Latest / Into the Channel ⚽️ A Podcast Primarily About Women's Football / UWCL POSTGAME: Lyonnes Advances, Arsenal OUT | Recap Analysis Breakdown | Lyon 3 (4) v Arsenal 1 (3)

Transcript

UWCL POSTGAME: Lyonnes Advances, Arsenal OUT | Recap Analysis Breakdown | Lyon 3 (4) v Arsenal 1 (3) · Into the Channel ⚽️ A Podcast Primarily About Women's Football

0:06
OK, welcome to you Into the Channel podcast primarily about
0:11
women's football. I suppose I'm your host, Dean of
0:14
Suspicion. As always, I'm joined by my
0:17
coast, Mr. Graham Angle. What is up man?
0:21
Well, buddy, you know, I often start by saying I'm feeling
0:24
fantastic, but I'm an empathetic man.
0:27
You're, you've been a good pal of mine for a long time and I, I
0:31
will offer you this though I'm feeling fantastic because,
0:34
because to talk about football, there's a lot to discuss.
0:37
Let me offer you this though. The Boston Celtics are a bunch
0:41
of fucking trash bags and all their fans are really sad right
0:44
now. So can I at least offer you
0:45
that? I mean, I'll, I'll gladly accept
0:49
that. I'll gladly accept watching
0:51
those bombs. Not even have to get on the
0:53
plane. They could just get in their
0:55
cars and go home and start their vacation.
0:57
That was just happy time. Never never felt so much Sixer
1:02
Sixer juice running through me. You know, I'm an Eagles fan, but
1:05
you saw. So I'm definitely a Philly
1:06
sports sympathizer. But that was that was nice.
1:08
Soften the blow for sure. No doubt.
1:11
But you know, that's why we're podcast primarily about women's
1:15
football. I needed to get the Boston
1:17
Celtics slander in there immediately.
1:19
But I suppose we should also talk about the football.
1:22
We should, man. Let's do it.
1:23
Where are you going to get started?
1:24
Let's get started with a beverage.
1:26
Speaking of softening the blow, let's.
1:29
Further soften. Cheers to you.
1:36
Cheers to the football, Cheers to a good run too, man.
1:40
Like, yeah, I think it's important not to lose sight of
1:42
that. You know, I, I felt, I felt a
1:45
similar tinge today. I was like, you know, we're one
1:48
of the three or four when I say we, I'm talking about Arsenal.
1:51
Arsenal is one of the three or four best teams in Europe.
1:53
And that's an absolute point of pride because you know, but you
1:58
know, they're right there and you ends up being a coin flip,
2:01
you know, match with Leon ends up going what, 170, five, 176
2:06
minutes into the 180 with these teams.
2:09
Even so, I felt great about it. The result?
2:12
Obviously not, not what we wanted and and not really a
2:15
great game of football, but a memorable game of football and a
2:18
memorable 2 matches no doubt so. Let's let's get started with it.
2:23
So Lyon 3, Arsenal 1 Lyon advances to the UEFA Women's
2:30
Champions League final on aggregate by score 4 to 3 over
2:34
the Gunners. I will say that yes, it was not
2:38
the most beautiful game of football.
2:41
Arsenal manager Renee Slager has correctly pointed out.
2:43
Especially in the first half, it was a lot of stop start, a lot
2:46
of ref ball going on that I didn't particularly enjoy.
2:49
One of the big things that really stuck out to me, made me
2:51
raise an eyebrow early was the fact that Lyon seemed to from
2:57
the whistle from from the from the tunnel, come out with a lot
3:01
of energy. And one of the first things I
3:04
thought about was how's my guy Dino feeling about this with
3:07
Leon getting off to a fast start?
3:10
Was it feeling great? I mean, yeah, to a fast start.
3:13
And in my notes, I look at my notes, my first note, third
3:17
minute, Leon dot, dot dot, great early pressure.
3:20
It's like my first note that I'm like, that was a that was the
3:23
foretelling of what was what was to come for sure.
3:26
And then I think later in the match, there was an overhead
3:29
shot when Von Domsler, I think, was taking a goal kick and the
3:34
touch tighted nature of what Leon was doing in the midfield.
3:36
It looked like a corner, like they were just like, no, we're
3:39
just going to be on everybody. And I'm like, it looked like a
3:41
third and 6th, you know, the NFC Championship game or something.
3:44
Like everybody was locked down. I'm like, what the hell is this?
3:47
Like, is this just a regular free kick, You know, 430 minutes
3:52
left in the match, but Leon was locked in.
3:55
Absolutely, you know, defensively and offensively, I
3:58
think, you know, for heaps to to get that look early, you know,
4:02
and then put in the back of the net and kind of get the get the
4:04
ball rolling. Do Mornay.
4:06
I thought from jump was super dynamic.
4:09
Do Mornay and Diani like you can see the chemistry and what was
4:12
missing from from from the first like matchup.
4:15
But what what was your read on like?
4:17
Let's say that you know, I I love the the 15 minute chunk
4:20
approach, 1st 15 minutes. What was your read there?
4:24
Yeah, I mean, you mentioned, you know, Heaps puts the ball on the
4:27
back of the net there's so we would was the official call.
4:32
I mean to put you on the spot, but it seemed like from the
4:35
broadcast the official call was Engen was offside on the corner
4:38
and she had impacted the play by standing in front of the keeper.
4:41
Or is she fouling the keeper? I thought she was fouling the
4:44
keeper. She kind of was on one side that
4:46
she scooted on the other. And then that was like a minute
4:48
after kind of like there was some some shenanigans the other
4:51
way where Endler kind of took a dive and got the foul.
4:55
But Blackstein, you say? So there was some weird dark
4:58
arts nature where I think both coaches regular let's make the
5:02
let's make the key, you know, the the ref make a call here and
5:06
and muck things up, you know, specifically right around the
5:08
keeper because it was kind of going both ways early.
5:11
Yeah, I definitely agree with that and I mean you, but you
5:15
mentioned that that heaps non goal there.
5:18
Hegeberg had looked like she had a golden opportunity when DNA,
5:22
you know, played the ball across Hegeberg just misses it.
5:25
She was probably offside from the first look.
5:27
But you know, some of those camera angles can be a little
5:29
deceptive as we'll we'll probably talk about that later
5:32
in the match. You need like the right camera
5:34
angle and you know the good the good line graphic, which just
5:40
quick note, broadcasters give me that early.
5:44
I know you got it. I know, I know it's available.
5:46
Give me the give me the you know, the the cartoon graphic or
5:50
whatever it is. And then you draw the line.
5:52
Just do the thing like you got all the it's a big enough match.
5:55
You got it. But to answer your question
5:57
directly, Buddy, Bosh a ball and Melchi du Mornay, we talked
6:03
about it in the last episode where you correctly pointed out
6:06
inserting Selma Basha into this fixture is going to have an
6:11
impact both defensively and offensively.
6:13
And I beat the drum pretty loudly that Du Mornay starting
6:18
over Corbin Trader would change things.
6:21
And we love Arsenal's defense. We talked about it all Champions
6:24
League. But Melchi du Mornay, when she
6:26
is when she is firing, she is a huge conundrum for any defense
6:32
that's out there. I mean, she obviously had a
6:36
great game and had great impacts today all throughout the match.
6:39
But it wasn't until I went back and kind of revisited my notes
6:42
to kind of see all the different spots where I where I had some
6:45
very elaborate, you know, stories, you know, many stories
6:48
written about Du Morne on the day. 12 box touches for Du Morne
6:53
Arsenal as the team had 19. She gets the assist to you,
6:58
LeBron, you know, basically the clincher.
7:01
There was one replay where lots of Woobin, Woobin Moi like you
7:06
kind of gets dispossessed and rolls over and just looks at
7:10
Duwanee exasperated in slow motion.
7:12
The camera catches or just being like, like you damn me, damn me
7:16
like that. Like, you know, it was kind of
7:17
bad. And in my notes, I wrote Duwanee
7:20
is an F1 car doing Donuts in the center of the pitch.
7:23
And then about 20 minutes later, I wrote Mel G unlocks
7:26
everything. You know, I think both of those
7:29
pretty much were, I don't know, it was a really night and day
7:31
between, you know, the, the I mean, she's just so good and
7:35
she's such a key, you know, I mean, she just basically makes
7:40
it so that your furthest your your your player in Seattle can
7:43
connect with your play in Orlando.
7:45
You know, it's just like, doesn't really matter what's you
7:47
know, she's just that that effective and has that much
7:50
range. Yeah, and Speaking of Seattle,
7:53
Melchi, beautiful weather out here right now.
7:55
I mean, look, it's a great place to live.
7:57
You win the Champions League. You know, Lindsay Heaps is going
8:00
to Denver back. You'll get you'll get, you know,
8:03
altitude sickness, all that. You don't have to deal with that
8:05
over in Seattle. Just keep it in mind.
8:08
And the great French onion soup right at this little restaurant
8:12
right by Lewinfield. I digress.
8:14
There we go. I like Leon's getting Leon
8:18
getting that heaps goal called off was obviously super annoying
8:24
for them, but they still look so dangerous and Du Mornay look so
8:28
dangerous from the jump that, you know, I think the the thing
8:34
that I that probably Lyon supporters had to worry about
8:37
was OK, we look great. We get that goal, that goal
8:40
called off. We have the Hegeburg miss chance
8:43
that might have been might have been offside, whatever.
8:46
The only thing they really had to worry about in that in that
8:48
moment, I'm sure they were worried about several things
8:50
they needed to get, you know, they needed to get the equalizer
8:52
over the tie and all that stuff. But they probably were thinking,
8:56
OK, the the attack looks good. Don't give up anything in
9:00
transition. And when you talk about their
9:02
midfield playing touch tight, shout out to the legend Lori
9:05
Lindsay. I think they were, they were
9:07
doing the work on both ends to make sure we're going to attack,
9:11
but we're also not going to be super vulnerable to the counter.
9:15
Yeah, and they they definitely did that.
9:19
You know, they just made it really tough for Mariona.
9:22
They made it really tough for Kim Little.
9:24
There just was not a lot of places to go.
9:26
And you know, Russo, they they just forced her to kind of like
9:31
be, you know, like she has those skills to, you know, kind of be
9:35
more active in the center of the park.
9:36
But when when that's everything, that's every touch it, it just
9:40
takes away some some of what she's so good at.
9:44
We were talking about Du Mornay. We didn't really even get to the
9:46
point where she's the one that draws that penalty in the 16th
9:50
minute where splits the double team.
9:53
Emily Fox, Latouman Moy just on on a no chance pass from
9:57
Johannes. Like, yeah, Johannes puts a good
10:00
pass in. It's like, let's see what
10:01
happens. And Du Mornay is completely
10:03
beaten, you know, to you know, and just I don't know.
10:06
I still I've I've watched it 10 times.
10:07
I still how exactly she gets through, gets through, wins the
10:11
ball, draws the foul and then we have 5 minutes, 6 minutes, 7
10:16
minutes, 8 minutes of, you know, just what court proceedings
10:20
before before finally Renar puts it in and and makes the goal for
10:25
real for real. Yeah, I mean, so directly from
10:29
my notes, you know, the angle here.
10:33
Here's what I say. Quote, the angles on the
10:35
broadcast were pretty goofy, but it looks like Woman, Woman Moy
10:39
clips Du Mornay's right ankle on her way in, and I think it's a
10:42
penalty. And then my next note, a little
10:44
like indented bullet, took CBS long enough, but they finally
10:48
got there because they finally showed the right angle.
10:50
And shout out to Chris Whittingham, who had like 50
10:53
good shouts during this match, which is par for the course for
10:56
that dude. He's a legend.
10:57
He's probably for my money, he might be they.
11:01
There's a different conversation.
11:02
He might be the best American football announcer there is.
11:07
I'm Will Han with respect to our guy Mike Watts.
11:10
Hold on a minute. Let me not get crazy here.
11:12
The best American football announcer who calls European
11:16
games. I think I can comfortably say
11:17
that. Yeah, I can.
11:20
Yeah. I think that I feel like that
11:21
play by play. Death match between him.
11:24
Steel cage match between him and Mike Watts for best American
11:28
announcer. We'll, we'll we'll cover that in
11:30
another episode that that's a great bracket for us to make for
11:34
for the offseason, but I digress.
11:37
Like, you know, Renard takes the first PK and then in my notes, I
11:42
say DVD had it the entire way. Like totally read it.
11:45
And it turns out it's largely because she jumped a foot ahead
11:49
of the off the line as the as the penalties being taken.
11:53
It's a it's a great read and a great dive, but the cheating, I
11:56
mean. I went back to watch this one
11:58
too, about 10 * a little tough for von Dumpsar because it
12:04
during renar's backswing, von Dumpsar's got 2, you know, he's
12:09
got 2 feet on the line, you know, and it and it's really
12:12
just a combination of the slow and you know it just.
12:16
She just drew it out a little bit longer than Von Dumpsar was
12:19
ready for and then caught her with it basically, you know, but
12:22
just kind of like really kind of slow, but it wasn't a a super
12:26
egregious jump and she jumped forward.
12:28
She doesn't really jump, you know, kind of into the path.
12:30
I mean, it's still for sure the advantage, but poorly taken.
12:33
You know, I think as soon as she kicked it out, even I wasn't
12:35
even looking at Von. I'm sorry.
12:36
I was like, Nope, you know, as soon as she kicked in, I think I
12:39
think everybody, the para, the parabolic crew also was talking
12:42
about at halftime. You mentioned that.
12:43
So apparently everybody in the world knew that that thing was
12:45
kind of had no chance. And then the second one, Wendy
12:49
renars the legend, you know, not really here, though, you know,
12:52
kind of like clown her. But the second one wasn't any it
12:56
wasn't kind of great shakes. You know, if she sticks it, you
12:58
got to give her, you know, got to be props for that.
13:00
But you know the point to the head, you know, kind of like the
13:02
head. I'm not sure if she was going to
13:03
heavy player there but. I hope so, I don't know that.
13:07
Was a misread. That I absorbed it as, you know,
13:10
heavy play, you know, I'm, I'm thinking about this or, you
13:14
know, whatever it is. Yeah, I, I think that I think
13:18
that's fair game by you. And, and, you know, maybe we
13:22
should give Renar credit for the, you know, the wind up and
13:26
the backswing taking a little extra to, to force, you know,
13:29
because it's a possibility that you force the keeper into doing
13:31
that. So 100%, you know, when it goes
13:34
in, you know, obviously then we're level on the tie.
13:38
It's 22-ON aggregate. We're 20, you know, we're 20
13:42
minutes in, everything to play for, for Leon, they feel, they
13:46
certainly felt like they had the momentum.
13:48
And then just a few minutes later, talking about Wendy
13:51
Renard and her being a legend, one of the greatest players,
13:53
whoever lived just an unbelievable slide tackle to
13:58
pull the ball away from Blaxtenius.
14:00
Renard crashes into Antler. But it's it's absolutely vital
14:06
that she made that intervention before Blaxtenius looked like
14:09
she was going to have a clean shot one-on-one.
14:12
Yeah, a huge, huge moment there. And I thought Renar was huge
14:17
just kind of stepping up for for Lawrence.
14:19
And, you know, I thought anger and anger was was was great on
14:22
the day from a passing standpoint.
14:24
But, you know, defensively there's, you know, there's stuff
14:25
that you, you know, is just left in the balance.
14:29
And then actually Lawrence on the other side, the same, you
14:33
know, really good moments. But there's spots where she she
14:35
just will lose a battle, you know, and so, and Renar is like,
14:39
she's got a lot of work to do, a lot of work to do, a lot of
14:41
ground to cover. And then it's it's just that
14:43
moment where it's like, right, we need you, Wendy.
14:46
We need we, we need this player for me right here, you know,
14:49
you're the you're the one last line of defense.
14:51
And to her credit, just, you know, just stuck it.
14:54
I mean, she was just really good, really, really good,
14:56
really vintage performance today from Renar.
14:59
Yeah, and that's what she does. I mean, you know, like when, you
15:04
know, we'll go back and you know, we're talking about how
15:06
great she is and she's had a billion great moments.
15:09
But do you think, you think about a couple years ago when
15:11
Leon lost to Barcelona in the final?
15:14
You know, one of the lasting images from that final was her
15:17
getting turned around like 4 times by CGH when CGH scores a
15:22
goal. And like, you know, part of when
15:25
we talk, we talk a lot about margin for error.
15:29
When that happens to Wendy Renard, Lyon's probably in big
15:32
trouble and they and they end up losing that final.
15:35
She didn't let it happen today. I mean, she was she was big in
15:38
in multiple spots, you know, obviously scores the penalty,
15:41
gets that big slide tackle. Yeah.
15:45
I just think, you know, there were a lot of things going
15:48
against Arsenal, but yeah, what what?
15:51
We're 16 minutes in and we've only talked about the first
15:54
goal. So we're we're 16 minutes into
15:56
the podcast, We're 20 minutes into the match.
15:58
I'm gonna, you know, help me out here.
16:01
The driver of this car We're how to.
16:03
Drive for like an 83. We're at drive for like an 83
16:06
minute episode. Let's try to pick up the base a
16:08
little bit. All right, 3036 minute.
16:10
Basha puts in the ball, a corner kick, but a little bit little
16:14
Basha ball from the corner. DND surgical, you know on the
16:18
you know on the volley. Just come on, how do you how
16:21
does one do that? How does one even decide, hey,
16:23
this is what I'm going to do? Obviously ridiculous finish
16:27
beats Von Domslar and then just go straight missing persons
16:31
versus Kim little on that one. I mean a tough, tough assignment
16:34
for little. But I thought and and IA few
16:36
minutes later I had in my notes too.
16:39
There was a moment where, you know, and it made me go back to
16:43
even last week when I was, you know, commenting on Lilihanas
16:45
and Kim Little, you know, kind of just going one-on-one, being
16:48
like, oh, this is cool, you know, kind of like microcosm.
16:51
But there was a moment where Lily beats Kim Little and then
16:55
Leo gives the ball away, Little gets it, and then Lily just
16:58
takes it right back. I think that was like her
17:00
before. And I'm just like, man, I'm
17:01
like, this is a really tough matchup for Kim.
17:04
It's not really a, you know, a shot on her.
17:06
It was just against that. It's a bad matchup.
17:09
And that midfield just bullied Arsenal's midfield.
17:12
You know, it, they made it really, really hard.
17:16
I thought Heaps was solid today, you know, Johannes, I thought
17:20
was awesome, you know, I mean, passing wise, I mean her
17:23
numbers. She completes 33 of 38 passes, 9
17:27
to the final third credited, credited with 10 recoveries.
17:31
She spun Mariana right before halftime.
17:33
Oh boy, that was a play buddy. You know, I caught that one.
17:37
Like, oh boy. In the spin, hit the circle
17:40
button on the PlayStation. Let's go.
17:43
Yep, 360 it was great, was great.
17:48
And I think yeah, that Velti Basha Lily's performance today,
17:54
I thought, you know, Renu Renar, like you can kind of see that
17:57
that that central that central bit, you know, just coming
18:01
having a massive impact on the match.
18:03
And I thought Arsenal left a little on the table.
18:07
You know, I would want to see Caitlin Ford kind of go at
18:10
Ashley Lawrence a little bit more.
18:11
I thought that was a matchup and and credit to Leon, they they
18:14
kind of took advantage of the matchups that favored them.
18:18
Another one from the first match of Olivia Smith had a really
18:20
good first leg. And then today, you know, Basha
18:25
Johannes, you LeBron, you know, on that side just made it
18:28
impossible. And there was a Smith Basha duel
18:32
right before halftime that I was just like, Oh my God, you know,
18:35
it's not going to be the day for Smith.
18:36
It was just like a tell, you know, like every, every duel was
18:40
close but ended with me being really disappointed.
18:45
I'm, I'm really glad you mentioned that.
18:46
So, so Basha won nine out of 11 of her ground duels.
18:51
These stats are courtesy from our pals at 5 mob, obviously.
18:54
And then she won two of, of she won 100%, two of two of her
18:58
aerial duels. We've talked about this like,
19:02
and you know, I obviously I, I pride myself on trying to be an
19:05
articulate gentleman and I try to be well spoken.
19:09
And as I've said about Arsenal's defense, they don't let you do
19:12
any of your shit. Leon was came into this match.
19:16
It was clearly like, no, we're going to do our shit today.
19:21
And and if you force Kim Little into some defensive mistakes, if
19:27
you make things really difficult for Cal Dente, if Woben Moy and
19:31
Williamson are going to be scrambling all match, you're
19:34
going to be in a pretty good position to beat arsenal.
19:36
Now all those doing all those things in the same 90 minutes is
19:41
way easier said than done as we have seen from the Champions
19:45
League title holders over this past calendar year Well in the
19:48
not calendar year 365 days since the since the last Champions
19:52
League final. But Leon was able to do that and
19:55
I and I think they, you know, they they took advantage of some
20:00
some space on the wide channels and you they needed Du Monet to
20:06
have a good game, Braun to have a good game, Dionne to have a
20:09
good game, which, you know, Dionne's form has a has been a
20:12
little up and down, but it was up today way up.
20:15
And and so, you know, and then they bring on Katoto and I
20:18
thought Katoto was good. I got to I got to take a look at
20:22
the comments. My apologies.
20:24
It was one of our pals might have been barred.
20:28
Who who the nor one of our Norwegian pals who has said
20:31
like, hey, man, anybody consider considering that Hagerberg
20:35
hasn't been that great for a while.
20:38
And like I, I felt like Katoto was good coming in for
20:41
Hagerberg. And I thought there were some
20:42
chances. I mean, we talked about that
20:44
first chance that Hagerberg missed that may have been may or
20:46
may not have been offside. But either way, even if she was
20:48
offside, you wouldn't want to see her bury that as the as DNA
20:52
puts in the perfect cross. I thought Katoto raised some
20:55
issues for Arsenal's defense as well.
20:57
Yeah, I think, you know, Hagerberg definitely flubbed
21:00
that one and she kind of gives the thumbs up.
21:02
I'm just kind of hanging, you know, it's always way off on
21:04
that one. And she was offsets.
21:06
But you know, I mentioned it last week, you know, that I'm
21:12
like, if, if Leon's going to advance the end, he's got to
21:14
score because it's not going to be, I mean, Kototo came in and
21:17
was was a shot in the arm, you know, just was involved and did
21:21
stuff did well passing the ball too.
21:26
I think, you know, it's it's kind of side note, but maybe
21:28
she's kind of carving out a little bit of a different spot.
21:30
But DND was awesome and then playing off Du Monet was awesome
21:34
too. So I think that that was a key
21:36
difference for me because, you know, if you're looking for DND
21:40
to just kind of be the the athletics tip of the spear, you
21:43
know, like you're leaving a lot on the table and just thinking
21:48
about where Du Monet was receiving the ball and starting
21:51
the offense just opens up so much.
21:53
You could give it to her anywhere and it's like, all
21:55
right, we're off. It's like you could be in the
21:57
corner. You could be like it's
21:59
everything's in play. This one obviously goes into
22:03
halftime 2 nil. Not going to lie, at that point,
22:07
I'm like your boy had I'm halfway home with my prediction.
22:12
I predicted Leo going up two nil and I I got even closer because,
22:15
you know, our Arsenal clause went back.
22:16
But at half time I'm like, man, what what's arsenal going to do?
22:22
Who's going to save this team? Like, and I'm like my, my, my
22:26
mind just kept going to one name Lindsay Heapes.
22:29
I'm like Lindsay, kick us, kick us some bad passes here, hook us
22:34
up, help us out. She gave she kicked 1 Fox's way
22:38
early. But outside of that, Well,
22:40
actually, this brings me to my heraldo's point, because I
22:45
thought it very odd. When Johannes comes off, Corbin
22:50
Schrader comes on heaps, stays on heaps, obviously involved in
22:54
the goal, you know, later and then gets subbed off for for for
22:58
Damaris in 77. But I I think I think her all
23:02
just kind of pan. I'm not sure what was going.
23:03
You know, you never really know, but up to nil.
23:08
You bring in traitor there and then traitor.
23:11
So you know, she you know what she's going to do.
23:12
I mean, she's going to win the balls.
23:13
You know, she's going to win the balls back and and you know, you
23:16
know, play solid defense. She also she's always going to
23:18
let it RIP. You know, she got the offensive
23:20
DNA for sure. I thought those Subs were kind
23:22
of odd and I'm not sure if he panicked but it seemed weird in
23:26
the moment. Yeah, I like where your head's
23:30
at. I don't know if it's, I
23:31
definitely raised an eyebrow as well, just on my opinion of what
23:37
Johannes brings versus what Schrader brings.
23:39
Right, Like and yeah, like Johannes, I think it was our our
23:44
pal Flanga Slammer mentioned that Johannes in her in her
23:48
development probably needs to do some more movement off ball.
23:51
I thought that was a good take. Shout out to her and pal Flanga
23:54
Slammer in the in the YouTube comments.
23:57
I think that makes sense. I like her.
23:59
I like her strength. I like her awareness on defense.
24:01
I know some people have given have told us too.
24:03
They're like they think she really needs to develop as a
24:06
defender and she does. She's, you know, she's a young
24:08
person, but I I like her defense more than traitor, certainly.
24:12
So I was a little confused by that, You know, Ketoto coming in
24:18
for, for Hegeberg. I like that right around the,
24:21
the hour mark. I don't know.
24:23
I, I wonder if if Heraldez was also trying to send a message
24:27
though of like, OK, I'm putting Schrader on because I want
24:30
somebody who's going to run directly at goal and RIP shots
24:33
and has the ability to make long range shots.
24:35
Like, yeah, we're up to nil, but we are absolutely not done
24:40
scoring goals. I I wonder if that was his
24:42
mindset. Yeah, and and that come that
24:45
came a few minutes after. I mean, it could be because 59
24:50
Steena hits the post and then I think it's barely called for
24:53
offsides, but didn't look offsides.
24:54
I mean, that was like. The did not look offside.
24:56
For the record, yeah. I mean, I don't know, that was
24:59
that just kind of was going around today.
25:01
And then Olivia Smith had that moment where, yeah, the poke,
25:05
like the the lunch poke that got so close that I'm just like,
25:09
man, this is really, really tough.
25:12
So maybe that kind of spurred, you know, hit all this to make
25:15
some moves and kind of expected something coming.
25:18
There was a shot and and I took a note at 65 where I thought
25:25
Arson was playing very kind of desperate.
25:28
And at that point, they're down a goal, you know, like it's 32
25:32
on aggregate. If it was one, if it was one nil
25:35
on aggregate, Arsenal wouldn't have looked like that incomplete
25:39
because they look completely like, you know, just disheveled
25:42
and just scrambly, you know, and I'm like, hey, it's only one
25:44
goal. They end up getting the goal.
25:47
But it just kind of didn't, didn't.
25:49
I thought, I thought things were a little bit unsettled down the
25:52
stretch. There was a shot at 68 with
25:54
Chloe Kelly kind of like not even warming up that that made
25:57
me a little. Gatorade.
25:58
Yeah, my thing right there. Like sitting back and.
26:01
You know, like, yeah. You know, something like, I'll
26:03
show you. She comes in 14 minutes later.
26:06
But I thought those Subs were a little bit slow.
26:08
Homburg obviously comes and gets the assist could have come in a
26:12
little bit earlier, but it was just it felt it felt nervy.
26:18
I mean, I'm, I'm I'm obviously an Arsenal fan.
26:20
I'm watching it and we've got obviously friends at Leo.
26:22
But is that how it felt when you were watching it like kind of
26:26
down the stretch or did it feel kind of sewn up?
26:29
Because, you know, you look at the four three on aggregate,
26:32
you're like, oh, this is this was pretty wacky.
26:34
But in the moment, watching it, it felt, it felt kind of like,
26:39
you know, pretty tumultuous. Yeah, I think that's, I think
26:43
that's fair. Like I never, I was never overly
26:47
confident. Even when they went up to nil, I
26:51
was not overly confident for Leon.
26:53
I was like, OK, they look good, but you know, Arsenal's not
26:57
conceding a ton of possession. Like Arsenal's still able.
27:01
Like, yeah, this isn't the Arsenal defense I'm I'm used to,
27:05
but they're still playing enough good defense.
27:07
They still have enough smart players to be in the right
27:09
position and muck things up when they need to.
27:12
And then, you know, as somebody who cheers for the Lionesses,
27:16
it's just like, well, they still got Alessia up there.
27:18
And so we'll see what what she's able to do.
27:21
But you were you were right earlier in your reference of it
27:24
wasn't an Olivia Smith game for sure.
27:28
And I'm really glad I want to you.
27:30
You teamed me up perfectly to get back to this at at some
27:33
point in the middle of the first half might have been closer to
27:35
the end of the first half. I was just like, where's Caitlin
27:38
Ford? Because she was dynamite in the
27:41
first leg. And, and I don't know if it was
27:44
a lot of like Leon not letting her get into her stuff and you
27:48
know that I think that's probably plausible, but I Leon
27:53
was was able to muck things up themselves on defense while not
27:57
giving up a ton on offense. You know, it's, it's
28:00
interesting. I mean, I looked at some, some
28:03
of the, the passing stats, you know, generally long passing
28:06
teams are in the 40s, fifties, you know, like the, you know,
28:10
range. Leon today was 21 for 41 as an
28:14
example. And then both teams were in the
28:16
40s and 50s first like as well. Today, though, Arsenal 12 for 45
28:22
on long passes, very uncharacteristic, about 25%.
28:26
So Wubin Moy 3 for 12. Now, mind you, 4050% is roughly
28:31
ballpark. Wubin Moy 3 for 12, Caldente 2
28:34
for five, Emily Fox 1 for five. Leah Williams had one for six,
28:38
Von Donsler one for four, Katie McCabe 3 for seven.
28:42
So nobody really in the range of, you know, being able to move
28:46
the ball forward. So you can't move the ball, you
28:48
know, over the top, you know, or just with with distance.
28:51
So what do you got to do? You got to chip away.
28:54
And then those Leo, like those Leo defenders that have closed
28:57
down the space. There's only so many passes
28:59
you're going to be able to put together before somebody gets a
29:02
foot in And and that's the end of it.
29:04
And then you look at the box Stitch, as I mentioned, Melchi
29:07
du Monet by herself has 12. Arsenal has 19.
29:10
You know, and it's like that just it's going to be really
29:12
tricky. Another stat that I think kind
29:14
of blew me away shots inside the box in the first half.
29:17
Leon's got 5, Arsenal's got one on the day.
29:21
It ends up six to one also. So Arsenal just not able to get
29:25
any kind of penetration, any kind of build up, you know, to
29:30
to to put anything consistently, you know, and and have something
29:34
you can bank on. Like to to your point, you see
29:36
Caitlin Ford early that goes away.
29:39
You know, Russo, you're not going to be able to keep her,
29:41
you know, away for 90 minutes. Pakistanis either.
29:43
But Smith, they were able to kind of extinguish Smith after
29:47
Smith had a really good showing last week.
29:50
Yeah, I think I think that was probably the the one of the
29:52
bigger keys for Lyon. Like you mentioned, as as we
29:56
talk through the match here, you're not going to be able to
29:58
keep Arsenal off the score sheet.
30:02
You know, it's you know, they they don't get clean sheeted a
30:04
lot, at least to my recollection.
30:08
How about that? How about that Russo goal?
30:11
I mean, you know, it's a, it's a great, it's a great ball in from
30:17
it was Homburg. Yeah, who who I thought made a
30:19
good impact, you know, coming in, you know, Homburg and Polova
30:24
come in together. Polova gets a yellow card 30
30:27
seconds into her time. 30 seconds might be generous.
30:31
Polova gets a gets a yellow card almost immediately.
30:34
But Homburg is, you know, running up and down the wing.
30:37
She plays in a great pass, but Russo splitting the defenders,
30:42
jumping in to kind of just create the opportunity for the
30:45
goal. You know, you you talk about the
30:49
roller coaster. Tell me where you were at when
30:52
you get that aggregate equalizer.
30:55
I mean, you know, I made the the I hate to do this, but the my
31:00
first the first place, but brain goes into prediction.
31:03
So I predicted Leon would go up two nil and then the this one
31:08
would end 22. So obviously we're at 21 here
31:10
and I'm I'm looking at the clap like what, 30 minutes, how many
31:13
how much time we have getting really close.
31:16
I'm starting to get really excited about that.
31:19
And the goal looked good and and honestly, you know, I had the
31:24
thought of like what, you know, heap still in the game, you
31:26
know, and obviously she's one of the the the the players that
31:28
Russo kind of splits. I think it's heaps and Lawrence
31:31
in the in that moment and then a great finish.
31:34
Plenty of time, you know, and, and I'm like, OK, this is here
31:38
we go. And I think Whittingham too on
31:40
the call was like feels like there's another, you know, like
31:42
it was like, all right, we've got like 6 or seven goals and
31:44
he's like, feels like there's one last one, like he was just
31:47
ready for it. So, you know, shout out to shout
31:50
out to him on the call there. But I was pumped.
31:53
I was really pumped, but also cautious because this was, you
31:59
know, Arsenal had 0 control of this match, you know, like 0,
32:05
you know, like we talked about last week, you know, the first
32:07
half was 5050 and then they they kind of wrestle control in the
32:10
second-half. Today things were happening in,
32:13
in spots, but Arsenal didn't had no command of this match
32:17
whatsoever. All of it played on Leon's
32:19
terms. Doesn't mean we're going to
32:21
lose, you know, under those circumstances, but it makes it
32:23
really, really hard. Yeah.
32:26
And I think part of that, it's really tough when you don't have
32:30
a lot of control of the match as a whole and you are holding on
32:36
for dear life on set pieces. Oh my God.
32:39
And it's like you, you know, then it's like, OK, where are we
32:42
winning then? Because because yeah, maybe
32:44
you're maybe you're getting rocked in like time of
32:47
possession or something, but maybe you have some bigger
32:49
players or whatever and you can play some counter attack in
32:51
football, win on some set pieces.
32:53
But you know, they talk. They did again, shout out to
32:56
Chris Whittingham and Jen Beatty.
32:57
Like they did a good job of talking about how great Lyon is
33:00
on on set pieces. And there we are.
33:06
You know why? I think shortly before the goal,
33:09
Basha played in a corner and goes out to du Mornay and du
33:12
Mornay, like takes a touch, controls it, Deeks a defender
33:16
and then just hits a laser that's barely wide.
33:19
I think that was right around like the 80th or 81st minute and
33:22
I was like, and and Beatty had just said a couple moments
33:25
earlier, you're going to want to stop conceding set pieces to
33:29
Leon. Duvernay almost scores on that
33:31
one. It's just a little bit wide
33:32
right. And you know, that was that was
33:36
only like 9-8 or nine minutes before Leon gets the winner.
33:40
But like, yeah, I think your point is well taken where it's
33:45
like you're not you're not winning possession.
33:47
You don't have you have way fewer shots.
33:49
You're not getting any real big chances.
33:51
You're not getting any shots on goal and you're getting beat on
33:54
set pieces. It's like, OK, you know, we got
33:57
the magical Russo goal, do we? Is there another rabbit to pull
34:01
out of the hat? And unfortunately for the
34:03
Gunners, there was not. Not for the Gunners, but for
34:08
for, for that F1 car, Melty du Mornay and you LeBron.
34:11
There was there was one last one for sure. 86 minute shout out to
34:16
the Spanish announcers too. I kind of flipped over and
34:19
enjoyed some of some of that over there.
34:20
Nice. And and on that moment, the play
34:22
by play du morning's got the ball on the edge of the box and
34:26
the Spanish announcer's like MI de la brande, MI de la brande E
34:30
labio, but on so she's like, look at Brad, look at Brad and
34:33
she found her, you know, like so pretty, pretty fun moment.
34:37
Like, you know, I love with it with the announcer kind of goes
34:39
out on the ledge and and nails it like that.
34:43
And then that one goes to VAR a lengthy extend extended VAR.
34:49
I'm not sure if you know any calls came came down from the
34:52
skybox, you know, moving along, but goes the owns way.
34:56
No, I'm just kidding. Beautiful goal.
34:58
And in my notes, I actually, I actually wrote like a goal that
35:02
was so perfect that I I kind of wanted to count, you know,
35:08
because like I want you want that moment to be like, Oh man,
35:11
to money over the top and put great action and finish from
35:15
Braun too. The control on the right foot to
35:19
get it over to the left and then to kind of curl it in.
35:22
Yeah, it was absolutely fantastic.
35:24
It was a great, great chip over the top by Du Mornay.
35:29
I like the rule of like if it's just your, you know, your
35:32
forearm and like your arm ahead of the head of the defender,
35:35
it's still not an offside. Again, I would I would like to
35:39
see from the broadcast, give me the give me the line graphic
35:43
quickly. Like you guys don't have access
35:45
to that. Like and and I've I've
35:48
complained on this podcast before, like I want the most
35:53
minimalist version of VAR as possible.
35:57
Is it like I want the people in the booth to tell me is
36:00
something a penalty or is something offside?
36:03
Don't go looking back at like what it might have been a foul
36:06
at midfield and all that shit. Like I want the most limited
36:11
version of instant replay in every sport that I watch because
36:14
I'm it's great shout by you earlier.
36:18
I'm not interested in court proceedings.
36:21
I don't need administrative reviews every couple moments in
36:25
sport. I I want to not live like that.
36:29
Yeah, yeah. And, and I don't think we need
36:31
to revisit it. You know, during the studio
36:33
shows or whatever, we could just talk about football stuff.
36:35
One of the genesis, genesis of this podcast, it's like, let's
36:39
just talk about the football. You asked me how I was feeling
36:43
and you know where where were my emotional states at?
36:46
If I could tell you the most pain that I felt, the most
36:49
painful thing that happened to me today.
36:52
You go on to Font Mob and you see Arsenal and you see the
36:56
strike through. It's grayed out cuts, right?
37:00
I mean, it might as well just cut right through my heart, you
37:02
know, right through, right through the letters of them, the
37:04
word arsenal followed on and right through my heart.
37:08
I've been there several times, buddy.
37:09
I know that. I know the feeling.
37:11
It's not great. It's you know, I understand the
37:14
utility of it for a website to to show it's colder results.
37:19
It is. It's a cold game and then to see
37:22
that cross out, nobody enjoys it, but I I got to imagine it
37:27
stings a little less after winning it last year.
37:32
It does. And, you know, I mean, like I
37:33
said, great showing. Glad, you know, Arsenal didn't
37:37
get rolled here. Not not not that I expected them
37:40
to. But, you know, they went out on
37:41
their sword for sure winnable. And and and I think they're
37:46
going to look back and feel like we we kind of left it.
37:49
We left some out there because they were they were that close.
37:52
Yeah, I wanted to put one last question your way because I
37:58
thought, you know, we've talked about these two players also in
38:00
parallel, Lily Johannes and Kim Little.
38:03
And again, I'm not disparaging Kim Little in any way, but it
38:07
made me think about Lily Johannes signing with Leon and
38:11
wondering if that signing tipped Leon's, you know, you know, the
38:18
that champs final spot in Leon's favor, because when you look at
38:22
just that matchup of those two players, you know, and then
38:26
Arsenal goes on to sign Olivia Smith for for a big, you know,
38:30
amount has moments. Homeburg for not a big amount
38:33
has moments, you know, so it's like, you know, all of it's
38:36
mixed up into one hodgepodge. But I think the Johannes signing
38:42
is going to kind of go down and and you could you could put
38:44
bronze in there as well, you know, because, you know, chewing
38:48
a that, you know, doesn't he goes awry a little bit.
38:51
And there's something about DNE du Mornay and Bronte and like
38:57
the dynamism of those three that I think there's there's really
39:00
good interplay. But I think that the signings,
39:03
those two specifically, I don't know if you feel like nudged
39:08
Lyon over the top in this matchup.
39:14
Yeah, just just for the audience it it's Lawrence Diani and
39:19
Johannes Shabba. I think you're saying bronze,
39:22
obviously, Lucy. Bronze I'm sorry you LeBron.
39:25
Oh, you LeBron. OK, I'm just mishearing you.
39:27
OK. I was just like, why are we
39:28
talking about Lucy Bronze? I mean, she's the best.
39:30
I would talk about Lucy Bronze all the time, OK?
39:32
You LeBron, I was talking about. Lucy Bronze right now.
39:34
Let's go switch. Gears, Yeah, Thank you.
39:37
OK, yeah, sorry, I think that's, I think that's probably fair.
39:42
I mean, Johannes 31 appearances for Lyon this year, six goals, 6
39:47
assists, you know, added creativity, completing passes in
39:52
in this match. You know, Gerald has showed up
39:57
to Lyon and a lot of stuff started switching around.
40:01
Ingrid hanging you could, you could argue is part of that, you
40:05
know, part of that group to come in there and try to inject some.
40:09
You know a different way of playing, you know from from the
40:13
bone past story years. It's it's making me think too of
40:16
like the essentially the Ashley Lawrence Ellie Carpenter swap
40:20
where at the beginning of the season Carpenter looks so good
40:22
Chelsea and we're just like, wow, this is crazy.
40:25
Now Chelsea's got Carpenter too. It's like it was that she was
40:27
playing out of her mind. But and I think Lawrence still
40:29
working right back from injury. And you know, and now it's not
40:33
that it's flip, but now Ashley Lawrence looks on the road back
40:37
and you know, same thing you see flashes looks great.
40:39
Oh, vintage Ashley Lawrence, but still always to kind of like
40:43
make it all the way back. But I thought those those two
40:46
signings specific, you know, and you just wonder if Arsenal grabs
40:49
those two players or if another team grabs those two players
40:51
like Bayern grabs those two players.
40:53
Like what does it look like? You know, because they they have
40:57
just had a little bit of an outsized effect and not just to
41:00
see it. I'm glad you bring up the season
41:02
stats. The season stats is one place,
41:04
but knockout football is a different, you know, it's just
41:08
it's kind of I don't want to throw some of that stuff out,
41:10
but you can throw a lot of it out.
41:12
Sure, there's a lot of productivity in D1 or chemo that
41:16
it really doesn't mean a whole lot.
41:18
You know, once you get to this final four, you know, like
41:21
couple matches left in the Championship upper upper upper
41:25
echelon of Europe, but just thought that was interesting
41:28
those two signings having such a big effect and and now here we
41:32
are with Leon in the final. Yeah, and I and I do think it
41:35
it, it's a, it's a constant battle.
41:38
You know, we talk, we've talked about it in men's football, but
41:41
we we see it obviously here in women's football as well where,
41:44
yeah, people can say whatever they want about, you know, the
41:49
Premier League, Arkema over in France or Liga F in Spain.
41:56
And WSL fans and, and fans of WSL clubs could say, well, we
42:00
have a, we play in a way better league.
42:03
And that sound, that sounds great when Arsenal's holding the
42:06
trophy. But if you're Barcelona and
42:09
Leona be like, well, I don't know.
42:11
We hold the trophy an awful lot of time.
42:12
So like, we play the games on the field and we play right up
42:15
against you guys and, and we're always the ones holding the
42:18
trophy. So we'll, we'll see how that
42:19
goes. So I, I, it does count for
42:22
something though. And as the sport continues to
42:24
have like injections of funding and, and players are, are moving
42:28
around, you know, I, I think it'll, that'll be more
42:32
interesting to see. But I, I compared to the men's
42:34
game too, because, you know, English Premier League fans talk
42:39
about, you know, La Liga like it's not that great.
42:41
And Spanish football fans are walking around like, well,
42:44
that's funny. It seems like Real Madrid and
42:46
Barcelona lift the Champions League trophy all the time.
42:49
And Even so, like other clubs, lift the the, you know, the
42:54
whatever the European. The Europa.
42:56
The Europa League. Thank you.
42:58
Yeah. Like we're we're always lifting
43:00
these intercontinental trophies. So what's up?
43:03
Yeah, and shout out to it. Did I think was it BK Hacken?
43:07
Then when Europa Cup was it, I believe it was Hammerby.
43:13
I'm sorry, on the women's side, I'm sorry I just completely
43:17
derailed this, but. No, I love it.
43:18
It's absolutely fantastic. I mean, I haven't been tracking
43:21
since obviously. Yeah, look at BK Hacken.
43:25
What do the title our old pals. I I I've been mad since
43:29
obviously Braun got eliminated, but look, I another Scandinavian
43:33
team getting it done. Let's go and and our old pals at
43:36
that BK Atkins. I think yeah, Emily Sam's old
43:38
team. I think Schroeder had three
43:41
three goals in the in the second leg.
43:43
So janitor the again Bay FC Bay Area beautiful this time of
43:49
year, young up and Comer. We'll we'll keep tracking it.
43:52
There it is little football calendar Next up next episode
43:58
Barcelona, Bayern little post game from your boys and next
44:02
week how about some more Champions League thoughts, some
44:05
reactions, maybe some interviews.
44:07
I don't keep it locked and end of yourself full on chaos.
44:11
I think we're back. We're we're not we're not fully,
44:13
we're not back right, right, right this second, but we're
44:16
looming. We're lingering.
44:18
I kind of just want to get involved in the chaos.
44:21
I need more chaos in my life. I don't have enough with two
44:24
small children. Keep posted, make sure you're
44:26
subscribed. Following us on all the socials.
44:28
All right man, I think we've gone and done it.
44:30
Is there anything else you want to hit before we get out of
44:32
here? I do want to add something a
44:34
little bit of a personal note, but I, I know a lot of our pals
44:37
on Blue Sky on social media, the folks who chime in, we're
44:41
recording this podcast on May 2nd, you know, moving into May
44:46
3rd at this point, but on May 1st, that is Mayday.
44:50
It is a day where working class people came together by the 10s
44:55
of thousands of the United States of America to celebrate
44:58
workers rights and things that that we can accomplish as
45:02
working class people. And I think it was a beautiful
45:06
celebration of across a lot of the major cities in the United
45:09
States, working class people came together to demand better
45:13
from our elected leaders, from our government.
45:16
I am drinking from a pint glass I purchased from a website that
45:22
is pre owned, airboats.com. And why is that such a silly
45:26
name? It is because it is the website
45:29
of the the only the internet's only college football podcast,
45:33
the shut down full cast. And what I noticed is on women's
45:36
football Twitter. Or pardon me, women's football
45:39
Blue sky. We don't fuck with Twitter
45:40
anymore. People were really locked in to
45:44
the shutdown forecast doing a thing called the Charity Bull.
45:47
And the Charity Bull raised $1.7 million for New American
45:54
Pathways, which is sorry, I just want to make sure I get this
46:00
right. New American Pathways is a full
46:02
service refugee resettlement nonprofit based in Atlanta.
46:06
And the reason I, I, I talk about Mayday and this very this
46:11
like niche college football podcast raising all this money
46:15
for refugee resettlement is that working class people, we can
46:19
make a better world if we band together.
46:22
And so I just want to, I want to shout that out.
46:25
We're, we're all doing our best. We all want to make a, a world
46:27
that's inclusive and, and great for everybody.
46:31
And so it's going to take a lot of a lot of effort because there
46:34
are some people who are definitely working in the
46:36
opposite direction and their own self-interest.
46:38
But we got to keep on pushing. And just, you know, for
46:42
everybody who turned out for, for anything on Mayday, I was
46:44
marching out here in Seattle with 1000, you know, thousands
46:48
of my union siblings just appreciate you guys.
46:52
And like I always say, we, we occupy a friendly corner of the
46:54
Internet, a corner of the Internet who cares about human
46:57
rights. And so let's, let's keep on
46:59
doing it, man. I know, I know everything sucks.
47:02
I know everything sucks right now, but we can keep on doing
47:04
good things. Yeah, we can.
47:07
Not everything. Let's keep it, you know, and
47:10
keep things in perspective, but extremely well said by you.
47:14
I appreciate that. And there's been another episode
47:16
of into the channel. Thank you for watching,
47:18
listening, hanging out. If you enjoyed the show, leave
47:20
us a review or like comment, subscribe, follow YouTube,
47:24
Spotify podcast where you like to watch or listen.
47:26
Want to support the show? Patreon.com section to the
47:28
channel or become a YouTube member using that join button or
47:32
grab yourself a piece of official into the channel merch.
47:36
So new items incoming for the summer, which means some of the
47:40
old items you won't have access to those anymore.
47:42
So pop in there, see what you grab all all everything in
47:46
there. Some first edition shit.
47:47
So even though we're it's going to be new, it'll be second
47:50
edition shit coming your way. So go in there and move you
47:53
around and see what you like. Links up links all the above.
47:55
Much, much more in the description of this this episode
47:59
in the description of this episode.
48:00
Thank you And a big thing to make close as well, Mr. Grant
48:03
Eagle 4, making the world better, making my world better.
48:07
I appreciate you bro. Likewise, buddy, and and thank
48:11
you to everybody. Like like, like we mentioned,
48:13
you guys make our world better. You guys do make the world
48:16
better. Dropping football knowledge, you
48:18
know, caring about people trying to trying to do great things for
48:21
society. We'll keep trying to do the same
48:24
with our with our little football podcast, a little
48:26
engine that could. So we keep on pushing toward
48:29
greatness. We're making our way toward the
48:31
toward the UAE for Women's Champions League final, the
48:33
ultimate celebration of life. Let's.
48:35
Go. Look forward to to talking about
48:37
it with all of you guys. Thank you for watching and we
48:40
will see you all next time.