over kind of. Like, they had no answer to, to respond to Arsenal's dominance. and leads, you know, I mean, they're just still going to be in other team's face, and they're going to create turnovers and break opportunities just through that to peer, pure, you know, will, determination, grit, grind, American spirit, whatever you want to call it.

Speaking of all of those things, Tyler Adams, you know, what a game. I think he's in the form of his life. That's my take on it. He just looks so good. I now granted his team he is a defensive midfielder and his team gave up three goals to one of the worst teams in the Premier League so there's probably some investigation required there but generally speaking he just looks so good everywhere involved in everything tough in the tackle he played that outside of the boot pass to Rodrigo which was super nice super and then the slip pass to Aronson into the box when it was 3-3 Very clever. I thought, man, is that, is that address Iniesta out there? No, it's Tyler Adams.

And then Aronson's shot was blocked. I guess we'll get into that a little bit. He was, Adams was perhaps, no, he was over-eager in the first half when he lost a duel and left Somerville alone in a 2V1 that Melier was to the rescue on. Otherwise it would have been 3-1 at the half

and then 4-1 after that, presumably. Yeah. This happened to Leeds either last or maybe a couple weeks ago where they just as stone, they had just a stone cold break away after one of their corners. And now it's happened again. It does seem like maybe that's one area where they could prevent that from happening. Yeah, come on, Jesse. Sort it out, bro.

Well, the thing is, like you said, Bill's, uh, Tyler's everywhere. And sometimes him being everywhere leads to him not being in a position to, you know, stop, stop a counterattack or something because he's he's up trying to get the ball back on the counterpress. It was weird because he was, I think, the last, it looked like he was the last person back on this corner. Normally he's not. Normally he's just at the top of the box.

And maybe, I mean, he went for the ball. Maybe he shouldn't have given his being at a different position. Oh, and the third goal, the third warm of goal, I mean, he does take a little. He gets a little bit of blame for that, right? No, he doesn't because it wasn't an own goal. And at first, it looked like it might be. But then if you replay, you look at all the replays,

it takes a little bit suspenseful. Once you get through him, you see, he didn't kick that in. But maybe he does get some blame. But most importantly, it wasn't her own goal. The key thing is we're going to have Aaron Long back there at centerback, so it's going to be all right. You know, he's going to cover over for Tyler Adams. No, I shouldn't say that.

That's bad. That's bad vibes. Who is our person that stays back last on corner kicks? Hmm. Because you said Aaron Long will be back there. He won't. He'll be in the box. That's right.

Sergenio. I think Sergenio would be the guy back on corner kicks. We have a lot of stay back on corner kick guys. Eunice does it. Tyler does it. Sergino does it? Yeah. Maybe when I said a lot, that was too many.

but. And I've noticed. Oh, Antony, anti-Jetai does it? He's a stay-back guy. What it says, what I like about watching Joe Scali is that he's like the front post guy. So he's never really, if they do give up a set piece goal,

he's never a blame for it. Yeah. I like that. It's where you want to be. You know, let me, let me, oh, go ahead, go ahead. No, I don't have anything. Okay, let me just say the way Ellen Road, I mean, a big reason leads is so fun to watch is because of Ellen Road.

That place is unbelievable. The way it was, the way the crowd was exploding every time there was even a hint of a goal from Leeds when they were down 3-2 and then when it was 3-3. And the moment of the game for me for Adams was him was on the goal, the game-winning goal. It's a counterattack. When Nanto picks it up, I don't know, like in his own defensive third, the entire stadium, just you can hear it just start to roar and people are standing up all. along the sideline as they're as ananto is weaving forward and Tyler Adams is just booking it as fast as he can up the right side of the field he does he does draw a little attention from the center back which I think opens up the opening for the goal but I'm not going to like give him too much

credit for that it just seems like so much fun to get on your horse and just run like sprint as fast as you can on the right side of what's going on as the crowd just explodes yeah and he never gets to, I can't remember him ever participating in a counterattack. So this might have been the first in a long time, or first of very few at least. To be on the leading edge like that had to be a thrill for him. Oh, so thrilling. And I wanted to assign as much credit as I could for his run dragging the defender, but he was part of the process for sure, but we probably do have to give some credit to the other

players involved in play there. Wonderful play from Nanto and obviously a great finish from Somerville. Who's Dutch, by the way. Did you guys know that? Yeah, I did. I did. I did. I didn't know.

Yeah, yeah. I had no idea until last match. But, yeah, Mr. Cresensio, Somerville, which MCB on the Discord said that's the name of a red shirt senior point guard. College point. Yes, it is. That is spot on. It absolutely is, man. Like maybe he gets hot in the tournament, you know what I'm saying?

Leads an underdog to the Sweet 16 or something. But yeah, that's him for sure. Not typically a good three-point shooter, but he hits a few big ones in the tournament. Yes. Yeah, that's all for sure. Griscienzio, Somerville. All right, let's talk about Aronson. Aronson played Somerville in to win the early penalty, which was good.

That was a nice ball. Yeah. For sure. Very good in the middle third, I would say. And then sort of in the first level of the final third, he's good. So it's like the... What you're trying to say? It's a little bit like the Darlington Nagby heat map.

A little bit, a little bit. You could... On the shot that got blocked, you could see him kind of sputtering a little bit. Just taking a little too much time to set that up. He had to do that stutter step twice, maybe. But I thought he did Did I see somebody To get in that position?

Yes he did Yes he did Got some XG off that Off what The shot? Yeah For sure for sure That's all we worried about here baby

He was trying to He was trying That's the only thing We've ever cared about It will ever care about So I guess what I was saying is Congratulations I do think he was doing

One of those Lofted little chips In the top corner it would have gone over looking at the back angle replay. So it was good that it was blocked. Okay. He did have that good little outside of the boot. Get a long pass to Spring Somerville down the left wing,

resulting in that Rodrigo shot. Another example, a blocked Rodriguez shot, another example of that Leeds crowd just going berserk at the slightest, I can't emphasize it enough, at the slightest hint of an attack. Yeah, they were, the Leeds crowd was outstanding. One critique I have is I thought they're fireworks. could have been a little bit stronger and a little bit higher up in the air. But the atmosphere was so good, the crowd didn't even need that.

So I wonder, like, maybe let's not do the fireworks. Either let's get them better or not do them at all. That's kind of my thinking. So do we have any critique for the booing at Heftat? It seems justified. Yeah, I would boo there, yeah. Jesse's in an interesting spot here, right? Because he's happy, obviously, that they won these last two games.

but I think he feels a little, a little hurt. Bro, there was a, they asked him a question after the game or something. It was like, have these two, have these like, I think the past week, has this past week been fun for you? And he was like, no. Yeah. Yeah. Which like, makes sense, man, because you see him celebrating or whatever when they get the big goal. But there's no way. Like, the stress, the mounting stress just has to be unbelievable.

I find the extreme close-ups on his face to be, when they're down 3-1 to be a little bit intense to bear. Yeah, kicking a man while he's down sort of situation. You just see it all in there. I mean, I've listened to a little bit of the Square Ball podcast since the game, and they're, they seem, generally speaking, unconvinced by Jesse Marsh. but, you know, happy about the results. I mean, well, like, I kind of can see what they're talking about, just watching, because when I watched the matchback, like, that first Bournemouth goal, like, yes, the centerback that makes that, like, an extremely tame header to set up the chance.

He's at fault, right? But the setup, like, Bournemouth was basically able to create an AVP, basically just from a simple pass from like Bournemouth's left center back to whoever it was. I think it was like the right winger, right back, whoever it was,

but they had found a space because the 4-222 is so narrow, right? Yeah. And they also weren't like high pressing at that moment. And so their line of confrontation was right about where the center circle starts. And so it wasn't even a long pass that he had to make. And he just kind of dinked it over there.

and then boom, like the left back has to come out and get them, which forces, you know, the whole backline and the rotation. And yeah, so it's like if a simple pass when your centerback can unlock your defense like that, that's not even an amoeba pass, really. No, it's not complicated to open them up. That's the thing. Yeah. That's the thing that I think is frustrating.

I mean, it's the thing that worries me about the situation. And people are like, well, they just need to sign a left back and maybe another centerback in the winter and that fixes it. Yeah, I wonder if there's not a simple fix here that maybe this is how these games go that's just kind of part of it with leads

and particularly when you combine Jesse Marsh with them. Maybe they'll probably get better at defending, but they're going to keep doing things like getting an early lead and then giving it up and then coming back from 3-1 deficits.

I think this is just kind of part for the course. And, what did you call it? The purple patch of the The chaos spectrum? What was that? The purple end of the chaos. Okay.

Yeah, well, I don't know what that means. Oh, okay. I didn't know if they were right. I can't remember what that meant, but they're certainly in that right now. I didn't know if they were like, have upgraded. Yeah, they're in the purple. They're in the purple this week for sure. And it's just like, you're not going to be in the purple that often, maybe once every four weeks.

I just so enjoy it when it happens. Yeah. Yeah. Be careful. Be careful. Yeah. All right. So we covered Marsh. Anything else on Aronson?

I thought he could have, just a pile on here. When he got subbed off, I thought he applauded the crowd. He could have slowed his walk more and just done more applauding. One last thing on leads. We didn't get to discuss this last week, but Tyler Adams did, like, said something pretty iconic on the way out of the out of Amfield after they were. He said three points, let's get the out of here. And one of the leads writers said that they should put that in Latin and put it on the away crest for leads.

And it's something like trace pointe, trace pointe something. I mean, I put it on the home crest too, to be honest. Yeah. Right. I mean, it was still about three points in getting out of there, right? Yeah. And he followed it up with another iconic moment, right? with the FU.

Yep. Said that to a sub who came on for Bormmouth. All right. One last thing. Kiefer Moore, Whale Stryker, big tall guy, who we may see on November 21. He missed a very good chance in this game. It's part of the case against Jesse Marsh, I think,

that he was in the spot between the penalty marker and the six-yard box, took the ball down with his chest, and then just badly mishit it. So maybe, That maybe we can take that as a good sign? I don't know. Maybe.

Maybe. But also, in watching this game, I was really impressed with them. Like when I listen to the, uh... Enough. When I listened to old dude on the Wales pod and he called him like, I hadn't really watched him too much. Yeah. But he was like, yeah, he's really like, you know, the modern striker.

Blah, blah. And I was like, huh, interesting. And then I watched him this match. And I would say I agree. Like, his feet, his feet are pretty nice. made a couple nice plays coming back to the ball and everything. So Aaron Long is going to have his hands for it. By the way, if you haven't, you should listen to that Wales episode.

I think it was pretty good. In my humble opinion, it was good. What Wales episode? I interviewed this guy named Ryan March, who was really good. They have a podcast that's kind of similar to our Monday reviews. Oh, okay. And he's just fun to talk to. I will listen to it.

I have not listened to that episode yet. You should listen to I Waki. I will. Okay, great. All right, moving on. Pulisic, well, played like 10 minutes. He was, as somebody on the Discord put it, he was invisible just like all of Chelsea in this game against Arsenal. Enough about that.

Well, can I talk about that a little bit real quick? I don't want to go into an Arsenal thing, no. But we are at top of the league. but just the fact that you know I'm watching Mason Mount I'm watching Rahim Sterling which is you know the quintessential Jamaican name by the way

but like I don't know I'm just not scared of them that's all that's the only point I wanted to make that's fair yeah are you scared to Pula sec no no I'm not scared of

Kai Havards man the way he played in this game I don't know just didn't look like Chelsea was ever going to score. But the more important thing is Pulisic was in the bowels of some stadium Whembley. Wembley was it. Is that what it was?

Yeah, Wembley. And it was a Jack Harlow concert? Yeah. Yeah, it was a Jack Harlow concert. It was just a hilarious picture. How was he dressed? What did you think? I mean, fine. Basically, that's how I expect Christian

Chris in the dress, you know, in some type of bomber jacket. Yeah. You know what I'm saying? Hat on. I mean, we've taught, you specifically, Waki, I've talked about his love for hats. This was a different type of hat then. Normally, he was going with a rock and a really small baseball hat. This was a little, not a baseball, like an old-timey baseball hat.

This was a little bit of a more contemporary hat. It was a Harrisburg Heat hat, right? Some kind of. Oh. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I saw somebody talk about that. Yeah, I saw somebody talk about that. It's a Harrisburg Heat.

But yeah, Jack Harlow, a native of Louisville, Kentucky, if you didn't know, I don't know. I was going to say important rapper, but he's not really important. He's just, you know, popular at the moment. Also, a noted soccer fan and soccer player played in high school and fan of Chelsea and Christian Pulisic. And he's done some work with U.S. soccer too. I think he voiced, he's voiced the hype video. Have you all watched the hype video? Watched a little bit of it.

I got the whole thing. All right. So I guess bottom line is how do we think Christian carried himself in this picture? What is the significance of it? How big of a deal is it? I'm not sure how famous these people are. Let's just kind of feel that out and figure out what this means for the World Cup. Yeah, okay.

The picture was with a London artist named Nippa, who I'm not sure how famous he is. I haven't heard of him. And, you know, just of him being like a black man from London who does music. I thought he made like drill, Grime type. He actually does not. It's some type of like R&B rap little. It's kind of a throwback.

It reminds me of like 2000, the type of music he makes. But anyway. Because this is what I was wondering about, because I was Googling trying to figure out NIPA, how big is this? It's, you know, it's a big, it's a good moment, but Nipa's not some famous person. No, no, no, not super famous. I mean, I guess he's famous in the UK or at least a little bit. He has 24,000 IG followers. You know what I'm saying?

We can probably... He looks like somebody who believes in himself in the picture. For sure. Yeah. So he's on the way up. I'm not saying he's not going to me. Yeah. He's on the way up.

He's on the way up. And so the big deal here, well, what you asked how Polly carried itself, he looks fine. He looks comfortable, number one. Number one, you don't want to be in a picture with a lot of black people as a white person and look like you're looking for the first. the first route out of town, you know what I'm saying? You don't want to look like you never been there before, you know?

Right. And the big thing here is like as a white person in a, I guess this is a hallway. I don't know what the hell this is. I'm happy this was Wembley because somebody at first said it was O2 Arena. And I was like, bro, the Bows O2 Arena looking like this. But for it to be Wembley as old as it is, it's okay that it looks like a, like a Jefferson County School better. But anyway, Wembley has smaller battles.

It was probably actually a good environment for Pulitzer to do this picture. I can see him being a little bit thrown by the O2, just the scale of it. Right. This is the type of hallway in like a horror movie where like a light would be flickering, like for sure. Yeah. He's really leaned into it. Okay. I don't know who it is behind him, but somebody has his, you know, both his arms around pulley.

He looks comfortable in the moment. He's chilling. He's smiling. I'm going to have to give him. It's a 10 out of 10 moment. And this is the reason why it went so viral, man, because he looks like he's at home. Yeah. Why is it so surprising, though?

Why does that have to be so surprising? To be honest, I was not surprised by until we started talking about it like this. I don't know. It's just always funny when white people end up hanging out with black people, the majority black people. It just is a thing. It's always a thing. Like, if you got a white person that pledges in the black frat.

You know what I'm saying? He's always going to be a legend for that. And he's going to get treated. He's going to get exalted in a way that like, you know, is a. Yeah. I would say that's just different. It's just different. It's things you don't see.

And, um, no, go ahead, Bill. All right. I was going to say 95% of white people want to be invited to the cookout. Like white people want to hang out of black people. Yes. Yes. White people want to be. liked by black people. It's one of the most important things in life, in American life right now.

Okay, okay. Are we putting this out on Patreon or because, I mean, whatever the comments is, the comment section, let us know. Let us, let me know. Oh, God, but yeah, man. This is our wheelhouse. This is the wheelhouse of the Monday review right here. This is the, this is the sweet core of, of what we got going on. Yeah. Like I said, man, it's just,

it's just always a thing. If you ever get a white person who just goes out of his way to hang out with it. I mean, and Pooley's not even going out of his way, probably. They probably just ran up. Nippa,

Nipa recognized him and it was like, yo, Christian Bullis. Like, yo, let's get this flick. And, and that's probably just.

I bet he was DMing on Instagram if he's just getting straight into backstage there, you know? I bet he would have gone to this situation with a set. up. Like, for instance, but like, black people love Ed Shearing. Why do they love Ed Shearing? Because Ed Shearing messes with black people.

Yeah. Made a whole career off of it. You know what I'm saying? So, yeah, this was a good, this was a great moment for image conscious Christian politic that probably just came by, came through a stroke of pure luck. But, but it happened naturally, right? I mean, it looks like it happened naturally. Right.

Right. And he didn't even put it on his Instagram. It was Nipah who put it on his Instagram. Oh, so, okay. Well, I take back what I said. If it looks natural to you, then let's go with that. He just showed up, and it was just a really natural photo. He took great job.

I am on that. Well, I should take back 95% is a little high. I'm going to say maybe not 95%. Bottom line, we just don't know. Yeah, we don't know. We just got to know what we do know that it was a 10 out of 10 performance on the picture. Yep, yeah, man. I mean, it just lets you know that, you know, Christian Pulitzer got the streets.

You got the streets on that side, you know what I'm saying? So I'm just very proud of it. You love to see it, basically. This whole diatribe has basically been me saying you love to see it. I'm ready to start Christian Pulisic at the World Cup now. That's where I am. All right, let's move on to Raina. Dorman beat Bulkham 3.0.

There's really just one moment in this game that is worth talking about, and it was Raina scoring a penalty. He demanded it, demanded it, and then kind of jogged up to it, Georgino style, hopped into the kick and passed it to the side that the goalkeeper wasn't leaning toward very un-American. I love it. And then what? Well, number one, that just seems to be his default penalty technique.

I mean, he did it like Costa Rica-friendly. That's right. after Nations League. But yeah, and then as he runs off to celebrate, he did the Antonio Brown put that shit on dance. Is he invited to the cookout now, too? I mean, you know what I'm saying? Like while the, like while Pandora's box is open,

we might as well hand him an invite. Might as well invite, Gio, at this point. For me, that's the best celebration of the year, excluding the really intense moments, but just a really contained sort of low-stakes celebration. I don't think there's been one better. I think he performed it really well. He did.

He did. And, you know, Antonio Brown is a person that is a very controversial. That's good. That's perfect for, I'll just leave it at that. This is the right. That's just why I don't know why he's controversial, I'll be honest.

But I don't, it doesn't matter to me right now. That's whatever way is. I think that's the right fit for Geo. I love it. I love it. I hope it's not like really bad, but we'll find out. No, no, no. My question is, uh, the confidence with which he took that penalty.

Is there any way this puts him into like the first choice penalty taker? Uh, or it has pool six record on penalties, just kind of been too good for that to even be a possibility. We know he's at the World Cup. The U.S. wins a penalty. Gio is going to try to demand it. The question is who's going to win out there? Does Polisic just have kind of the seniority in the track record at this point? Yeah, he got it.

Yeah, I think so. My guess is Bralter is going to say if there's a penalty, Christian takes it and then just like take away all the guesswork. Okay, the question now is, do we think that will work? Will you still go for it anyway? Will you obey? I don't know. Well, time will tell.

Yeah. Yeah, time will tell. Also, so I guess there was a moment in this match where he also helped the ref not call a penalty that he would have otherwise earned. How did he do? How did he help the refth not call the penalty? I don't know. It's just reports that I'm seeing after the match and stuff. When you watch the video, it seems a little, there's nothing definitive there.

Like you mean he was giving advice, the ref was kind of thinking it and Gio stepped in and said, I kind of see it this way. and they're like, yeah, it's a good point. This is not a penalty, that type of deal. Well, he just kind of got up and was like walking back. And he just, I think he just looked at him and I was like, no, don't even worry about it. Which to me can only be interpreted as an underrated act of arrogance. Also. Well, just according to the reports, you know, you got the Boca manager like fair play to Geo and all this type of stuff.

But bro, like he, in a, and Dortmund was already up 2-0 at that point. And Gio was like, you know what? I'm not even worried about it. You know what I'm saying? We're going to beat your boys anyway. It's one of those things that, you know, if you play pickup ball and you get into one of those inevitable arguments about maybe the score or a foul. And the only way to dissolve the situation is basically just to be like, you know what? Just y'all can have the ball.

So what happened on this play? I'm sorry. I'm not sure which play it is. Okay, he's played in, basically. I forgot who the past came from. He's on the right wing, and he basically goes to dribble at his marker. They both collide. Because the guy defending him kind of like goes to ground in a weird way.

His feet don't really make contact with Gio, but his upper body does. Oh, okay, okay. Now I understand, yes. He said, we don't need this penalty. We don't want it. Right, right. That's what was happening. I just kept moving.

I'm going to say in the long run, it's a really, really smart move because they noticed that in the referees lounge. You know, they're like, oh, this man's a straight shooter. For sure. The next time he gets bundled over in the box when it really matters, he's going to get the call. No one else is doing that either. Yeah, he's so smart. Let's move on. Folham.

The boys put up a good fight against Manchester City. However, Riem was beaten by Alvarez for Man City's opener. Beaten pretty badly. Well, they, you know, they slipped it right in there very subtly. It was a little bit close to his, he was kind of running past it. It went kind of behind him and grazed his heels. You'd almost like to see him just kind of, you know, easier said than done. Monday morning, Center backy here.

Stick that leg out and just kind of knock it away is what I would have liked to have done there. Yeah. Yeah, it was unfortunate. I mean, really, I feel like Tim got beaten for quite a few chances in this match. There was an Alvarez header, like early in the game, like maybe within the first 10 minutes. That could have been a decent chance. He kind of wasted it. And just a few more moments.

So I was like, eh, I mean, you know, it is Man City. So it is what it is. But, yeah. That's the thing. Yeah. He did stop Alvarez one time. he got beaten for a Holland header, but Holland was offside.

He did it was offside. He had that in hand. It wasn't a concern. Fair enough. I mean, it was close. It was really close, and it seemed like a goal for about, like, two minutes before they went and checked,

but you knew the whole time. Yeah. Yep. And then, so, I mean, no, not a great report here, but, and then Robinson Fowles, DeBroyna in the box for a penalty in stoppage time, which Holland converts.

Kind of dumb penalty to consider. seed. DeBrona made a meal out of it, but, you know, kind of has to do at that point. It was a foul. Just kind of a bummer that play. I don't think anyone should feel too happy about it. I'm sure Man City does because they're heartless, but. Well, it was a double whammy for me because Man City got to win that game.

Like I said earlier, Arsenal was in a title race. But, uh, and number two, just, just Jeddah doing that. That was also upsetting. But this was an instance of his chaotic body language coming back a little bit. Because he won the header to head it out to the edge of the box where DeBrona picked it up. And so he basically just follows the header, comes in a little out of control and just grazes Kevin's foot, unfortunately. I mean, he just like taps his heel with his toe, but that's enough in this, you know, in this modern era, isn't it? Right. Yeah, yeah. But if you just would have throttled down, you know, a half a second sooner, you would have just, you know, been in position to play a little D and we'll see what happens. But yeah, man, it's all good. Just get it out your system.

Yeah, it's hard to. That's right. Get it out of your system. It's also hard to achieve perfection as a defender against Manchester City for 95 minutes. I can't imagine. If I were in charge of R, I would say, that's not a penalty. And I'd send somebody out to Kevin and say, hey, you just need to relax. You're trying to harm Jedi here. Yeah, maybe he tapped you in the leg and that maybe was a foul, but we're not having it in VAR anymore. Right. Because the way he did a, the way he did a 270 degree turn and then threw his arms up and fell to the ground, was like, hey, hey, dog. You don't even look like a soccer player, Kevin. You're lucky we even let you out here. I don't know what you are.

It was crazy, though. All right. Sargent was, you know, solid in a two-zero win for Norwich on the road at Rotherham. The main thing he did was he forced the issue on the game winner picking the ball up inside Rotherham's half, dribbling past two guys and then shooting from 20 yards. It got deflected on the way in. The keeper made a nice save back in the direction he had come from with his right hand, but it fell to Pookie, who scuffled with a guy a little bit and then poked it to Ramsey, who thumped it in from close range to one. Norwich wins. Good to see Sergeant back in the starting lineup after a few games missed.

Yep. Oh, and this was a left footage shot. Let me just point that out. Yeah, he's, I mean, he can shoot with both feet pretty well. Yeah. Excited to see him, excited to see him announce on this roster coming up. He's done it, hasn't he? I think so.

I think Pete Fox's going to be the odd man out. But, what was about to say? Josh Sargent. You make in fun of the way I said, I hope so. No, no, I was, I was, it was a shout out to Kodak Black. But anyway, he, oh, that's what I was going to say. He does the, it's possible that he does the Hesu stuff better than Hesuz does. It's possible.

It's probable. It's probable that he does the Hesu stuff better than Hesusus. I ain't want to go that far because sometimes recency bias be good at me. I'll have more information after this month but but yeah man just when he when he drops into midfield I mean there was that

there was that chance he kind of created towards the end of the match where he dropped in kind of paused on the ball and dinked it over the top to somebody who I think Pookie ended up being offside so the chance never actually ended up fully materializing but it was just very very nice bit of play

man. He had that one shot, the outside of the boot shot from close range too. That was pretty nice. Like he drew a good save. Oh, and as far as Ricardo Pepe goes, he had an assist. Yep. People are saying it was a shot. Not me.

I won't hear it. No, it's an assist, yeah. You sure about that? No, I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm 100% sure. Oh, okay. I wasn't sure. I'm not completely sure.

Okay. Well, I mean, we'll take him anyway we can get him. How do we feel about Tim? To be honest, to be honest, I wasn't, I'm not sure. But I think I'm going to say probably it was a pass. Okay. Good enough. Tim Wea. Yeah, I was wondering what you guys thought about him playing right back this weekend. A little bit late in the game to be changing his position, I think. It was crazy to see.

Not waiting back. Right back. Right. A back floor. How was he defending? That's my question. There wasn't a single clip of him on Weiskeld defending. So it seems like there was just, you know, the aura of Tim Wea basically shut down that right-hand side for Lille.

There was no traffic coming through. None. It's crazy. Lill didn't win this game. They were pounding the goal. Just couldn't. But, you know Tim Wea in the attack probably. Probably.

But he, bro, he did it pretty damn well. It was crazy to watch because it was like, I mean. He looked like he was playing the position correctly. Right, right, very correctly. And especially like, you know, offensively build up and stuff. I mean, bro, just like unbothered all different types of passes, little dinks and dunks just to get out of pressure. Which is not a surprise he's adapting that quickly. He's our, I think we've established the top three smartest.

player. Yeah, right, right, for sure. And that's, that's definitely a reason why he's able to adapt to it so quickly. And, you know, not for nothing. He did play right wing back in that, uh, a nation's league final. Maybe not forget. It's true. He's a thinking, he's a thinking man's footballer, man. He does, he wastes no action. I mean, he wastes no energy. Everything is precise. I trust him basically anywhere on the field. Maybe not centerback or goalkeeper. I'm just saying if surge happened to be out, which, you know, he wasn't in the squad this weekend

because of muscle fatigue, again, popping back up, man, there's muscle fatigue. But, you know, we could do worse than having Tim just, Tim just straight up take Serge's spot. I don't see why not? Yeah, why not? He's going to jump all the regulars plus just. Scali?

Well, the thing is, it's just with everyone else, we're probably going to have to change a little bit about what we're doing. But Tim for Serge would be a plug and play because, you know, we do use Serge as an attacker. And Tim will, you know, be up there attacking. Also, Tim ended up having a nice ball to Jonathan David that could have been an assist. Yes. When David received in the box, got a shot away, ended up being right at the keeper. But anyway, well, I will say about this, mostly based on my knowledge of Tim Wea and a fairly quick viewing of this game is if he were starting it right back, I would be totally fine with that against Swales.

I think he would do a good job. I'm not saying that's going to happen. It's definitely not going to. But if it did, I wouldn't, I wouldn't, my gut wouldn't sink into my deeper into my body. No, mine neither. It's not going to happen, though. Eunice Musa tried in a group. Okay, go ahead.

I'm sorry, those. Just one more thing because now I'm thinking about it. When you asked about it's defending, and there wasn't much one-v-one moments, but he was getting some slide tackles off in the midfield, winning the ballback, stuff like that. I just wanted to. Okay.

That's all. I feel good about Timmy. What happened with Eunice Musa? He played against Real Associate Dad. He tried an aggressive Meg in the box. wasn't really that close to working, but it was a good idea. Otherwise, I would say a completely nondescript game. Did he walk off?

Yeah, I've never watched a more... I can't not remember a more nondescript game from Eunice Moussa. It wasn't bad game. He did walk off healthily, so... He didn't or he did? He did. He did. Very importantly, he did. Yes. So we need, baby.

And it was a 1-1 draw. But who cares really? Scali, Vince. You know, at this point, man, what more is there to say? Another 90 minutes. This performance, he was, I thought he was pretty good. He had a nice first time left-footed pass and the buildup to the romp. And the build-up to Munchin-Glauback's second goal.

Something I noticed with him and Jeddah just, just, you know, much, much improved in the buildup this week. Good. And Jedi was good last week. We talked about that a little bit. He was real good last week. Didn't have as much opportunity because I think they had like 27% of the ball, even up a man. Which is crazy.

Yeah. But, but yeah, Joe's just, he's putting in these performances, man, putting in performances. Big time, there was some clamps in this match. you know, I've been on him about basically like allowing crosses and shots when he's one, when he's 1v1.

There wasn't much of that happening today. He was more often than not getting a body on him, not letting him come in. He's a shirt in the air too. Hey, hopefully he's on the plane. You know, we kind of resigned to him not being on the plane

and that's probably still where I stand. but I would like for him to be on there. Yeah, I mean, now that Greg Burhelter knows, way as a right back, they can't help. Right. All right, all right, all right. All right. But just Sam Vines breaking his leg.

Oh, yeah. Which, unfortunate for him, seemed like he was having a career season for sure. And very unfortunate, but yeah, maybe that opens a spot up for Joe. Who knows? I don't even know. if Sam was on the plane.

I apologize for leaving Sam finds when I, at the beginning when I said there were no injuries. I left out the broken leg. That was a mistake on my part too. Let's do a quick injury before we talk about MLS Cup. Weston reportedly going to be back tomorrow. You wanted to say something about Paxon Aronson and Cade Cowell, Vince? Well, just that Paxon Aronson Arson got transferred. Oh yeah, to Frankfurt.

Yeah, to Antwerk, to Antwerk for what, it seems like, 4 million, $5 million, something like that, which is a big deal, which is a big deal. Very big. I do not know if he's ready for it or not. We'll have to see. I guess I don't know how y'all feel. I didn't think Brennan Aronson was really ready to go to Europe that much and look at him now. I wonder why he didn't go to Austria.

Yeah. So I don't know, Waki. I don't know on that one. I would feel more comfortable with going to Austria. Yeah. Look, I'm just going to, I'm going to put some respect on Brenda's name here. I thought he would kill it in Salisbury. Thank you.

Okay. But also just K-Kal supposedly piggybacking off of this initial report from Tommy Scoops, Tom Bogart. I think it was Sam State School that said K. Cal might be following him and that Munchin Glabach is tracking him. And I don't know. What position he's going to play? I mean, Munchiklovak does need some help on the wings, for sure. I don't think K. Cowell is that good of a player, but...

I don't either. But, again, better to just be silent in cases like this is what I've learned. Yeah, I guess so. But he was, bro, he was looking like the red-headed stepchild on that U-20 team. Yeah, he was. He did not fit in. Did not fit in. And he took out all this frustration of fighting Costa Rica or whatever.

clapping at him or something. No, no, no. You don't remember that fight after the... Yeah. Wasn't it because he was... Yeah, yeah. Because he was. Yeah, yeah.

Yes, he was. So Matt Turner back on the bench, right? For Arsenal? Yep. He's back. And healthy. And training. And then Sergenio and Luca both apparent...

Well, Sergenio's got this muscle fatigue thing, but Luca's back, but not on the bench. Yeah. Reportedly, Luca Delatoria is back in training. And Serge... Serge's thing is not supposed to be serious. Okay. All right. Two more things.

MLS Cup. Kellen Acosta scored the first goal on a deflected free kick. I don't think it was, you know, anything that much to be proud of. Jack McGlynn was the one who headed it in. Not really something to be, you know, ashamed of that much either. He got up and got his head in the way. I mean, but he does thump a ball, Kellyn. He does.

He's good. Yeah. It says something that when he and Carlos Vela are both over it, sometimes Kellyn still takes the free kick. True, true. So that means Christian Pulisic gets to take all the free kicks at the World Cup. Yeah, he's taking all the free kicks. Well, Kell is not going to be on the field most of the time, so. Right.

Polisik does know that he's not taking the free kicks, though, right? Oh, he's going to be taking it. I mean. Burrhalter, if Burrhalter wants somebody else to take the free kicks, Christian is not listening to him. at this point. Hasn't up to this point, I should say. All right, you know. There were lots of set piece action in this game,

a back and forth one, ended up 3-3 in regulation thanks to Gareth Bale, scoring the equalizer at the death in extra time, rising over Jack Elliott and thumping it in. What a life that guy has. It just shows up for the MLS Cup. Big moments, man. Scores an equalizer.

Yeah, he got up and Jack Elliott was going to be the, we got information from, damn, why is the name forgetting me? Miquely Gianone said. Yes, yes, yes. From McKelle saying that he had just been informed that, you know, Jack Elliott was going to be the MVP, which rightfully so, I think he had scored two goals. Yep. As a centerback. As a centerback. And, you know, life comes at you fast, man.

he gets absolutely just I mean that that's that's that's a dunk you know that's a Shaq that's a Shaq type dunk yep for somebody would be right there a shack would just spin and dunk on you anyway and and like you know put put different types of anatomy on you um yeah man yeah Jack Elliott just was laid out on the ground making a snow angel Christian uh I almost called him Christian Bell Gariff Bell running off

into the corner of the Bank of America Stadium Did you know this is the first time It's not back to the same last name? Christian and Gareth. Yeah. Just now. You know. What a world.

It's true. Bail's such an amazing, he's such an amazing athlete. Yeah. And then Philly wilted in penalties just to put kind of pathetic showing from God's dog, Martinez, and Wagner. Wagner. So I didn't get to see the shootout. What were they, were they saves, where they blasted over?

What happened? I think Goss Dogs went over. Martinez and Wagner's were both saved, if I remember correctly. And we got a lot of Philly, you know, we got a lot of serious Philly fans in the Scuff family, and I want to send my condolences to them. My non-ironic condolences, because I know it's pretty sad. And I don't know. I didn't really have a dog in the hunt, but I would have to see Philly rewarded for all the good they've done for American soccer.

Yeah, it happens. I was a Falcons fan during 28 to 3 and I curled up in the fetal position when the Patriots finally took the lead man and it really hurt so I get it I get it and Steve Tarundalo wins the cup

first season as a manager in the U.S. after kind of I don't know kind of flunking out at Hanover and so good for him yeah and I remember telling you bills you asked me when Tarandolo got announced and you were saying that

his record at the Las Vegas lights wasn't that good or whatever. And I told you, man, just don't take anything from that because they just, you know, they really do treat it like a farm team. Yeah.

A bunch of kids. You know what I'm saying? So people in and out. But it is what it is. So congrats to Tarondolo, who, and I want to get into this. The fact that this game was over the air.

which means that it was on my my grandparents' kitchen TV. Yeah. Because they, I mean, they have cable at their house, but in the kitchen, it's just straight, you know, over the air. And that's like the common area in their house. So they usually just sit at the table, watch TV, whatever's going on. And I had a wedding to go to Saturday. And I get a call from my mom, who also lives with my grandparents. and she calls me

and she's like man we're about to watch this world cup man what you got to so what's the deal with this man Steve Arundalow and I was like a rundelow and I was like his name is Cherandalow man I was like and she asked me who the who I was picking or whatever I said LA I said L.A so I got that right but and then I go over there this morning

to drop Eden off there wasn't school day. And my grandpa watched the entire match. I guess my mom and my grandma were like kind of in and out. But my grandpa sat there and watched the entire thing and he had any had questions for me when I showed up today. Like he was like, man, how do you get a corner kick? What's the yellow card mean? What's a free kick? Like how does a free kick happen? And just to explain all these things, it was cool. It was cool. That is cool. How old is your grandpa? almost 80. I don't know exactly, but he's, he's almost 80 for sure.

All right. What a man. Yeah, yeah. That's my guy right there. Yeah, yeah. I guess I've kind of got them all to it. I didn't really force it on them that much. But, yeah, we're here now.

This is the power of over-the-air soccer is kind of what you're saying. Yeah, yeah. I mean, you get a much bigger number. I've learned that from listening to the World Soccer. World Soccer Talk podcast over the years. And you just get a lot more people watch the games in that situation. And with everything going to paywalls and whatnot, they're not going to be able to watch the MLS Cup next year if it's on Apple TV.

Got some prayers to the MLS production team working on getting ready for the Apple TV contract. So shout out to MLS. They had an excellent final match. Yeah, not as exciting as Leeds Bournemouth, but pretty good. Also, I would just like to say that watching Kell and Acosta play for L-A-F-C is not fun. If you're watching it for the Kel and Acosta experience, because it's usually just him just chilling. Yeah, it's a fair amount of chilling. But that's a big part of soccer, you know.

Right, right. Hey, he does what he's asked to do. He does what he's asked to do. But, you know, cheers to him. Got his trophy. Maybe eventually he'll get his move to Europe. Right, right. Yeah, right.

When you think about the fact that he didn't want to be an MLS this season, and that was the whole thing that started this, that whole controversy started this season. And for him to go out with the trophy, very nice. He's a winner. Let's get out of here. Yeah. Hey, thanks everybody for listening.

You can get this. every week, delivered directly to your phone if you join the Patreon. We'll see you.