Latest / Into the Channel ⚽️ A Podcast Primarily About Women's Football / 🇫🇷 France Dazzles | England On Track | Netherlands, Wales Eliminated | UEFA WOMEN'S EURO 2025 MD12
Transcript
- 0:05OK, welcome to into channel podcast primarily about one's
- 0:08football. I'm your host Dino de Suspitis
- 0:10and as always, I'm joined by my Co host, Mr. Grant Angle.
- 0:14What is up man? I'm feeling fantastic, buddy.
- 0:17Day 12, match day 12, whatever you want to call it, the final
- 0:21match of round three. Who cares?
- 0:23Whatever it is, it was great. I thought the group stage was
- 0:26fun and entertaining. Now we're under the knockout
- 0:28rounds. Survived the group stage onto
- 0:32the knockout rounds perfectly put 12 of 12.
- 0:35Got it done against all odds, against the, the, the, the
- 0:39sleepy gods, the football gods, We, we basically defied all of
- 0:42them. Here we are show #12 let's hope
- 0:44that we survive it. Some, some happenings today.
- 0:48But, you know, I think things ultimately landed where we
- 0:51expected. But I'll kick it to you, Mr.
- 0:53Grant. Angle where you want to get.
- 0:54Started. Let's get started with a
- 0:55beverage. Let's celebrate this 12 straight
- 0:58shows and now this one's already started.
- 1:00I'm going to assume we will finish the recording.
- 1:06The infinite episode. Yeah, you never know.
- 1:08Cheers. Unless yeah, cheers to you
- 1:10cheers to the football unless it gets lost in space somewhere
- 1:13We've we've done it. I, I listened to the preview
- 1:15earlier today to just like rehash our picks, like our, our
- 1:19semi final picks and our final picks to make sure I remember
- 1:22them accurately. And you, you know, you were out
- 1:25there getting in front of it saying, hey, I'm not making any
- 1:27promises. We're going to try 12 episodes.
- 1:29I thought you did, you did well, you didn't want to over promise
- 1:32and under deliver. I'd say I don't know if we over
- 1:35delivered, but we definitely delivered on the promise 12
- 1:38straight shows. So we we did that.
- 1:40Deliveries. Yes, regular delivery.
- 1:44Marked delivered. Yeah, let's get to it, England.
- 1:50Oh. Yeah, you asked me, England.
- 1:50I was going to say you asked me where I want to get started.
- 1:52I just started talking about us doing 12 straight shows again.
- 1:54We're the first people in in his human history to work 12 days in
- 1:57a row. Nobody else has ever
- 1:58accomplished that. And by work, I mean watch
- 2:00football and talk about it in front of our computers.
- 2:03Anyway, England 6. Wales won.
- 2:07That went well if you're an England.
- 2:09Supporter, I'd say so you know, sort of stakes coming into this
- 2:13one. You know, obviously England's
- 2:15got a notch to three points. There's some outside scenarios
- 2:18where where England, you know, maybe gets eliminated, but I
- 2:21think they they quelled that really early on put the press on
- 2:25the Wales. I think they were out on the
- 2:27front foot kind of not messing around, kind of taking chances.
- 2:32I like kind of like the the Ella tunification of the line up, you
- 2:36know, and just kind of introducing that player and I
- 2:39thought I thought they just played really well.
- 2:40I mean small caveat. I'm not sure how how into this
- 2:44one. Wales was, I think they were
- 2:46they had a little bit of like, let's not pulling the muscles
- 2:49out here. They play it playing off a
- 2:50little bit. You know, not not the most
- 2:52aggressive Wales defense that we've seen.
- 2:55You know, they they were playing out there, but it it did have
- 2:58some exhibition vibes. I will say England did have a
- 3:00lot of room to operate. Yeah, I can see that.
- 3:02I think, you know, not not so much between like France and
- 3:08Wales, but I mean, the talent disparity between England and
- 3:12Wales is is pretty significant. And sorry that that first
- 3:16sentence that I was trying to spit out is it's not like
- 3:18England versus Wales, the talent disparity is that much greater
- 3:22than than France versus Wales. You know, it's obviously fairly
- 3:24even, but just like the style of play that England plays, I don't
- 3:29think Wales was ever going to get near them even if they were
- 3:33playing, you know, full bore. No, no way.
- 3:36And I think, you know, England wanted the ball back quickly.
- 3:40You know, it like they they were pressing pretty hard.
- 3:43And I think in the midfield. I mean, these are two great
- 3:45players. So it seems kind of silly to say
- 3:47this, but how far have Georgia Stanway and Kyra Walsh come
- 3:50since that first France match where they just looked lost?
- 3:55They just looked like they were playing on a new team with new
- 3:57players and and didn't speak the language.
- 4:00I mean, they they look so much more woven into what's happening
- 4:04these last couple matches today as well.
- 4:06You know, obviously a little bit of a softer opponent, but this
- 4:09was my contingent with with kind of Germany yesterday.
- 4:11Like you need to use these minutes, you need to maximize
- 4:14them. And I think that's what England
- 4:15did today. Like Wales was like, all right,
- 4:17we're going to play this type of match and said, OK, we'll take
- 4:19that. And we're going to keep our foot
- 4:21way, way, way on the gas. We're going to work all this
- 4:23stuff out. We're going to make connections.
- 4:25And then you just look at the score sheet.
- 4:27It's all these players that we we wanted to see score that we
- 4:31wanted to make sure, OK, we want these players going to the
- 4:33quarterfinal with some positive momentum.
- 4:36I think they got that done as well.
- 4:37Yeah, no doubt. And I'm glad you described it as
- 4:40like the Ella tunification of the lineup.
- 4:43I want to say I think it might have been Kira Walsh or Alessia
- 4:47Russo. Sorry.
- 4:48Sorry for the mix. Up to our pals here, I know it
- 4:51was one of her teammates had pointed out like how valuable it
- 4:55was to have Tune and Lauren James on the pitch at the same
- 5:00time, which obviously, you know, Lauren James was more central in
- 5:03that first match versus France and Tune came off the bench, if
- 5:06I remember correctly. But now to put James out on the
- 5:09wing, Tune in the middle with those two great kind of
- 5:12defensive minded midfielders and Stanway and Walsh back there who
- 5:16can still step up and take shots.
- 5:18It's just like totally unlocked something.
- 5:21And now we're back to the Serena Wiegmann special, which is she
- 5:26found that James in tune combination and then she did
- 5:30this the flip flop of Greenwood and Carter.
- 5:32And now she's played that line up the last two matches.
- 5:35It's one of it's one of the calling cards of Wiegmann.
- 5:37She finds her 11. She likes the way they play.
- 5:40She thinks they're adaptable depending on the opponent and
- 5:43she's going to play that 11 till the wheels fall off.
- 5:46Yeah, I thought I was thinking a lot of today about Serena
- 5:48Wiegmann just kind of dunking on the haters after the France
- 5:52match up. You know, there was, I mean,
- 5:54some silly, silly rumblings using a Jackie Oleism using
- 5:58silly twice there, but just some rumblings that you're just like,
- 6:01I'm not what what are we doing here?
- 6:03And to see what Serena Wiegmann's done since then, you
- 6:06know, with those lineup changes, with these rotations.
- 6:09And like I said, you know, in this one, Aggie Beaver Jones
- 6:12gets a late goal. You know, Beth Mead comes in off
- 6:15the bench scores, you know, Alessia Russo, I mean, as silly
- 6:18as that sounds, you know, had had been racking up the assists,
- 6:22you know, and wrecking games, obviously, you know, from from a
- 6:26#9 standpoint, doing everything but scoring goals.
- 6:28And then Russo gets a goal today.
- 6:30And you just don't know how those moments are going to kind
- 6:33of compound and like, pay off in the quarterfinals or later the
- 6:36knockout stage. Would you might have to go to
- 6:38Aggie Beaver Jones, you know, or you might have to go to Beth
- 6:41Mead off the bench or maybe before half time, God forbid
- 6:44something crazy happens and you know, some kind of move like
- 6:47that has to be get made. Or you can even look at Ella
- 6:50Tune, you know, looked good in short minutes early.
- 6:53That change happens and England goes up, you know, to nothing
- 6:58today. You can't spell to nothing
- 7:00without tune. So there you go.
- 7:03Nicely done my good man, I love that.
- 7:06Yeah, I'm about to be a dad of two, so just flexing these dads.
- 7:09I'm just working out. You know what, I'm honored to
- 7:13have heard that first before, before the children.
- 7:16That's that's solid. And I look forward to them
- 7:19cheering for Ella Toon also. So I like that.
- 7:21Now you can test out the material on on us.
- 7:25Yeah. I think you know, Wiegman, just,
- 7:28she knows these players so well and you know, she's, she's
- 7:32managed them for a while now. So she has this continuity with
- 7:35them and she has an idea of, like you've talked about some
- 7:39other teams where it's just like, I'm not quite sure what
- 7:42their identity is. And for this team, the identity
- 7:45is we have two genius defensive midfielders.
- 7:48We get the ball out onto the wings and it's either going to
- 7:51be to LJ, who's going to be a maestro and super creative and
- 7:55make things happen, or it's going to be the Lauren Hemp
- 7:57who's going to try to cave your head in with her physicality,
- 8:00with that technical ability that she has.
- 8:02And then lurking in the middle there is Alessia Russo, somebody
- 8:06who's always finding dangerous spaces.
- 8:08And that's, you know, that feels like the identity of the team.
- 8:11So, you know, I, I think she, she knows what she's going to
- 8:14have to do. And she talked about it in her
- 8:16post game press conference. Quote.
- 8:18I hope we keep going with this. We created great chances, like
- 8:22we did against the Netherlands, and now we have to break down
- 8:25Sweden, End Quote. And so, you know, she's not
- 8:27going to take, she's the last person in the world who would
- 8:30take Sweden lightly. And it would be foolish for
- 8:32anybody to take Sweden lightly. I think they're going to
- 8:35approach this challenge and say we have to unlock their defense.
- 8:41And I, I, I think they can do it.
- 8:43I mean, obviously they're the, they're the reigning holders,
- 8:46but it's going to be, it's going to be tricky.
- 8:48Sweden's defense has been on another level.
- 8:51You know, we'll talk about that one.
- 8:52We're going to coming up here. We'll, we'll do a, a little, not
- 8:55quite a full, full on thorough preview of the four
- 8:58quarterfinals matchups, but we are going to dedicate 1 episode
- 9:02to some picks, some predictions, some players to watch, our
- 9:05favorite players, you know, we'll, we'll have some fun with,
- 9:08with a little look ahead on all four of those matchups.
- 9:10And as you alluded to, England does play Sweden.
- 9:13We'll get into that one very shortly here.
- 9:15But let's talk a little France, Netherlands today.
- 9:17So this one had some stakes too. There, There was, there was a
- 9:20scenario like, I don't know, it, it got a little bit live.
- 9:24I think it, it might have been in the +5600 range that we could
- 9:27have had some craziness where, where Netherlands needed another
- 9:30couple goals to be able to make, make it happen.
- 9:33So they did get close, but ultimately France prevails.
- 9:36They take the group. They lit up the scoreboard in
- 9:39the second-half for sure. What are you going to take away
- 9:42from this one? Well, my take away, like, you
- 9:44know, obviously I wasn't as concerned with Netherlands
- 9:47making it through, but when they were up to 1 and England was on
- 9:51top of the group, I felt pretty great in that in those moments.
- 9:55But it was like a there's like a 20 minute segment there where,
- 9:59you know, Netherlands was up to 1 after the after the Basha
- 10:03unfortunate own goal. And, you know, I was ready for
- 10:07England to win the group and play Germany.
- 10:09Frankly, I'm not, you know, there's no reason for the
- 10:12Lionesses to be scared of Sweden.
- 10:13Like I was mentioning before, like it's going to be a
- 10:15challenge. But yeah, did I want to see
- 10:18Lauren Hemp go up against the third choice right back of
- 10:21Germany? Sure did.
- 10:22Thought that would have been nice.
- 10:25But you know, it, it was all for naughty because France A-Team
- 10:29where people have kind of questioned their mentality at
- 10:32times. They just slammed on the gas
- 10:34pedal and we're just able to, you know, I, I don't know, I
- 10:38don't know how to describe what, what was happening with
- 10:40Netherlands, but I knew France was like, oh, we'll take
- 10:42advantage of this. We'll play faster than you.
- 10:44We'll play with style and speed and skill and we'll just beat
- 10:47you. And that's how and that's how it
- 10:49felt like the match played out. Well, I think what happened to
- 10:52the Netherlands is they they actually came out and put forth
- 10:56like a proper EUR group stage type effort in this one in the
- 11:00first half. Obviously it wasn't just the
- 11:02goals. I think they were competitive.
- 11:04They were threatening. Like even right off the bat, you
- 11:07know, the Van de Donk, you know, get to drive in early, you know,
- 11:10Chastity Grant, take some, take some, some shots early.
- 11:13And it felt like after 5-10 minutes, they had already put
- 11:16forth more shots in the All England match.
- 11:21So they they they clearly did come to play.
- 11:23And then obviously they they go in with that 21 lead.
- 11:26Pulova. I mean, that goal was was
- 11:28awesome. Comes off that chastity grand
- 11:30deflection. And I love that Pulova, who's
- 11:32just a big game player, like could have taken it first time
- 11:36when it deflects out and you see so many players do that sort of
- 11:39in scramble mode. Oh, I'm, I'm here.
- 11:40The ball comes my way. All right, let me let me crack
- 11:43it. I don't know what's going to
- 11:43happen. They put it, you know, to the
- 11:4515th row. But Pulova, to her credit, takes
- 11:47a touch, brings it back inside, takes another look up, takes
- 11:51another look at down and just rips it.
- 11:54And perfect placement, the most professional of professional
- 11:57finishes and in a huge spot, like just a big time spot to
- 12:01make that happen. Yeah, man.
- 12:03And you know, believe me, when I saw they equalized, I was like,
- 12:06OK, what? What's France going to do?
- 12:08How's France going to respond here?
- 12:10And then they respond by, you know, an unfortunate and you
- 12:13know, we love some of Basha as as much as any player on this
- 12:16podcast. You are the inventor of Basha
- 12:17ball. Then I see the quick highlight
- 12:19as I'm watching England, Wales, I see the Basha own goal.
- 12:23I see the live table flip England up in the 1st place.
- 12:27And I was just like, all right, is France going to be able to
- 12:30respond? But I mean, credit to
- 12:32Netherlands for coming out there and playing hard.
- 12:35Like you obviously watched that one live.
- 12:37I had to watch highlights and kind of watch some after the
- 12:41fact. Can you explain to me, did they
- 12:44explain this on the broadcast? Why didn't Viviana meet him a
- 12:48play? There was some talk about, I
- 12:50don't know, the, the telecast here in the States alluded to,
- 12:53well, you know, she can play, she she can't play the 90
- 12:57minutes. So she could play sub minutes.
- 12:58So it's better to keep her for the later minutes versus the
- 13:02earlier minutes, which sounded like total garbage to me, just
- 13:07like, you know, we know, I mean, what's the what's the one of the
- 13:09most basic adages in football's like goals change games.
- 13:12So if you've got meet him up for 18 minutes, put her on to start.
- 13:16Who knows, maybe you go up one nil, maybe you go up, maybe you
- 13:18go up two nil, something crazy happens and now you've got
- 13:21France chasing the game. You could totally flip the but I
- 13:24mean, pretending like you're saving me to Ma also sends the
- 13:27message that we expect to be down late in this match and then
- 13:30we could bring her back It it's just all wrong.
- 13:33And just another thing that Netherlands from a coaching
- 13:36standpoint, you know, trickling down into what's happening on
- 13:39the pitch. Just another thing that they got
- 13:41that they got all wrong this cycle.
- 13:42I see. Yeah, that's I, I definitely, I
- 13:45definitely see your point. I do wonder, you know, with her
- 13:48injury history with like, you know, the amount of rest that
- 13:51she needs, I wonder how much. And you know, obviously no
- 13:55reporting here, but you, you just have to kind of ask the
- 13:57questions of like, how healthy was she?
- 14:00Is Idlib service to say like, Hey, she she could get in the
- 14:04game if we need her or something like that?
- 14:06So you never know kind of what's going on.
- 14:08But I tend to agree with you. Like, if you if you think she
- 14:11could give you 45, like, then I would rather have her in the
- 14:14first half, frankly, because like you said, like France can
- 14:17score in bunches, even though they did score their bunch in
- 14:22that second-half. So hard to see like the the
- 14:24logic around that absent of her. Just not really being able to
- 14:29go. But you know who was going out
- 14:31there? Delphine Cascarino.
- 14:35She looked like the best player on the field from everything
- 14:37that I saw. She was just styling on
- 14:39defenders out there. I mean, just we don't normally
- 14:43see her power game. I I, you sort of associate
- 14:47Cascarino with, you know, like a grace and like just that the a
- 14:50long stride and, you know, the ability to change direction and
- 14:54the ability to kind of like shoot passes where, wherever,
- 14:57wherever they need to go and finish when need be.
- 15:00But today we saw Adelphi and Cascarito that was just look
- 15:04like an absolute force to be reckoned with, in addition to
- 15:07all the other stuff that she always does.
- 15:09Yep. No, I think that's totally fair.
- 15:11And can I, can I kick this to you?
- 15:13Because I know we've talked a lot about Claudia Pina for Spain
- 15:16and the, the form that she's in. You know, obviously this is this
- 15:20is one match, but it's not like Cascarino has been bad in her
- 15:22other appearances. I think Cascarino has that same
- 15:26thing that Pina has this, this last run of form where if you
- 15:30just kind of sat down and watched her play, absent some
- 15:34other context, she'd be like, is that the best player in the
- 15:38world? Maybe like just her, like her
- 15:41ability to move. Are you talking about the grace
- 15:44she showed off? The power and the strength, the
- 15:46decision making, the shot making.
- 15:49Like I think it was that first goal where she's just running
- 15:52and she's just doing step over, step over, step over.
- 15:54Like at speed. Just like juking the the
- 15:57defender. You know, I had to think of an
- 15:59NBA comp and I just think about like when in Kyrie Irving's
- 16:02prime, when he would be really, really cooking and he he would
- 16:06be getting to the basket and then like throwing up crazy
- 16:09layups with touch, juking dudes out of their shoes, making three
- 16:12pointers. It's just like you're just
- 16:14looking like, where is he on the like, is he the 5th best player
- 16:18in the league? Is he like the 8th best player?
- 16:20Like he's like the ceiling is so high.
- 16:22I just get the same thing from Cascarino.
- 16:25I saw your note about the the potential NBA comp conversation
- 16:28with Cascarino, so I did get my wheels turning a little bit and
- 16:31where I landed. I think she's Giannis.
- 16:35You know. The step overs, the power, the
- 16:38the finishing ability, the ability to dish when needed, but
- 16:41everything starting from this physical, this physical tool set
- 16:47that is not really, that's not really her game at all, but her
- 16:51game is built on top of it. It's like, oh, I can run like
- 16:54this. I can, I can pivot like this, I
- 16:56can change direction like this. And she just built a, a
- 16:59beautiful tool set on top of those skills a la Giannis.
- 17:03So that's my that was my NBA cop.
- 17:05I like it, yeah, standing at at 5 foot five, you probably don't
- 17:09hear many athletes compared to Giannis Santede Kupo at 5 foot
- 17:125, but I, I think it totally tracks.
- 17:14I I totally get what you're saying Like that the skill set
- 17:17on top of her physical attributes I think I think makes
- 17:20a lot of sense. 55 but 55 foot 8 wingspan though, I mean, you
- 17:24can't really use it in football, but talk about that.
- 17:26There you go. You know, yeah, the the treore
- 17:29principle of what do I need to be a good forward?
- 17:31Giant biceps. You never know how a wingspan
- 17:35could help you. It might help you get a red card
- 17:38and make a diving save on the line if it if, you know, if it
- 17:42calls for it. Yeah, man, I mean, France, this
- 17:46kind of win, I think they're just going into the knockout
- 17:48stage full confidence, loving the way they're playing.
- 17:52I think England does the same. I think, you know, both of these
- 17:55teams are very clearly dangers to win the title.
- 18:00I agree with you. Yeah.
- 18:01I mean, I think these two teams could they could end up in the
- 18:05final, Yeah, they're on different sides of the bracket,
- 18:07I feel like. Yeah, England's top half,
- 18:08France's bottom half. So who knows?
- 18:11We we could get a rematch from that opening stage, group stage
- 18:15match up between these two. Absolutely.
- 18:16On the table, certainly 2 of at worst, the best 4 still left
- 18:22still alive in this tournament. So excited to see where they go.
- 18:25And you know, as mentioned, check back in with us, make sure
- 18:28you're subscribed. We will be back very soon with a
- 18:32little mini preview, little alternative style preview of the
- 18:36four quarterfinals matchup. So definitely keep it locked for
- 18:38that. Absolutely.
- 18:39I think I feel like we've done it, my Goodman.
- 18:41I think this is, you know, we got a little bit of chalk.
- 18:45You know, we talked about France, Netherlands.
- 18:46It's not like Netherlands was a big underdog.
- 18:48But judging by the run of form, it looked like France was going
- 18:52to take it. They did, in convincing fashion.
- 18:54I think everybody felt like England was going to do the
- 18:56same. So everything happened as
- 18:58expected in Group D on the final day of the group stage.
- 19:02Something tells me we're probably in for at least one or
- 19:06two surprises in this knockout stage, but we will see.
- 19:10All right, man. Well, I don't need to check in
- 19:13with you about if there's anything else we did before we
- 19:16got here. I think we I think we hit it.
- 19:17So I think we are ready to to call it a day.
- 19:19There's been another episode of into the channel.
- 19:21Thank you, thank you, thank you for hanging out.
- 19:22If you enjoy the show or Loveland's football as much as
- 19:25you're boys, you make sure you're kicking with us each and
- 19:27every single week or sometimes 12 days in a row.
- 19:30Who knows? Like subscribe, follow YouTube,
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- 19:35Leave us a review over your favorite podcast app links, all
- 19:37of our socials except one in the show.
- 19:40And so this episode and a big thank in my coast as well, Mr.
- 19:43Grand Angle, for I needed an Iron Man to kind of get through
- 19:47this whole stretch with me. You already know what time it
- 19:50is. Nobody else I could call on.
- 19:52But my guy, I appreciate you bro.
- 19:53Likewise, buddy, you know what? We, we did it, man.
- 19:56Like we, we weren't 100% sure, but I felt like we got stronger
- 20:00as the match days went on. So we've made it.
- 20:03We've, we've officially, I think we've said this in the last like
- 20:066 shows particularly, but doesn't matter.
- 20:08We've made it to the knockout stage.
- 20:10We won Group D. We're ready to go play some one
- 20:13and done football and we appreciate all of you for
- 20:16keeping it locked and and like rocking with us throughout all
- 20:19this. The comments have been awesome.
- 20:20We appreciate all the support from you guys and we will see
- 20:23you very shortly for the quarter final preview.
- 20:27Stay asleep y'all.