Latest / Into the Channel ⚽️ A Podcast Primarily About Women's Football / UWCL knockout stage is taking shape

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UWCL knockout stage is taking shape · Into the Channel ⚽️ A Podcast Primarily About Women's Football

0:03
OK, welcome to Into the Channel podcast primarily about women's
0:09
football. Before we hit the pitch.
0:10
If you enjoy the show or love ones football as much as your
0:12
boys do, come kick it with us already.
0:15
Subscribe, follow YouTube, Spotify, Apple podcast, wherever
0:18
you'd like to watch or listen. Leave us a review over your
0:20
favorite podcast app. Links to all of our socials in
0:23
the show notes of this episode. I am your host Dino de Suspitas
0:26
and as always I am joined by my Co host Mr. Grant Angle.
0:31
What is up man? Don't feel it, all right, buddy.
0:33
I would say that was two really good days of football we just
0:36
had. 2 monster days of football, good matches, good stakes,
0:41
machinations having to do with the quarterfinals, teams getting
0:44
through, teams getting eliminated, a ton to talk about.
0:47
Both of our teams were in action.
0:49
That was exciting. Mr. Cran Angle, I think we're
0:52
ready, man. Where do you want to get
0:53
started? Let's get started on your
0:55
account. Let's do this by chronological
0:57
order. We've we make no secret on this
0:59
podcast, I'm a big fan of chronological order.
1:02
Let's start with Wolfsburg 5. Galatasaray nil.
1:08
This one, This one was interesting.
1:10
Wolfsburg obviously playing with lots of stakes.
1:13
They're chasing Roma. We've talked about the Revenge
1:16
Tour. This was this squad's 100th
1:18
Champions League match, and I think this one's going to go
1:21
down to history as the the Alex pop game, or maybe one of many
1:24
Alex Pop games, maybe one of the 2024 group stage Alex Pop games.
1:28
She was dominant, scored too early, ends the day with a
1:32
Hattie +2 assists, five goal contributions on five Wolfsburg
1:37
goals. I think towards the end of the
1:39
match I think she just got a little bored scoring goals.
1:41
She's just like, let me just start distributing because her
1:43
passing was almost maybe as impressive.
1:46
I also must say her passing was as impressive as her scoring on
1:49
this day. She was awesome.
1:51
Yeah, I mean, she was just unbelievable in this match.
1:54
And so, in honor of her, what do you say we Alexandra pop these
1:58
beers before it gets too late? Terrible joke.
2:06
I appreciate you supporting me even though puns are stupid.
2:09
I love puns. What a good teammate.
2:13
Yeah, I mean, her, her ability to head the ball is just
2:16
unmatched. I mean, they talked about it on
2:18
the broadcast. She just dominated the run of
2:20
play. It felt like Wolfsburg pretty
2:23
much got whatever they wanted out there.
2:24
Absolutely. And then Yudina Minga had an
2:27
absolute laser, assisted by Alex Pop of course, for Wolfsburg's
2:31
third goal. That one was a Backbreaker, but
2:34
you can also look at the stats. Wolfsburg outshot Galatasaray.
2:37
Get ready for this 51 to 2. Come on man.
2:43
I mean, tough to get more lopsided than that.
2:46
Galatasaray keeper, though. Gamzanur Yaman, who we've called
2:48
out a bunch of times in the show.
2:49
Another solid match. I think she's sort of like
2:53
carving out a nice little niche for herself as a kind of like a
2:57
big game keeper. She saved 14 of 19 shots on
3:00
target from Wolfsburg. The German side.
3:02
Dominant though. Twenty corners to 0.
3:05
Also dominant in crosses, 58 to three.
3:08
One of my main takeaways though, if I wanted to get a little bit
3:11
critical, I think Lynette Meerin Stein has to play better for
3:15
this side to really kind of like make a deep run.
3:18
She's getting into good areas. It was mentioned on the telecast
3:21
multiple times that she's in really good scoring form in
3:24
frown Bundesliga, but in this one, nine shots, 4 on target, no
3:29
goals obviously, and she connected on just 55% of her
3:32
passes, 10 out of 18. She just was a little bit off
3:35
kilter. I think she's still looking for
3:37
her first Champions League goal for Wolfsburg if I'm not
3:39
mistaken, and she just might be pressing a little bit too hard.
3:43
Yeah, it's a great point. I I didn't even consider that.
3:45
I mean, I I realized, you know, we had talked about her form in
3:48
league play being outstanding. But yeah, it would be relatively
3:53
understandable for her maybe to be pressing a little bit in the
3:56
sense that it's her first time in the Champions League with
3:59
Wolfsburg. It's like first time on this
4:01
kind of stage with with their new team.
4:04
You know, you want to play well, you're brought in pretty much to
4:06
supercharge the attack for this like kind of historic club.
4:10
So it would be worse if she wasn't playing well in the
4:13
league or in the Champions League.
4:16
So maybe if you're if you're Wolfsburg, you're kind of like,
4:18
OK, we'll shepherd you along, but let's make sure we we get
4:22
there because they're going to need her if they're going to
4:23
really go really deep in this thing and have a look at winning
4:25
it. Yeah, that's definitely the
4:27
thinking. And Wolfsburg, after a really
4:28
slow start, obviously they lose the 1st 2 in the group stage.
4:32
Didn't score a goal in either of those matches.
4:33
Now level on points with Roma 6 points each.
4:37
Wolfsburg. Couple big matches looming.
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December 11th, they'll be back taking on Roma.
4:42
That one's at home. December 17th, they traveled to
4:45
Lyon to closeout the group stage.
4:47
I'm not sure how much we learned in this one.
4:49
They wanted to come out, get a big win.
4:51
That's exactly what they did. They want to dominate.
4:53
That's exactly what they did. And now they've got they've got
4:56
2 monster ones left and they'll very much have to earn their
4:59
place in the quarterfinals if they're going to get through.
5:01
Yeah, I mean, it turns that Roma Wolfsburg match into a massive
5:05
game for both sides. We talked about the the first
5:08
tiebreaker in the Women's Champions League after points is
5:12
points against the opponent you're tied with.
5:14
And then the second tiebreaker is goal differential against the
5:19
the team that you're tied with. So let's say Wolfsburg beats
5:22
Roma 2 nil and then they just go and get cracked by Leon.
5:26
Roma would have to could still be Galatasaray, but because Roma
5:31
only beat Wolfsburg one nil in the first fixture, Wolfsburg
5:34
would still progress to the knockout stage.
5:36
So it's a massive, massive game for Roma.
5:38
You got to keep it close and preferably you win it so you
5:41
don't got to worry about these things, Yeah.
5:42
Huge stakes, super excited for that one.
5:45
Let's shift gears though. I want to head to the
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Netherlands FC Twente 2, Real Madrid my Blancas 3.
5:52
What do you see in this one? I thought Twente was able to
5:54
kind of execute a similar game plan they did in the first
5:57
match. First Madrid, they held the
5:59
ball, they tried to minimize your Blancas attacking threats.
6:03
They just didn't leak the goals like they did in the first game.
6:07
They scored the opener. A Seeing Eye free kick by Alika
6:10
2IN whose name you hear a lot on the broadcast because she always
6:14
seems to be like, involved in the play.
6:16
And it falls right to Jamie Ravensburg and who taps it in
6:19
for the opener. So Twente takes the lead.
6:21
One nil there. It's right around the 30th
6:23
minute, but Real Madrid found a way to really March back and it
6:27
was on the strength of Linda Kaiseto, who just played like an
6:30
absolute hurricane out there. She was awesome.
6:34
I mean, monster, monster stat line 2, one goal, one assist,
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four shots, 3 on target, six shot creating actions and just a
6:42
ton of ground covered up that left hand side.
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I mean every every time you look up, she's just flying past
6:48
somebody or going right at somebody else.
6:50
Absolute handful and definitely a game changer in this one.
6:54
Yeah, she gets the goal before halftime.
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And how many times you see in football where it's just one of
6:58
those things where the favorite is down and they storm back and
7:02
they get that equalizer before halftime.
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And that's just like, oh boy, you hate to call something a
7:08
Backbreaker, especially in a high level match like this.
7:10
Because 20 is a good side. We've talked about them a lot.
7:13
We had high hopes for them coming into this, but when you
7:16
give that up at +2 of stoppage time right before you get to the
7:20
half, right when you think you're going to have some
7:22
relief, it's only natural to have like a kind of a little bit
7:25
of a mental let down in that moment.
7:27
Yeah, absolutely. And I think it's not just, it's
7:30
not just a random event either. You know, this is what good
7:33
teams do. This is what more skilled teams
7:36
do. They, they understand it's
7:37
getting later. It's harder to stay focused.
7:40
It's harder to chase, harder to defend.
7:42
Those are the opportunities like that last 5-10 minutes of each
7:46
half. It's just easier to kind of find
7:48
a little crease, find somebody napping a little bit.
7:50
But shout out to Twente, still, still, still a scrap, you know,
7:54
come second-half. They hung tough throughout the
7:57
second-half. I mean, I really think you could
7:59
make an argument they had the better chances over the course
8:03
of like the the end of that match.
8:05
Even after Madrid goes up in the 71st on again the strength of
8:09
Kaiseto streaking down the wing and getting the ball into the
8:12
middle of the senior Brune, Twente continued to fight back
8:15
and fight back. And even though they hit, like I
8:17
said, they had the better chances over different stretches
8:20
of the match, they get caught in transition with one of the last
8:23
players you would want to get caught in in transition by and
8:27
that's Alva Redondo. If you look up, tuck away the
8:31
goal or tuck the shot into the corner, Alva Redondo tucked that
8:35
into the corner. That is exactly what that phrase
8:37
means. Beautiful finish, professional
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goal scorer finish, and I'll say in the moment, you know, it kind
8:44
of felt like the game was kind of well in hand.
8:47
But obviously we see what happens later in the match with
8:50
Twente kind of storming back a little bit.
8:51
You know, not a ton of time left on the clock, but that Redondo
8:54
goal ends up being the difference.
8:56
Yeah, I mean, again, credit to Twente's mentality.
8:59
Sophie break scores that absolute banger at the end and
9:03
it ends up being the if it wasn't the last kick of the
9:06
match, it was the second to last kick of the match.
9:07
I don't know if they even let him kick off.
9:09
I think it might have been the end of it.
9:11
So it's too little too late for them.
9:13
Like you said, the Redondo goal is the difference.
9:15
That's why you sign Alva Redondo in the offseason.
9:17
A. 100%, yeah, Twente unfortunately eliminated.
9:20
They go out with a banger. Real Madrid.
9:22
Congratulations to them. They advance to the
9:24
quarterfinals along with another Group B team who we'll get to in
9:28
just a moment here. But let's shift gears.
9:31
Want to keep it moving. I want I want to keep the same
9:33
lightning fast pace. You know, I want to be Linda
9:35
Chiseda running up the left hand side.
9:37
There we go. A lot of ground to cover, a lot
9:38
of matches, a lot of football. Let's get to it.
9:40
Lyon 4 Roma one. This was a Tuffy for your guy, a
9:45
real, real Tuffy. So to rewind back, I'm not going
9:50
to dust off any old clips, but I did predict that that Roma would
9:54
escape this reverse fixture with at least a point feeling good
9:57
for for a good chunk of it. I want to Fast forward.
10:00
Well, actually, let me start with the starting lineups.
10:02
No DNE to start, no Samabasha to start, and then no Evelyn Vien
10:06
for Roma. This one scoreless for the grand
10:10
majority of the game. 74th minute, beautiful 5 pass
10:13
sequence, starts from the keeper.
10:15
Ball works its way all the way up the field, including Evelyn
10:18
VN getting a touch. Ends with Julia Dragoni, she
10:21
gets a hold of one, one touch, smokes it, pass Endler breaks
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the deadlock. 74th minute and now Roma is up one nil.
10:29
Definitely felt vindicated in the moment.
10:32
I think that the one prevailing notion before this moment was
10:36
Leon was better. Leon was more athletic at every
10:40
single position and the only way Roma was going to like stay in
10:43
this match or be any kind of competitive was with with a
10:46
sequence like this. Let's string together four or
10:49
five pinpoint perfect passes. Let's get creative with some
10:52
runs. Let's create create some space
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moment of magic which Dragoni creates to put them up one nil.
10:58
This was pretty much the only way that it was going to happen
11:00
A. 100% like I think we talked about it in the preview that
11:04
Roman needed to find a way to get through that Lyon midfield.
11:08
And if you're going to do that, sometimes it takes A5 pass
11:10
sequence. And we've talked about how
11:12
Leone's defense and their midfield is able to shrink your
11:14
margin for error and make you make 5 good passes in a row.
11:18
And so Romo was able to do that. Dragoni hits the banger.
11:22
First line in my notes was Dino, right?
11:24
I think Dino might be right. And so I was pulling for you,
11:27
man. I was excited for it.
11:28
The reason I gave you the side eye at the opening of this
11:30
segment was you said the score line 41.
11:34
I totally get Leon's a better team.
11:36
It didn't feel like a four one match, even at the final
11:39
whistle. Definitely didn't, but with that
11:41
said, it's easy to see how this scoreline happens.
11:45
That's true. Yeah.
11:45
So I mentioned at the top, no Diani to start, no Basha either.
11:49
That's an incredible amount of creativity with just those two
11:52
players. Now you got to give credit to
11:55
that Leon midfield, Marozan, Lindsay, Huran and Damaris, like
11:59
really, really difficult to contend with in the midfield.
12:02
They made it really tough all day today, but I I think Leon
12:05
was missing some of that creativity.
12:07
And then two 2 1/2 minutes after the goal, Diani gets on the
12:10
board with an equalizer. I'm not going to lie, man, felt
12:14
like a Backbreaker in the moment.
12:15
You know, Roma had done so much work.
12:18
I mentioned, you know, the athletic disadvantage that they
12:20
had the strength. This is like a pretty much at
12:23
every spot on the field. They were playing underdog
12:25
football. So for them to kind of like
12:27
breakthrough on the road and then give it right back a couple
12:31
minutes later, I'm like, this is really not good.
12:33
And then it turns out about just a couple minutes after that, off
12:36
another corner, Diani finds herself completely unmarked, I
12:41
don't know, 2 yards from goal. Yeah, maybe with enough time,
12:45
with enough time to chest it down and smash in a volley.
12:49
I mean, you just knew that that this Aromaside kind of was
12:52
broken after those 22 moments. And I think that's that's how
12:56
you quickly go from one nil 1121 and then you end up with that 41
13:00
score line it in pretty much a blink of an eye.
13:02
Yeah, I think. I think I want to amend of the
13:05
way I worded that when I said it didn't feel like a four one
13:07
match. It definitely felt like a four
13:09
one match. At the end I was left with the
13:11
feeling this shouldn't have been a four one match and it's
13:16
because that that set piece defending was dreadful.
13:19
I don't think anybody on that bus after the match was looking
13:24
forward to watching that film the next day or the day after
13:28
whenever they get back into the training grounds.
13:31
Really a bummer to give that away.
13:33
Asaki Kumagai, one of our one of our favorites.
13:36
Not a great moment. I think on that DNA second goal,
13:39
just like gets put in the blender and just kind of, you
13:42
know, falls down essentially like you hate to say it like
13:45
that about a great player, but not what you want from your set
13:48
piece defending, let's say that. Not at all.
13:51
And then Leone decided to, you know, come back after after
13:55
going up to one and play a couple of the hits, a couple of
13:57
the oldies, usually Lisa Mayer, great goal, genius assist from
14:01
DNE, absolute game breaker as well.
14:04
I mean, imagine bringing a player like that off the bench.
14:05
What are you going to do? And then when you were in our
14:07
header to make it 41, you know, so just run-of-the-mill Leone
14:11
stuff. Nothing, nothing really to see
14:13
here. If you just looked at the score
14:15
line, you would think exactly kind of like what what probably
14:17
a lot of people think. OK, another day at the office,
14:20
but this one was extremely exciting and then a little sad
14:23
at the end. We saw kind of like the air come
14:26
out of Roba's balloon, unfortunately.
14:29
Well, actually no, Roma's still very much in it, as mentioned,
14:32
even on points with. Got to win.
14:35
With Wolfsburg and they've got that that huge 1 coming up.
14:37
I think the way that it shakes out though, the Galatasaray
14:40
match up match day 6 probably won't come into play.
14:43
It's looking like our Twitter audience probably was right on
14:45
the money, predicting or or voting that this Roma side would
14:48
probably be the one left out in the cold.
14:50
One quick thing, Eugenia Lesemer, that goal was her 49th
14:54
all time UEFA Women's Champions League goal.
14:57
That is three more than Marta of the Orlando Pride.
15:00
She scored her Champions League goals, I know as part of Umaya
15:05
where she won her Champions League trophy.
15:07
She also played for Rosengard out of Sweden and she played for
15:10
another Swedish team. I can't remember off the top of
15:12
my head. No disrespect to them, we were
15:14
trying to keep it moving, but 49 Women's Champions League goals?
15:18
Incredible. For Eugenia Les Samer, however,
15:21
it is 15 behind the record holders.
15:24
Lisa Mayer is alone in 3rd place, 15 behind her teammate,
15:28
Norwegian legend Ada Hegerberg, who has 64 Champions League
15:32
goals. Not too shabby.
15:34
Unbelievable. Yeah, and Ada Hegerberg is
15:36
still, like, in her 20s. Right.
15:38
No, no way, I don't think. She's 29.
15:42
Get the fuck out of here, Jesus Christ.
15:47
The only reason I know that is because I had that same reaction
15:51
when I found that out, because I'm like, Oh yeah, she's been
15:53
around forever. Yeah.
15:54
She's like a legend. Of course.
15:55
Yeah, no. Good Lord.
15:57
Oh yeah, her sister Andreen is older than her.
16:00
Yeah, when I discovered this stat, she was 28.
16:02
And I was like, this can't, no, this can't be right.
16:05
Goodness. Yeah, it's wild leaving that in,
16:08
by the way. That's fair.
16:09
Yeah. I mean, you know, it's a
16:10
learning podcast. So let's keep the learning
16:12
going, OK? Chelsea 3, Celtic nil.
16:15
What did we learn from this one? Chelsea is still really good.
16:17
Lucy Bronze shows up in big games.
16:20
What else did we learn? Chelsea really good at short
16:23
corners. That's how they got their first
16:25
two goals in this match. The short quarter ends up at the
16:27
feet of Cat Macario. She plays in a beautiful pass to
16:30
Lucy Bronze. She has a volley probably a
16:33
little too easy or probably a little too much space for
16:35
Bronze. Gets the goal in the first
16:38
minute of the match. Not ideal for the Hoops.
16:41
Next, Chelsea is mostly dominating the ball in those
16:45
first 20 minutes, but Celtic is holding up pretty well until you
16:48
have another short corner. This time it's Johanna Ritz in
16:51
Kannerud plays in a bullet pass to captain.
16:54
She heads it in for her first ever UEFA Women's Champions
16:57
League goal, Only 48 behind Eugenie Lasermere, only 63
17:01
behind Ada Hagenberg. And really, I mean, just credit
17:06
to Celtic, man. Like they played great in
17:08
Glasgow and this one had the opportunity to get really,
17:12
really ugly, but they were able to muck it up enough.
17:15
I think they showed a lot of character out there.
17:17
You know, you're not playing to lose 3 nil, but you know, you
17:20
see in some of these games when you have the absolute elite
17:22
teams with a big talent advantage, you can see these
17:25
scores get really, really ugly. And especially when you're
17:28
Celtic and you have to contend with Johanna Ritz and Kanner
17:31
Rude streaking up the wing at a 1000 mph and then you're like,
17:36
OK, thank God they're taking off Cat Macario at halftime.
17:40
Oh, wait a minute, Lyra Ramirez is coming in.
17:42
That just has to be unpleasant to be a defender in that
17:46
situation. It's got to be really tough when
17:48
you look at the stats in this one.
17:49
Chelsea outshoots Celtic 24 to three.
17:52
The one thing that they did have going for them, I thought Celtic
17:55
forced them into some tougher looks.
17:58
Only 5 of Chelsea's shots were on target of the 24.
18:01
So not the worst day defensively.
18:03
I thought Celtic, again, they they held up pretty well
18:05
offensively. I don't think they had the same
18:08
zip that they did in Glasgow, right?
18:11
But yeah, at this point, Chelsea 12 points from four matches and
18:15
they punched their ticket into the quarterfinals as well.
18:17
You got to love it. Those European Knights, they get
18:20
back-to-back matches, they play at Celtic Park, they play at
18:22
Stamford Bridge. Historic stuff for the club.
18:25
Like you said, you know they're going to be making their way
18:27
back. You just hope that the club
18:29
continues to fund them and do the things necessary to make
18:32
sure they're consistently competing.
18:34
Yeah, no doubt. Let's shift gears to Thursday.
18:36
Little team from Manchester, the Manchester City Sky Blues
18:41
visiting Sweden to take on Hammerbee.
18:44
What'd you see in this one? What do we need to know about
18:46
this one? OK, I am many things, but one of
18:49
the main things that I am is an unbiased journalist, of course,
18:53
a truth teller, a man who believes in fairness and
18:56
justice. And so I I said something
18:58
similar to this when Manchester City beat Barcelona in the first
19:02
match of the group stage. And I'm going to say it on the
19:04
reverse side here. I think if you watched the first
19:07
half of this match and you didn't have previous context,
19:11
even though City was ahead one NIL at halftime, you could have
19:14
reasonably watched this and said, I think the and white team
19:18
is as good or maybe better than the blue team.
19:21
I liked Hammerbee's first half. I thought they were aggressive.
19:25
I thought they put pressure on City in their own half.
19:28
I think one telling stat. And now obviously you're a lot
19:31
of teams, you're especially if you play kind of possession
19:33
base, you're going to have more passes in your in your defensive
19:36
half than you will in your attacking half.
19:38
But in this first half, City had nearly 70% of the ball, and that
19:42
yielded 178 passes in their defensive half versus 75 in the
19:47
attacking half. Well, it was a lot of them
19:50
trying to maneuver the ball around just to contend with
19:53
Hammerbee really put in some pressure on them.
19:55
Yeah, that's really interesting. And I keep going back to the
19:59
environment, you know, when I'm thinking about Hammerbee and,
20:02
you know, just a quick diversion here.
20:03
But covering the Pride recently, I was really surprised over the
20:07
last few weeks how many times it almost feels like every player
20:11
at the presser set behind when he gets on stage at the presser,
20:15
everybody mentions the crowd and everybody.
20:17
Mentions how they feed up the crowd, how they feel the crowd,
20:20
how they hear the crowd. I kind of always felt like the
20:22
crowd situation was a little bit BS.
20:24
And I'm not sure if it's like a soccer thing or a European
20:27
soccer thing or like a women's soccer thing, but the crowds
20:31
very clearly affect games more than I think are jaded American
20:35
sports fan. You know, brains are are sort of
20:38
used to because it did feel like hammer be fed off at big time.
20:41
And I think you're totally right.
20:42
When you look at like 1 stat that that sticks out like a sore
20:45
thumb. The XG differential for the
20:48
entire match. Manchester City 1.0, Hammerby
20:51
2.1. You look at shots 14 to 14, you
20:56
look at shots on target six to five in favor of Manchester
20:59
City. So I think even extending past
21:01
the first half, this was a pretty even match.
21:04
Yeah, man, that's a banger of a set.
21:06
That's, I mean, I know you're a fan of real G versus XG, but I
21:10
think that is telling. I think Hammerby had their
21:12
chances and they took their chances pretty well.
21:14
I know they only only ended up with one goal, but I thought
21:17
they were capitalizing on the moments that they were able to
21:20
hold the ball and get forward and they did so aggressively and
21:23
with a lot of purpose. I got to talk about Bunny Shaw's
21:27
first goal of this match. She scored both of them.
21:29
For anybody who hasn't seen, you should watch both of them.
21:32
We got to talk about this and I'm going to turn into strident
21:35
annoying guy here for a second. But so City's able to
21:38
breakthrough and I think it was the 31st minute.
21:40
I want to call it live Fact Check.
21:42
It was the 31st minute. All right, nailed it.
21:44
So she gets the ball. Yui Hasegawa pushes the ball up
21:47
field, gets to Bunny Shaw. She cuts the ball onto her right
21:49
foot, takes a deflection and it kind of sails.
21:52
It's one of those kind of like really high arching deflection,
21:55
sails over the keeper into the back of the net.
21:58
Here's where things get confusing for me.
22:00
Bunny runs toward the end line to celebrate like hundreds upon
22:04
hundreds of footballers before her.
22:06
And then the first thing you see on the broadcast is that she's
22:09
clearly hit by some kind of projectile and reacts to it.
22:13
And I think the reporting is that it appeared to have been
22:15
some kind of coin. And then this is where things
22:19
get really confusing. She is shown a yellow card by
22:23
referee Sylvia Gasparotti. So I would like and let me just
22:27
make sure. Let's do another quick live Fact
22:29
Check. OK, back from the Fact Check.
22:31
So yeah, the reporting I'm seeing from Sky Sports from
22:33
earlier today, we're recording this on Friday evening is that.
22:36
Yeah, it appears it was a coin. And the new reporting that I've.
22:40
I'm now seeing here. And this is according to UEFA, a
22:44
quote. Proceedings have been opened
22:45
against Hammer BIF for throwing of objects and quote this.
22:49
That's from a UEFA spokesperson. So first of all, to anybody who
22:53
throws things at athletes on the field, you're lame.
22:57
Don't do that. It's stupid.
22:58
However, we can leave that off to the side.
23:01
I would like one person, whether it's from UEFA, the PGMOL, IFAB,
23:06
FIFA, Interpol or NASA, somebody from an organization with an
23:13
acronym to please explain to me why Bunny Shaw, it's a yellow
23:18
card for that celebration. The next part of the quote from
23:21
the UEFA spokesperson is Manchester City player Khadijah
23:23
Shaw received the yellow card following her goal presentation
23:26
for unsporting conduct. And quote, What are you talking
23:30
about? Because I didn't see that on the
23:33
broadcast. I don't know why she has that
23:34
yellow card. I joke about being over serious
23:37
sports guy, but somebody show me where the unsporting contact
23:41
was. That's just silly.
23:43
Refs are going to ref. I think that's kind of like my
23:46
best explanation. You do hope that I'm not sure
23:49
what the accumulation situation is, but you do hope that
23:52
something like that is wiped off the record and made right after
23:55
the fact. That's something that we'll
23:56
we'll have to keep an eye on. Yeah, totally.
23:58
We're calling for the full void. Hopefully the Braun Battalion.
24:02
We already know Braun is. Then the Braun Battalion are
24:04
against UEFA. Come rock with us again.
24:07
UEFA completely out of out of their elements once again just
24:10
making bozo decisions. I digress.
24:13
Back to the football after halftime, Hammerbee comes out
24:16
swinging as usual. I think as expected, Julie
24:19
Blochstadt and Alan Wongerheim continue to just get into
24:22
dangerous areas. Blochstadt drives the ball up
24:25
the field to start things. She then cleans up a bad touch
24:28
by Smela Volato and then sends in a perfect cross.
24:31
Wongerheim as a tap in for the equalizer 11 and it just felt
24:36
like Hammerbee was finding a way to attack the space between the
24:42
midfield and the defenders. Really in an aggressive,
24:47
purposeful way like I mentioned earlier and it was setting them
24:49
up for some good opportunities. Yeah, it's a great adjustment
24:52
because we talked about them wanting to kind of go over the
24:55
top. So once City's kind of prepared
24:57
for that, that's a kind of the the counter move to the move.
25:00
I thought it worked really well. And you know, you mentioned when
25:03
we were talking 20, Real Madrid Bunny's goal in the first half
25:06
wasn't right on the heels of halftime, but it was a little
25:09
bit unfortunate. The deflection flies up in the
25:12
air, could have gone anywhere. It goes into the back of the net
25:15
a lot of time. That one is a little bit of a
25:17
turd in the punch bowl, but it just seemed to give them a
25:19
little bit more fuel, a little bit more energy.
25:21
They didn't want to go out like that.
25:23
And that adjustment, I think, caught City a little bit off
25:26
guard and was definitely paying dividends.
25:29
Credit to Hammerby, you know, their crowd was obviously super
25:32
in it like you had mentioned, but it was time to take that out
25:35
because Jess Park and Jess Park it.
25:37
We talked about Mary Fowler a week or so ago.
25:40
There are just those games and we've talked about it's hard for
25:43
Mary Fowler to keep up consistently, like the rare air
25:46
that she's able to kind of inhabit at times.
25:48
But there are just times where Mary Fowler is kind of a little
25:52
invisible in some of these matches.
25:54
But that opens up opportunities for Jess Park to cut through
25:57
your defense and then either RIP shots herself or distribute the
26:00
ball like the genius passer she is.
26:02
This time she gets the ball to Bunny Shaw.
26:05
Always a pretty good idea. Bunny gets the ball, is able to
26:07
get away from a defender and then just hit an absolute
26:10
missile, as I believe the commentator described it as top
26:14
corner. That's where Mama of the Cookies
26:16
21, felt like we were in good shape after that.
26:19
They get the win, they're 12 points from four matches.
26:22
First in the group. Some machinations to think
26:25
through, so cities couple of batches that are still left.
26:28
December 12th versus STP December 18th at Barcelona.
26:34
That looks like it's going to be for first place in the group.
26:36
I love to look at the stuff just because I I love to kind of
26:39
understand the stakes. So if City beats St.
26:41
Polon, all they need is a draw at Barcelona to take the group.
26:45
If City beats St. Polon and out points Barcelona,
26:48
what Barcelona does versus Hammerbee, they also take the
26:51
group. Or you can look at it and say,
26:53
OK, City's three points ahead of Barcelona, what happens in the
26:56
Zinc Bolton match kind of doesn't matter.
26:58
Just get through that final Barcelona match with at least a
27:01
draw and then City takes the group.
27:03
And we talked about the importance of winning the group
27:06
because if you come in second, more than likely you've got to
27:09
beat 3 #1 seeds to take the whole thing, which is a much,
27:13
much tougher Rd. Yeah, I mean, I think you got to
27:16
go for it. I mean, theoretically you could
27:18
rest some players and rotate the squad, which might be helpful
27:22
for when your team is pretty hurt the way Chester city is.
27:26
But if you want that, you know, number one seed, you're going to
27:29
have to go for it against Barcelona in Barcelona.
27:31
And also, I just don't think it'd be good for your psyche
27:34
because if if you go in there and think like, OK, let's play
27:37
for a draw against Barcelona, you might lose 4 to one against
27:41
Barcelona because it doesn't matter if you're a big team or
27:43
not, they could run it up on you.
27:44
So I think they're in a in a really fascinating spot.
27:48
You know, Gareth Taylor has some big decisions to make.
27:50
It's a great point by you. Can I just do one more?
27:52
I got I got real caught up on the Bunny Shaw thing.
27:55
We have to shout out in this match Kiara Keating played
27:58
absolutely fantastic. I said, you know, it looked good
28:01
for City after after Bunny put us ahead to one, but it required
28:06
great saves and smart play from Kiara Keating to get them across
28:09
the finish line. Yeah, great.
28:11
To have a second keeper like that that can step into a match
28:15
like this and produce at that level.
28:17
Still so young Kara Keating. I thought a little early in the
28:20
match there was some moments that I, you know, kind of wasn't
28:23
sure. It's like we haven't seen Kara
28:24
Keating in in a high leverage match like this in a minute, but
28:28
I think she definitely grew into the match and was was rock solid
28:32
for sure. Yeah, she's excellent.
28:33
I've been a big fan of her for a little while.
28:36
I was curious when they brought in Yamashita, but now it's it's
28:39
not a situation where if you think you have two number ones,
28:42
you don't have any. I think they legitimately have
28:44
two number ones. I think so too.
28:46
Yeah, no argument there. Just did a quick double check.
28:48
It looks like Barcelona, Hammerby City, Zinc, Poulton are
28:52
taking place at the same time. So interesting think, I mean, in
28:56
the absolute off chance that Barcelona Hammerby draw, I mean,
29:01
we saw it last year versus Benfica.
29:02
It's not impossible, although highly, highly improbable.
29:05
If you're city, I don't think you can risk not taking the
29:09
group in the instance that that happens.
29:12
Yeah. So if they do draw city's got,
29:14
you know, a win could clinch the groups for city.
29:16
Yeah. So I do feel like, you know,
29:18
rest could make some sense, but I, I, I actually think they kind
29:21
of go for it. Yeah, I think you're right.
29:23
I think you have to. And St.
29:24
Polton played Man City tough last time, so I mean, I know
29:27
this one's going to be in Manchester, but why risk it?
29:30
Totally agree with that. Let's head up to doorway.
29:32
Back on my beat. Balleranga 1 Bayern Munich one
29:37
stop me if you've heard this one.
29:38
Great atmosphere in Oslo, Champions League football in
29:41
Norway in the evening time. What else is new?
29:44
This match told an interesting story.
29:45
So Bayern way outclassing Balleranga pretty much in the
29:48
first half and for most of the match I would say.
29:51
But Balleranga look bigger, they look stronger, they look more
29:54
athletic, you know, they looked imposing and it almost felt like
29:58
as the match went on Bayern had to kind of find ways around
30:01
that. Volunga defense. 0% surprise
30:04
that this 1 ended in a draw. Super hard fought match from end
30:07
to end. A lot to discuss in this one.
30:09
Anything about this matchup? Catcher Eye.
30:11
I mean, Karina Sebic was awesome.
30:13
I thought she was absolutely fantastic.
30:16
Olaf Deventon I thought also looked really great.
30:19
There were multiple opportunities it felt like for
30:22
Vol Arenga to not only win this game, but kind of pull away and
30:26
create some distance to win the match.
30:29
Yeah, that there was a Tvedson strike in the 55th that somehow,
30:33
I mean, shout out to Byron Keeper in a Mammotovich who got
30:37
the lightest of fingertips on it, just enough fingertip to
30:41
keep the game. Nil, nil in the 55th.
30:44
That strike ends up bouncing off both posts somehow.
30:47
Still still doesn't find, still doesn't cross the line.
30:51
So I got a weird AP physics flashback, SAT question
30:55
flashback. I'm just like how is this even
30:56
possible that a ball could can hit both and and and trickle
30:59
away? Can I ask a question about this?
31:02
Yeah, less of a question. I'd like to introduce a game.
31:04
Love it on the idea. The first thing I thought about
31:07
when I saw that is I know my good pal, the host of this show,
31:11
Dino de Cespedes, is not a big fan of the term when announcers
31:15
say a player is unlucky. So I'd like to introduce a game
31:19
very intelligently named unlucky with a question mark, and I
31:24
would like you to be the arbiter and tell me if this is unlucky.
31:28
When you hit a shot and the keeper gets like a fingertip on
31:31
it and it hits both posts, is it fair to say that is unlucky for
31:36
the player? You know, man, I, I still say no
31:42
to me. Keeper made a play.
31:44
Keeper made a play, man, what are you going to do?
31:46
You know, if you want to score, don't let her get her fingertip
31:49
on it. Put a little a little dab of
31:52
mustard, a little a little extra dab of mustard on it, maybe a
31:55
couple a couple extra leg extensions in the gym before or
31:58
kick off and you know, that'll give you give you the extra
32:01
juice you need. There we go to find the back of
32:03
that. No, I mean, it's that's the way
32:05
the ball bounces. It was great strike, but
32:08
phenomenal, phenomenal interjection by the keeper to
32:12
keep it nil, nil as mentioned and totally cosigned your Karina
32:15
Shevic point. She was a monster.
32:17
She's so good, so fun to watch. She had one progressive carry, 6
32:21
progressive passes, five shot creating actions.
32:24
She was all over the place and created a ton of gravity.
32:28
Yeah, she was just dragging Bayern defenders wherever she
32:30
went on the offensive side. Linda Dahlman, I thought was
32:33
Bayern's most threatening player, wasn't able to cash in.
32:37
But Bayern does bring on Jovanna Damianovic a little bit later in
32:40
the game and one of their go to players this season.
32:43
Pernil Harder starts in action, finds Julie Kvin up the right
32:47
hand side who we talked about a ton last week.
32:49
Pinpoint crossed. Valeranga had been defending
32:52
really, really well up to that point.
32:54
They're the kind of team that will not panic when the balls
32:58
ping around the 18. No, we know where we are.
33:00
We're in our spots, We've got everything covered.
33:03
Just to see them give up a goal on a little bit of like a fall
33:06
asleep kind of play. But I mean, you got to give it
33:07
to Byron. Great ball from Harder, great
33:10
ball from Vin and then the finish, you know, still a little
33:12
bit to do there. And yeah, that puts Byron up one
33:15
nil. Love the intensity on the face
33:17
of Don Yanovic. Give in with her arm around her
33:19
as she, like, just goes to the crowd and just pumps her fist.
33:22
That's what football's all about.
33:23
Except when football's also all about the underdog coming back
33:26
and equalizing late. Go yeah, so a little bit later
33:30
in the match, haiders dotier gets it to Emma stolen Goda, who
33:33
finds at least thorns Ness for a monster goal to keep Valerie
33:37
goes Champions League hopes alive.
33:39
I mean that goal 100% deserved giving the Norwegian champions
33:43
their first Champions League point.
33:45
Just a really exciting moment. The Arsenal fan inside me give a
33:50
very stern Domyonovich level fist pump with the same level of
33:54
intensity. I was very excited about Bayer
33:56
dropping points in this one. But super great moment for
33:59
Balaranga. This one also pretty even when
34:01
you look at some of the key stats.
34:03
Both teams manage 11 shots, 6 on target for Bayern, 4 for
34:06
Balaranga. Bayern advances Balaranga.
34:09
Fortunately it's the end of the road for them.
34:10
You look at Bayern's next two, they've got a couple big ones.
34:13
December 12th versus Juventus, December 18th.
34:16
They had to north London to play Arsenal for the group.
34:20
Right now they're one point ahead and a + 3 goal
34:23
differential in terms of the head to head between those two
34:26
clubs. Yep, it's going to make things
34:28
very, very interesting. Maybe we can talk about it
34:31
later, maybe we won't touch on it.
34:32
Do you remember all the way back to that 5 two loss that your
34:36
Gunners had and you said something?
34:38
I think it was something to the tune of we stink.
34:42
No, I don't really remember that.
34:44
OK, man, I must have. I must have made that up.
34:46
Sorry about that. I my apologies for misquoting
34:49
you. No, I mean I I do remember that,
34:51
but to be fair, and I hate to do it to the guy that was Jonas
34:55
Eiduvall's arsenal. There we go.
34:58
Yes, right under the bus. See you, Jonas.
35:01
Nice and warm under there. A lot of cold, cold to cold
35:03
European nights this time of year.
35:06
Speaking of Arsenal, Arsenal won Juventus nil, Arsenal punches
35:10
their ticket to the quarterfinals.
35:12
As mentioned, we're going to see who takes this group between
35:15
Arsenal and Byron. This one made me sweat, not
35:18
going to lie. Juventus came out really good
35:22
defending, really confident defending and the thing I kept
35:25
thinking about over the course of a very nervy first half was
35:28
my observation from last week. I think these teams are a lot
35:31
closer than that four NIL scoreline would indicate and
35:35
that first half definitely bore that out.
35:37
Yeah, I mean nervy really. From the opening whistle it felt
35:43
like as a neutral, if you're Juventus, I think you really got
35:46
to be. Again, terrible pun here, but
35:49
it's really not intended. You got to be kicking yourself
35:51
after this match like Cantori doesn't play that well,
35:54
Vongsgard didn't really look that threatening and you lose 1
35:57
nil in London and it's just like that was a golden opportunity
36:02
for you to really take like a big leap as a club and just have
36:06
a have put a feather in your cap in terms of results.
36:09
And they just really didn't do a lot with the ball, it felt like.
36:13
Yeah, I think, I think Juventus, I mean they're they're in a good
36:16
position in Syriafemonial sure, I think they're still top of the
36:19
table there, but they've been really wobbly.
36:22
And I think actually watching the Valerango side against
36:25
Bayern, if that team came to North London or if we had to go
36:28
there today and play that team or a Hammer bee, I think it's a
36:32
different result. I think Juventus is probably in
36:34
a rough patch right now, definitely to Arsenal's
36:36
advantage. I don't think any Arsenal fan
36:38
should be getting too over the moon about kind of like what we
36:41
saw today, ton of empty possession.
36:43
I think that was like a really, really big issue.
36:45
You look at the possession numbers, 73% possession for the
36:48
Gunners, they they completed 753 passes, 87% completion.
36:55
The XG number 3.7 for Arsenal to 0.5 for Juventus.
37:01
That's that's a tremendous delta between XG and Real GI mean you
37:05
already know that's going to make me sick to my stomach.
37:07
Didn't like it one bit. And there was some talk on the
37:10
telecast about Steena Blaxtenius versus Alessia Russo.
37:14
I kind of sneaky feel like the answer is like we should
37:17
probably be playing both of them because they do different
37:19
things. They can kind of playoff each
37:21
other and maybe reconfigure some of the midfield situations to
37:24
make this more of a reality. Blaxtenius comes on late for
37:27
Caitlin Ford. Lena Hertig comes on, I think
37:31
brings a different energy, bring some different spacing, some
37:33
different movements. She had really great looks.
37:37
She came really close on a header, then had a point blanker
37:39
that she just totally whipped on.
37:41
So I was really glad to kind of see her cash that final one.
37:44
But you look at those XG numbers, those possession
37:46
numbers, those passing numbers, and then you look at just nine
37:49
shots, 2 on target, the single goal really, really late in the
37:52
match in a match that they needed, you know, to be able to
37:55
kind of punch their ticket. Not the most encouraging result
37:59
for my Gunners. I, you know, I'm not going to
38:01
say they stink. You know, I'm going to go ahead
38:02
and, you know, retire that one for for a while.
38:06
But still, I think a lot to be desired when you when you start
38:08
to think about what's this team that look like once we get to
38:10
the knockout stages of this tournament.
38:12
Yeah, it's a fair question. I I think for, for our pals
38:16
who've been watching this show for a while.
38:17
I'm going to do a quick, a very quick tangent, very quick
38:20
analogy, if you will allow me to.
38:22
So I am lucky enough I work with education support professionals,
38:27
members of their union. So sometimes when I go and see
38:30
members, I go to their their place of work, I go to their
38:33
schools. I was going to see somebody
38:35
recently and I saw a kid as I'm parking my car and going in, I
38:40
see him getting off the bus and he's very clearly, he's got like
38:43
the book bag unzipped. He's very clearly stuffing a
38:46
sheet of paper as he's like running off the bus, he's
38:49
stuffing the sheet of paper into the folder and then stuffing the
38:51
folder in there. And I was like, aha, I remember
38:54
that. It was a long time ago.
38:56
I remember doing my homework on the bus sometimes and I feel
39:00
like that that kind of is what happened with Arsenal where it's
39:03
just like, OK, we got to get this thing done.
39:06
We got to get this math worksheet done real quick.
39:08
And there is Lena Hertig to get it done on the bus right before
39:12
you got a run into first period. So you got it done.
39:15
Was it pretty? Are you going to get a great
39:17
grade for it? Maybe not, but hey, it's not a
39:20
zero and and you're moving on, you're looking forward ahead.
39:23
Hopefully you don't do it the next time.
39:24
So it feels like that's kind of what happened with your Gunners
39:27
today. Yeah, totally agree with that.
39:29
One last mini rant to kind of go on here.
39:31
I know we love to say, OK, you know, these coaches, you know,
39:35
they've got this inside information.
39:36
They know what's happening at practice.
39:38
They've got their finger on the they they got.
39:40
They know so much more than we do.
39:41
Rosa Cafage needs to play more. There we go.
39:44
Let's go. Like she comes on in the 80
39:47
something minute, they don't score until she comes on.
39:49
She wasn't super involved in the in the her to goal, but she did
39:53
almost play seen by sending us through for a second goal, you
39:57
know, just after the hurting goal basically out of nothing.
40:00
So I'm in the I'm at I'm at the point where I'm like, I don't
40:04
care what's happening in practice.
40:05
I don't care what other information our our coaching
40:08
staff has. Shout out to Renee Slager.
40:10
She's doing a great job in In interim role.
40:12
I wouldn't be disappointed. If she gets the permanent gig, I
40:16
think she's proved enough under really tough circumstances.
40:20
But I need to see Rosa Cafagi. I know that she's produced at
40:23
this level. She's produced in the very
40:26
limited minutes that she's gotten.
40:28
She's a young player. She's like years away from her
40:30
prime prime, and this is a player that we saw contribute to
40:34
this tournament last season. When she gets in these matches,
40:37
it's like, why is this player not playing?
40:39
She clearly when the lights are on, is able to summon special
40:44
special moments consistently. I need more Cafagi minutes even
40:48
if they don't bear fruit. Those reps are incredibly
40:51
important if this is a player that that we want to build
40:55
around. Yeah, I think it's a great
40:56
point. You know, I'm going to buy in on
40:58
more Rosa Cafagi minutes. So, you know, we we enjoyed her
41:01
game last year for BK Hack. And I will say it's it's an
41:04
interesting proposition because you have freedom on them there.
41:07
She wasn't like a superstar really in this match.
41:09
I do want to point out it is kind of funny to think about.
41:12
So like if you if you are thinking of like that number ten
41:14
kind of attacking midfielder role.
41:16
So freedom on them. In her last three matches before
41:19
this Champions League match, she had again a goal against
41:22
Tottenham, played the full 90. She had a goal against Juventus.
41:25
You know, last week played sixty.
41:27
She had a goal and an assist against Brighton.
41:30
Those are three matches in a row that she had played.
41:33
And also just for good measure, a few weeks back on October 29th
41:36
against Albania, she had four goals for Norway in 66 minutes.
41:40
So freedom on them in good form. But I'm with you like I, I, I
41:45
yell this at coaches all the time.
41:47
You know, again, it's easy for us to say, but I like to say it.
41:50
If, if you're going to tell me it's impossible to play freedom
41:53
on them and Rosa Kavaji at the same time, I don't believe you.
41:57
We should at least try it like you should at least see how it
42:01
works. And if there are times where
42:03
maybe Manem doesn't have it as much, pull the cord a little
42:06
earlier than the 88th minute and get Kavaji onto the field.
42:10
Yeah, totally agree with that, that we have to make some room
42:13
for a player like that. And we've been talking a lot
42:16
about Lily Johannes, thinking about US women's national team
42:18
kind of reminds me of what Lily did against South Korea.
42:20
It's just like now she's on the pitch and now things are
42:23
happening, new things are happening.
42:25
And I think that kind of consistently happens when when
42:27
Kafaji gets opportunities, very excited, there are some
42:30
advances. One more team left to hit.
42:32
This team has yet to advance. There's still, they're still,
42:35
they're still scrapping for a spot.
42:37
There's still very outside chance that a team like
42:40
Barcelona, I'm just, I'm just joking that mathematically they
42:43
haven't yet clinched, but you already know what time it is.
42:45
Saint Polon won Barcelona 4. What'd you see in this one?
42:48
I think it's going to work out for these these plucky underdogs
42:52
from Catalonia. So Barcelona 4, St.
42:56
Polon won. Like you said, you know, St.
42:58
Polon stopped Barcelona from scoring in the 1st 20 minutes of
43:02
this match. I think they, they prevented
43:04
them from scoring in the 1st 30 minutes of the match before.
43:06
And I don't say this to belittle STP in any way.
43:09
I, I, I love the journey that they're on it.
43:11
They continue to get better. They, you know, they dominate
43:13
the Austrian league. The commentator mentioned, if I
43:16
heard it correctly, I believe the commentator said St.
43:19
Polton has not lost a league match in Austria since 2018.
43:24
I think, I think I heard that correctly.
43:27
We can go back and Fact Check if we'd like.
43:29
But you know, they moved midfielder Camila Dubkova,
43:34
essentially turning her from a midfielder into either a
43:36
defensive midfielder or what at times just felt like a straight
43:39
up third center back to kind of put in there to try to keep this
43:43
thing as low scoring as possible.
43:45
But Dubkova made a critical error, turned her back on Kika
43:50
of Nazareth and kind of played with the ball a little bit.
43:53
And Kika just immediately runs up onto her, dispossesses her
43:57
and drills it into the back of the net.
43:59
You could see I'm going to harken back to our NWSL last
44:03
show that we did, where you talk about when Orlando Pride gave up
44:06
that goal. And they immediately came into
44:09
what you described as like the tightest huddle you could
44:12
possibly come into. And everybody's like, OK, we're
44:15
going to fix this. We're going to figure this out.
44:16
Karina Schluter absolutely tried her hardest to get that team to
44:21
get into a tight huddle and be like, look, OK, I realized that
44:25
was bad, but we're going to be OK here.
44:28
And it was not a very tight huddle.
44:29
I mean, people got into the huddle.
44:31
Karina Schluter is obviously a leader.
44:34
But you could see the look on some of those faces like, oh
44:37
boy, here we go again. Yeah, shout out to Schluter, one
44:40
of my favorites. She's awesome.
44:41
Must be tough. Imagine not losing a game in
44:43
like, I don't know, half a decade or something and then you
44:46
got to go up against Barcelona and things are not going well.
44:49
You know, you just don't have those reps, You know, those like
44:52
kind of like tough, uphill kind of reps to kind of go to.
44:55
Makes it a little bit difficult. And while we're on the subject
44:58
of players that need to be getting more playing time, how
45:01
about Kika Nazareth? Can can we find a couple more
45:03
minutes for Kika? I know it's Sinkholton, not the
45:07
toughest of opposition, but this still is the championship group
45:09
stage. It definitely made the most of
45:11
these minutes. You know, not every player, when
45:13
they get an opportunity, you know, will slam their foot on
45:16
the gas extent. Yeah, but I thought she was
45:18
locked in. She was super hungry.
45:20
And I think we saw really just a sliver of what a player like
45:24
Nazareth is able to do. Yeah, I mean, she had an assist
45:26
in only 14 minutes against Real Madrid in league play.
45:30
She scored and had an assist in the reverse fixture at home
45:34
against Saint Paul. So I mean, when she gets on
45:36
there, she makes the most of her time.
45:37
But yeah, I mean, she is one of absolutely the best forwards in
45:40
the world. Her second goal was absolutely
45:44
as calm as you like. Collects the ball, turns, slots
45:47
it in, easy peasy brace. I mean, she is just an electric
45:52
player and playing in that cold weather.
45:55
No sleeves for Kika. I just, they're just, they're,
45:58
there is no end to the list of things I love about watching
46:03
Keegan Nazareth play football and just the fact that she's
46:05
like, no, I don't care. No sleeves for me.
46:07
Let's go, let's go play. I love that like no sleeves is
46:11
like you're. I love it.
46:13
It's like you're the greatest hallmark for just an absolute
46:18
warrior when it comes to and it's only Champions League like
46:21
these winter evening matches that just kind of like gets you
46:24
the way I don't think anything else does in the sport of
46:26
football. I immediately just start doing
46:28
push ups in my living room when I see a player go out
46:31
sleeveless. I will say I have renounced a
46:33
great deal of my Midwestern roots of being a person born in
46:37
the Midwest. You know, living in New York for
46:39
a long time, not living out here in Seattle.
46:41
I will tell you it must be biological or something, but
46:44
that that hypes me up. When you see somebody go like
46:47
Green Bay Packers offensive lineman style, like, I don't
46:50
care how cold it is, I'm not wearing sleeves.
46:53
It's awesome and I think from there, yeah, Barcelona gets off
46:56
to a good start. Not the full, full squad, but
46:59
still still some really nice moments I think from both sides.
47:02
Yeah, for sure. I mean, it can it can just turn
47:05
on a dime like obviously St. Polton doing a much better job
47:08
of keeping these kind of matches close, especially this week like
47:12
you'd mentioned. But with Barcelona, it can just
47:15
still turn into an and one mixtape moment whenever,
47:19
whenever one of the players is able to make it happen.
47:21
So Patri just decides, Oh yeah, right here at the top of the 18.
47:24
This is the perfect opportunity for me to turn and back heel a
47:27
pass. Alexia, because she's just a
47:30
supercomputer of good decisions, is like, hey, yeah, I'll let
47:32
this go. And it goes right to Vicki
47:34
Lopez, the Wonder Kid, who then slams it home.
47:37
It's three nil. We're going into halftime 3 nil.
47:40
And at that point, it felt like, OK, this could end up one of
47:45
those big crooked numbers. And then it didn't end up that
47:49
way because it felt like Polton was able to kind of do some of
47:52
those things that you mentioned that Celtic did to Chelsea,
47:55
where it's we're going to just kind of get in the way.
47:57
Or some of your shots, they were real physical at times.
48:00
They just kind of try to knock you off the ball and make you
48:03
uncomfortable. You don't often say it about
48:05
four one defeats. If we talk about like, you know,
48:08
Roma having a kind of a weird 41 defeat to Lyon, But for Poulton,
48:12
not a terrible result. No, they they were able to kind
48:15
of get some shots off. They held Barcelona held in
48:18
quotes to 15 shots. You know, that's like a really,
48:22
really stuff. Pretty good defensive day.
48:24
Couple board matches from Zinc Bolton.
48:26
You know, they've got city, they've got hammer be that
48:29
hammer be matchup I think is going to be really fun.
48:31
You know, definitely some pride on the line.
48:33
We'll see if Schluter is able to to kind of muster up some more
48:37
some more energy, some more tight energy for for whatever
48:40
players only huddle she wants to hold on the field in that one.
48:42
But I yeah, I continue to like this STP side, how they're
48:45
looking. Barcelona, you know, again, not
48:48
the full complement of firepower, but I thought they
48:50
did look good in spots. They still have that Sheen on
48:53
them as probably the best team in the field.
48:56
Barcelona still feels like the class of the tournament.
48:58
Yeah, gotta be class of the tournament, class of the world,
49:02
class of the universe at this point.
49:03
I don't know if we if there's a women's football team somewhere
49:06
in on Saturn or Jupiter or I don't know how, planets where, I
49:10
don't know which one of those. One of those might be the dashes
49:12
planet. Yeah, wherever or Orlando, look
49:15
at that. You know, we're still waiting on
49:18
that match. We, you know, we got to see that
49:20
plate at some point. But a couple other notes. 200
49:23
goals for Alexia Putais in her career at Barcelona.
49:26
Absolutely incredible. I do think we need to shout out
49:29
from Saint Polton pulling one back on a skidding free kick.
49:33
It looked like somebody skipping a rock over a small pond the way
49:37
Maria Mikhaliova, like, delivers this free kick.
49:40
And you know what? I'll say I don't really hold
49:43
this one against Katakoi because she kind of had to freeze when
49:47
Tupkova is right there kind of coming across the face and
49:50
Tupkova can't get there. But Koi had to be in that spot.
49:54
And then Valentina Medel just comes on the back post and is
49:58
able to knock at home again. Like, I know it can come off as
50:01
like, a little bit of like, participation trophy nonsense,
50:05
but like, seriously, like, you think about the resources and
50:08
the history and just everything that's stacked up between some
50:12
of these teams in this Champions League format.
50:15
Like, that is super rad for Saint Polton to notch a goal
50:20
against Barcelona in a Champions League match.
50:22
So, yeah, you lose for one, but that is something for your fans
50:25
to remember and hold on to and then think about as you continue
50:29
to, like, build your program to see where you might get one day.
50:32
So amazing moment for Valentina Medo again.
50:36
A really, it was like a clever, interesting way to hit a free
50:40
kick by Mikhailova and it worked out.
50:42
So I mean good on all of them. Yeah.
50:44
And I think you hear teams and players talk about the desire to
50:48
keep a clean sheet and kind of how serious these teams and
50:52
players take that. You know, that that's not a goal
50:54
that Barcelona wants to give up or is willing to accept as OK,
50:59
normal course of business. No, that's, that's something
51:01
that they're going to look at and say we, we need to fix this.
51:04
Really great moment for STB. Great call out by you.
51:06
I want to hit a couple quick programming reminders.
51:08
We've got the end of yourself final.
51:10
We will be back with a recap of that final next weekend.
51:13
We're going to be back to breakdown the US women's
51:15
national team and their match against England taking place at
51:19
Wembley. And Champions League is back the
51:21
week of December 11th, December 12th.
51:23
That's when match day five goes down.
51:25
We'll talk about the previews for those matches.
51:27
We'll talk about machinations, some big, big time stakes tied
51:31
to that, but either way, we'll be back before match Day 5 kicks
51:33
off. Help you get properly excited,
51:35
help you properly preview. You already know what time it
51:38
is. I think the Champions League is
51:40
absolutely our domain, our space, and I think as we hit the
51:43
stretch run, you know, we're also hitting stretch run.
51:45
I mean, just consider this show that Keegan Nazareth of the UEFA
51:50
Women's Champions League. This is our space.
51:52
Sleeves, no sleeves, whatever. We show up ready to play.
51:55
We show up ready to score goals. That's what we do.
51:57
We're about this. Yeah, except we're always in at
52:01
least a a second layer for sure. I don't think we've ever gone
52:04
one layer either. I mean, it's chilly down in my
52:07
office. I mean, give me a break.
52:08
I'm. I'm not as tough as Kika.
52:10
Come on. All right, man, I think we did
52:12
it. It's been another episode into
52:13
the channel. Sincere thank you, thank you,
52:14
thank you for watching, listening, following, liking,
52:16
subscribing, just playing, hanging out with your boys and
52:19
remember to like. If you liked and subscribe or
52:20
follow into the channel, YouTube, Spotify, Apple podcast
52:23
or wherever you like to watch or listen.
52:25
Leave us a review over your favorite podcast app, links to
52:27
all of our socials in the show notes of this episode.
52:29
And a big thank you to my coast as well, Mr. Grant Angle for
52:32
always being sleeved up the Kika of Nazareth to my Rosa Cafagi.
52:37
I appreciate you, bro. Get us more playing time.
52:39
We need more playing time, damn it.
52:40
Likewise, and we appreciate all of you for giving us the playing
52:43
time. You know, you could let your
52:45
friends know if they, if they like women's football, be like,
52:47
hey, are these two American Bros?
52:49
They talk about the Champions League, they talk about the
52:50
NWSL, they talk about lots of stuff.
52:52
You could help us out. We appreciate you, but for
52:55
already helping us out and rocket with us leaving the
52:57
comments, putting us on game, educating us as always.
53:01
We'll be back for the next round of group stage matches and we
53:04
will see you guys next time.