Latest / Into the Channel ⚽️ A Podcast Primarily About Women's Football / UEFA Women's Champions League Preview (Part 1)

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UEFA Women's Champions League Preview (Part 1) · Into the Channel ⚽️ A Podcast Primarily About Women's Football

0:05
OK, welcome to Into the Channel podcast primarily about women's
0:08
football, maybe primarily about the UEFA Women's Champions
0:10
League. We'll get into that in just just
0:13
a moment before we have to pitch.
0:14
If you enjoy the show or love women's football as much as your
0:16
boys do, come kick it with us already.
0:19
Subscribe, follow YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcast, wherever
0:21
you like to watch or listen. Leave us a review over your
0:23
favorite podcast app. Links to all of our socials,
0:26
every single one in the show notes of this episode.
0:28
I am your host Dino de Suspitas and as always I'm joined by my
0:32
Co host Mr. Grant Angle. What is up and?
0:36
I'm feeling fantastic, buddy. I think we could say the
0:38
Champions League is back. It's about to be back there.
0:41
Varying degrees of being back we're.
0:44
Back. We're certainly back.
0:46
You could also be. You could be back.
0:47
You could be so back. You could be back back.
0:50
I'm not sure we're at any of those levels yet with the
0:53
Champions League, but they are coming.
0:54
They're they're around the bend. We're just, we're almost, we're
0:58
almost back, back. I think I feel comfortable
1:00
saying that we're getting close. How about a little Season 2
1:03
action, Season 2, Episode 1? I don't know.
1:05
It feels good. Feels good to be back on the
1:07
other side of the pond, mixing it up out here.
1:09
I mean, it's the, I think it's the best tournament there is.
1:11
It's my favorite tournament there is.
1:13
Maybe that's a more accurate way to put it in terms of Spotify
1:17
episodes. We did exactly 81 episodes on
1:21
Spotify in Season 1 and now here we are back.
1:25
Not yet back back, but just back to the UEFA Women's Champions
1:29
League where this podcast started.
1:30
I don't know man, I'm excited. I don't know, just feels good,
1:33
feels good to be back. We're going to talk previews.
1:36
Obviously the football re kicks off Wednesday, September 4th.
1:39
There'll be a quick turn around some more football September
1:41
7th, that's a Saturday, so this is going to be a big time week.
1:45
A lot of teams going to be eliminated.
1:47
This is equivalent to like the Thursday, Friday, Saturday,
1:49
Sunday of March Madness. Nice.
1:51
Where you go from like 60, I don't know, 68, it's 60
1:55
something down to 16. Very exciting stuff.
1:57
With that, said, Mr. Grant Angle, where do you want to get
1:59
started? I want to get started by
2:01
cracking this frosty beverage because Champions League is
2:05
back. I will join you.
2:08
Excellent. Good to hear.
2:13
That's what I like to hear. So OK.
2:16
Real quick before we jump into that, sorry.
2:18
Yeah, it's like crazy hot in here.
2:22
Go, we are back. We might be so back now.
2:25
Here we go, Here we go. Shame on me for not having the
2:29
same idea. Oh, my God, Yeah.
2:31
Feels much better. You know, these, these Florida,
2:35
Florida Augusts are, are no joke.
2:37
So I've got my frosty beverage. I'm down a layer.
2:41
I'm feeling good, man. I'm, I'm feeling agile, feeling
2:43
springy. I'm ready.
2:44
I'm ready to kick this thing off.
2:45
Where do you want to get started?
2:46
For real. For real this time.
2:48
Nice shirt, buddy. OK, for anybody, for anybody who
2:52
remembers, Dino is our expert in how you qualify for the
2:56
Champions League. He explained it masterfully last
2:59
season in the first episode, and he will do that again.
3:02
But I'm gonna, I'm gonna try to help out as much as I can.
3:05
I think I retained some from the way you explained it.
3:07
I'll start the bidding with Barcelona won the Champions
3:11
League last year, so they're in. They also won League F Lyon won
3:15
Division UN Feminine in France, they're in.
3:19
Chelsea won the Women's Super League in England, so they're
3:22
in. And Bayern Munich won Frown
3:24
Bundesliga, so they're in. They are all the way in into the
3:28
group stage, those four, we start the bidding with them.
3:32
Yes, we do. Congratulations to all four of
3:34
those teams, including the defending champions Barcelona.
3:38
Now's where it gets interesting, buddy.
3:40
So we're going to start things off this episode with the
3:43
Champions path, which is experiencing round one this
3:47
week. That is where 43 teams, these
3:50
are going to be champions of Europe that are not the four
3:53
that you mentioned essentially go into like 11 different four
3:56
team little mini tournaments. We don't have 44, unfortunately,
4:00
we have 43. And I think Valoranga gets like
4:01
a little bit of a buy, but basically those 43 teams have to
4:05
win two matches to become eleven teams that are going to move on
4:08
to round two. And of those four team pools,
4:11
three of the four are going to go home.
4:12
So there's real stakes. I mean, there's some big names
4:15
playing this Wednesday. As mentioned, you drop 1 and
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it's a wrap. That's the end of your Champions
4:20
League season. So in the Champions path, we've
4:22
got some recognizable names, Benfica, St.
4:24
Polton, Valarangala, as mentioned, FC 20.
4:27
So these are some some big clubs that have some business to take
4:31
care of this week. Exactly right.
4:33
I mean, like you said, you think about Saint Polton or Benfica,
4:36
who made it all the way to the group stage, maybe into the
4:38
knockout stage last season, and you could be one and done here.
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Something goes, something goes haywire.
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You know, there's a weird own goal early in the match or
4:46
something like that. You lose at the death and the
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dreams are dashed right there. And honestly, in these
4:52
qualifying phases, if it happens, then it's almost like
4:55
it never happened at all because you don't have nearly the slice
4:59
of the global audience. So I think it's interesting to
5:02
think about these matches are being played in small stadiums
5:07
with not a lot of fans fanfare, but they have massive
5:10
implications for the clubs themselves.
5:12
Huge implications. I mean, for some of these teams,
5:15
well, for all 43, they're going to be active as part of the
5:18
Champions path. I mean, they're three wins away
5:21
from the group stage. You know where they're going to
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be, right there alongside some of the heaviest of heavyweights,
5:27
Chelsea, the Lyons, the Barcelonas, the Munichs and
5:30
whoever else is able to survive Round 2.
5:33
Alright, first mention, I want to talk about the team near and
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dear to my heart, Benfica. They take on Norscheland.
5:39
So Norscheland finished first in the Danish league, the elite DVS
5:43
UNN. Coming into the weekend, though,
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they were in 6th place of 12 teams.
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Not great. After six matches, they are
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three wins, 2 draws, one loss, just a + 2 goal differential.
5:53
So even though this team took the league title last year off
5:57
to a much slower start, I'm not sure there's ever a great time
6:00
to be catching N Chelan. But maybe is a great time to be
6:04
catching N Chelan. If you're a Benfica, what are
6:06
you going to be? I don't know.
6:07
What do you miss most about this Benfica side?
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I think you were right there with me with regard to, you
6:12
know, just kind of all the feels, you know?
6:14
What I loved about watching them play is that they were tough and
6:17
we had kind of talked about like they were going through, they're
6:20
clearly going through like a maturation and they're just kind
6:23
of women's football and culture. The the league.
6:25
This team specifically, they had a lot of players from the
6:28
Portuguese national team. But the one thing I absolutely
6:31
miss most about watching Benfica play is Keeka Nazareth.
6:34
And now I'm going to continue missing that because she no
6:36
longer plays there. Yeah, we'll have to wait a
6:38
minute to see Kika back in action as part of this
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tournament a little bit sooner though in League F so very
6:44
excited to see what she looks like there.
6:46
But yeah, no Kika Nazareth, no Jessica Silva for Benfica.
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I would say most of the core teams still pretty much intact
6:51
though, and they did sign 31 year old striker Cristina Martin
6:55
Prieto from Sevilla. She notched 17 goals, 3 assists
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last year in League F and 29 appearances.
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So this is a productive player. Had a lot of success in League F
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last year coming into this new league.
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Gabbianato Nacional and you know, in Portugal with that,
7:11
that large kika sized Jessica Silva sized, you know, gap in
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terms of like play on the field and opportunities.
7:18
I think this could be a really nice position for Montin Prieto.
7:22
But like I said, I think Benfica for the most part, a lot of
7:25
talent. I think what we're going to see
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from this team is a great display of depth, a great
7:30
display of toughness, like you mentioned, and probably a bit of
7:33
an evolution of their game. Even just watching them kind of
7:36
mature through last year's group stage, it's kind of like they
7:40
went from very, very plucky, you know, type, OK, second or third
7:44
tier, you know, league champion to this is a real team that
7:48
could make noise in the knockout stage of the Champions League.
7:51
And I don't think we can overlook that.
7:53
Kika did miss games. Yeah, absolutely.
7:55
This is a team that really performed very, very well
7:58
against extremely tough competition.
8:01
Obviously anything can happen, but as unbiased as we we aspire
8:04
to be, I can say that I very much hope that if Ika comes out
8:08
and shows out in this one against Norscheland and survives
8:11
another day. Yeah, I think you're totally
8:13
right. And this is going to be an
8:14
opportunity because it, you know, it's, it can be tricky for
8:16
us over here in the USA to kind of follow these clubs as closely
8:20
as we would like. You know, you kind of got it,
8:22
really got to dig for the information and even you're
8:24
Googling around for the transfer window and all that stuff,
8:26
trying to figure out who's going where.
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You know, there could be there could be a couple of wonder kids
8:31
walking around over there for Benfica that that we kind of get
8:33
to discover. I think that there is a
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mysteriousness to this tournament that I really like
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because it, you know, we're not constantly inundated with all
8:40
this information. So we get to kind of walk in
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this and be like, hey, what's going on here?
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We want to watch this tournament.
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And then we get to see like all these surprises bubble up,
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whether it's teams or players, coaches, coaching styles.
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And that's part of why I've enjoyed the tournament so much.
8:53
Yeah, no doubt. So hopefully, hopefully we can
8:55
track this one down on live TV somehow.
8:57
And then I don't know, maybe next year, who knows, maybe we
9:00
make it out to Kosovo City Stadium in in Sarajevo, in
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Bosnia and Herzegovina. You never know anything is
9:06
possible, KG said it. Where do you want to go from
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here? Let's talk about I had my eyes
9:16
on one of these champions path matches it as well.
9:20
So let's talk about FC 20 winners of Editivizi Brown in
9:26
the Netherlands. They're taking on Cardiff City
9:29
of Wales. This one is happening in and I
9:32
I'm, you know, I'm not 100% sure on like how all the draws of all
9:36
the stadiums work, but this one's happening in Sports Park,
9:39
Schreyer serve and shit, I think, I don't know, it's in
9:43
Dutch. How should I know how to
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pronounce that? But it is roughly 4.4km from 20
9:49
days Home Park, so like a 10 to 15 minute drive.
9:52
In doing the research for this, I was hoping I could be like,
9:55
yeah, just go up route 4 and then you'll get that.
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But that's not how they name streets or roads in the
10:03
Netherlands, apparently. So 21 added to Busy Brown.
10:06
Like I mentioned, they went 18-2 and two they went ten.
10:09
Oh, and one at home last season. As some folks might remember,
10:13
they lost to BK Hacking in the second qualifying round of the
10:17
Champions League last season. But here's the kind of the crazy
10:20
part. They got A22 draw at Gothenburg,
10:24
which we saw in in the group stage was a hard place to play.
10:28
But then they lost 2 to one at home.
10:30
They're undone by a Felicia Schroeder goal in the 65th
10:33
minute of the second leg that goes exactly to what we're
10:36
talking about. Like you can be a good team on a
10:39
good run, you run into BK Hack and you're before you can get to
10:42
the group stage. That's why I'll this week I
10:45
thought a ton about my other favorite side, the Arsenal and
10:49
them just dropping that that tough one to pre FC and then
10:52
that just being the end of it sort of seemingly before it even
10:55
got started. I feel like personally, as a, as
10:58
a fan and a follower of the sport, I feel like I can't let
11:00
that happen again. Because like I, I, I don't, I
11:02
don't even think I watched that match live because I'd like
11:04
before I even knew the machinations, I was like, you
11:06
know, you're used to the men's and there's the group stage and
11:09
now there's a bunch of round Robin stuff and nobody's getting
11:11
the until like weeks and weeks into the action.
11:14
But here it's like teams are going to go home on Wednesday,
11:17
right? Major clubs, another huge chunk
11:19
of teams, they're going to go home on Saturday.
11:21
Major clubs, absolutely Champions, you might say.
11:25
Very excited to see kind of what happens between these two
11:28
squads. I think 20 is going to have
11:30
pretty big time advantage from a travel standpoint.
11:32
Oh yeah. You know, they obviously
11:33
they're, they're coming off a championship domestically
11:36
against some other tough teams that they had to line up against
11:39
this season. So I'm, I'm excited to see
11:41
Twente, what they look like in this tournament.
11:43
This is going to be an interesting an interesting early
11:45
test for them, I think. I'm ready to see it man.
11:47
So their top scorer last season was 22 year old Liz Reichbergen.
11:52
She knocked home ten goals, had six assists.
11:54
But also coming into this Champions League, they've lost
11:57
two of their three leading scorers from last year.
12:00
Taylor Zimmer, born in Santa Rosa, CA, left Twente and went
12:05
to Cologne and frown Bundesliga. She had nine goals and four
12:08
assists for Twente last season and Marissa Alaslagers, she
12:13
played all 22 matches for Twente and had five goals and six
12:16
assists out the door as well. They are taking on Cardiff City
12:21
from the Welsh League, the Adron Premier and I think it's
12:24
important to note that obviously Wales, pretty small country.
12:28
I went there recently on my trip to Manchester.
12:30
Me and my wife did a cool bus tour around like a little piece
12:33
of northern Wales. The tour guide told us there are
12:36
more sheep in Wales than there are people so that that's one
12:40
thing to consider and not like sheep like what Aaron Rodgers
12:43
calls people if they don't believe crazy conspiracy
12:46
theories with actual sheep, but I digress.
12:50
Cardiff City, they won a domestic tremble last year, so
12:54
they won the league, they won the Odron Premier, they won the
12:56
Odron Trophy, which is a 24 team tournament across Wales, 3
13:00
divisions and they also won the Welsh Cup which has 24 teams in
13:03
qualifying and then those 12 winners, they joined 20 more
13:07
clubs. And so it's a big old tournament
13:09
and by my calculations, looking at the scores of the Welsh Cup,
13:12
Cardiff City outscored their opponents in that tournament 27
13:15
to one and route to winning that trophy.
13:18
Their nickname is the Bluebirds. They were in the UEFA Women's
13:22
Champions League qualifiers last year but they lost both of their
13:25
matches. They lost one to Lithuanian
13:27
champs FC Jintra and one to Shelbourne, the winners of the
13:31
Irish League. So I'm just going to go out and
13:34
say that we don't know shit about Cardiff City because how
13:38
could we like it is I raise my hand and say as a guy living in
13:42
Seattle, WA, despite our climate being very similar to Wales,
13:46
it's hard for me to keep up with the Welsh Woman's League over
13:51
there. I'm excited to see him play and
13:53
I just want to shout out real quick because I was perusing
13:55
their website looking for this, I want to shout out Siobhan
13:58
Walsh. She retired this past offseason
14:00
after captaining the club to the treble.
14:03
She was their leader and their best defender who had some
14:05
scoring ability, especially on set pieces.
14:07
She hung up her boots after 11 years with the club.
14:10
And so shout out to her because I think, you know, people get
14:12
lost in these in these things. They realize that like one of
14:15
the beautiful parts about like club football is you have these
14:18
club legends and maybe nobody will ever outside of there will
14:21
ever talk about them. So shout out to Siobhan.
14:24
As for the players they currently have, Eliza Kali.
14:27
She scored 31 goals across all comps for the Bluebirds.
14:30
I have a good feeling that that's probably where the attack
14:33
is going to come from in this match against Twente.
14:36
But again, I don't know. Let's see what happens, and
14:39
let's see who plays well. Love it definitely shout out
14:41
Siobhan and I feel you bro on the research front, not easy to
14:44
find what were the biggest comings and goings for
14:48
Norscheland our our Danish league champions?
14:51
Yeah boy, I had a little bit of a time trying to get to the
14:53
bottom of this one. But to your point, a lot of our
14:56
learning last year was just in watching the games bro.
15:00
As mentioned, the Champions path going to be wild. 43 teams
15:04
getting whittled down to 11 this week.
15:06
That isn't the only way though to get to Round 2 of this
15:11
qualifying phase. There's also the league path
15:13
where some of those runner ups and 3rd place teams and some of
15:16
the other leagues will get whittled down just as
15:19
mercilessly. So in the league path round one,
15:23
there are 16 teams, pretty much the same format for 14 mini
15:28
tournaments. So those 16 will become four,
15:31
some more heavyweights in this pool as well.
15:34
You look at teams like IAX, you can look at teams like Perry FC,
15:38
Lincoln Ping, Arsenal, Atletico Madrid, ION track, Frankfurt and
15:43
you just don't imagine that all that all of them are going to
15:45
survive. I want to start my league path
15:48
examination with my Lady Gunners from Arsenal who take on Rangers
15:53
2:30 PM Eastern in Meadow Park in Borehamwood in the United
15:57
Kingdom. Oh, I got stuff.
15:59
I got stuff on Borehamwood. So Meadow Park at Borehamwood,
16:02
Arsenal women used to play there.
16:04
Arsenal's youth teams currently play there, as well as
16:07
Borehamwood FC who plays in the National League S, which is not
16:12
some new baseball division where like the Houston Astros.
16:15
Would play or something like that.
16:16
National League S is the 6th tier of English football.
16:20
It's about 7 1/2 miles east of Vicarage Rd. where Watford FC
16:26
plays, and it's about two miles north of Roger Gracie Jiu Jitsu
16:30
Studio, if you're into that kind of thing in London.
16:33
Hell yeah, you said. That's a 6th division.
16:35
The 6th tier of English football, yes.
16:38
The 6th tier, yeah. How many months of training
16:40
would we need to to show up and participate in the tryout?
16:44
Oh buddy, I don't know if that just exists.
16:47
Yeah, no, maybe we could be their preferred podcast
16:50
partners. Run their media.
16:53
Relations maybe. I love that.
16:54
Yeah, let's do it. Anywho, Arsenal, they're taking
16:58
on Rangers at said Meadow Park in said Borehamwood.
17:02
Arsenal finished third in the WSL last season.
17:04
They've only played a couple friendlies so far to kind of get
17:07
warmed up. They had that 21 win over the
17:09
Washington Spirit or shorthanded Washington Spirit side and then
17:12
one no loss to Chelsea, which I was pretty encouraged by.
17:15
But then I started doing some of the mental math of who didn't
17:17
play in that game. And then you quickly get to my
17:20
Ramirez, Sam Kerr, Cat Mikario, me official.
17:24
Did LJ play in that game? Aaron Cuthbert LJ didn't play in
17:27
that game either. Yeah.
17:30
That's a lot of good players. Not the yeah, I know.
17:33
I started thinking about of all the players that didn't play, is
17:36
that like, where would that team rank?
17:37
And best in the world band, probably top five, top 6.
17:42
I mean, this is effectively a preseason game.
17:45
Really great, really instinctive finish from Sandy Baltimore,
17:48
Chelsea's new signing was the difference in this one.
17:51
Arsenal had a few really good chances, mostly Caitlin Ford
17:55
that had the best looks, Alessia Russo as well.
17:57
Cafagi was in spots mesmerizing. You know, she didn't quite
18:02
dominate the game, but you just sort of see what she's able to
18:04
do in tight spaces and in duels that she'd she really shouldn't
18:08
be winning. She doesn't have any discernible
18:10
advantage and she's just scoots out the other way and does
18:12
whatever she wants to do. Hard not to get excited about
18:15
imagining her entire game morphing into that, which would
18:18
just be incredible. But I'm going to I'm going to
18:20
check my Rosa Cafagi excitement. Speaking of BK Hack and last
18:23
season, the other play that I was excited about, Mariana
18:25
Caldente, who, you know, might have gotten over not quite lost,
18:30
but maybe a little bit more overlooked Barcelona And all of
18:33
the Barcelona players are so technically gifted that when you
18:36
see, you know, this, this match was really funny because you had
18:39
Lucy Browns on one side and Mariana Caldente and the other.
18:42
And you just see their level of poise is it's in a different
18:46
stratosphere, right? I mean, there could be monster
18:48
trucks like, you know, like jumping over piles of cars on
18:52
the field and they would just very quickly, very tidally scoop
18:55
past and, you know, get the ball exactly where they want to get.
18:57
Both those players are just so incredibly cool.
19:00
The skills on Cal Dente was just great.
19:02
I mean, you just see it. You're just like, oh, OK, That's
19:04
that's why they brought her in because she can just do whatever
19:07
she wants, especially when she has that space.
19:09
And it's so much more noticeable when she's not playing with
19:11
other ten other players that are just as skilled.
19:15
So I went from being maybe Luke warm on the Caldente signing to
19:19
pretty excited, pretty helpful. I've warmed up quite a bit.
19:22
I met like 8 1/2 in terms of my my warm scale.
19:26
So obviously I mentioned at the top extremely disappointing
19:29
Champions League experience for your boy last year.
19:31
As an Arsenal fan, I don't want to be too excited about this
19:34
tournament, but I am very excited as an unbiased observer.
19:38
Mr. Grant Angle, you look at this Arsenal side, what do you
19:41
see with regard to a this team ceiling might be this or this
19:45
team still looks like a cut or two below some of the big dogs.
19:49
You know, we talked about it during the transfer episode.
19:52
Rosa Cafagi to Arsenal, I think is massive.
19:55
I think you're exactly write her creativity or kind of ability to
19:58
play in the middle of the field and move forward.
20:00
I think that's going to be massive.
20:02
And then you add Cal Dente, her calmness, her poise, her
20:05
experience, her skill. I think they're going to be
20:08
super dangerous. And when we talk about this
20:10
path, can they win three matches to get into the group stage?
20:14
Of course they can. And I think they're going to be
20:17
ready to go. And I'm just going to put this,
20:18
put a little take chip out there.
20:21
Jonas Idovol. If he knows what's good for him,
20:24
they'll be ready to go. I like it.
20:26
The league path I mentioned, just four teams are going to
20:28
advance there, right? So if you combine those four
20:32
with the 11 they're going to advance from the Champions path,
20:35
that gives us 15 teams that are going to make it to round two.
20:40
Now those 15 teams will then get matched up with nine teams that
20:45
advance straight to round two, which include Slavia, Praha,
20:50
Roma, Hammerbee, your Manchester City, Wolfsburg, Real Madrid,
20:54
PSG, Juventus and BK Hakken. So those 9 will be matched up
20:59
with the 15 that are going to be in action this week and then
21:02
those 24 teams will get whittled down to 12.
21:05
So when you say Arsenals got to win three, they got to win here
21:08
in the next in the in the coming week or so, there will be
21:11
another draw happening September 9th to figure out OK, of the 24
21:14
teams, who's going to get matched up with whom.
21:16
So I think at that point, once those 24 teams become twelve, we
21:19
will have our entire group stage 16.
21:22
So a lot of exciting stuff, a lot of stakes and just this
21:25
these these are kind of be like very nervy times for a lot of
21:28
teams. I want to talk about Rangers
21:30
really quick. They finished second in the
21:32
Scottish Women's Premier League. They are four matches into this
21:35
season's campaign off to a hot start.
21:37
Four wins and four tries. Zero goals allowed, 33 goals
21:41
scored. OK, pretty good in four matches,
21:44
I would say. I'm no mathematician, but I
21:46
think that's a that's good for a + 33 goal differential.
21:50
They're led by Katie Wilkinson, 29 year old English forward.
21:53
She's got eight goals in four matches.
21:55
She scored in all four matches as well and she is a new signing
21:58
for Rangers from Southampton. Outside of that, we'll see how
22:01
this Rangers side will be able to adjust against an Arsenal
22:03
side that won't really let them dominate possession like Rangers
22:06
likes to do in the Scottish Women's Premier League.
22:09
So it's going to be interesting team that dominant domestically
22:12
having to switch up having to play stone throw away from north
22:16
London. And I think that's kind of one
22:18
of the beauties of this tournament.
22:20
We remember from the last year's group stage some of these small
22:23
clubs that, you know, maybe were ranked really low, maybe of a
22:27
teams whose jersey I'm wearing right now, you know, really were
22:30
able to step up. And then you saw other teams
22:33
that were champions in other leagues just kind of get waxed
22:36
by these other like large clubs. So it really is a mixed bag with
22:40
regard to which of these domestic champions is able to
22:44
kind of switch their style, maybe play a more counter
22:47
attacking style, maybe play them in a more of a defensive shell
22:50
and still be able to get results a la BK Hakin.
22:53
So I think that's the one thing that I'm going to be looking for
22:55
the most closely, not just the results for this week, but who
22:59
maybe has the formula to play two or three different kind of
23:02
ways and have some success. Yeah, totally.
23:05
And I, I think there's, there's an interesting piece and maybe
23:07
I'm just a super dork and that's why I'm a little interested in
23:10
this piece. But Rangers from the heart of
23:13
Glasgow, Scotland, Rangers is a massive club, the gigantic club
23:19
in 100 year long death feud with Celtic FC.
23:24
Now I, I'm very curious to see, you know, what if they put on a
23:27
really good fight or, you know, and I don't want this for you,
23:30
I'm not wishing bad things upon you.
23:32
What if they beat Arsenal? Do the people at Rangers then
23:35
say Arsenal puts 50,000 people in their stadium to watch
23:40
women's football? Do teams in the UK like Rangers
23:43
look at this and go why can't we start to build some some of that
23:47
culture around here around women's football?
23:49
So I think there is a piece here and your club and Chelsea
23:53
Football Club are at the forefront of it.
23:55
In the UK specifically. There is a growth opportunity
23:58
here and if you can pull together some results on the
24:01
pitch, then maybe some of these dopes will come to their senses
24:05
and actually start really investing in their squats.
24:08
Yeah, I'd definitely love to see that.
24:10
And I mean, we could just look at it.
24:12
Last year, you got to look at a team like, I don't know, Benfica
24:15
or an IX or an escape Ron or BK Hakken or Paris FC.
24:20
These are organizations that are not that far off.
24:24
And then when you look at like what Barcelona is able to do or
24:26
Chelsea or Arsenal or Lyon or like, you know, like these
24:29
massive clubs that can fill these stadiums and tour around
24:33
the world and spread the brand and, and actually enter these
24:36
new markets already with some market share.
24:38
They're not showing up as like the opening band and like these
24:41
are superstars as these international tournaments start
24:45
to cycle through and like you have player movement and now
24:48
we're we're only getting more and more exposed to so many of
24:52
these talented players. You got to imagine that a team,
24:54
like you said, even that gets bounced this week, probably
24:58
leaves this round of qualifying in a better position than they
25:02
came in with regard to their brand, with regard to like the
25:05
OR around the club with regard to their vision for the future.
25:08
You know, and like I think you really can't put a price tag on
25:11
that. Yeah, 100% right.
25:13
I mean, you know, and, and so my research for Cardiff City, they
25:16
said like, look, we got we got bounced there, but then we won
25:18
the domestic treble. We're building towards
25:20
something. People are excited about
25:22
something. And you know, I think every
25:24
every single club, but especially if you have a massive
25:26
advantage like being Rangers Football Club, you have an
25:30
established brand to build on. So go build on it.
25:33
Hell yeah. So like, as mentioned, that
25:35
one's going down 2:30 PM Wednesday, September 4th.
25:39
Did you have your eye on any of these other league paths?
25:42
The matches I certainly did my good man and coincidentally the
25:46
match that I'm looking at, Atletico Madrid versus
25:48
Rosenborg, obviously Atletico Madrid from Liga F, Rosenborg
25:53
from top Syrian in Norway. This one's also being played at
25:56
Meadow Park in Borehamwood. I want to start with Atletico
25:59
Madrid. They finished third in Liga F,
26:01
only 24 points behind Barcelona. And they had some really
26:07
interesting player movement. Lacey Santos out to the
26:11
Washington Spirit. Ludmila out to the Chicago Red
26:14
Stars, Anna Maria Certain Gorsevich out to my Seattle
26:18
Rain. Evan Navarro out to Real Madrid.
26:21
Those players, plus some of the other departures accounted for
26:24
nearly 20 goals, 15 assists and 8000 minutes of playing time
26:30
last season for this squad. However, they had a bunch of
26:34
incoming transfers as well. 27 year old Norwegian Sinha Jensen.
26:38
She played at rail associated at the last two seasons.
26:42
She had combined over those two seasons, 24 goals and six
26:45
assists. And again, I'm I'm out here
26:48
watching highlights and and commenting on this.
26:51
But from what I saw, looks like a real player and you notched 24
26:54
goals over the course of two seasons.
26:55
And even before her two seasons at Sociedad in her last season
26:59
with Volarenga in top Syrian, she notched eleven goals and two
27:03
assists in about 1300 minutes of playing time.
27:06
So she's been on a on a nice scoring streak the last few
27:09
seasons. So they bring in her and they
27:11
also brought in a trio of Brazilians midfielder and a
27:14
Victoria from Paris Anjuman defender Lauren from Casey
27:18
Current and midfielder Luani, who last played for Madrid CFF
27:23
on loan from my Seattle Reign. So you know, I have this opinion
27:27
with your Orlando pride domestically, if your strategy
27:31
is we bought a bunch of Brazilian players contracts,
27:35
thumbs up. I like your strategy.
27:38
Totally agree with that. We've seen all three of those
27:39
players shine, I think at different points.
27:41
And I really appreciate the the little look in preview on two of
27:45
the teams that Arsenal might be facing.
27:47
There we go. Should they advance here?
27:49
I mean, for all my optimism, I do have some worry.
27:52
But I like those moves that you mentioned for Athletico because
27:56
I kind of like it. And I kind of also don't like it
27:58
because we might be facing this team who's going to be, I think
28:01
pretty battle tested. And I think we've we've loosely
28:05
gotten to know Rosenborg a little bit full.
28:08
Disclosure, I started to plan a whole bit where I just, I'm just
28:13
a huge Rosenborg hater because they're one spot above brown in
28:17
the top Syrian table. But I will just say the fine
28:21
folks of Bergen, Norway, we're very, very kind to us.
28:24
You know, Dino's wearing the Crest on his chest as we speak.
28:28
So I don't I don't want to I don't want to alienate Rosenborg
28:32
supporters right away. Although I will say some of my
28:36
some of my instincts are to now treat them like a rival because
28:40
we're indoctrinated in the bronze battalion.
28:42
But Rosenborg finished second place in top Serie in last
28:46
season and they're currently sitting in 2nd place this
28:48
season. Now they are only three points
28:50
ahead of of our beloved bronze. They're sitting on 37, bronze on
28:54
34. And let me just say for the
28:56
record, bronze goal different 18 goals better.
29:00
So we got that going for us. However, I believe we've lost a
29:04
Rosenborg in the last two matches that we've played them.
29:08
So that's unfortunate. I.
29:09
Think it was a great Rasheed Wallace that said gold
29:11
differential don't lie. That's right.
29:14
She'd said it best no matter what.
29:17
Sorry for everybody who's just jumping in this and actually I
29:20
say sorry, but we're not that sorry.
29:21
This is still a Braun podcast, just so everybody knows.
29:25
We're just talking about the UAV Champions League at the same
29:27
time. Yeah, to wear the jersey, in
29:29
case I forgot. Nicely done.
29:32
So there was a lot of joy to be had for Rosenborg last season.
29:35
They had seven players score at least five goals and they had a
29:39
total of 14 players hitting the back of the net.
29:41
Anna Josen Doll was their leading scorer.
29:44
She had eight goals and 9 assists last year.
29:46
But she's not going to be a factor for Rosenborg in this
29:49
UEFA Women's Champions League. But she might be a factor for
29:52
Donald's Fensken winners Hammerby, because that's where
29:54
she's playing and we're going to see her in the qualifying round.
29:58
So in the one match that I did see Rosen play Braun, obviously
30:02
I was watching it from the Braun perspective.
30:04
Rosenborg scored early, they scored in the 1st 5 minutes,
30:07
they scored late, they scored in the 76 minute.
30:10
Again, they had more of the ball.
30:12
They allowed Braun to kind of take some shots, but they never
30:15
really looked super comfortable out there.
30:17
So when you say that one of these teams, whether it's
30:20
Atletico or Rosenborg, is going to come in playing Arsenal
30:24
battle tested, I think you're exactly right.
30:27
I think these are two good sides.
30:28
And this is exactly what kind of the theme of this entire show
30:32
has been. These are great teams from all
30:34
over the world and they play in, you know, very decisis of
30:38
leagues. And now we kind of get to see
30:41
what happens. And we talked about it as Braun
30:44
progressed and they made the knockout stage and we were
30:47
mocking everybody for saying, oh, the lowest coefficient, but
30:50
you ain't you. What's the coefficient for
30:52
Braun's heart? You don't even know what that
30:54
is. It's off the charts.
30:55
That's the beauty of the tournament.
30:57
We might get be able to see it from another team this year.
31:00
Yeah, here's hoping. Here's also hoping it's not
31:02
Rosenborg. I was going through the mental
31:04
processes of like, you know, do I want them to beat Athletic so
31:08
that we could just lay the smack down on them and get a little
31:12
brown retribution. Nice.
31:13
But then I realized that I don't know, man, those top Syrian
31:16
teams might just be something about them.
31:19
Maybe I don't want those problems.
31:21
I don't know. This is sort of what the
31:22
Champions League does to us, turns us into maniacs.
31:25
Up is down, down is up, left is right.
31:27
So we just kind of have to buckle up and and and you know,
31:30
just try to survive, survive this round.
31:33
I did want to hit one more matchup in the league path.
31:37
There's some good matchups you already mentioned pre FC has
31:39
taken on 1st Vienna and that one's going to be good.
31:41
Eintrac Frankfurt in action against sporting CP Spartz of
31:44
Praha versus linkoping. That one's going to be really
31:47
fun. The matchup that I wanted to hit
31:49
though, another one of our beloved sides, Ajax taking on
31:53
Kolos Kolivka. This one's going down in
31:56
Denmark. IX finished second in the Air
31:58
Divisi, just two points behind the aforementioned FC Twente.
32:02
IX, though, you know, we're talking a lot of goal
32:04
differential on the show. We're talking about how how
32:06
little goal differential lies. They did finish the season in
32:10
the Dutch league with the best goal differential, clearing the
32:13
next best by seven goals. Now heading into this
32:16
tournament, they will be without Rome Luchter and Chastity Grant,
32:19
both who have moved on. So IX, they're going to need to
32:21
find goals elsewhere. I don't know what are you going
32:23
to be looking for when when we get to see IAX and those IAX
32:26
colors out there doing IAX things on the pitch.
32:31
I'm looking forward to it, man. You know, IAX, whether it's
32:34
women's football or men's football, if IAX is playing in
32:37
there on television, I probably want to watch it.
32:39
Historic club, legendary players, some players who are
32:43
legends in the making, some might say, I think that they
32:46
should come out here And you know, we talk about the plucky
32:49
teams who are going to come up. Kolos Kovalevka out of the
32:53
Ukrainian league. I think if you're IX, you have
32:56
to look at this and say we need to batter this team.
32:59
They need to kind of look at this and say we're the bigger
33:02
club, we have elite talent on our side.
33:05
They have to go into this tournament every time thinking,
33:07
OK, air divisive round is not quite big enough for us to get
33:12
an auto bid yet. So we got to win three matches,
33:15
but we're IX. Can IX win three matches in the
33:18
row? Of course we can.
33:19
So I think they're going to come in here in Denmark really
33:22
looking to set a tone. Yeah, I think you can you can
33:25
imagine that maybe they got a good draw.
33:27
They're in the the same pool with Fiorentina and Bronby and
33:32
Koloskovolvka. Koloskovolvka.
33:35
They finished second in the Ukrainian Women's Professional
33:38
Football League last season. This season, different story
33:40
though. Four matches and still early.
33:43
They're currently 15th in their home league.
33:46
Yet to win a match. 2 losses, 2 draws -2 goal differential.
33:49
So Ajax might be another team catching their opponent at the.
33:53
Right time. Nice.
33:54
That is a recipe for obviously the Charles Barkley quote.
33:59
I don't know who Kolos Kovalevka is, but they're in trouble.
34:04
I love that, so good. It works.
34:06
It works for so many things. Yeah, it's, it's a, it's tried
34:09
and true. Absolutely.
34:10
Last little tidbit on this one. We know that ARA DBZ is
34:13
announcing their town of the Year award winners on Monday.
34:16
Kind of like the Dutch league Heisman Trophy.
34:18
You could, you might say nice. Previous winners include RN
34:22
Robin, Kristen Erickson and Esme Brooks last year.
34:25
Some pretty talented young players at IX probably in the
34:27
mix for that award. We'll keep an eye on that.
34:29
I would have to imagine last year was the first year that
34:32
they started actually award supporting it to someone on the
34:35
women's side of the league too. So progress is good.
34:39
Some people have accused me of being a progressive kind of guy.
34:42
I would say maybe we could have started doing that a little
34:45
earlier, but you know what, we're doing it now.
34:47
Let's keep it moving forward. Interested to see who takes it
34:50
on both sides this year. Yeah.
34:52
I mean, this is only season 2 for us.
34:53
So who are we to say? Anybody that is anybody should
34:56
have started earlier. You know, we're starting where
34:58
we're starting. What are we going to do?
35:00
You know, we're all, we're all trying to elevate this thing
35:02
together. Quick programming reminder,
35:05
we'll be back early next week to breakdown NWSL match week 18.
35:08
So be sure to be subscribed. You won't want to miss that.
35:11
And we will be back next weekend to kind of recount all the
35:15
Champions League action. We might wait till after the
35:17
9th, maybe after the draw. We'll be back with Champions
35:20
League recaps and previews for those final 12 pre group stage
35:24
matches. Very exciting stuff man.
35:27
Our Champions League coverage still just just just getting
35:29
started. Make sure to stay locked in.
35:31
This is just the first little baby step in the journey to the
35:35
final in Lisbon. Yeah, man, I'm excited to take
35:38
this very first baby step. But I also want to point out
35:41
that to all of our pals who started rocking with us at the
35:44
beginning. And like throughout the UEFA
35:46
Women's Champions League journey last year, we've been lucky
35:49
enough to make pals with people all around the world from Norway
35:51
and the UK and Portugal. So let us know who are we
35:55
missing? Who did we not not talk about
35:56
who? Maybe we should reconsider as a
35:58
dark horse. You guys know ball and you're
36:00
out there in those countries. So please tell us.
36:03
Honestly, I'm almost as excited for that part as I am the
36:07
football itself because we have so many people are like, hey,
36:09
man, I watched this video hoping to get my team.
36:11
You didn't talk about them. Here's why they're great.
36:13
And then we'll we'll be locked in.
36:15
So please let us know. I love that.
36:16
Yeah, definitely learning. I mean, it's a learning podcast
36:19
of. Course.
36:20
But it's also a community podcast.
36:22
So I'm glad you kind of showed a little light on that because the
36:26
community that bubbled up after last year's Champions League,
36:29
just unbelievable rocking with us all the way through to our
36:33
post final live show and then to our post post post final recap
36:38
with our guy Chris Sharples from the Zone.
36:40
That was a great. I mean, just, I mean, I can't
36:42
believe we're we're back here already.
36:44
I am just ready to get the football going.
36:46
I mean, the midweek action as well, the midweek midday action,
36:51
being in the US, I mean, that's just fucking unbeatable.
36:54
It's just unbeatable. I'm very, very excited.
36:56
Alright man, before I have to go hold myself off in the backyard.
36:59
Anything else you want to hit before we get out of here?
37:01
I think that's it. I think we are back.
37:03
We're only we're stopping right there.
37:05
We are back with the UEFA Women's Champions League.
37:08
I think we've covered some of the things we need to cover
37:10
again. Let us know who we missed, who
37:12
we need to keep an eye out for. But yeah, man, it's good to be
37:16
back. Hell yeah, great to be back.
37:18
Wanted to do a couple quick shout outs as well.
37:21
We got a lot of great feedback from some of those members in
37:24
our said community. So shout out to a boy named Blue
37:27
Flangus Laumer. Legends.
37:29
Both of the Michaels, you already know what time it is a
37:31
CO2 Filey chiming in, giving us a little bit more shit on our
37:35
Delphine Cascarito oversight, but she also came back over the
37:40
top and let us know that she thinks that we should have an
37:43
alcoholic beverage sponsor. 0 arguments there.
37:47
I appreciate you chiming in. A seal for sure.
37:50
Philip Sullivan, you already know what time it is.
37:51
Great, great friend of the show Blade Runner.
37:53
Way way way too many to name. Sharky Kitten, who I think had
37:58
some great Orlando Pride stuff after all that they chimed in
38:03
with in our comment section. So shout out for sure.
38:06
I don't know, the community just keeps coming through.
38:09
I'm just extremely appreciative of that.
38:11
We found a good corner of the Internet who would have thought
38:15
unbelievable. 30 plus years after Al Gore invented the
38:18
Internet, Dino Des Espinos and Grant Angle have found a
38:21
favorable, nice, friendly corner of the Internet.
38:25
Who? Who could have conceived that?
38:27
I don't know, man, life's good. What what else could we say?
38:30
And we're right here again. We have an entire tournament.
38:34
We have an entire tournament to look forward to.
38:36
Oh my God, it's going to be absolutely amazing.
38:39
All right, man, I think we did it.
38:40
There's been another episode of Into the Channel.
38:41
A sincere thank you for watching, listening, following,
38:44
liking, subscribing, just plain hanging out with your boys,
38:47
being part of said community. We appreciate you.
38:50
Remember to like, if you liked and subscribe or follow into the
38:53
channel, YouTube, Spotify, Apple podcast, wherever you like to
38:55
watch or listen. Leave us a review over at your
38:56
favorite podcast, podcast app, links to all of our socials in
38:59
the show notes of this episode, and a big thank you to my coast
39:01
as well. Mr. Grant Angle debutante no
39:04
more. We are vets in this shit.
39:07
Season 2. You already know what time it
39:09
is. I appreciate you bro.
39:10
Likewise, buddy, we're coming back stronger than ever.
39:13
There's no one and done for us. We're going to win the three
39:16
matches. We're going to get into the
39:17
group stage, make it to the knockouts.
39:19
We'll be here throughout the duration and we appreciate that
39:22
you guys will as well and we will see you next time.