Best of the Football Ramble 2024: Part 2
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American Public University. Value for the whole family. Learn more at apu.apus.edu slash military. Hello and welcome back for part two of the Best of the Football Rumble 2024. I've gone back into my archives and fished out our very favourite moments for you to enjoy while you're buying those late Christmas presents. I see you again slithering through the middle aisle of Lidl. You are shameless!

Well, here's our gift to you. Anyway, our very favourite moments from the show in the second half of 2024. We begin with Euro 2024. As Stevie Clark himself, he doesn't want any negative Normans around the camp. Nice. So get rid of them now. Is that what he said? Positive Peters, please. Yeah. That's a positive Peter yourself, Peter. How do you feel about that?

I, yeah, I don't mind being, because usually it's petering out, which means you're obviously falling. I've never thought about how disrespectful that is to peters. It's awful. For Pete's sake. Yeah, for Pete's sake as well. It's my parade. Is for Pete's sake for a positive Peter or a pessimistic Peter? There you go, for Pete's sake. It's actually for constructive culverts. Oh,

a constructive cuspid. Would you rather be known as Positive Pete or Pepper Army Pete? Oh, Pepper Army Pete, because that would have some kind of licensing agreement. That's true, you get paid for that. That would earn me money. Always thinking about the money. Always thinking about the IP. IPete, as he calls himself. Apparently, Franz Beckenbauer will be honoured

at the opening ceremony. Will they honour a dead Scotsman? Sean Connery died really recently, according to Vish. Vish is still hoping that Sean's going to be there. I think, you know, joking aside...

died, didn't he, at the age of 78. What, this year? Earlier this year. This year, it wasn't last year. Okay. And he is a legend of the game. I mean, he's won the World Cup as a player and a manager. Fair enough. I wasn't suggesting they shouldn't be doing this, by the way. The way you said it was a bit like, well, what's happening here? I'm saying, what's Scotland getting out of it? That's true. Is this going to be the future of honouring people? Everyone gets one. You get one and we get one. Do you reckon Germany say, if we find enough people to honour, we would never have to play the game and therefore we won't lose to Scotland? Is that what you're saying? Could be. Oh, you know what?

It hasn't sort of entered my head that there is a possibility that Scotland win this. Could you imagine how much everyone will be bouncing tomorrow if they actually pull it off? 100,000 Scots have gone. 10,000 tickets. It's amazing. I very much enjoyed that bagpipe player falling off his chair in a crowded bar.

and balls out? It was hard to tell. It was a dark, the MPEG compression on the video was too dark. Was either one, because there was a bit of a scuffle, wasn't there? A couple of Scots fans were taken away in police cars. Was he one of them? Was it like a little mini car that takes the ball out to the pitch? Yeah, I don't think they were that small. I don't think it was Bonnie Prince Charlie himself. No. The

The minicar's not coming this year. I know. I know. How are they going to deliver it? Not in an official capacity. No. Oh, do you reckon they could just go outside? Yeah. Well, German fans did that with remote-controlled cars as protests in some of the Bundesliga games. But the idea is that the reason they had the tiny car delivering the ball last time around is because I think Volkswagen were the...

the sponsor, they have got an official mobility partner in the form of an electric car manufacturer. So there's absolutely no reason to not do it. They're just not doing it. I think it's laziness in my view. I don't know if the marketing department of that other company suggests the same thing the previous sponsor did. That might also be viewed as lazy. You've got to go with your PowerPoint. You've got to go big. You've got to say, right, we're going to have big mamma your way first. She's going to give birth to the ball. Amniotic fluid all over the pitch. We're going to be tripping over the thing.

And obviously the... Bang, Franz Becker. Bang, goodbye. I'd like to hear more about Big Mama UEFA. Big Mama UEFA. What's she like? She's friendly. In my mind, she's got like a soul food chat. She's friendly, but she rules with an iron fist. She rules her homestead with an iron fist. Dress made of all the flags. Dress made of all the flags. Yeah, yeah, good. Yeah. I mean, obviously, again, covered in... Do you know how many fluid is mainly baby piss?

No. I didn't know that. It's mainly baby piss. Oh, right. Dirty gets. Good to know. Thanks, Pete. You tell yours off when you get home. Thank you very much. Dirty gets. Is there any more from you? No, see you later. I'm off to watch a football. I prefer the stuff you did about pepperoni to the day.

Managing to take the shine off and start the tournament. You've got to host this show. Sorry about that. It's one of those moments where you're stunned and you think, no, I'm duty-bound to let him continue talking. The trophies are tits, presumably? No. The World Cup trophy looks quite mammorrific. Mammorrific, yeah, I suppose so, yeah. Well, you'd go for two plates, wouldn't you? To look a little bit like a Madonna costume or something. And would you let her have a big Paul Brightner afro?

Why? Just in honour of the German. Because it's German. The German. Oh, right, yeah, yes. Keegan. Depending on which country she was in, right? Yes, exactly, yeah. Big mama UEFA. Coming at you. Yeah.

Coming at you, Marcus. Confusingly. Stomping around. How big is she? Massive. She's like Ursula in The Little Mermaid. That big pipeline going from Russia through Germany, she'd sort of step over that daintily. She's like the Marshmallow Man in Ghostbusters. They're definitely involved in the oil pipeline. They are, yeah. Is she like the Marshmallow Man in Ghostbusters? Yeah, about that size. That kind of movement as well. But still,

Quite dainty, isn't it? Well, look out for her as the tournament progresses. I just don't want her to come into the stadium in the final delivering the trophy just stamping to death like Trent Alexander-Arnold. Accidentally. I'll draw you a picture. Okay, thanks. We'll look forward to that. Maybe put it on socials if we can't bear just sharing that burden ourselves. This is, of course, Scotland's second Euros in a row. They went out in the group stages...

We mentioned VAR at the end of the first half. Well, Rangers played a Champions League qualifier against Dynamo Kiev last night. Ended 1-1. Yeah, Rangers scored in the last goal kick of the game. Very late goal. Could be a vital one. There were VAR officials involved, of course, in this game. It's Champions League, for crying out loud, despite it being early August. Now, the VAR officials, though, did have to be changed on the day of the game.

This was because the original VAR officials were arrested for stealing a road sign. I know what you're saying. Presumably caught on CCTV. They've been down the student union. They've nicked a shopping trolley. There's only one place to go from that.

I think it's you who stole that road sign, but just let me go to my monitor. Right, let's replay. Is that you or is that not you? Quote from local police said, at around 1.40am, we received a report of three men carrying a road sign down the street. They were arrested at 1.43. I'll tell you whatever, quick.

on a charge of destroying road infrastructure. If the coppers knew who they were, do the old... Caught you on CCTV doing the old TV signal like that. Just go over to check it. So they're Polish, weren't they? The De Waal team. Yeah. And it's kind of... It's surprising because it's a ridiculous story anyway, but...

referees and like match officials I've met a fair amount of them they're all quite dull serious people yeah like police officer types right so it's quite weird that they're doing this clearly in the middle of being on a trip for this game yeah a work trip maybe they're having some sort of existential crisis and they're trying to learn to live a little it's like

What do the fun people do? Do you not remember though when loads of... Were they Premier League referees? There's different referees from this country. When they went out on a jolly to Thailand, do you remember? Yeah. Seeing some of the photos. And I'll leave that there. Yeah, I do remember that. But that wasn't around the game, was it? No, no, no. That was a holiday. That was a holiday, but I'm just saying that...

You're right when they seem sort of quite serious and whatnot. Buttoned up men. It's basically the kind of thing that Pete would do before a live show when we're on tour. I was nearly thrown out of university for doing something quite similar. And it's pathetic and it's very... What year are we talking about? 2001? Yeah, 1999. Right, okay. But you were like...

a teenager effectively, right? You weren't a fully grown adult referee. I was hauled up against the beak of De Moffat University in Leicester. They don't put you up against the beak, they put you in front of the beak. Put you in front of the beak. It was a very small room. And he was, I'd recently done a history module on the Weimar Republic and I kept on saying, this is a diktat, I'm not agreeing to these terms. Did you really? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, very honest, very honest.

What had you actually done? What was the specific charge? Somebody in my halls of residence had stolen some street signs. And all you'd done was enjoyed a suckle at Chinese meal, of course. I kicked open a door to look at the booty, basically. Okay, right. And they'd been locked up for, I don't know, police interaction, and I kicked open the door, and I was caught...

kicking open the door to have a look at them. Foolish. And yeah, I was threatening me to get kicked out of university. I said, I'm not having this. Basically, they said, you have to apologise for stealing the road signs. I was not involved in stealing the road signs. This is a diktat. Kicked the door down. I just broke someone's door. So what happened then? You attacked evidence. I think he just got bored of it after a while. He's a security officer at Demoppo University. You think he's like, this guy's a fucking wanker. I can't speak to him anymore. This guy's a live wire. I can't...

I can't control him. I'm leaving my post immediately. I think I know what happened. What? He suddenly thought, is that the guitarist from One Eyed Wood? They're one of my favourite bands. You're right. You're good to go, mate. You look like a local judge or something like that in the NFL. We'll leave this guy. Because you do look like a lot of people. Right, everybody. We start the Premier League roundup.

With Wolverhampton Wanderers 2, Chelsea 6. Speaking of that fever dream. It was the most predictable scoreline of the weekend. A feisty goal fest at Molineux, I might suggest, everybody. From Daft Penguin on X, who had Wolves v Chelsea as the first barn burner of the season?

Not me. And also, I think if you looked at the score on paper, you wouldn't think it was a barn burner. It's weird. Such an expansive score. It gives you no idea of what actually happened in the game. Yeah. So the first half was incredible. You know, you've seen four goals and you thought, well, who's going to come out on top here? Yeah, it was 2-2 at half-side. Well, that's right. And if we said, oh, you're guaranteed another four goals in the second half, we didn't think it would be all one side that got them.

But as I said, a feisty encounter. There was a little bit of pushing and shoving. You know what I thought, Vish, when I saw that? I thought, we've got our game back. I thought to myself, yeah, it's funny what a little post on social media can do to whip up an atmosphere. Obviously, Noni Madueke, who scored a 14-minute hat-trick

said or posted on his Instagram story the night before the game, everything about this place is shit. He was then booed throughout at Molyneux. He apologised after the game and said, I'm sure Wolverhampton is a nice town. I love how he was like, no, yeah, that is what I meant. He didn't go, no, no, I was in another place. I was in a pub. Until that point, he could have just been talking about the hotel. Well, he could have done it. No, no, no. On Instagram, he tagged in the location of Wolverhampton. LAUGHTER

It was very clear where he was and what he was talking about. But then he claimed he was like, oh, sorry, that went out on the wrong account. I was like, do you have some burner account? Yeah, loads. He's slagging off all the towns of England. It's him. He's outed himself on that. Sorry, I meant to send that to Fesshole. Sorry. But what I loved is he did that thing that it's just the way people talk when something's happened.

Like Wayne Rooley even did it on the documentary when he was talking about, when he was asked about certain difficulties they'd had in their relationship and certain stories that had leaked about him. And Maddy Wickey said the words. And he went, she wasn't that old. He said, well, you know, hopefully that'll never happen again.

Well, yeah, let's hope so. I mean, it is all in your court, that. Yeah. That's not it. Don't slag off a town, especially if you're... I've done it again. Oh, no. Yeah, just hopefully, you know, I won't press those buttons. He should have finessed it a bit and gone, you will never see that again. Yeah. Exactly. But, yeah. You can't slag off Servette. Come on. You can't. You can't. That would be quite bold to slag off... Was it Geneva they are? Yeah. Yeah. The lake here is rubbish.

Hi everybody, it's me Marcus here. I'm with Vish and Andy. Before we get started with Tuesday's ramble, we were recording this on the Monday and the news that Sven-Jörn Eriksson has died at the age of 76 broke. So we thought we would say a few words about the great man before we get started.

We knew that this was coming, of course, in January. He said he had at best a year to live after being diagnosed with cancer. A new documentary about him was released last month. And in it, he said, I hope you will remember me as a positive guy trying to do everything he could. Don't be sorry. Smile. Thank you for everything. Coaches, players, the crowds. It has been fantastic. Take care of yourselves. Take care of your life and live it. And it's always so poignant when someone...

before they die saying farewell. Because normally, obviously, what happens, you don't know these things, and the appreciation starts basically the day or the hour after that they've died. But with this, with Sven-Jörn Eriksson, a little bit like Billy Connolly, actually, not that long ago on the BBC, he did his goodbye in that documentary, and of course did the sort of the farewell tour that we spoke about when he was at Anfield, when he managed one of those Liverpool Legends games. It's...

he's so kind of poignant touching but ultimately sad and obviously for his family it's a heartbreaking yeah it is sad but I feel like very happy that football did get to appreciate him and he did get

get to appreciate football in the last six to eight months. Yeah, exactly. What point is it having your flowers when you're not there to fully enjoy it? And he really was. I think the way that, of course, it started off with him coaching Liverpool in the charity game against Ajax, but then he was appreciated at Gothenburg. Going way back, reminding you of all the longevity he had of not just a life lived in football, but a lifetime's worth of

football achievement and you know I was at Gothenburg a couple of months ago for a game and they were ushering the next generation young fans into the into the Svennis stand and that was beautiful actually yeah I mean he managed in so many places and was successful in a lot of different countries and so on so like

All of Europe was aware of who Sven-Johan Eriksson was, and of course the first foreign manager to manage England. He gave us some memories. I mean, the notable one is, of course, the 5-1 against Germany. But he's an important person in some regards in the history of the England national team. Yeah, without a doubt, because he brought charisma to the role that had been...

Since he drained from it, really, hadn't he? And he brought that with himself without necessarily having to be anything that he wasn't. And you probably think that, you know, you look back at it now and you wonder if the FA really had a grasp on the person they were getting, let alone the manager. Because as you said, an incredible track record, but he brought with it, you know, a bit of a smile and almost a kind of sense that,

you know, there is more to it than this. Remember that. Always remember that. And I kind of think, you know, when you were hearing him speak after his diagnosis and I suppose up to this point, there was a real sense of, you know, he was telling everyone else around him to, no, it's not sad. This is life. This is what we all have and it's about making use of the time before this happens and...

I think back to, it's a really silly thing, but as soon as Andy said kids there, I thought about the kid who had his hair cut like Sven. And it's just like everyone has their own little Sven thing and you remember different things, but you also do remember the football and the success as well. And this story was doing the rounds earlier, but it's from D.M.R. Hammond's autobiography.

And it kind of sums up the bloke, really, because it starts with... I mean, already there. Yep. Yep.

Boss, what are we celebrating? He turned to me, smiled, that gentle smile of his, and took on the air of a Buddhist philosopher as he said, Life, Kaiser. Then after pausing for dramatic effect, we are celebrating life. Yeah, absolutely right. And he did that every day? Yeah, he did. And that was the final quote, wasn't it? As I said, just to remind everybody, the last bit of it, take care of yourselves and take care of your life and live it. And my goodness, he certainly lived a life and it's one we'll remember forever.

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Hey, I'm Ryan Reynolds. Recently, I asked Mint Mobile's legal team if big wireless companies are allowed to raise prices due to inflation. They said yes. And then when I asked if raising prices technically violates those onerous two-year contracts, they said, what the f*** are you talking about, you insane Hollywood a**hole?

So to recap, we're cutting the price of Mint Unlimited from $30 a month to just $15 a month. Give it a try at mintmobile.com slash switch. $45 upfront payment equivalent to $15 per month. New customers on first three-month plan only. Taxes and fees extra. Speeds lower above 40 gigabytes per details.

When it comes to weight loss, no two people are the same. That's why Noom builds personalized plans based on your unique psychology and biology. Take Brittany. After years of unsustainable diets, Noom helped her lose 20 pounds and keep it off. I was definitely in a yo-yo cycle for years of just losing weight, gaining weight, and it was exhausting. And Stephanie. She's a former D1 athlete who knew she couldn't out-train her diet, and she lost 38 pounds.

My relationship to food before Noom was never consistent. And Evan, he can't stand salads, but he still lost 50 pounds with Noom. I never really was a salad guy. That's just not who I am. Even through the pickiness, Noom taught me that building better habits builds a healthier lifestyle. I'm not doing this to get to a number. I'm doing this to feel better.

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As mentioned earlier, a local councillor, a council leader, you might call him, in Wolverhampton, Stephen Simpkins, has responded to Nonny Maduweke's claim that Wolverhampton is shit. Now, Maduweke, again, has apologised for this. He apologised in the post-match interview after scoring a hat-trick. He did, and he did say, I'm sure it's a lovely town. Yeah, which sounds worse. You made a different assessment earlier when you were looking at it. What he should have said is, he should have said,

now I've spent some time here, it's clearly a very nice place and I should never have said it. And I look forward to coming back and scoring another hat-trick. But he was thrown under the bus though because he... I thought he handled himself well ultimately in the placement. But clearly the media lays on put him up and they didn't have to put him up in the post-match. They scored a hat-trick. It was a difficult situation because...

ordinarily every broadcaster is going to want to speak to him because he scored a hat-trick but they could not ask him about that stuff and it felt to me like that wasn't the place to be talking about that stuff he could have given an interview later on in the week or something it's always going to be but he had to do it it was a part of the game though the booing and everything and added an extra bit of spice so I do think it was relevant to talk about that after I love that he picked up the match ball

from the little cone yeah absolutely big time yeah great player I wonder if Carlsey will be looking at him Lee Carlsey possibly possibly him and Morgan Rogers from Vidder I think maybe the two big additions for the much anticipated and well needed international break next week we're all looking forward to that aren't we I am yeah I know you are why do you say it like that

Carry on. Can we get back to Stephen Simpkins? Yes, we can. It's his moment. This is his moment. This is his time to shine. This is his Susan Boyle moment. Martine McCutcheon. Yeah, Martine McCutcheon, yeah. Simpkins said, Madoweka clearly doesn't know about Wolverhampton's rich industrial history. Oh, you've not helped. Yeah. You've not helped, Stephen. He said it's a bit shit, and when you hear what a town's big on industry...

it tends not to lend itself to beautiful architecture and lovely plazas and all that kind of stuff. But still, I've not been to Wolverhampton, so I can't say. He said, so he doesn't know about Wolverhampton's rich industrial history or that it was the first place to have traffic lights. What a defence. What a defence. Does he mean that as the club night? Maybe. Maybe he does. So here's how Wolverhampton don't really help their case. I went online earlier to find out some Wolverhampton trivia, which I thought could accentuate...

a great area and a great part of the country. And we could talk on the show in an even handed way about what a great place it is. Cause I'd like you, Mark, cause I've not been there either. No, but we're going to a back to school disco on a Friday night there. No, I found a quiz, a Wolverhampton themed quiz. Here we go. Uh, online about the, the, the city. Uh, and, the first question, it's a trivia based quiz. This is the first question about Wolverhampton.

LAUGHTER

What a grim start. The answer's influenza, part of the great Spanish flu, I imagine. Yeah. But that's what they've opened with. My goodness. So, traffic lights, a rich industrial history and a shortage of coffins. I've genuinely never been to Wolverhampton. No, I haven't either. Yes, you have. When? You did a little piece there. Oh, of course I have. I've been to Molyneux. Yeah. That's how great it is. I completely forgot about it. I went to Wolverhampton. Actually, do you know what? I've remembered that now. How would you compare it to Gillingham? There's...

It's better than Gillingham. Yeah. There was a very interesting... I wonder if it's still there, but this was during the time of Nuno. Yeah.

This was a, there was a big Portuguese enclave that we went to and did a few pieces because we're doing a VT for Premier League. I remember, yeah. Did a few pieces from different Portuguese cafes and there genuinely was quite a large amount of Portuguese people there. Yeah. But they all play for Wolves. That's what I'm saying. That's what it was like at the time. Yeah, apologies to the great place. I've done a noni-madoaki. You have. I've forgotten I've even been there. No, you didn't slag it off. I scored a hat-trick as well. You did? Ha!

It just wasn't filmed, sadly. Well, I should say that Simpkins went on to say, if Wolverhampton is so bad, then why would Bob Dylan, a proper superstar, pick to play not one, but two gigs here, if it's good enough for Bob Dylan, he says. He has an opportunity to do something really funny, doesn't he? Wolverhampton, yeah, maybe that's shit. You won't really understand what he's saying. Have you been to Wolverhampton, Jim? I have in my student days. I remember nothing about it.

Because you went to Birmingham for university. I did, yes. Is that when you went there? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Right, let's go a little bit further afield in Spain. Now we're going to go to Spanish TV show El Chiringuito, a favourite of yours, Jim. Absolutely. A quite ridiculous television show. We don't have anything near it, do we, Andy, in this country? Like The Big Breakfast would probably be the closest thing we've ever had to that. But like a really angry Big Breakfast. Yeah, something about football. Yeah, The Big Breakfast with like crime watch lighting. Yeah.

But does football. If GB News did the big breakfast. In a football context. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. It's on at night as well, isn't it? Do they have as troubling views as GB News? No, no. Oh, OK. It's more ridiculous. There's a lot of conspiracy on there. OK, OK. Yeah, it's an absolute madhouse.

But there was something stunning happened. Even for them, this was quite brilliant. They had former La Liga referee Pajares Paz being interviewed. Now, Pajares Paz, I thought that's... Because Paz means peace in Spanish. And I thought, Pajares, what does that mean? If you go to Google Translate, Pajares means...

according to Google Translate, whatever you think, Haystacks. So we're saying he's got like a ref with a wrestler name. They were talking to Haystacks Peace, Andy, is what I'm saying. But anyway, we'll go with his Spanish name, Pajaro Paz, because that is his name. And he was being interviewed from his home.

sat there, you know, a high-profile referee. And, you know, imagine in this country, we see this now, don't we, that Sky Sports make, you know, TNT Sports, when they have a recognisable referee in the studio, Darcy O'Donnell, the World Cup. In the background, his parrot...

started to whistle a little tune, as parrots do. And then it became apparent that he was whistling the Real Madrid anthem. The great thing about it is his face, isn't it? His face betrays him more than his parrot does. He starts going, shut up, shut up, shut up. But he doesn't understand the technology because he doesn't realise that we can hear him and see him go, shh, shh, shh.

Oh, Matt, it's so good. Imagine like... Right, well, we've got Howard Webb. He happens to be in his house at the moment, his living room, and he's got a minor bird going, come on, you reds. LAUGHTER Like, it's the same essential, isn't it? It's a difficult one for me, because like most people, I love parrots, but at the same time, we know that no-one likes a grass. LAUGHTER

Good point. You are ultimately from East London, of course, Jim. So, yeah, you would very much take that. But, like, again, you often see shocked faces and people trying to leave the studio in horror during that show. Whereas it was genuine, without a doubt. Minds were blown. But fortunately, no one in the last 70 years has ever thought that Real Madrid have had preferential treatment from referees in La Liga. Well, Andy, it could start a new conspiracy.

new conspiracy. Yeah, definitely a new one. Apparently old Haystack's piece. Um...

Paris Paz claimed that another ex-La Liga referee, a guy called Urizar Apitarte, has a parrot that says cabron at the word Barcelona, which of course means bastards. Yeah, so... Why do all these referees have parrots? I know, it's weird, isn't it? What is going on? In a very weird story, that's easily the weirdest bit. Yeah. That's his defence. Why are you training people to stop you in? I have to do this to balance it out. You should talk to his parrot. LAUGHTER

It's some of the stuff that he comes out with. Imagine that, dobbing in someone else's parrot. Is that all you've got? But the thing is, though, it's not a word. How many times has that parrot had to hear that tune to perfect it, to know it? Teary, mate. The idea that one of the equivalent over here would be like an Excel bully, so you'll never walk alone. Yes, yeah, yeah. Do you know what I mean? Oh, stunning stuff.

Right, everybody. I want to finish the half with some former Premier League men strutting their stuff abroad. Andy Carroll has made a dream start to life in Bordeaux, scored a couple of goals. And again, just to remind you why Andy Carroll is in Bordeaux, it's not the Bordeaux who were fighting for titles not that long ago in a Champions League club. A bit of a desperate situation at Bordeaux. They've gone down the divisions, of course, in France. They've been punished.

It's tough for the fans to take that, but perhaps the sight of Andy Carroll scoring British goals, as the commentators described it, Vish, will be a bit salve to the wound, do you think? It's magnificent. I think so. I reckon Andy Carroll can get us back in Europe as a nation. LAUGHTER

Is that what we're down to? Because if he goes over there and shows British values and British goals, they might think, we want a piece of this. What else have you got? Macron will be begging for us. Or whoever's in charge, I forget about French politics. But yes, a couple of goals to last minute equaliser. It's good to see. I mean, he just loves life in France. Yeah, this feels like an old story, doesn't it?

It does a bit, yeah. It feels like he's just on a little tour now. Yeah. A tour of headers. Yeah. For obscure French clubs. Of course, we mentioned this when, was it, a particular tabloid were quite sneery at the fact he'd dropped down the divisions in France. And I was like, hang on. What have you ever done? Yeah. But he's played football. He's now scoring goals and he's living in Bordeaux. Oh, dickhead. Yeah. You know what I mean? He's cooling down with wine and pate. Oh.

What a life. Yeah. You wouldn't have predicted this, would you? No. There's a lot of players where you think, oh yeah, they might like a sort of quite gouty late retirement. Actually, no, that is, now it does make sense. Now I think about it. I reckon he's getting Doritos and dipping them in pate. Yeah. I'd love that. And then a bit like, oh, he's getting annoyed that they're breaking, so he's scooping them up and putting them on. Yeah. Pints of wine. What a life. Still doing booze cruises. Yeah. But you live in France now, you don't need to...

He may or may not be doing that, everybody, but we hope he's having a lovely time. He is doing that. We hope he's having a lovely time. He's doing that. He had to get fetched out of a vineyard for this guy. Hey, I'm Ryan Reynolds. Recently, I asked Mint Mobile's legal team if big wireless companies are allowed to raise prices due to inflation. They said yes. And then when I asked if raising prices technically violates those onerous two-year contracts, they said, what the f*** are you talking about, you insane Hollywood a**hole?

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As a part of your subscription, you'll also get ad-free episodes of The Ramble, OTC and Upfront, as well as an extended version of every Wednesday Ramble. Just head to patreon.com forward slash football ramble to listen to that. And we also, I think we're going to, I know we've done watch-alongs in the past before, but now exclusively going to offer afters.

with every Patreon member and they can ask us about other podcast hosts. They can video us? No, no, they very much cannot do that. That's the one thing we agree, because they can't video us. Because we have another video which says, please don't send this around if this gets out. I thought that was the point of the old afters, was to just let it all out. It's fair game, it's off the record. I've never seen an on-the-record afters, actually. No.

Until this week. Maybe this is the start of a trend. Yeah. Oh, dear. Well, of course, on Monday afternoon, a video was leaked on X, which used to be known as Twitter. And it appeared, appeared, it appeared, yes, it appeared to show Premier League referee David Coote saying very nasty and naughty things and xenophobic things about Jurgen Klopp.

Everyone's seen this. You've had a couple of days to let this sink in. It's interesting that you said it appeared to show David Coote because everyone was thinking, is that AI? It was like a VAR check. There's no way that's AI. I'm not counting this as a goal just yet, but it really looks like that was a goal. Yeah, and in the space of an hour, he went from denying it to...

No, it is genuine. I just can't remember what I said. Yeah, that is so much worse. This should jog your memory. It's so much worse. Yeah, or is it like leaning into it to the point of I was so inebriated, I just don't remember. I could have said anything. That's true. That's true. Well, the video thought to be at least two years old, of course.

saw Coote calling Liverpool shit. Not in a particular game, wasn't it? I think so. I think he's referring to the Burnley game that they're talking about. Yeah, it was certainly right after. Because when he talks about Liverpool being shit, it's in reference to that game. Yeah, okay. So, lots of people won't overlook that, of course. Some of them go, well, yeah, okay. Then he calls Jurgen Klopp arrogant. And I'll soften the word for you. He calls him a cunny. Yeah.

All right. He does. Yeah. I'd want this podcast to be a PG-13. Yeah. As they would have in the States. And he calls him Cunny. That's cunt to everyone in the UK. Yeah.

He calls him a cunny in, kind of as you mentioned at the start, like in a xenophobic way, which kind of in isolation of everything. Yeah, he references his nationality. Yeah, and I think a lot of people have spoken about, well, he can't referee anymore because of this, that and the other. I mean, that's enough for me, regardless of any kind of...

clouding of judgment he might have due to his dislike of the club. He said James Milner's alright though. Yeah, but arguably that just leans more into that James Milner is a bit meh. Ah, come on. No, it's because he's in that photo he's holding up. No, I know. But I felt a bit for Milner. He's like, why am I involved in this? Leave him alone. Why am I getting a mention? Yeah.

I know, yeah. Well, then the second video was leaked, of course, where the chap next to him said that the video can't go anywhere because it would...

ruin his career. And to be fair to whoever that was sent to for a good couple of years they were true to that bargain. I don't know who broke the pact but somebody has done but he's obviously suspended by Pugmall and UEFA have removed him from the list of referees for the Nations League this week. Yeah I mean surely there's no coming back from that. I wouldn't have thought so. Because you know it's it's

It's not unreasonable, is it, to privately say to your partner or to your friends, you know what, Jurgen Klopp was really rude to me once. I think he's a bit arrogant. I don't really like him very much because of the way he personally made me feel. That's fair enough. But it's so...

naive to do it in a context like this. And now, obviously, as was always going to happen, lots of Liverpool fans and lots of non-Liverpool fans are analysing his performances going, actually, this decision doesn't look right and this one doesn't look right. And it leans into conspiracy, but actually perfectly reasonably. Do you know what I mean? If you're someone at Liverpool or you're a Liverpool fan, you have every...

it's completely reasonable to look at that and go, well, he doesn't like us. We know he doesn't like us because we've seen him say it. So, I mean, you surely, your position is untenable after that. Other referees are going to, are tired by this now. Yeah, the whole association, this is the problem, isn't it? Which is unfair because all it takes now is a disagreement as a fourth official referee

where anyone could posit that, oh, it looks like they don't get on. Let's look through this or let's be wary of this going forward. And obviously fans are like that anyway. But, you know, the language used in that video is such that it kind of takes it to a new level, not like a stratospheric level, but certainly a level where you're thinking, I mean...

the stuff he's saying about Klopp, the personal stuff he's kind of intimating there, we know where it comes from and we can understand the motivation, but

but we've never really been confronted with it like this. Yeah, yeah. It just obliterates any sense of his kind of objectivity and impartiality, which is an absolutely key tenet of being a referee, isn't it? Like, rightly or wrongly, whether we can't know if he, you know, bases decisions on things other than what he's seeing in front of him, but that's the whole problem and that...

And that's what he's done here. He's made it so that we can't know. I wonder if actually the way this goes is PGMO will go, you know what? Some of us do have biases. We try our best to fight it. It's just human nature. You can't really do it. So from now on...

every referee has to wear the kit of the team they support while they're refereeing. Or we could have like an amnesty where every referee comes forward. Who's the biggest cunning in football? They'll get a go. It'd be like the TNT eye dents they do where they step to camera. Exactly.

Speaking of TNT, I love this, that Peter Walton had his say in. He said, I would have described David Coote as captain sensible, maybe a bit highly strung at times and not one of the lads. Presumably they then went back to Fletcher McManaman on commentary. We should get Coote in as our Peter Walton. Yes. David, is Arna Slott a cunny? LAUGHTER

Well, Jim, I haven't officiated him that much. But I can safely say... Savage champion afterwards. Oh, that's very weird. I wouldn't say. He's not... They're bigger cunnies. Much bigger cunnies. Me, for example. So the...

Right. Jim, you look like you've got an email. I do look like I've got an email for good reason. Christopher Rogers has been in touch. He says, hello, Ramble Crew. You don't seem to have a campaign song for your probably doomed bid to win at the FSA Awards. That'd be fair. I was about to say, I love his attitude. Well, he's realistic, but he's hopeful. He continues, but don't worry, I'm here to help. All the best from Sonny Ayrshire. Chris, you're joking.

When the ramble dominates them at it.

Oh,

Oh, Chris Rodger. Bloody hell. The fool meets the beastie boys. He must be related to Nile, Roger. It simply must be. That is unbelievably good. So good. The guitar. That is outstanding, yeah. We're going to win. We are now. The only thing I was going to ask, I didn't know it was a free bar. Is it a free bar? I don't remember, which suggests yes. Yeah, brilliant.

Honestly, that is stunning stuff. And if you don't get your vote in, not only are you disrespecting the football round, but you're disrespecting Christopher Roger with that wonderful song. I like the fact that he refers, presumably, to Luke, Andy and I as dilfs. Yeah. And you two and Pete will drink the free bar dry, get cheap kebabs and then all throw up on the way home. There's a clear line there, isn't there? I didn't read it that way. I genuinely, in my head, I was like, well...

Our industry is just made up of blokes. So when we win it, the other blokes, the older blokes, go home. Yeah. You know me, I like to be last man standing. Not drinking will give you a head start on that. The wet wipes at the Guardian was an enjoyable line. Look, come on. For crying out loud, everybody, the...

Bring them down. Remember when they brought the news of the world down? Yeah. Let's do this to them, but very specifically in terms of the FSA Awards. Yeah, exactly. And you're still fuming about what they did to the news of the world, so you want to get your own back in some way. Actually... Why do we...

Why do we always torpedo ourselves? We're on a good thing. No, no, no. I've got... Jonathan Liu's a good mate of mine. Oh, is he? So I can root around for some videos of him. Great, yeah. There you go. Set up a sting operation. You can plug us on Match of the Day. There we are, you see. Start evening things up. But you can vote for us. The link is in the show notes. You've no excuse. And if we don't win, it is genuinely your fault because it is a public vote.

We've done all we have come this far. You need to do the last stretch for us here. Not even Trump went that far to blame. If I don't win, it's your fucking fault. You fucking idiot. Not even Trump.

Thank you for listening to part two of the best of the football ramble 2024 myself, Luke and Andy are back tomorrow for the previous show. Make sure you join us for that for now though. Thank you truly for joining us throughout 2024 and a special thanks to our patron supporters who help us do what we do. Goodbye and enjoy the Christmas perineum. The football ramble is a stack production and part of the ACAST creator network.

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