Scuffed | USMNT, World Cup, Yanks Abroad, futbol in America - #566: Richards & Musah on the up, Sarge scores again, Happy St. Paul Day

Episode Date: February 3, 2025

Belz, Vince and Watke cover the weekend action, including Richards' strong performance at Old Trafford, Sands v Banks in Hamburg, Musah's apparent inside track with Conceicao and Jedi captaining Fulham to a win in Newcastle. Also, a song in Italian about Pulisic, transfer rumors and facts, Cardoso puts in a good shift for Betis, and Tessmann gotta turn on his defensive brain.Clip Notes (a companion video to this episode for patrons who pay at least $5 a month) from Vince: https://www.patreon.com/posts/121442258?pr=trueCheck out our woso spinoff! The Boots on the Ground podcast: https://boots-on-the-ground.simplecast.com/If you are interested in joining us to see Juventus and AC Milan play in Rome in May, register your interest here: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfp2O1bIr5KNSymt3ayP3ctERCooDo3ADM5Kf_kSHpmr6ITMg/viewformCheck out the artist who made that song about Pulisic, here: https://www.tiktok.com/@yeyamusic 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.

Welcome to the scuff podcast where we talk about U.S. soccer. Hey, everybody, it's the Monday Review. Happy three-year anniversary of USA versus Honduras and St. Paul, perhaps the coldest World Cup qualifier of all time, one of the great in-person scuffed get-togethers, also one of the all-time fake controversies from Burrhalter, getting a selfie with fans in the 83rd minute of that game. How are you guys doing?

Waki, how are you? Just thinking about that moment Last night, I was looking at the calendars. Now it's coming up. Yep. It's a big day. It's an important day. I'm glad I'm here with you guys to reflect on it.

Is that what we're going to talk about all episode or do you have some other? No, we have some other things. But I just wanted to start with that because it was a distinctive moment in the last five years. It was really cold, man. It was zero degrees Fahrenheit. Were you there? I was there, yeah. Yeah.

That's my stomping grounds up there, the Twin Cities. You know, Greg was there. I think it was Greg's first in-person event. He was shouting at everybody, Rondo and outside in this little square outside the brewery where we met. It was really fun. And this was the height, the zenith of Adam Bell's soccer composer. Yeah, right. We sang all together inside the brewery.

It was, in retrospect, maybe a little bit embarrassing. But, you know, we did it. We did it. No, you got to embrace it. You got to embrace it, Adam Bells. It's the problem. This embarrassment caught up with you on this. And I think you've got to push that away.

Exactly. It stopped your creative impulse to make songs about all of our soccer players. Yeah, exactly. I'm not as strong as some other people on that front. You know, embarrassment catches up with me. But not, but not too much. You know, we're moving forward. Plus the outlaws kept rejecting all your songs.

That had to be discouraged. The outlaws. They're right. They're not, they would be very complicated songs to get out. Yeah. A whole stadium to sing. Yeah. It was like trying to bring the tenors in from the, you know, the corner behind the right corner flag and bring the sopranos in from the left.

No, it wouldn't work. We would need to get them to become pop hits first. But that was, that was an incredible afternoon and evening. And I just want to, I just want to mark it out and celebrate it. I'm up celebrate it every year. I'm happy you did. Because, like, the Greg Burrhalter picture, that's one of my favorite moments of the Burrhalter era. Yeah, if Pach did that, would anybody criticize him, you think?

I don't think so. They would say the aura was on a million or whatever, you know? Yeah. I mean, I'd be everybody's Abby on Twitter or whatever. But yeah, man, it was, once again, like last episode, we talked about moments, right? USSF, the Powers at B and Greg Burrhalter provided us a moment with that St. Paul match. Yeah. We got that Mark McKenzie Giff.

he's just on the bench miserable cold blowing air uh yeah that's right surge was doing the same thing right like he's pretending he was exhaling some smoke surge looking like you smoking we got the after the after the game where surge is basically teasing reggie cannon for having played in the game that's right reggie canaan's about to freeze off and serge is just like i love that from you man that. That was great. Well, Surge is just like, at least it was you. Couldn't have been me. Couldn't have been me, baby.

And then there was the whole, like, talking about how the Honduras players suffered from hypothermia, you know? People acting like there was actually some serious life danger to the whole thing. I don't know. What a time we live in. Matt Turner, which I do kind of feel bad for Matt Turner.

Because it's like, I mean, he had nothing to do. That's true. He was running back and forth from the goal trying to warm up his feet. Yeah. That is the worst when you're just standing still out there like that. That's terrible. We got reports from people that were at the state. Well, sorry, just last thing.

Reports from people that were at the stadium, their beers were freezing. Yeah, I'm saying? You got to be cold for your alcohol to freeze. Yeah. So, yeah, just it's a great night. great memory for me by the way I don't want to brag

but you know here in the Tennessee River Valley it's basically spring already you know it broke out today yeah

it's really nice I was just I'm worried it was great are we gonna get a moment like that picture moment from Potch

there's little hints of it he could do something weird but I don't know if he could do that he'll do something weird I think well I think now

is when we make sure we proposition the people. If you listen to this podcast, and you think, and you're thinking about going to a game, maybe one of these, uh,

Nations League matches or the pre-gold cup tuneups or the actual gold cup, maybe procure you some tickets behind the bench and, uh, see what you can do. See what you can do. He wants to be loved just as much as Burhalter. Make sure it's a, you know, Bermuda.

A little group stage game, man, you know. We got some criticism on the, 11 Yanks YouTube yesterday. Oh, for what? That we weren't critical of Berhalter until it's too late. And he went through the reasons. But he didn't give the reason that we appreciated moments. That's right.

That's right, man. He had a whole segment on us, like a timeline of when we criticized Burrhalter. He takes questions, and it was the opening question of the episode. Oh, okay. It was us, us in total soccer show. We were the, you know, the sunshine pumpers. And the number one reason gave was because of access. Second reason was we didn't want to offend the soccer dads.

I mean, look, man, let me tell you who the number one, your number one customer is if you're doing any USMint. content. It don't matter who you are. It's a soccer dad's baby. Some may be more angry than others. Some less angry. You know, this depends on your disposition. You know, so where are you at in life? What's your 401K looking like? Your boss, et cetera, et cetera. A whole different, a lot of different factors are probably playing into that, you know, that puts each soccer dad into a bucket. Are you a scuffed guy, TSS guy, 11 yanks guy, etc. But, but they're all soft. Soccer dad is not the same.

He did paint the soccer dads with an awfully broad brush there. I hope the soccer dads are hearing this to know that we don't do that. Is soccer dad just something to do with your age or you actually have kids who play soccer or you have kids at all? What is the soccer dad? The soccer dad thing comes from when Pete or, you know, they post a lot critical and occasionally they'll get some pushback on social media. And it's almost always from a middle-aged man.

Those are the soccer that's some. I see. Yeah. Oh, the third reason was we were tricked by his, Burlter's deception.

What type of discipline? And no fault of our own, though. We fell for it. What are we talking about? Sometimes it's not clear who he doesn't criticize him enough because he's right

that I, my reason is he's my favorite soccer coach. I mean, he should Really, it should all be directed to me. I didn't criticize him. I never would. In fact, it makes me angry whenever you guys did. Well, so I don't believe that.

He did give us a little credit. He was like, okay, he's like, I've just criticized it a little bit. I've thought about this a lot. I think the main thing is Greg, Greg Velasquez, that is, just doesn't like saying stuff just because, or agreeing with stuff just because it's, I don't know, popular or whatever. He's just allergic to that kind of thing. And he doesn't, you know, agree that Burrhalter was a terrible coach.

And he's, you know, he's been relentless about it. Not relentless, but he's been steadfast, I guess, is the way to say it. Yeah. And I think that's mostly what they're mad about. It's not you. And the thing is, it's like, well, first of all, you know, man's kind of intimated that, like, you know, we're saying things that we don't believe in. in order to cozy up next to J.T. Batson and CPC, which... We have zero access, guys.

Sanjay actually has some access. Well, we have Mixoan access. He specifically mentioned that. Okay. A press pass? But anyway, okay. All right. So that's number one. Turns out that you just kind of get to watch the part of the soccer practice where they stretch.

15 minutes. It's pointless. It really is. And I mean, being a generally affable person does help. I think I charmed Michael Cameron out of shoes. At his very nice Air Force ones that he'd be wearing the games. Customized. But, okay, number one, the idea that, you know, we're saying whatever facts.

I mean, come on. I mean, we believe what we're saying here. And then number two. And it's almost impossible to get, well, it is impossible to get Adam to say something he doesn't believe. I try it all the time. just say whatever he thinks. We all do try to get him come around on multiple players. Just pretend to be happy about something.

He won't do it. He can't even fake an emotion. Yeah. He can't. He really cannot. Oh, I remember number two. The second point about this. Bells, you talked about Greg.

And it's like when you take a, when you take the type of approach, scuffed has taken to this project, you know, the type of bent that this podcast has. When you have something that's like a small sample size type of phenomenon, like a national team, you know, we're just not going to draw conclusions in that steadfast, hard way. You know, it's like maybe, it's like Greg Burhunter could be bad, but I mean, I'm going to need about 20 more games to tell you that. You know, he could, yeah, and you know, he had his flaws.

I don't think anybody said he was perfect. and nobody wanted them back for this second the second cycle but I mean anyway, let's let's move on. Yeah. We talked about it long enough it's making it sound like we care about this,

which we do not. Our feelings are not hurts. I mean, Greg. That at the end, he also did an impression of, like our collective voice where we were kind of a feat sounding. Oh, no.

And he called us hipsters. That hurts. Oh, man. None of us sound like that. I love for you. You don't want me to do your voice, bro. That's the one thing I take offense to. That's one thing I'd take offense to you.

I don't think he was including you in the voice impression. Okay. Yeah, if anybody doesn't sound a feat on our podcast, it's definitely, I don't think Greg does either. It's also kind of effeminate. He does that impression for everyone, though. He has the same impression he does for people when he doesn't like a personates them. It wasn't personal. I just remember after the first Panama Qualifier, we were both, Greg and I were both ready to, you know, pull the rip cord.

gave him the kiss of death, man. I remember. What did he say? He said the project, if you assess the project right now, there is nothing worth saving, which is about as harsh as Greg can be. Exactly. And that's the thing. People get tricked by the way Greg talks.

You got to read it between the lines, man. Like sometimes he's ripping Greg, but he's saying it. He's using like four or five sentences to get to the point. But if you really cut through it, it's like, oh, man. All right. Big news, the big news right now is Pepe's hurt. He's out until, you know, probably at least through Nations League, that's the word on the street.

Happened in the Champions League game, which we did cover last week, but we, you know, we didn't, I guess the news of his injury wasn't fully out by the time we recorded. So it's basically Josh Sargent. Starting at Stryker, I mean, it's got to be. on March 20th when we play Panama. Good news is he's back, scored again.

Three goals and two games for him at Norwich. Norwich visited Watford, a town just outside of London, and Sergeant got an early chance on a volley from point blank. Missed it, was rightly, I believe, chastised by the broadcaster. I mean, he didn't miss the frame. He hit it low and hard. It just hit it right at the goalkeeper's feet. Right at the keeper.

And, um, yo. So real quick, just on that, on that chance, I do want to say I like his movement there. Because if you watch the clip, I got it in the, I got it in the clip notes that the video that accompanies this pod every week. It'll be, it'll be in the Patreon. As this as this down, excuse me, as this episode is playing into your ears. But anyway, if you look at the clip, he kind of, no, which is. in the box, they're attacking. A ball's about to come in.

Norwich has kind of flooded the box with attackers. I think one of their midfielders comes in. There's a winger in there. And Wofford is playing a four in the back. You know, two centerbacks, you know? And what Josh does, he steps back. He doesn't occupy

a centerback. He lets the other people that have flooded the box occupy the centerbacks so that he's free. And so when that cross comes in, he's able to then spring back from the place that he's like basically hidden and

be there naked to to side foot that thing unfortunately it's right at the keeper but I do like that and you know for all the times we've talked about Josh lacking you know subtlety in his play and everything like that I thought that was

I thought that was pretty sweet yeah definitely and you know it's a You know, variance, I think, is the answer to why this doesn't go in. He does everything right. He hits it hard and low. It just happens to go right at the keeper's feet.

I mean, it's a little bit unlucky. But then he does score a very easy chance. It's like a rebound on a free kick gets blocked by the wall. Teammate nearly scores on the rebound. Keeper makes a good save, but palms it right to Sergeant, who is free in all the chaos. Easy money, taps it in. One zero.

Turns out to be the game. winner. And he's, I think, got a little bit of momentum heading into, you know, the next 50 days, which is what we need from him. And this goal is the third time counting the goal, his last goal, and the thing we just talked about, where he's just wide open and wide open. Yeah. Kicking a ball in.

You know? Yeah. It didn't seem like he did much to do them. But we talked about just the magic of making that defense drift away from. you. Yeah, the poetry of the current of the defense moving away from you. Yeah. I don't know.

Was there anything else to say about sergeant's performance? I mean, it was pretty. I think his hold-up player was worse than it usually is this match. I'll say that for sure. He was matched up with Watford Centerback James Abanqua, 21-year-old Irish mate. and he was he was given he was given Josh

he was given Josh some problems there especially on the yeah in the holdup department so not as sharp as he could have been there but hey keep scoring goals and we know what you can do as far as like all the other stuff I think I agree with that

there was a really nice one really nice play he did in the holdup where he like volleyed it like kind of rainbowed it over himself to lose a guy and then and then played a teammate promptly lost the ball and this is the thing with Norch right now. They suck outside of Josh.

And a big part of it is because they're missing Borahsines who is the real class and the attack along with Sergeant he's he got a five game suspension for spitting on somebody. He's a real hot head. So when he comes back,

I think things are going to start picking up in the chance creation and sort of beautiful soccer departments from Norwich City. Yep. Josh has become the default striker once again. He's got his big chance coming up. He's got that to look forward to as he's working back up to full form here. Yeah. Do we have any thoughts about what the rest of the depth charts should look like?

I mean, because we're down too. I mean, you know, now we're getting into some murky water. Right. So, balligan's out, peppy's out. Who comes after Sergeant? I mean, Brandon Vasquez and Big Pat come to mind. Haji Wright, maybe we slide once he comes back, slide him into Striker. I don't love it, but.

Big Pat. Gio? Play Gio as a false nine? Just to fit him on the field somewhere. Waya was playing there earlier this year. That's true. We'll see. I mean, it might just be the case where we just bring two now.

It might just be Vasquez and Sergeant at this point. Yeah. Well, so we'll see, though. We'll see. The haji thing, I just, I truly want people to understand, man. He's done everything, every single thing in his power to let everyone know. He doesn't want to play as a lone striker. He just doesn't want to do it.

He's not good at it, not interested in it. That's not, it's just not where he's best. He can't get on the ball. He can't dribble. He can't dribble at people as well. He can't. He's not good holding the ball up back to goal necessarily. He also, I mean, he likes to, he likes for defenders to not know he's there.

And when you're the lone striker, defenders know you're there, buddy. He kind of joint. He does sort of join Tanner, Tessman, and I can't think of who else, as big guys who play small, you know, in the USMNT pool. You know what? I usually take that as a slight or a slur, but you know what? Yes. You're right. He's a big guy who wants to play small.

He does. He does it by choice. It's not a lack of toughness. It's not who he is. It's not who he is, man. Maybe it's a lack of toughness. I don't know. I don't want to slight anybody, but I do think it is what he wants to do. And he's good at playing small. He's good at playing on the wing.

Yes. At least for Coventry. He just hasn't gotten back on the field for them yet. And I'm not sure when that's going to happen. Let's talk about our two men in London who both got nice away wins over the weekend. First Jedi, Captain Fulham, once again. And they came from behind to beat Newcastle 2-1 way up there in Newcastle. We're talking, you know, I don't know if you know your geography, but it's way up there.

About as far up as you can get. I was almost a Newcastle fan, Adam Bell. Really? I talked about it. Oh yeah, because of Rafa. Yeah.

Rafa and Yedlin, I was watching a lot. And yeah, I fell in love of Rafa and Solomon Rondon. It was something about the way he tucked them glasses after a big win, man. Yeah, man. Love that.

Yeah. So, I mean, I flirted with Napoli. Like I talked about, I think last Monday. flirted with Newcastle too. We've had a lot of success in St. James Park in the last couple of weeks. Bournemouth went up there and smashed them,

and then Fulham gets this win. It's Jedi gets an assist, a tidy little volleyed ball across for Ralu Jimenez, his Mexican teammate ties him for second most Premier League assists this season with Bukai Osaka. Yep. I think I saw something of like only eight Premier League defenders have had 10 assists in the season.

Crazy. If Greg were here, he'd wet blanket at all and say, you know, assists are a noisy stat. Well, he might say it's only 3.5 expected assists. Get that out of here, right? Get it out. We don't care. Come on.

You got to do it in the Levin Yanks voice. You know what anything doing on that few is more impressive. I don't understand. the numbers, but you would have to think it's more impressive. From the people that finish the chances, I guess, allegedly. But one thing, though, on this partnership, there's a beautiful picture of Jedi and Raul, like arm in arm, you know, celebrating the goal. And, you know, I've been seeing a lot of discourse about Santee, potentially going to

Milan. And people acting like, oh, how are the American? get fans going to feel about it. And for whatever reason, you know, I guess for the same reason that Jedi just keeps going under the radar, but it's like we got it right here. I mean, this is the real starter for Eltree.

Raul. Santhia has not stamped any any ground that matters on the international stage. And this is the guy. And Jedi is feeding them. And they seem to get along very well.

And may along continue. And you mentioned arm and arm And that's because Jedi It's one of my favorite things about him He is a way of celebrating with a goal score Where he comes up beside them In a way that doesn't interfere with whatever they're doing He's just joining

Yeah He's supporting right there A little bit behind them even But I'll put an arm around Be right there And then they can lower the arm And he's just a perfect celebrator Yeah

gestures at the crowd Just gestures at the away fan And he matches their enthusiasm exactly of the person he's joining. Yeah, I think maybe we've been, we haven't given quite enough credit to Jedi's emotional intelligence, you know? Probably right. Now he's the captain of a mid-table Premier League team. And, and I mean, Waki, you just add it on to the fact of why, like, Jedi is our best celebrated by a country mile, a country mile. I mean, his own celebrations and then and then add on to the fact of his, you know, when he's an accessory to the celebration and how he just brings that up as well.

I mean, come on. And then nobody has ever topping the flip fake hamstring pool ever, bro. Did he do that in the, did he do that in the Honduras away game? No, I was just thinking about that. No. I think it was Columbus. Okay. It was El Salvador, Columbus.

Costa Rica. guys. Okay. It was a big moment, too. Yeah, because remember that El Salvador, like, we won 1-0, and we didn't score until, like, second half. Oh, it was. Yeah, and, yeah, it was that one.

It was that one. Okay. Things were a little too desperate in Honduras when he scored the equalizer for him to do that, I think. But, yeah. He did do a flip, though. He did a round off, off one foot. That's right.

incredible well in this game you know you know how he played he's stout defensively composed with the ball projecting into the attack in a way that is always difficult for the opponent um richards in crystal palace chris richards that is went to old trafford got a two zero win over manchester united you know i would have

thought without doing any research i was like surely this is the first time in a while No, actually they did it last year. And they've beaten, Crystal Palace has beaten Manchester United four out of the last six times at Old Trafford. It's almost like it's expected at this point. It's nasty. The NHS United is really, truly in the mud, man. I don't make them feel sad. I don't even care about it.

Very sad. Yeah. They've been in the mud the entire time I've been a soccer fan. It's funny, man. Because I remember the 2000s, like they were just unbeatable, you know? this is uh yeah it's crazy so the one at old traffic last year that was chris in the midfield

did they beat them uh i can't remember i don't know should we look that up real quick it sounds right it does sound right assume it isn't losing to Chris in the midfield broke it's not a club as manchester united like a mall he plays his own version of being in the midfield

Yeah, it's like An advanced centerback Kind of Yeah No, we had no Chris Richard Still He subbed on as a centerback In the 88th minute

So yeah Basically no Chris Richards Well it sure still felt like he played them in the midfield and they lost So everything we said still stands I think That's right Well I thought He really didn't put a foot wrong In this game

Nine interceptions one really timely one early in the game, just outside the 6 on a cut back to Garnacho, just an outstanding, I think, goal-saving challenge. Basically, we won every 1-V-1 battle with Garnacho out wide, which is something we've been concerned about, his 1-V-1 ability defensively. He got help from his friends one time, I think. He did play a header into a dangerous area on,

I don't think it was a free kick, but it was like a looping ball in, and he just kind of headed it down right into the most dangerous spot. Ugarte for Manchester United had a really sweet volley that was saved well by the keeper. But that's really the only ding for him on the day, for me. Pallas wins on a set-piece goal and a ruthless counter, and Mattetta gets both the goals. That's what I got.

Anything to add to that on Richards? That's just really encouraging. Yeah. He was cutting everything out. Yep. And he's back in a starting lineup. I've noticed that people are starting to leave him out of their, their starting lineups for the coming thing.

Come on. I think they're going to stop doing that. I think they're going to put him back in. It was, it was kind of wild in the first place. But, uh, yeah. I'm happy. I'm happy he's having a good game.

Once again, let the cake bake, baby. Let the cake bake. And also just, just to continue the Manchester United in the mud. propaganda just the fact that they employ and winger they can get shut down by chris richards in this way is just like yo it's as it is just insane insane like um i'm not taking anything away from chris having a bad game but like i mean come on man i mean uh is jaden sancho still on manchester United's books, he kind of played Chris like a fiddle

when they played Chelsea, unfortunately. But it's just a once mighty club. Mighty no more. Mighty no more, man. Sancho's on loan at Chelsea. Is that what's up? Yes.

I feel like I've seen Garnajo look dangerous, but he didn't look particularly dangerous in this game, which is, you know, let's call that a credit to Chris. I'm not taking anything away from the man. Nope. Okay. Okay. Hey, A.C. Milan, lots to talk about here. So they faced Inter in the derby yesterday. Tide 1-1. Rangers is the one who scored on a, like a rebound off of Laos. Shas. They took that 1-0 lead through the second half, just couldn't withstand the late barrage of crosses from Inter Milan.

Pulisica and Musa both started We're both off the pitch when inter-equalized So they've both been subbed off Milan's in trouble, man They're like eighth in the league 35 points You know for all the for all the triumphs that Pulis and Musa have given us this season

They got to really push if they're gonna make a Champions League spot But I think I feel like the biggest news here is that Conce Sal really loves Musa Now he got this He got this damaging send-off in the middle of the week, basically set his team up to lose in Zagreb. And yet, the Portuguese manager starts him right away. Now, he was starting some games under Fonseca too,

but Conceau has started him in seven out of nine matches, which is basically as much as he could start him in, like, given rotational needs. And in this one, I think he slid into the midfield at halftime, right? Because he started on the wing, but then he went into the midfield. Is that right, Vince? Yeah. Yeah. It was the wing, like, I don't know.

They were almost playing like a 4-4-2, I want to say, to start the match off. But yeah, he slid into midfield. We talked about Constanceau, man. It was just, it seemed like a love at first sight type of thing. The Super Cup. Once again, I'm going to mention that kiss on the neck. I mean, you're not going to kiss somebody on the neck. like that and not playing.

I have a question. Now that Jow Felix is coming in from Chelsea, you know, players can start shifting around in the midfield. Does he love Musa enough that he's going to keep his minutes up? Or maybe there's some drop in minutes,

but maybe that's fine. What are we looking at here? I mean... Or does it affect Pulisic more? Maybe it's good that he's not going to... He'll get a little more time, a little more support. I think...

Here and there. I mean, look, he doesn't play units on the wing so many damn times. It's like they needed another attacker, right? So now they got an attacker. Maybe they stop putting a moving pulley inside as much. Jow can not play inside and pulleys out there on the wing. I don't know. It probably will reduce some units playing time a little bit.

We'll see if Constanceau really feels comfortable moving Rangers back, Rangers back? I don't know if that's really what you want to do. But we'll see. It probably will result in some reduction of Eunice Musa's minutes.

But man, he keeps performing. Conscious out keeps loving him. I mean, Eunice came off in the 78th minute. I tweeted this from the scuffed account. If you go watch the last 15 minutes of that match, Milan's up 1-0. And Eunice has slid into

the midfield, he's basically like the hold of midfielder. Fofonnas was suspended for this match. And Eunice was just like, it was everything that you would want to see from Eunice, just as far as like his development. He was getting on the ball. He was taking the sting out of the game. You know what I'm saying? He was setting the tempo.

He was controlling the proceedings a little bit. Like with Milan, like nursing this lead. He was getting forward. He was doing, had a nice little pass to, to Chris. Pulisic in a half space that was nice like he was just

all around and it was just it was beautiful to see bro it was beautiful to see and you know I really I tweeted this out just real quick

and somebody came and was like well he made some bad final third decision once again man leave it get it out of your head he's not going to be

he's going to do some dumb stuff in the final third it is what it is but but but the other stuff they're getting on the ball controlling the pace of the game dictating the game even if it was only

for 10 to 15 minutes that was something very cool that I don't think we've necessarily seen from Eunice at this level before and I think with that and with this play from these games where Conscious Salis been starting them

particularly as playing in the midfield I'm not too worried about it I think his partnership with Reinders really works too You know, because Reinders is so classy. And he and Musa can just sort of tap the ball back and forth for a while if they want to. And they were doing it together in that 15 minutes you were talking about. And then, of course, Musa comes off.

I'm not saying correlation is causation necessarily, but Inter Milan was like the last 10 minutes, they're just knocking on the door. Hit the post twice. Well, they lost all control. I mean, they lost control of the game. It lost all control of the match. All control the match, bro. It was gone.

And Unis was probably flagging a little bit, you know. Yeah. But that just shows, you know, how important he was in this match, basically. I mean, you know. Yeah. I mean, it's probably going to, to answer your question, Chris, from my point of view, it's probably going to affect both of their minutes, both pool six and Musa's to some extent. But that's all right.

I guess is how I look at it. I think it will affect their minutes, but we do need them to be better as a team. Yeah. That's right. So we shouldn't be rooting for their attack to be better. I think they'll be better for everyone. Right. Enough of like, you know, Pulisic getting a goal when nothing else is going right in the game from a lot.

Also, so another thing we need to cover is rumor has it that some of the players are not happy with Conce Sao. You know, lots of quote unquote report. going around. Apparently they do not, quote, do not like the hard line of the Portuguese manager. Certainly there is visual evidence that Davidei Calabria doesn't like Conce Sao, but Pulisic was also looped into this dissatisfaction in various news reports. What's the takeaway here? This is what we want from our star plier.

It's what we've been asking for, for him to be making headlines like this. I don't know how much credit we give him, because it sounds like he just kind of got looped in as an afterthought to the port, and it may just be because of his stature, it was good to include him. Yeah. But however he made it into the headlines, which he did, I think it's a very good sign.

We learned also that Conce Sezal just seems to be constantly yelling. He does seem like... Then meetings. Nonstop. Well, was it that Pulisic said he said the game never stops or something like that? Oh, man.

Yes, with Conce Sal, the game never stops. And then he, mentioned that it was all there's no training it's just games and meetings yeah and the game is continuing in those meetings reading between the lines so he's just yelling and you know who's been performing well he's also having buses leave early he's not in a good mood that bus is taken off and a marauda the wrong way he's gone yeah maras got bradda's out he's out turkey he's gone it is it is a good sign that pool sick is included You know, because it's the headline writer, whoever the headline writers, the people who write these articles, they feel like they have to include him because otherwise people won't click.

He's never come close to being included in one of these before. Right, right. There's only the other one that one who was supporting the coach. Yeah, you don't want to be that guy. No. You want to be that guy. We got to talk about this other thing, the song. And I got, I think I'm just going to play it in its entirety.

So this Italian artist who has a TikTok account called Yeya music made a song about Pulisic. She plays guitar and sings, sometimes with an older man, who's probably her dad, but I don't know for sure. She's written in songs about Teo, Liao and Giroux at least. I think maybe Marada as well, RIP, I guess. And she's well known enough that the Milan account main account is definitely aware of her And she she put a song about Pulisic up in December Which just surfaced for us in the last few days Let's listen to it

When he calce and she gonfia the net Cross a ball and a bustle a bustle a spitzata When When you punt, it's quite a Pura Pure magic and Tanta quality And what

The American American Corre in that Faschallet And fauna a fint a With a RETo in red

Howe Hec In his name is Polisik Sinist Destro, Goal Ciao, Ciao,

Gversario, So, Magician So, So the American So let me read the Translation Because it'll

I think it'll help I mean you heard Americano, I'm sure And Pulisic's name But basically it says When he kicks the When he kicks the net swells He crosses the ball and just a flick is enough.

When he takes you on, it's almost scary. Pure magic, pure magia, and so much quality. Tanta qualita. And what does the American do? The American, the American, he runs down that wing, fakes with the soul of his foot, straight into the net. What a player. His name is Pulisic.

Left foot or right. It's a goal. Goodbye opponent with his magical touch. Opponent is aversario, which is kind of nice. But what does Captain America do? What does the American do? He wears number 11 on his back. Every time he makes me fall in love.

He is Christian Pulisic. His name is Pulisic. So that's it. Tears of my eyes. Italian is such a nice sounding language, though, isn't it? I mean... It is nice. Let's go to a break.

A couple, well, several actual announcements here. First of all, skip the ads, get access to the Discord, and throw your support behind the podcast. podcast by joining the Patreon. The link is in the show notes. And if you sign up for five bucks a month or more, you will get access to Vince's highlight reel video, which is a companion to this podcast episode every week. And then three announcements.

So check out Boots on the Ground or Spinoff Women's Soccer podcast. Vince is half of that duo along with Tara. And I got to say, they're really fun to listen to. Just nice chemistry. A great way to stay on top of what's happening with the player pool on the women's side and the National Women's Soccer League. That link will be in the show notes too. The Thursday episode this week is going to be a review of the U-17 player pool

with Marcus Cherez and Matt Hartman. So look forward to that. It should be a blast. Matisse Albert and Kevin Sullivan, among others. This is kind of the moment when the magic is back in the young prospects, I think, that 2008, 2009 birth year. And third announcement is, I believe an email is going out to everybody who expressed interest in the Rome trip.

So look for that. And if you haven't expressed interest and are interested, I'll put the link to that in the show notes. But if you have expressed interest, you should get an email as we sort of like turn the screw on getting tickets to the Latsio Yuve game and the Roma Milan game and sort of start to finalize plans. Hey, we'll be back in a moment. All right, we're back. Let's do some transfer rumors and some transfer facts. Chris, are you ready? I'm ready.

Any hope of Giorina going to A.C. Mon seems over. As mentioned, Jow Felix is going there instead. Yeah. And the only other rumor, I believe, is now a fact. So we're transitioning into a chance of facts. Caleb Wiley is joining Watford online. It's been announced. By Watford.

Other facts. Peppy signs extension with PSV. He's staying there. Matthew Hoppe. He's going to Sonderjisk. Contact through 2027. That's the club that Haji turned things around at. Oh, yeah.

Taylor Booth? Off to FC20. And then Jack moved in to Houston, not Europe. 200 million cash. You can get a 50% sell-on clause. This is kind of a new thing they're doing with the cash. This isn't what wasn't a gam. or whatever it might be called thing.

They just paid them normal money. Just straight cash. Did you say $200 million? I feel like you did. I did. It's not quite that rich. That was too high. It was two.

$200 million would have been too much for for the Houston Dynamo to shell out. But yeah, there's some, you know, transfer economy. Right. It's interesting because I think it's only the second, or I guess it's the second. largest cash deal in the history of MLS or something?

Yeah, well, they just started it. Yeah. Yeah, there's only been two. So that's... Okay. I think as far as I know. It's the second one. It's the second one.

Yeah, not second largest. And, you know, Matt Doyle does have a good post on this on his substack. And he points out that this is a good deal for McGlynn. too. I mean, look, there was interest from the championship and from Siri B, but the Houston deal was a better deal for Philadelphia. So, you know, there it is. Philadelphia's got to go, got to follow the money. And it's not like him going to, you know, Livorneau or something is really that much better than going to Houston. So he's going to Houston. Hector Herrera's gone. This is an opportunity for Jack to say, like, I can be the guy, you know.

You know, the thing that really stuck out the most to me is Doyle posted a blue sky tweet or whatever you call it. A ski of a video of McGlynn just like absolutely not getting back on defense once last year. And he said basically this, hopefully it'll stop him from doing this nonsense. That's a paraphrase. Man, that clip is so damning. What was he doing? He was chilling, bro. You got to play.

defense. Bro, when I saw that, like, we'll talk about Tanna Testament later, but it reminded me, it reminded me of Tanna,

bro. Like, I mean, Tanner really is just like larger beefier. Jack McGlynn. But, but yeah,

hopefully he, with both of these dudes, they just got to turn their brain on, bro. Turn your brain on. When you're not on the ball, there is still a game going on. Yeah.

And, uh, you need to participate. participate in the game. Isn't that the truth? Yeah. I blew by that Caleb Wiley could be

a little bit interesting. I think he's that going to be out for a couple more weeks. But it sounds like he's going to play, really play there and that they're going for a promotion. Okay. Where are they sitting in the table right now at Watford? I mean, I know they just lost to Norwich,

but they are. They're 12. 12th. Yep. Which... But it's tight. It's tight. It's tight.

They're two points behind, well, three points behind West Brown, who's sixth in the promotion playoffs. You know, they're in the promotion playoffs. And Blackburn has 45 points. So really, it's a group of, I mean... It's basically fifth to 13th are all in play. But they're a real team going to. for a push and it sounds like they play full box

out of position and there's room for him to slot in there. Okay. Yeah, I haven't bought a lot of Caleb Wiley stock yet, but let's keep him let's let the cake bake, as I'd like to say. That's right.

Those cakes do bake faster than the centerback cake. That's true. You know, you need to do something. They have baking soda. Uventus, I think we can do this pretty quickly, but Juventus wins over Empoli, a convincing scoreline, but really started off rough,

went down 1-0 in the first five minutes, then gave up a penalty that was called back for a handball earlier in the sequence. Weston and Waya both started. I don't know. New signing, Randall Kola Mwani had two goals. Waya got an assist, but it's the noisiest of all assists.

I mean, it's just a... ricochet off Moani. He shot it to Moani's feet, man. He earned it. But, yeah, so that happened. And then also on the first goal, Weston won the ball back to get Yuvai on their way there. So, I mean, we'll take it.

West looked like, West looked pretty good to me. They'll play PSV and their Champions League knockout game. I think this is a favorable drawing. for Yuveh, because PSV won't have Tillman or Pepe. They're not playing well. They're drawing games against clubs who play in 8,000 seat stadiums

across the Netherlands. They're shipping them draws. They're giving up a lot of goals. Banks versus Sands. In Hamburg, at that just electrifying-looking San Pauley Stadium, they both started.

Sands went 90. Banks subbed off in the 7,000. You know, everybody's kind of in mourning because Banks got an own goal. But, you know, it's like a goal. It's a goal line clearance that goes wrong. It's desperation moment. I don't know.

I don't put that much into it. He did give it away in the buildup, though, huh? Yes, he did. Yes, he did. Which no one seemed to notice. Maybe they did. I think it's because of the other place. I know.

I saw Vince noticed, but. So I think because of the clips going around, you know, so any, well, I don't, I don't want to talk about posting things on Twitter, but, but, you know, it's like you can only use one clip. There's only one clip that's not going to get struck down. It's like from the official, from whoever the official Twitter account is or whatever. And if that one doesn't have the lead up to it, then you just wouldn't ever know what happened before. But, but anyway, so I do feel like no key, shit, it did better. on that clearance man I mean

he got his limbs all tangled up it was it was it it looked as bad as it could have looked from him just just from like an aesthetics point of view

but but he he played well though yeah he's out there doing stuff you got a video made out of him called creator of offense I saw that hmm

can't remember the exact it was Tyler who made it Tyler Adams made it I don't think it was Tyler Adam, I think it was someone else named Tyler. But I think they might have called it creator of offense, mostly to leave out the own goal. Yeah.

They did include some defense in the video. They included all the good defense and offense. Now, hold on, that's offense too now. That's offense too. Yeah. It would have been a bummer of a way to start the video, though. It wouldn't have gotten 178 likes. That's right.

That's right. But, yeah, man. I mean, he was making challenges all over the field, a couple, a couple sliding, sliding challenges where he poked the ball away and thwarted some danger. I mean, probably his nicest pass yet, I feel like the one he hit that broke like two lines. It went like deep into the St. Pauli attack and half, like that, and hit the receiver like right in the pocket.

I think he gave it away right after or something. But I think he kind of, they started business. building in a, you know, like a back four basically. And no key was playing full back essentially. But until he came out, it was just like, and he was doing stuff there. He like dribbled two people on the touch line. I mean, the dude's nice.

The dude's nice, man. Yeah. And I mean, there's not too much more you could say. The question remains as far as like, he's a young man, right? And Bells, we talked about this on the Wosso side. That is just like, you know, with young people, how much, how much of a load do you really want to put on them when they're first getting their feet wet as a first team pro? Do you really want to call him in the Nations League and get him going on that, on that thing? He's not going to have an offseason and all this.

Like, do we really want to get him going on that path for 18 years old? But you know what? It might be that time. And, you know, you got to ask what you can do for your country now with you, what your country can be for you type of thing. That's right. But it is in my head, though, because I don't want to break the man. But we need him, though. I think we got to invest in who he will be 16 months from now, you know?

Yeah. And keep. Of course, some people will disagree with this, and that's okay. It's okay. You can disagree with me. But I think we should call him in. It's a fair thing to bring up, though. He's got this whole new experience of being a regular for his club now

and playing in the pressure of a Bundesliga environment every weekend. And then you throw on top of that, you know, the transatlantic flights and the whole new group of people and a new coach and all that. So yeah, it is a lot. But Jack Kennedy would say, you know, get over here, no key. I have noticed some people start to, I think, over worry about when I look at Germany's centerback depth chart. They're saying it's not that good.

I don't think we need to worry in the next 18 months, though. That he'll get called up by them. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, he's been part of the U.S. setup, you know, for a minute. Hey, man, we did some great work there. Whoever is in charge of that, congrats to you.

Yeah. The Warriors were just doing some convergence of what if the best case scenario collides with the worst case scenario on that. They were just being proactive. We don't need to worry about that. So I wonder if we, do we like, we got boots on the ground over in Germany and we just profile every mixed dude you see? I don't think so.

I think, no, I think the folks on big soccer are just, you know, searching high and low for passports, evidence of citizenship. And I think that a lot of it starts there, honestly. They're fighting people in way more difficult places than Germany. Germany's nothing for them. The target rich environment for Big Sock. Right. Yeah.

They're more than up to it. I don't know that it was Big Soccer who unearthed Nokey's lineage. There's like a 90% chance of it. Yeah. It's funny, man. How about Sands? What did you think of him? So I do want to issue a retraction.

I put a tweet out on the scuffed account saying I'm really liking what I'm seeing from James Sands. And I am liking what I'm seeing. Really liking was a little tough. Once I went back and rewatch the match, I mean, once again, he's really not doing anything with the ball. He is not. He had one decent, I mean, it's a straightforward pass.

No key pass that when he turned the ball over for his own goal, he passed it to James Sands, basically. James Sands received the ball and then played a pass to the St. Pauli right winger. And off they went. and then the goal came from there. But, you know, it was cool. Like, James got the ball, passed to the right wigger, and off they went.

He got it off his foot or whatever. But other than that, he didn't do it. He didn't do anything. He didn't do anything with the ball. But this is not to say he played bad. As far as, like, pitch control and all that goes. He controls the middle of the field. It's tough sledding, bro.

Once again, like, if you're trying to come through there, you can't do it easily. James Sands is lurking. And I think it's really helped St. Paulie out. and they're just a solid team that's tough to break down. And a lot of it's because James Sands is there. And, you know, he's getting all over the pitch. I mean, even you'll see him like press a goalkeeper every once in a while.

Like he'll run like the first line of St. Pauli's defense a lot of the times. And then, yeah, when they get pushed back into like second phase of play or whatever, when somebody like progresses the ball up towards the midline then he's in there in that two with Jackson Irvine and like I said good luck buddy good luck so so that part of it I do like and you know I mean he's not better than Tyler Adams or like Johnny at it but uh it's a it's a skill that he has and it is legitimate his destroying ability you know it's playing up in the Bundesliga and I think he looks better at doing it than like a than like a Maloney it just seems to be a better athlete than Leonard I think

hmm so probably a little more comfortable with the ball than Maloney too although even if he doesn't do that much with it um and he's coming in there and they're getting points that's right and he looks like a part of the future okay yeah so I mean it's going it's going as well as could go, you know, I keep saying the stuff about the on-ball stuff, but this is just USMNT projection or whatever. But like St. Pauli is like, man, this is going swimmingly. Okay. Way to go, Jimmy. Not really doing much for me in the, you know, USMNT projection department, but I, but I'm happy that he's, that he's succeeding at what he's doing.

John Tolkien, on the other hand, guys first start for Holstein-Keel. They did lose in Munich in Bavaria to Bayern Munich But man I thought he looked really good Like surprisingly Excellent So he played wingback but he inverted a fair amount So he was doing He was doing playmaking from deep and wide

But also getting in that half space And receiving on the half turn a little bit He created two chances right in the first 12 minutes I mean legit chance creation from him. One on a run in combination of the left and a ball slid across the box. Then he plays a nice measured through ball in behind that gets squared for another good chance. So, I mean, he just looked really good in possession.

I didn't notice that he was really at fault for any of the goal. Maybe the first one a little bit. Yeah. Yeah. Because he gets beat. The first one, he should have done better on the first one, yes. Yeah. But it's not like, it wasn't like an egregious taking a fault upon oneself.

So he, yeah, his guy gets found in the cutback zone. He doesn't, he gets there late. The cutback finds a free attacker and it's 1-0. And, you know, Byron just keeps scoring goals. But, you know, we talked about this a little bit off air, but Holshin-Kil actually kind of fun to watch. They're actually trying to play soccer, which is part of the reason they're giving up so many goals, I suppose.

But they pull one back in the second half, make it 4-1. They get two more in stoppage time after. Tolkien was taken off. So I think this might be kind of an interesting thing to watch, is our young left back playing for a relegation zone team that is actually trying to play soccer, and they got to make a push here to get to safety in the next two and a half months. These German clubs aren't shy about giving young Fulbach

their first Bundesliga start against Bayern Munich. It does see that way. Just throw them into cold water. Yeah, straight into it. That's right. The cold water. Yeah, I mean, I didn't know what to expect when I turned that match on. But, I mean, pleasantly surprised.

Pleasantly surprised, man. And just, yeah, just everything you said. And the fact, well, let me shout out. Let me shout out everybody's agent, man. Shout out James Sands agent. Shout out John Tolkien's agent. Because they put them in some, situations to succeed.

You know, we've seen other transfers where, you know, the result, you see the result and you think about it and you start thinking back to like what could the thought process have been and you realize there probably wasn't one. Thinking back to like Giorina. You thought you're talking about Giorina mostly. Giorina and not in the forest. But like James found himself a system and a team. a team where he is thriving

John Tolkien, hosting Keel, they had a plan for this man and how they were going to play him. And so may along continue. Also, he was taking set pieces too. He was taking the set pieces. He had a nice, he found somebody's head in the second half

with the free kick that he took. The dude just kind of headed it right to the, right to the Byron keeper. But I'm not mad at what I've seen, man. And then when they start playing I don't know, some weaker teams and effort to get some points. We're going to see some entertaining games.

And thank you, Holshankil, because like I talked about last week, I mean, the Bundesliga is depressing me a little bit. Yeah, watching Augsburg is like, as much as we are fans of Nokey Banks, Augsberg is a chore to watch. And, yeah, I guess we already covered that. But Holston Kiel's not like that.

Nope. They're fluid. They got people running all over the place. and Jamie Man, he's He looks like he's Like sort of immediately kind of one of the guys You know

Did you get that sense? Like their possession is going through him He's demanding the ball Yeah He's Yeah Shout out his agent indeed So they have to get past

Heidenheim and Hoffenheim To get to safety This sounds like two teams You could get beyond I think so Not that I'm watching all their games Just the ring of their name names.

Heidenheim, I believe, is two points ahead. Hoffenheim is six points ahead of him. So that's going to be the real challenge. Geo Raina played total of three minutes for Dortmund over the weekend, despite them having a new coach and Nico Kovach, despite his gorgeous backheel assist in the middle of the week. Like we said, the chance of him going to A.C. Milan seemed to be dead. and Dorman just signed a fellow named Karni Chukwameka from Chelsea on loan.

He's good, too. So, okay. Bro, as I keep watching more and more soccer, this isn't, I don't think it's going to be a surprise to anybody, but it's like, we do keep going in this, like, loop. Or it's like, G.O gets on the field, he does something. Everybody's like, why doesn't he play more? Put him on the pitch. It's not going to happen, man, until they improves off the ball. It's just not.

Like, as I, like, I was watching Johnny and watching Eastco. And, okay, it's Eastco, right? I understand this. Yeah. But, like, bro, first of all, of course, we all know he's nice. But it's like, and it's not like he's doing the most running in the world. But when he needs to get back and, like, help on a defensive transition, bro, he is busing it. Yeah.

He is busing it, bro. It's part of the game. You got to do it, bro. And like, once again, the fact that he's not doing it, and he has not passed a sprint test yet, he has not passed a sprint test, ladies and gentlemen, and the fact that he has not just still leaves me to believe there might be something going on with that hamstring.

Like, nobody is on a soccer pitch and not running ever just because, like, you know, they feel like that guy's gift of soccer. I mean, well, well, well, messy, okay. but even Messi might get busy Who literally is God's gift to soccer Yeah yeah right But uh Yeah man

Until until he starts doing it It's just not going to happen It don't matter how many backhill assists he has It's just not going to happen It's sad It's sad to hear But we need to hear it But they did use him as a defensive sub

Which has never happened It's happened once before So we can choose to read into that something positive if we want. I mean, he's going to come into camp for the U.S. I don't feel like I've said this a hundred times

and he's going to probably, I don't know if he's going to start, but he's going to play. And he's probably going to make an impact for us. So, bro, if he's our, if he's our hummus, it's going to be great. I'll take it. Yeah.

It's just the club stuff, man. Everybody keeps acting all befuddled. Like, bro. Mark McKenzie scored his first goal as a Toulouse player. It was a late equalizer in a 1-1 draw with Nice. Not the most beautiful goal you'll ever see, but the goalkeeper spills it. He kind of shins it home. Did he do it on purpose or not?

Who cares? He was very, very pumped. I've never seen him this animated before. It's very cool to see. Brennan Erinson scored for leads in their 7-0 win over Cardiff. 7-0 in a league game. these Welsh clubs are really adrift

anyway leads uh it was the first goal in this romp and just a counter attack finished through the defender's legs Daniel James gets most of the credit and whoever played him the ball into the

into him behind um how's uh how's your relationship with Big Brenda these days Vince um um well big Big Brenda's

gone. Oh, is he? Big Bend is it dead. Big Brando is the lobby. Yeah. I feel like. Is the lobby gone? I think it's, I haven't seen it rear its head. So I mean, they have to be planning something. Yeah.

They have to be planning something here soon because, I mean, Brindo is putting up. He does have A goals to assist in this championship season. Not too shabby. It's not shabby at all. it's not shabby at all and he is giving us some production and so i am i am happy with that and

i'm just going to say it the rest of his general play is not moving me whatsoever it's not it's not right now even though he does have those a goals and two so he's playing like uh he's like leads 10 but it kind of almost functions as like a second striker or something like he's not doing a lot of playmaking. He's just he's just in the box waiting for a ball to come to him. And look, he's finishing chances off. So I'm not going to

take that away from him. But like the idea that like, you know, the championship is looking like a like it's on cheek code mode or something. Like, no. No, not so. But look, keep scoring goals, man. Let's get us a 15 goal season

and promotion to the Premier League. You know, I mean, the first in the championship, all that. Hey, that's a, that's a good campaign. That's a good campaign. If you got,

and get back to the championship, get back to the Premier League with Leeds and, um, see what happens there. And that he's putting up pretty good numbers and we're still not hearing much from big Brenda is what leads me to believe it might be, at least dormant. There could be some door shuttering that went on.

Okay. Yeah. You know, the fundraising around like the, like the whale oil. just gone completely it is wild that that was the biggest industry yeah isn't that crazy over gone uh Tyler versus Liverpool I don't know that there's a lot to say here uh he did play the full 90 Bournemouth couldn't keep their winning streak going against the best team in the league

but you know Tyler is flying high I think still and then let's get to Johnny Cardoso So there's some stuff to say here. Played 81 minutes in a 2-2 draw with athletic Bilbao. Keys to move on the first goal, a pass through the lines. A good shot in the 40th minute, darting into the box for a nice ball from Anthony, who just came from Manchester United, I think, right? And neither athletic goal was his fault. And I just noticed, and I'm confused about this a little bit,

but I notice he's very stout in duels in this game. Like the ball's almost, like there's almost a magnet in his foot. And it seems like some games he's like this, some games he's not. I don't quite get it, you know? Some games he's, some games he just can't keep the ball.

Some games he's really, really strong in these duels. Maybe I'm just thinking of that one, that first game when he was coming back from injury. No, no, but he has. So bad. This was his, I want to talk about this because this has been his best match since he's been back from injury.

And yeah, so maybe it's just the rest getting off of him a little bit. But it's like, I mean, even early in the match, it's like a ball kind of squirts towards him. And he's like in a bad situation heading towards the touchline, like on the left side of the pitch. Does a little pirouette, knocks it off the defender, closing him down to get a little throw in. It's like, it's not a lot, right?

But it's like keeping that ball in the situation where like you could easily gave anything away. Could easily be a very dangerous counterattack there. Yeah. Right. And it's just, I mean, the niceness just pops from Johnny from time to time. It's like you just know he wouldn't developed here. But, yeah, I saw some, I think it was a tactical manager, actually.

When talking about on Twitter, I think, talking about how. how well Tyler's performed or whatever. And, you know, some people were talking like, oh, it's crazy that Tyler versus Johnny was a discussion and all that. And Tack was like, hey, let's put Johnny and Tyler in double pivot. And he said Wes is the 10, which y'all know me, it's cool me. But like literally anybody at the 10. But I do think Johnny, he has a midfield partner at Bettys.

And I think he does function better that way instead of, instead of a lone six, because I think he's like a, he's like a six, eight, you know, and like you said, you know, he's getting shots,

he's in the box, he's moving all around the place. He's, he's getting after it, kind of box to boxing that way. And, um, yeah,

having Tyler behind him, I mean, having Tyler next to him. And they can just both do their like, heat-sicking missile thing, even though Johnny's a little bit, Johnny kind of, he doesn't do the heat,

taking missile thing as much as Tyler. Donnie just kind of positions itself well and deals with attacks that way. Kind of like draws a line of confrontation. But I like the idea. Yeah, I guess I wonder what you lose by doing that. I mean, do I really want to start Cardoso over Musa, the way Musa's playing? Yeah, definitely not. Definitely not.

But it's good to have as an option for sure. I think we should finish off here with Testman. Yep. Came in off the bench briefly. Yep. He has a... I noticed... Go ahead.

Well, I was just going to say, I noticed even in his, like, six-minute cameo off the bench yesterday. I didn't watch it. He did something nice? No. Oh, okay. He was... He got dribbled through once. And a second time, he was just a little...

Like you said earlier, turn your brain on when you don't have the ball at you. feet. Yeah. My son. Yeah. It's getting to a point, man. We're like, dabble going to have to get him on a,

that's going to bring him in the training camp or something, man. Like, you got, bro, because like, he has a new manager, Paulo Fonseca, you know,

former manager of Milan, former manager of Lille, the man who moved Tim Way back to fullback in the first place. And so he has this opportunity or whatever. He got to start against Ludo Goretz in the, I think it's the Europa League, in the Europa League. And even in that match, bro, it's just like, man, you are just not like, like, there was one situation where, like, there's an attack going, like, Ludo Goretz is, like, going on a counter. And, like, Veritow basically, like, runs past him to, like, get, runs.

past Tanner Testament to like get pressure to the ball. Tanner's just Tanner's just like laxadaisicly just looking around like, oh, what's going on? It's just like, bro, you got to, he does have trouble. The job is to be a fireman. Yeah. Yeah.

He does have trouble like turning his hips and stuff a little bit because he's like a six three dude. But it's like, bro, it's the physical stuff doesn't even come into the frame of reference right now because it's like, bro, you don't even, you can be Tyler Adams, bro. And if you put Tannenessman's brain and Tyler Adams, it would render him an ineffective player. You know what I'm saying? Because he's just not.

It's a lot mental. Yeah. So he did start doing a little bit better against Little Goretts, like 30 minutes, 35 minutes into the match. And then from then on, he was all right. But it's like, man, if, bro, if you don't start, if you don't start taking this defense and stuff seriously, like your time in Leon is not going to be,

it's going to be a rep here soon yeah you're going to end up back at the Birmingham Legion no not that bad but I just said of Venetcia to be honest with you

but maybe so the cake baking how much time does a midfielder a defensive midfielder need in the oven relative to the centerback and pullback I don't know well

Tanner ain't played a lot of ball well well I guess he has what he got Two seasons in... Two seasons in Siri B? You have to get to the... You have to get to the point that we decide you're a cake.

Yeah. Okay. And I don't think we've decided he's a cake yet. Maybe we thought he was a cake. But now we've maybe thinking he's not a cake. Man. Dude, because he was doing... He was doing a lot better.

It's harsh to not be a cake at all. Like the... But that's the discussion. The one match he played at the... They started at the 8. He was showing signs of like handling cage matches and stuff a little bit better. Like I think maybe that's the thing is where he has to decipher space and, you know, kind of like impose itself in the cage. Like all that, I think the space made me confuse them.

Because like I said, when he was at the 8th at one match, he was doing all right. He was doing all right. But, yeah, I don't know. And. So you know what? Go ahead. Sorry to interrupt you. I just realized.

I think this is important. Midfielders aren't cakes. center backs are cakes midfielders we throw them in the cage okay we're not putting in the they're in the cage we see what they do in the cage yeah just a different analogy so far the cage has not been super friendly to tan man right hey tam man I'm so proud of you uh he uh tana's just literally open like reaching his arm out of the cage opening the opening the gate and the self out every time, man. The hell am I in this cage for, man?

Give me the ball. I want to be in here. All right, let's get out of here. Thanks, everybody for listening. Again, U17 episode coming on Thursday, and we'll see you.