Not bad this league, is it?
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Good tidings we bring everybody. Welcome to the Football Ramble. Late winners, red cards and managerial sackings. What a weekend. It's Monday 16th of December. I'm Marcus Speller. I'm Luke Moore. And I'm Jim Campbell. MUSIC

My goodness. Wow. My goodness. What a weekend in Martin Tyler's Barclays Premiership Limited, which I believe is the full name, Jim, isn't it? It certainly used to be. Yeah. I don't know if it still is, but that doesn't matter. I'll tell you something, in the words...

Richard Keyes

But I think this was the best weekend of the Premier League so far. I think it was the best. Whatever. No, this season. Oh, OK. Well, that's less of a shout. Look at the inputs, though. Less of a shout. Look at the inputs. Is there a heavy Southampton bias in this? Possibly. Yeah, absolutely. Come on to that, Jim. Don't worry about that. Plenty of time for that. There is plenty of time for that. One of two managers that have gone. No news on Pep Guardiola at the moment.

That will happen while we're doing the show, though, won't it? We know that. No news is bad news. Oh, dearie me. Where to begin? I suppose, you know, this is how it goes. Two managerial seconds. We will get to them, of course. But we are going to start, of course, with the Manchester derby. 2-1 Manchester United were the victors. I mean, we all saw this coming, of course. A late comeback from those Red Devils to pile on more misery to Pep Guardiola. Jim?

I said it before and I'll say it again. The empire's gone. It's crumbled. Yeah, you've been banging this drum for a while, haven't you? You've been saying he should have gone in the summer. And the new contract feels like just a sort of little bit of... Almost like delusion at this point, doesn't it? No, it's okay. It's okay. We'll keep it going. We'll turn it around. And...

obviously it's not going to be this bad forever, but it is absolutely fascinating to watch the kind of depths it's plumbing at the moment. Like, getting done by a route one Man United goal like that, like where Guardiola has that kind of mad decision to think, maybe I can backheel this, maybe I'll just, oh, it's gone in, I can't do anything. That was weird. It really was. That was almost as weird as Man City scoring by accident. Yeah. Which is the most accidental goal.

It's the most accidental goal that Man City scored that they kind of meant to score. When I say accidental goal, people think, oh, it came off someone's arse or something. No, they kind of meant to score it, but they did it in a way that was totally unorthodox. And Guardiola was just like, oh, yeah, I'll head that. I'll head that. That's what I do. Yeah, I'll head that. No problem. And I've never ever seen a team of such obvious quality perform so badly in my life.

The lack of quality on display from Man City and the execution of what they did, how they went about doing it, the final pass, sometimes even just a basic play. It was so, so bad. We've seen this with, I don't know, Chelsea's champions under Mourinho when it just goes wrong the next season or Spain at 2014. Yeah.

France in 2002 do you know what I mean when you just go look at all these players Pompey in any season indeed and you go oh it's no they're done but it feels like they think that now doesn't it the way they're playing and the way they're like shanking everything and under hitting this and over hitting that and it's strange yeah the

that kind of strangulation they had with possession just seems to have deserted them completely. And I thought that when Marcus was saying what he was saying, it was when I was away and I wasn't able to watch as closely as I would normally. And then...

I just thought I was probably a bit premature to say that over the top. I think I'm on board. Well, this is the thing. It's impossible to kind of excuse what you've seen. But the performances before this... I can't outrun the sadness I've seen that Maximo Park once said. Blimey. There's too much evidence. I think this is the point is...

this side under Guardiola have been so devastatingly good that we're just refusing to believe, oh, it's a blip, it's a blip. No, look at the body language. Look at it all. You don't need a body language expert to tell me that Pep's not having a good time. But Jim, for years, Arsenal were considered a banter club.

Are you going to label Man City a band of club now? Well, I don't think I need to. I think the Ramblersons would love to hear you say it. Well, I mean, look, I'm not going to pretend I'm not absolutely loving every second of this. I think you need to say the words, Jim. They're a band of club. Hey! Easy!

It's very, genuinely very interesting, isn't it? Seeing the fans boo and the frustration and stuff. Because the extremes that they flipped between there are quite dramatic. Four Premier League titles in a row with the treble in there and all the other trophies along the way and stuff to... What is it? Is it one win in ten now? Yeah. It's just an astonishing drop-off. Yeah. It's like...

It's like there's been some sort of body swap situation gone on. I think it's 1-1-11 if you count the recap at the start. But it does seem odd because against, go back to Feyenoord, which Guardiola himself referenced after the match, 3-0 up and cruising...

And then that happens. You think, well, bloody hell. And then, okay, so let's, when they beat Nottingham Forest 3-0, was it the other game or the other round of fixtures? Yeah. It was, okay, right. That looked a bit more like it. Forest having a fine season, of course. And you think, well, that's a good win, good performance, and there you go. But I'm afraid that it's so, it's inconsistent now. Those players are capable of that. So don't be surprised if next week they actually pull out a 2 or 3-0 win or something like that. It's,

to me, as I've said before, in terms of them being the enormously dominant force, I think it's gone. I don't think they'll win the title. I don't think they'll be in the title race. They're not going to win the title. Do you know, to the point of, I think a top four finish, they're very capable of that still. Carragher already said before this game that he thought they'd go out of the Champions League next season. Yeah, well, I mean, this season, certainly the way they're playing, but in terms of what he's saying, I think a top four finish would be decent. What's remarkable to me is that

You look at, you know, Rodri's missing. We know that. And they've had other players missing as well. But that can't explain. It's not it, Luke. I've never seen, I was trying to think when I've last seen Kevin De Bruyne play so badly. And it must be really when he was completely shorn of confidence in

when he was at Chelsea maybe before he even went to Germany there's no real comparison he looks absolutely cooked to the point where when Guardiola reacted to Man City scoring it was like he was confused that they even managed to score it was the weirdest thing Man United cannot defend corners they can't defend set pieces the only team worse than them at defending set pieces is Wolves who we're going to come on to Man United are awful defensively from set piece situations

And Man City weren't really even putting the ball in the box. The one time they put the ball in the box was that it meant to do something else, and it deflected into the box by accident. That's what I mean. And then Guardiola scores. And Guardiola was looking around thinking, I don't know how that's happened. He looks totally... It looks like when he puts them out on the pitch and knows that he can no longer control things, because obviously the massive control freak is all top managers are these days. He just seems completely confused. It's not even that...

Obviously he's frustrated but he just seems confused as far as possible. But look at his reaction when the penalty was given away. He was crestfallen. But he would be anyway. No, no, no. But that's not what he... Normally he would be... Ah, was that... It would cut a different figure. He was completely defeated in that moment. And there was all... There was an...

sense of inevitability about them as well, where you think even if they do concede a goal in the 85th minute, you think, oh, they'll probably still bloody go and win it and then they'd maybe find a way. But they look like they're playing with fear, don't they? And I wonder if that has actually been kind of transmitted from him because he seems completely out of control and at a loss as to why this is happening. And they look a little bit lost on the pitch. They've stayed too long. De Bruyne, there was chat about him maybe going to Saudi and so on. When you play that...

quality that amount of football at that intensity and produce that amount of quality again it's important to remember what they've done in recent years it is phenomenal what they've done and achieved you know unprecedented

But at some point, you are going to have to... It will start to wind down. Everybody gets older. Everybody in inertia kicks in. All that kind of stuff. And again, I go back to it and I think Guardiola signing that extension, staying on. He was tempted with the England job. There's no two ways about that. De Bruyne is thinking... And it feels like everyone's gone, go on then, let's just stay a bit longer. And you think, no. They're also... He's making really odd decisions. I mean, when Man City lost 4-0 to Spurs...

That was kind of off the back of them losing to Bournemouth. And Kyle Walker was appalling in both those games. Against Spurs, he was dreadful. One of the worst games I've ever seen him play. It's crazy, his drop-off. Yeah, and you have to... If you're Man City, it produces all these players. Back when they were flying high, what used to happen, you guys will remember this well...

they'd come into like a key game you can't think of a specific example but they'd come into like a big game beyond tell it and all of a sudden they'd pick like Oscar Bob will be playing or some centre back and they'd be good right so there's no reason that he can't bring someone else in Karl Walker I think has played every game since that Spurs game and he's been terrible like he's been terrible I honestly don't think the personnel issues don't help but I think it is it makes a big difference when you've got people who can't kick the ball straight

Yeah. Playing in a big derby. I know, but it just feels to me there's something greater than that going on. And I think some of the analysis before the game, forgive me if I've got this wrong, but I'm pretty sure they were essentially saying, might have been on the radio, essentially saying that teams, whoever they are in the Premier League now, are just...

attack in that left-hand side. I mean, look, but against Palace the other week when... Exactly, that's a good example, yeah. Palace scored that many goals and there's only a handful of teams that have scored fewer, although after their 3-1 win against Brighton, maybe they've gone up there. But...

they thought, oh, okay, man, yeah, we can get at them. And that's the difference. It's, oh, well, we can have these. We can give a good account of ourselves. Especially given that, you know, they're not making chances, aren't they? When you've got a player like Erling Haaland, obviously, you know, his slump in form is the same as everybody else's, but he's a player where you don't actually need to get that many chances for him because you know he's going to put some of them away, but they just can't get it near to him. He looks so isolated. It was, I have to say, by the way, I'm not just going to heap the...

criticism we have to mention Manchester United at some point because they're also shit they were yeah that's fucking terrible it was the worst quality Manchester derby for ages definitely it's the sort of one where you go do I like football I saw Anthony Taylor's face at one point thinking he looked like he was thinking what the hell what's going on I'm going to have to do something to spice this up it was so predictable from United as well very little spark no kind of intensity at all I think Gemma obviously until the

Until they turned it around, the story of the game was that they'd been really kind of passive and kind of uncreative. And obviously you get those two brilliant moments that change the narrative of it. But I think, you know, there's still a hell of a way to go in terms of that team firing. That was not a good performance. But on that point though, Rashford and Garnaccio, not even in the match they scored, given detention, they came in on Sunday, didn't they? They trained on Sunday. What do you think of that? Well, I think it's clearly, obviously it's something that's been needed to,

in that squad by the sounds of it. We've heard rumours for years and years and years and we're not just about those two particular players but like lots of players don't seem that, don't seem invested. It's interesting his comments about how he takes everything into it and not just discipline. It's how you interact with others in the squad and how you lift people up, that sort of thing. So it sounds pointed, doesn't it? It's really difficult to draw any conclusion other than that from it. And clearly those who've come in

to take the place of those two players have worked well and I think it's just him trying to change the culture of the dressing room which we've heard for a long time has been a little bit too slack and it's but he said I pay attention to everything the way you eat the way you put your clothes on to go to a game everything

And I... You put your clothes on. Yes, that bit. I have secret cameras in all of my players' homes. Well, yeah, your words, not his, Jim. I mean, obviously, the other week, Enzo Maresca does this with Nani Maduweke. He says, right, well, you're not trained hard enough and...

you know on this show I was saying you know actually you see the control he has and so on it's not too dissimilar to this but he's vindicated because they've won the game and it's also about provoking a reaction from two of his best players isn't it let's be honest they are two of the best players in that squad when they're really firing but they're not at the moment and they need to be I think you have to I mean Mark you're right to say the fact that he's won the game makes it a little bit easier for him today I expect

he's in that position isn't he where he's come in with a big reputation he's done an amazing job where he's been in the past and you know he should be empowered to make these decisions that's going to be a big story because Manchester United and because Rashford is a massive name and because Garnaccio actually has been one of the few outfield players across the last few years for Man Utd he's kind of done pretty well but

They've both been okay this season, like fits and starts, really. And he has the right to pick whoever he wants to pick. And if he gets asked a question about it before a game, that's fair enough. That's part of the job. But I think he's fully within his rights to pick whoever he wants. I mean, I felt really sad for Mason Mount. Yeah, that was a shame. He's had a tough old time of it. You know, obviously Mount and Diallo played in the kind of positions you'd expect maybe Rashford and Ganacci to play. But, you know...

It's a funny one, really, because they could have lost that game 1-0 and it'd been the worst derby in history or in living memory. But the fact they turned it around without being that good because City imploded means that no one's really going to talk about that again. But there's a little bit of momentum you've got to build on this. Should he stick with Amadou Diallo? I think Amadou Diallo's been fantastic. I think he's been the best outfield player by miles. Yeah. I actually think Masraoui did a pretty good job on Doku. Doku was the one...

He's trying something. Yeah, and he's always going to. He moves the ball so quickly. He's so keen. He's always positive. And that does you a lot of credit, particularly in the Premier League where people are used to seeing a certain type of pace to a game in football. But Masraoui was brilliant on him. And obviously, Dockery didn't get any help from anyone because that's where City are at the moment. But I thought he did a really good job. And I thought Dalla was quite good as well. And I thought Diallo was...

absolutely outstanding. I mean, Diallo is just, he is the bright spark, isn't he, at the moment for Manchester United. I mean, even when he races through to latch onto that mistake, he takes it slightly too wide, a bit of a tricky one, checks back in and thump is given a, you know, wins a penalty, which is a penalty all day long. And,

And I did actually talk it on the penalty. I actually quite enjoyed Bruno Fernandes' celebration there. I do quite like it when a player just kind of goes, oh, you've been getting stick all game probably. Yeah, exactly. That was quite enjoyable. But Diallo, the way he took his goal, the way he latched onto it, he's such an exciting player. And yes, Guardiola, don't try and backheel it off the line for crying out loud. I understand it would have been a tricky one, but he could have got something like that. They just look mentally cooked. Well, they do. But Diallo is the bright spark at the moment.

for Manchester United. Yeah. And...

A player like that, not only does he give the crowd a lift, he also gives the players around him a lift as well. Oh, absolutely. It's an energy thing, isn't it? We mentioned already that we're very, very flat. But actually, to be fair to Diallo, that's not a fair assessment of his performance. He's very, very direct. He kind of leads the press by himself at times, it feels like. And he's an example there, isn't he? Of just someone who's trying to make things happen whenever he's got the ball. And in some cases when he doesn't. And also, arguably the...

The other thing that sort of went wrong for Guardiola in this kind of little mini period where everything seems to be going wrong is the guy who gives a penalty away. He's like, he's someone who's asked to play left back who's not a left back, who gets into a position where if you're not a specialist defender, you can make those kind of decisions and,

And it's an absolute obvious now Don penalty. And he looked absolutely gutty, knew what it meant. He knew the situation they're in. He seemed really upset. It's not particularly edifying seeing these players looking so upset, but...

you know, got to comment on it, I guess. Was it Edda Fine seeing Carl Walker going down after that brutal headbutt from Rasmus Hoyland? If I may be so bold, I did like Rasmus Hoyland's poem on Instagram. Shall I read it for you? Which is not something I expected to say today. Manchester is red, violets are blue. What a brilliant performance, but the Oscar goes to... And there's a photo of him...

With his head on Karl Walker. My biggest issue with this Instagram post is the line, quite simply, what a brilliant performance. Totally disagree. But I've said what I've said about Karl Walker. Everyone else has probably seen him play, so knows what I'm talking about, and I expect probably agrees. But when you see that...

from you know captain of Man City on the night established international you know got his own little podcast as well doing his broadcasting thing he should just retire father of many just retire yeah there's nothing I thought Roy Keane was actually quite understated I don't know the guy and I'm embarrassed for him yeah Roy Keane also said pride has to kick in at some point for a footballer before the game yeah

Great, isn't it? Oh, dear. But what do we think next for City, though, Marcus? What do we think is going to happen? Because surely if you're an Arsenal fan, for example, you'll count down the days until you play them. Surely. Well, everybody feels that at the moment, don't they? You know you can get something. This is the frustrating thing. When it lasted February, Jim. When Fulham went there. Like, right now, Fulham would do them. But talking to Karl Walker, when Fulham went there and lost 3-2, obviously Traore, when he burns past Karl Walker, everyone thought, yeah, but that's Traore. He's one of the fastest men on the planet. Yeah.

You know, actually now... They're staying at the party too long some of these players, aren't they? I wonder, is Kyle Walker's future, presumably there's not going to be too many seasons left of it given his age, but might he revert to a centre-back for a while as he has done for England before? A little bit less important? Well, I mean, he's been the right centre-half in a three. So maybe Amarim will be looking at him. But what I thought was quite interesting was that when I saw the line-up, and I don't want to get too tactical because people aren't listening to us for that,

But when I saw the lineup, I thought it would be a back three with Nunes further forward. Because...

Because he could have played, what he could have done is he could have played a three, he could have played Foden and Gundogan in front of the three, and he could have played a four and a one, like he's done before. They've played a three, two, four, one load, see, but they didn't do it. Hang on, you're sounding like Pep now. Just saying. Foden in front of a back three. What's happened to you? We're next to Gundogan. I don't know, Luke. I think if he'd have done that, then... Might not have been quite so good. It's a wonderful thing, isn't it?

Well, anyway, Man City, yeah, they're struggling. There's no two ways about that, everybody. We're not dressing that up at all. Fifth, they are, of course, behind Nottingham Forest, who went above them with a lovely victory against Aston Villa. What a game, by the way. I mean, this game's just getting immense. This is the thing. On another week, it would have been right at the top. Yeah, I mean, an incredible comeback from them. Elanga scoring a 93rd-minute winner, of course. And the game may well be remembered today

For one of the greatest saves of all time from Emi Martinez. I've never seen anything like it. My God. Pfft.

I could not believe. It's such a shame that he didn't save the other one. Obviously, Forest fans will disagree. But a shame that he was somewhat at fault for the equalising goal. But still, that save, you can't praise it enough. One of our producers, Tom, shout out Tom Wally, big Forest fan, he said he was about four or five seats behind it. He couldn't believe what he was seeing. I just thought it was...

The one that reminded me of is that famous Seaman save against Sheffield United in the FA Cup 75. But it is...

if you'll let me, because the ball gone behind him, it makes it look better. Same with Martinez, but it was lower and it was far more last ditch and far more reactive and far quicker because the game's quicker now, makes it on every level better than that. But that save that Seaman made is held up as being like, people still talk about that now sometimes. I think it's a crap save now. Yeah, I do. I don't rate it anymore and I will no longer be referring to it. Yeah, in fact, in light of this, I thought Seaman could have caught that. It was an amazing save.

Look, I think that game, I know you want to touch on it just briefly, but Aston Villa have found it really tough, as expected, after Champions League games. They found it difficult. I think they might have only won one after a Champions League game. And they've got to concentrate on the Champions League. Win that, you're in it next season. Exactly. That's all it is. That's what they've got to go for. That's the job. That is the job to do. But Forest, my goodness. They've been really, really good. I was just going to

say that you know Forest deserve all the credit in the world though it's not necessarily too much to do with Villa but then to battle back with not that long left to get a win was incredible but I think people some people are expecting them

And I think you'd have sympathy for this view that, okay, that's fine, but they will sort of drop off at some point. And that may well happen. We've seen some teams have a really good first half of the season. The Christmas period we'll see and get one or two injuries and so on. But I don't know, they've got such balance across that score. All the players are playing well. Milinkovic has been, let's say, phenomenal at the back.

I think that if they can hold their nerve, and with the way Nuno likes to play, he doesn't like to give too much away and so on. I think that kind of bodes well, because it's not a kind of a... They've scored goals and they've got goals on the team, but it's not a sort of swashbuckling style necessarily that has got them there. It is a bit more considered and...

And I don't know. I think Forrest, yeah. I don't know about top four. Still not sure about that. But the fact is that Villa are struggling. Spurs, despite their win, are not having the best of seasons.

I don't know. It is. I mean, basically... And also, it doesn't need to be four, it can be fifth. You've got to ask yourself, is there a spot? Is there a spot there? You think Liverpool, Chelsea and Arsenal, that's done. So there's two spots. And who's going to be most likely? Who's going to go on a tear between now and the end of the season? Who's capable of it? There's a few teams that are probably capable of it. But as Aston Villa showed last season, you've got to put yourself in there and be ready to do it. And some teams like Forest...

like Fulham even, like Bournemouth, you know, like Brighton. Man City maybe. Let's not be silly. They don't have a huge amount of games compared to the teams that are going to go deep in different competitions. So it could make a massive difference. The opportunity is there for them. It really is. The opportunity is there. All right, coming up after this, Gag O'Neill has been sacked. Boom!

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Welcome back to the Football Ramble, everybody. Gary Neville's latest Golgasm. Thanks to friend of the Ramble, Billy, for sending us that clip. You can become a friend of the Ramble too by heading over to patreon.com forward slash football ramble. You'll get access to the Discord where you can chat with us and other Ramble listeners. Yeah. And get ad-free episodes of the Ramble up front and on the continent all for just five bucks a month.

That's patreon.com forward slash football ramble to sign up now. Yeah, the big chat over the weekend has been that someone in the US, one of our discorders in the US, has spotted Andy Brassel on telly. He appeared on some TV programme, but the guy had a massive projector-type screen, so they just shared a photo of Andy looking gigantic in their living room, and everyone was just reacting to that. Do you want to see it? There it is. Yeah, that's a huge Andy. It's a massive Andy, isn't it? Yeah, I happened to see that myself. It's a big Brassel. Mm-hmm.

That's the kind of chat you can get involved with. Indeed it is. If you want.

I mean, you don't have to. Not what I do. But now we've got to talk about Wolverhampton Wanderers 1, Ipswich Town 2, a great win for Ipswich, a damning one for Wolves. Gary O'Neill has finally been sacked by Wolves, Jim. We thought it might happen after the West Ham game. It's happened after the Ipswich Town game. Yeah, it gave them a little bit more of an opportunity to get it right. But I mean, this was really a damning result, wasn't it? And the first goal, the Matt Doherty own goal,

was genuine Keystone Cop stuff. It's nice to see it actually be appropriate for once because it was so, so clownish. Like really, really daft. Yes, it was.

They talk about Keystone Cops quite a lot, I think, on Football Clichés. Yeah. Over 100 years old. Yeah, it's amazing. It's amazing the longevity of that kind of analogy. It's so good. People normally, we'll have a little chat about some kind of reference and people go, oh yeah, it's the 90s and people aren't going to remember that. I think it's 1914 or something, the Keystone Cops. Yeah.

Yeah. Sorry, Wolves. Oh, they're going to call me Keystone. Oh, God, I don't even know what it is. I just know it's bad. Big takeaway for me was Wolves. And I hope this is a tradition that continues post-Gary O'Neill. Thought you were just talking about the weekend there. The big tradition I'd like to see continue in a post-Gary O'Neill Wolves world is the pick someone to have a massive punch-up after the game every time. And...

A poor old Ipswich coach. He did seem quite old. Was it coach or security guy? He had the Ipswich jacket on. He did. He had his glasses stolen. That was poor. No, on the back of the head. I've got to say. He got on the back of the head as well, didn't he? Yeah, yeah. As a glasses wearer, very impressed by the composure of the Ipswich security guy. I was. Someone doing that is, well... But he kept his composure and essentially all Kunya achieved from that was just...

basically being able to read the man's disdain a lot more clearly. Do you know what I'd like to have seen happen? If he's a security guard or a coach, we're not sure which, or possibly even a translator or a goalkeeping coach, whatever. Maybe he's all of it. What I'd like to have seen happen was the guy just straight batter Kunya. No, do you know what I did? He had to be pulled off him. What would have been more menacing is if Kunya had done that and he just looked at him and then pulled out of his pocket another

and put them on. What, the reverse Benitez? Yeah, he'd be like, ooh, this guy knows, this guy knows. Imagine though, if he just grabbed him, couldn't you? Punched him 50 times in the face. 50. Pulled his head off and just held it up into the crowd like that. Yeah, and...

I don't know. This is all very mortal combat. Gary and Neil will be thinking, I'll get another week out of this now. Yeah. This is the big story. This will be the big story. Don't worry about that. Yes, I have lost an important attacking player, but I'm going to get a job for another week. I've got the sack. Have they sacked that guy? You can't do that. You can't do that. Well, none of that...

happened with regards to the head pulling and the punching thank goodness but Matthias Cunha is surely going to get retrospective punishment for that yeah you would hope so he has to have I mean surely he has to get that but this is the thing kids copy these things in the playgrounds it's going to be a bad week for the glasses wearing children of Wolverhampton if they don't do something immediately and beyond because the Premier League is everywhere well true it is everywhere well look

It's not the first time we've seen, as you say, Luke, because you alluded to early angry scenes at full time. I mean, Mario Lamina had the captain's armband taken off him after what happened against West Ham. And now this. Kunya is a crucial player for Wolves. The last thing they need is for him to be out for a handful of games. It's not O'Neill's problem now because he's gone. He got the dreaded vote of confidence from the board at the start of the week. And I think the board have been fairly patient with him

And from what we hear from reports is they did quite like him. I mean, he'd obviously done an all right job last season. I think it's reasonably fair to say. Luke, you were concerned at the start of this season. That he didn't upmarge in Portsmouth? Yeah, I still am. No, but you were concerned for O'Neill that the budget perhaps wasn't there.

The mood and the squad wasn't great, all that kind of stuff. And this is before a ball had even been kicked in this year's incarnation of the Premier League. It was partly that, but it was also just such a tough start they've had. And he came in in a certain situation where he did a decent job and it was the right to manage him for this season. But the problem is I don't think they strengthened that well. They had such a difficult start where...

you know, they need to get through it with their confidence intact, which doesn't seem to have happened. They also don't seem to have had any ability whatsoever to defend properly, particularly with set pieces. I mentioned it earlier. I mean, talk about Man Utd being bad at defending set pieces. I mean, there was a graphic that was flashed up at the weekend that said Wolves are twice as bad as the next worst team at defending set pieces, right? You know, so,

it's been bad they went on a little they had a little bump where they got through that the last game was against Man City in which they were pretty unlucky actually they hadn't lost by the old goal they've had a lot of kind of unlucky moments haven't they but off the back of that they go four undefeated and then they just start

you expect them to kick on and the profile of teams they've played against in the last four games, Bournemouth, Everton, West Ham and Ipswich, got not a single point out of it. Yeah, I mean, that's not good. The writing's on the wall when that happens. So... One for one at the cottage, isn't there? I mean, the fact is the away fans were singing that, you know...

you're losing to us, how shit are you? I mean, the red card made a big difference in that, didn't it? It probably wouldn't have been 4-1 if it was 11-11. Wolves were still 2-1 up at that point, but anyway, it's all ancient history. Well, good news for us is that Ole Gunnar Solskjaer was seen at the stadium. It seemed like it was going to be good news, didn't it? It's good news for us. Well, but wasn't he just visiting Kieran McKenna?

You say that, but he's favourite for the job. Why don't you go to Ipswich and see Kieran McKay? You've got loads of opportunities to go to Ipswich. He said the reason, actually, part of the reason he went was because one of his sons is an Ipswich Town fan. It's like, Oli, how on earth have you allowed that to happen? Also, again, go and see them at home. There's loads of chance. It's the sort of thing that Solskjaer, being the character he is, would probably kick his kid out for not sporting a name, wouldn't he? Oh, I don't know. Not give him any food. Yeah. That's what he said, isn't it?

I think you find people, that seems like a convenient excuse that, you know, people can say, oh yeah, I went to see McKennifer. But he's favourite for the job. I mean, so we have to leave comment on that. And that'll be magnificent for everyone who likes the football round. Yeah. It would be amazing. Four nil at halftime. Is Manchester United? It's not. It's not. It's not there anymore. I phoned Sir Alex before the game. Why are you doing that? He wants, he wants, he wants to get in there quick because they play at May Night on Boxing Day. Oh,

He just wants to see some familiar faces again. Yeah. Although I reckon Sir Jim Ratcliffe is probably barred Solskjaer from the... I don't know. The drum I want to bang, and I continue to bang this drum until people listen, is that Jim Ratcliffe's not that good. It's shambolic. Yeah, I think we're all in agreement. Yeah, but people seem to think he's going to be fine. He'll be having a great day today, won't he? Yeah, exactly. He'll treat himself to second at dinner, lady. Yeah, he will. Treat him. Everyone, thanks for coming. Here's some more M&S vouchers. No, no, no. Yeah.

I've got you all a panettone. Oh, dear. Yeah. No, as in just one for all of you. Yeah, share it out. Everyone have a bite on your way out. Yeah, like when we accidentally ate the panettone here for someone else and I didn't realise. Oh, yeah, we did, didn't we? They came knocking for it. Yeah. We haven't had one delivered. Crumbs around my mouth. No, I think... Hang on, let me just finish this mouthful. Yeah.

That was funny. Huckleberry Finn. That company's got a business now. Oh, okay. Because of that? Might have contributed. To morale. To morale. That's what it was. Oh, everything will be fine when the panettone gets here. If we could just get through the Christmas with a panettone. Is that what Guardiola's thinking? Get a panettone in here. It'll give the boys a lift and we'll be fine from there. I don't think they've got that business. I'm only joking. I just moved locations. Oh, okay. Yeah. People were more honest. Yeah.

It was a genuine mistake. It was a genuine mistake.

Oh dear. Anyway, I've got to give a mention. Which I didn't own up to. A mention for Jack Taylor. Yes. He was very happy to score. Do you know what? I was thinking to myself, please, no VAR. No VAR for that because that was a celebration. There should be a threshold where you can't take it back. VAR does not exist in this land where everyone's gone mad. Oh my goodness, yeah. Lovely, lovely little header. And a great win for Ipswich Town. Yeah. It really, really was.

Only their second win of the season. You saw McKenna's face beaming at the end. I don't know whether that was because he knew he was going to see Solskjaer for a little drink after, but the three points would have... I've done it all in front of my spiritual father. Yeah.

I think you should probably point out that Wolves did have quite a few chances in this game. Yeah. And the Ipswich goalkeeper was excellent. I think he's actually really good. Well, would you blame him for the goal, for the Wolves' goal? Because the old beating at the near post and all that kind of stuff. I know that's not always... I know what you're saying, but he had a good game overall. Okay. And I would like to spare...

I mentioned McKenna because it's easy to forget the journey they've been on. It's almost like you see the Premier League, them arriving in the Premier League as the destination because they've come up back to back and they've adjusted so well. He was right to point out the amount of players they've had who played for him in League One, who started this game. Often we say, well, the problem is they've got, not problem, but the thing is that it's really a championship squad. Obviously they've got one or two players that are Premier League.

but it really is only just a couple. But it's a championship and a League One score. And they've done so well. And he's always adjusting. He's always tweaking things. He's always trying to solve problems on the job, really. And the gap is big. The gap is massive, certainly compared to League One. It's ridiculous. So he's done so well. And they could very easily have been in the situation that Southampton find themselves in, but they're not because the coach is doing a really good job. Because of him. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, and that is a massive, massive win. That puts them on 12 points. So obviously they're three ahead of Wolves, but it puts them two behind Leicester. So Wolves are obviously already five points off of 17th. So they had to twist Wolves. It's as simple as that. And...

of course, now there's talk of them lining up Vita Pereira. That seems to be, it seems like it's very, very likely to happen. We haven't had confirmation on that, but apparently they have broad agreement with Al-Shabaab in the Saudi Pro League over his appointment. And I find this quite a fascinating one because I didn't really know that much about him and having read up on him,

Pereira there's a good article in The Athletic about him all I'll say Wolves fans is this could be very good for the football ramble

He seems like a nutter. Now, clearly, they think it could go one of two ways, and it's a gamble. And I would imagine old Jorge or George Mendez is involved in this, as you would expect. Obviously, they looked at Potter a little while ago, and he didn't fancy it, and there's been one or two others linked, and David Moyes, and you've mentioned Solskjaer.

But it does appear at this particular moment in time that Pereira actually is in pole position. And Pereira himself, you know, a long CV he's managed all over the place. FC Porto would probably be one of the highlights of his career. He's managed in Turkey, China, Saudi, where he currently is. He managed in Germany, didn't do too well there, but he managed all over the place. He was very keen for a move to the Premier League. He nearly went to Everton.

And somebody graffitied on a wall, Pereira out, Lampard in. So that's what they thought of him. And he responded to this and said, look, I understand. Imagine a graver insult than that. Yeah, well, will we see that in Wolverhampton? I don't know. It's unlikely it would be disrespectful to Coventry City. Pereira out, Solskjaer in. Maybe, maybe. But Pereira, there's a video of him when he was in, I think it was Saudi Arabia. It's an old clip, maybe up to 10 years old. And he may well have changed. But...

but I implore anybody to watch it. He is going, he is, anybody who looks at him wrong in that press conference, he's having a go. So, you know, he is a certain type of character. I mean, he left, he went to Brazil. He also managed Brazil. He went to manage Corinthians and they, and they, and they want, a lot of the fans quite liked him. They wanted him to stay. And he said, no, I've got to go back and help my mother-in-law who's very ill at the moment. Right. Okay, fine. Didn't have to a month later go to Flamingo, did he?

And it didn't do very well there, so he burnt his bridges with Corinthians and Flamingo. I definitely want him in. So it's looking like that he could be the man, so... This sounds ideal. LAUGHTER

Wow. Amazing. Strap yourselves in if he gets the job, which again, it does look like at this moment in time that he will. But it's the time of the year now with the Ramble where you guys are going to have to bear with us because as soon as we get this out, something else is going to have happened. Yeah. So you have to do it on Reacts tonight. You're doing Reacts tonight? We are doing Reacts. Yes, of course. West Ham involved again. Yeah. Mr. Monday Night. Julian Lopetegui. It's like a really boring version of Pitbull. LAUGHTER

Mr. Monday Night. I mean, compared to Pitbull, I'm thinking it's probably quite a boring night out, isn't it? Imagine introducing yourself as, oh yeah, look, people call me Mr. Monday Night. What does that mean? You do a lot of admin. Bloody hell. Shall we talk about Southampton 0-5? Yeah, let's get the main event in now. Yeah, Russell Martin has been sacked. That happened a lot quicker, didn't it? We barely had the final whistle gone. They could have done it at half-time. Yeah, well, Tottenham, of course, were 5-0 up at half-time. 4-0 up after 25 minutes. Russell Martin didn't even see the fifth goal. He'd already left.

His touchline post and had retreated to the dressing room where Tottenham then promptly scored a fifth. A lovely goal from James Madison as well. Brilliant goal. And such a strange thing to see goals being scored and then the celebrations be drowned out by boos. It's such a rare phenomenon in football. It's a bit discombobulating, isn't it?

But yeah, obviously the frustration spilled over so much there. To concede after a minute, you know Spurs are going to come at you and they're going to make it really, really difficult for you. And they're just not at the level, are they? They're just so out of their depth. And Sal's goal was the best illustration of it. He had all the time he needed. They gave him the keys to the city of Southampton. Yeah, they did. Brilliant goal, but... You're right to say they're not good enough, right? And we know that and we've seen that. And Martin's shown himself to...

either be not capable of or not willing to adapt. One of the two things. His pre-match comments were very punchy. I was just going to say that, you know, Tottenham themselves are a fragile team. You wouldn't say that they've...

Postakoglu's been under as much pressure as Martin, or at least it's been a different kind of pressure, but he's been under a lot of pressure. He has, yeah. He's had to do some spiky interviews. He's had to do the old thing. He literally said bare bones in the beginning of this game, the old Redknapp special. He said, we have to play Timo Werner after that performance against Rangers. Which he then didn't do. So, fine. But the...

the fact is that it's fine to lose a game of football in the Premier League we all know that but the way that they went about it after 25 seconds then conceding another and conceding another it's

it was only ever going to end one way after that his position was completely untenable and actually the reason he didn't resign would have been because he would have lost a load of money which is how it goes in modern football but he should have really resigned at half time did you think we were on for another nine well they're sinking the water down there there's not really a huge amount of pride down in that club so that's why they lose does that seep out to the city in general well Bobby lost four on Friday

But it didn't spill over to quite so bad as five or even nine. You've been very restrained on this. Is a little bit of sympathy too easy? On Friday, you mentioned the words of Hampton and I laughed out loud for like two solid minutes. And then you were like, well, you can't do that. You can't do that. They got put on socials and I got hammers for it. So I'm just saying it's clearly not...

not worked they're a terrible side they're arguably the worst side in Premier League history they may go on to be the worst side in Premier League history depending on what appointment they make now well to back you up on that they've lost 13 out of 16 games they are 9 points from safety of course they're 5 points from those first 16 games this season in the Premier League

Only Sheffield United in 2020-21 picked up fewer points at this stage of the campaign in Premier League history, which was two points. Just to give you a little bit of a stat. But it is worth pointing out, this is not just a Russell Martin thing. This is a combination of things. This is like a kind of...

The board are penny-pinchers. He wasn't really backed. I don't think they expected to be promoted. It seems to me, based on what a few of my friends who support Southampton have said to me, is that they want to just take the money. They don't really want to invest and try and give them a chance to stay in the Premier League. They're not going to stay in the Premier League now anyway. That kind of will inform the decisions they make next. But I do think that the fans there...

are within their rights to, you know, what is going on here. I mean, like I said, it's fine to lose a game, but to lose it in that manner. The reason they didn't concede by a lose more than five is because Spurs stopped trying. It's as simple as that. Spurs have got a huge amount of players out for different reasons, mostly for injury, but some through suspension as well. And they probably didn't want to put the pedal to the metal for the...

for the second half what happens so often doesn't it when a big score like that is there by half time but if you're in a position that's March and you're thinking about your goal difference and you think we need to really do something here because it might be the difference between qualifying for Europe or not it could have been really really nasty for them really bad so um they should I mean it's not really the most pleasant thing to think about but you should be grateful that you got out of there with a five nil home defeat and you've got to remember some of these nine nils we talk about at least one of them was at home I mean it's like it's

does happen yeah it's the one where Jamie Vardy really really gleefully celebrated the 9th in front of the fans do you remember in front of the home fans something around that club makes that kind of stuff happen I don't know why no one's going to listen to me say anything because I'm a Pompey fan but that is really the situation yeah what did you think of the Southampton fans who were chanting for Russell Martin to be sacked at one stage a section of them chanted for him to give him a wave which incredibly he did and then they booed him immediately why is he waving there's the laughter yeah why

There's that laugh. Why are you waving though? Thought we'd get it. But the thought process to me is like, why are you waving? He's been tricked into it, hasn't he? It's not really the greatest trick in the world, is it? He's got stuff on. He's got so many problems to fix in front of him. He can't be thinking about that as well. He's not fixed any of them. I mean, I mentioned, by the way, that he gave quite a punchy pre-match press conference at Russell Martin where he was really defending Ange Postacoglu and Ange Ball, really.

and saying that, you know, why would you change principles and so on? And again, he was really quadrupling down at this point. He's always done that. He did that at MK Dons famously. He's done that wherever he's been. And I think, you know... Did he do it post-match? Did he defend Anderson? See, I told you. Look at his methods. His methods are great. I told you they were brilliant. Did you see them though? Oh, they were good. He... He...

you know it's a complicated one really for Russell Martin because I actually quite admire that he's got a very fully realised way of how he wants to play football and we said this at the start of the season before the first ball was even kicked the problem they've got to solve at Southampton is how they're going to play and if they're going to play like they played before um

without the strength that they need to make which is probably totally unrealistic anyway because really what players are you going to get you're not going to get players that are really going to make you massively better because if they're good enough they're not going to go to Southampton because they don't want to be relegated etc etc but what I do admire about him is that he knows he wants to play and he sticks to it

And I think there should be a place for that in football. And I hope that he kind of bounces back because he has actually been really good. No, no, I agree. It's just a different level entirely at the Premier League. It is, but I think... And also, when we say you've got to be a little bit more flexible, no one's saying, for crying out loud, abandon your principles and play along, but you just have to mix it up just a little bit. He has done that a bit, though, to be fair. Okay, fair enough. On occasion, he has tried that.

I think probably we're looking at his comments maybe rather than what's happened on the pitch. But the fact is this has been very, very difficult and he'll have to go away and lick his wounds. But you're right, I do hope he comes back. I think from memory, he did it at home to Leicester. He basically gave Leicester the ball, which is really surprising. And it worked for a bit. But they lost, they lost the game. And then they lost the game. Next Southampton manager, there's...

Danny Rule seems to be one of the names mentioned. I mean, I just wonder, you know, Carlos Corberan, I just wonder if you're a manager in the championship, you know, you're doing decent stuff, you know. Rule is doing, he's having a decent season with Sheffield Wednesday. They've really kicked on and they started quite badly, but they've started to do a bit better. Yeah, exactly. And Corberan, you know, he's doing right. The problem they have now in trying to get a decent manager is,

A manager, as I say, in the Championship might think, you know what, I'm doing good stuff. Maybe, could be this season, maybe next season, could get my team promoted or at least have a right good go at it. And I say, that could happen this season. And if not this season, they could certainly be looking at next season as well. Why would you take the Southampton job? You're going to get relegated. And so, again, Moyes has mentioned, Potter's mentioned, neither of them are going to go anywhere near that. Ridiculous. The only thing you could do

and it seems like this cord is not available to be pulled anymore, is Sam Allardyce. Do you know what I mean? That's literally what you'll do. There's no way. No, I don't think there is either, Luke. But it is a case of who on earth do you go for?

Do you get your man, your Welshman back, Jim? Nathan Jones. Is that what we're looking for? There's the dream. I don't know where they go from here. I really don't in terms of managerial appointments. He's going to have a bit of a payoff, old Russell Martin, because he signed a new contract, I think, at the start of the season. I don't know if he's taken his coaching staff with him, but maybe they'll have to do some kind of internal appointment. But it's got to the stage now in modern football in the Premier League where they're basically relegated.

You might as well really get them now, in which case it means you're absolutely right. It's impossible to find someone who wants to do it. The only chance they're going to get is just by promoting someone from within or someone who's so down on their luck and just wants the money. Someone will take it. It's a Premier League job and there's to say there'll be a few quid involved. The likelihood is they'll get someone who hasn't managed in England before or certainly not managed at the top level in England before and can kind of essentially use it as a shop window, right? Because, you know,

they might be able to put in a good fist of it at least and whoever this manager is might think you know what this is a massive challenge if I pull it off it will be huge and again it's that shop window thing so Ruben Sillers basically did that for Southampton when they were relegated before and now he's now he's at Hull City so people have kind of learnt who he was I suppose by from doing that

and now he's managing hardly a rock bottom of the championship so I mean there you are you see but a great win for Spurs though and that's probably what they needed they couldn't believe their luck when they saw what was in front they ended the game with four teenagers on the pitch and Andrews talked about first time I think probably seems done that person is that right but a big win some players who have been a little bit out of form getting goals and

and basically taking it easy in the second half, which is why people say, it's a bit of a shit. It's like, no, they got what they wanted. There was no way they were going to be pegged back at all. Oh, as a viewer, it's unacceptable. If you watch it on telly, this is great, I want more of this. That's not their job. It's a little bit, but that's not their job, as you say. So a lovely old job, though, for Ange and Spurs. All right, coming up after this, Fulham got a point at Anfield.

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That's right, at the top of the table, one couldn't forget it, Liverpool drew 2-2 at home with Fulham. Diego Jota, of course, making sure that 10-man Liverpool got a point. Jota's first appearance since October due to injury, so they were very happy to have him back as well. The story of the game really was in the 17th minute when Andy Robertson was sent off.

Now, did you think it was a sending off? Because the obvious answer is yes. But of course, Harry Wilson, the way his touch is heavy, and it would be very unlikely he was going to get

And they played advantage anyway, didn't they? Yes, exactly. So the idea that you've denied a goal-scoring opportunity surely becomes moot when... Can you use the proper phrase, please? Dogzo. It's Dogzo. Dogzo, right, okay. Otherwise you'll get Dogzo's abuse. Yeah, and obviously nobody wants that. Did you not think it was Dogzo? I thought it was a Dogzo. I thought it was, but I can understand the argument to suggest. But the argument is that they played the advantage, there was a goal-scoring opportunity, and they didn't take it, right? Yeah.

Kind of, but he was... If they'd given the opportunity... He didn't have an opportunity because he was taken out. No, but... The play carried on, didn't it? So the goal-scoring opportunity wasn't for Harry Wilson himself. Yes, exactly. The goal-scoring opportunity was Harry Wilson's heavy touch ended up being a pass to Raul Jimenez, who did the most Raul Jimenez thing, where he does an amazing little dink over the keeper, but doesn't score. It's like, just stick that away. Ha!

So you feel like they've had a bit of double jeopardy there. They've had two chances. Maybe. I can see why that happened. I just think it's an interesting scenario that you rarely see play out. So you do see a lot of decisions now under the current rules or laws, whatever you want to call them, where whatever the referee decides, the threshold isn't deemed to be high enough to be overturned. So it may well be that if the referee didn't give it, VAR wouldn't have given it.

which may exist in that hinterland where it kind of stands whatever happens. I can understand why, given the heaviness of Harry Wilson's touch, why it seems kind of harsh. But I think also there's an element of that you're not able to fully predict what's going to have happened because Robertson did that. And it was also really poor defending by Robertson. Incredibly poor defending and an awful heavy challenge. I think maybe the heaviness of the challenge perhaps made the referees minor. But also as well, I suppose you could argue that if Wilson plays that...

or the heavy touch and he's still on his feet Jimenez can knock it back to him and he can stick it in an empty net so obviously I was delighted with this sending off and oddly I think Fulham despite Jimenez not putting the chance away and if he does then Robertson stays on the field at 2-0 I think

it would have been inevitable Liverpool would have come back and won it. Whereas 1-0 but down to 10 men with the way Fulham can play, especially against bigger teams, to exploit gaps and so on. I thought actually Fulham have probably got more of a chance. I know that seems ridiculous to not know. I get it. You know, bird in the hand and all that kind of stuff. Liverpool always come on strong in the second half. Well, they do. And really, it was very impressive from Liverpool. The fact is they had so much possession. But I mean, that's,

also by a little bit of design from Fulham as well because I think they thought right give them the ball we'll try and hit them on the break and Fulham there were periods of the game there was a period in that first half where Fulham were on top and they were coming forward Robinson was getting a lot of joy down that left hand side he had a great game he's having a good season but again the way Silva highlighted it on match of the day he was so high up the pitch

Silva thought, right, we can get behind Alexander-Arnold and we can target them. And again, hugely impressive the way Silva set Fulham up and the way they sort of nearly executed it. But it's that lack of cutting edge that Fulham, again, got in behind time and time again and that final pass or someone coming on the end of it

and I think if they'd have gone 2-0 up with a man advantage that would have been a mountain to climb for Liverpool but the fact is you've got to give Liverpool huge credit because again playing against a decent side are in good form I know it's only Fulham they're not going to bother the title race at all

But to come back, you know, Kakpo scores and then Jota gets the equaliser. So the disappointing thing for me, if I was a Fulham fan, would be Leno makes Jota's decision for him. Yes. I think Jota's probably... I mean, the XG on that's going to be high, though. But he's one of the best finishers in the Premier League, Jota. But that gives him the eyes and the shimmy. Yeah, but if you watch again, Leno does go down very, very early. He leaves a lot of the decision for Jota to make. I think you've got to stay on your feet there. Easy for me to say, I know. Mm.

and Jota may well have scored anyway but it does seem to me like he went down a bit early I thought Robinson was excellent I thought Alexander-Arnold was getting got at over and over again it's the point where Slott had to change it he had to change it I was on the radio on the weekend and there was talk about you know Ben White for England and all this but he's not the player that Alexander-Arnold is and I was like well actually defensively

you know, again, like Alexander-Arnold. Alexander-Arnold flourishes really well in a situation where it's like you attack, we attack, you attack, we attack because he catches the eye really well. There's a chaos factor. So, you know, that Newcastle game, 3-0, massively brilliant, massively attacking game, couple of assists. The game against Brighton, which was they won 2-1, got out of it, he was brilliant in that game. There's other games where he looks like

I mean, against the Fulham game, for example. And actually, he got caught out quite a lot against Girona in the Champions League as well. I think people feel like they can get him. And when you've got someone like Robinson who's had a great season, he's super quick, super energetic. Also got a bit of quality as well, Robinson. Yeah, he's a willing runner. He's a tough player as well, isn't he? He's very, very strong. He's matured so well in the last couple of seasons, really, at Fulham. I mean, he's...

there's a reason why they bought him. He just plays every game as well. Yeah, he does. Always available. But he's matured so much, has Anthony Robinson, because when Fulham first got him, as you can imagine, they got him from, was it Wigan? You know, it was a big step up. And there was a, you talk about Alexander-Arnold, there was a bit of a hectic nature to him. And you thought, okay, this guy can put in a brilliant performance and deal with a very tough winger. But also, if the ball bounces in front of him, he can, you know, do a bit of a 50p head and you don't know where it's going to go. Whereas actually, he's eliminated...

so much of that from his game I think he's having the best season he's had it's almost a bit of a shame that he declared for the US actually with England's you know it would be yeah he'd absolutely be in the next squad on this form oh I think he would but he's you know Arlos is America's game I mean it's a testament to how far Fulham have come that we're discussing them in this way though I mean they've had such a good start to the season I know the red card changes the dial moves the dial a little bit but Fulham was still a goal up though

Exactly, two great finishes as well, like Pereira's improvised finish, Muniz's improvised finish. I couldn't really even work out what Muniz had done at first. Well, yeah. A brilliant goal. Yeah, and do you know what? The Fulham did this with Jorge Cuenca at centre-half. That's his first start in the Premier League. You know, what a baptism of fire that is. I think he's maybe three substitute appearances, all totalling a handful of minutes. So to go in there, you know, he's one for the future, they got him from Spain.

Okay, Jota does it maybe a little bit too easily, but I mean, at Anfield, you know what it's like in the last minute and Jota's very, very hungry. Because Anderson's been important for Fulham. Very important, yeah. He might be out for another couple of weeks still to come. So, you know, again, an encouraging performance from Fulham. I understand people say, well, come on, you play against the side when you've got a man up, but this is... But are they on the verge, Marcus? Of what? You tell me. I think that they're always on the verge. LAUGHTER

It just depends what. I think Fulham have really got to be looking at this and thinking, there's European spots out for grabs here. And they're in the mix. And Marco Silva knows that. Could they go to another European final? Now you're talking. Not this season. No, but I mean, this time next year we could be talking about that. Well, this season, of course, they did win the Algarve Cup, so they've got a bit of pedigree. And they've already done it is the answer. They've already done it. This season, yeah, that box is ticked. Go where Roy couldn't. Go where Danny Murphy couldn't.

The thing is, though, if you look at some of these Premier League sides who are in the mix, whoever finishes in the Europa Conference League, that really is, again, with the budget of the Premier League, that should really... As a footballing community, we have reduced ourselves to developing a European competition where people can go, if we can just get in that, we'll definitely fucking win it. Exactly.

Yeah. I mean, it is inconceivable to think that Chelsea won't win that trophy. It's like the Intertoto Cup, but it's worse. Yeah. And it's longer. Way longer. Fulham already have an Intertoto Cup. So that one, again, that completely, the cabinet of the minor trophies. I think if you're Fulham, you look at some of the games Chelsea are playing against your Astana's, your Heidenheim's and your FC Noah's and you think, I want a bit of that. That's us. That is us. Heidenheim sounds like a level from God of War. Fulham are standing outside a house party. Absolutely. Full of...

lovely stuff and go there's one in there just let me in there Chelsea are in there Noah's in there he's in there there's no room in there because Chelsea are in there

So many players. Well, look, I think, again, so yeah, but it has to go down as a good point for Liverpool, all things considered, especially as Arsenal couldn't put Jordan Pickford's XI away. I mean, what a frustrating afternoon. I went to Gare du Nord so I could watch the game legally. Good for you. Well done, mate. In Paris. And it was extremely, extremely frustrating. Although, in a way...

Quite funny? Well, no. I'm forever bound to this, aren't I? And it was immensely frustrating. And if I'm looking on the bright side, that's at least a good warm-up for a family Christmas. That's true, yeah. But of course, Chelsea...

they thought, well, thank you very much. If everyone's going to drop points around us, we won't. And they've got a good plan that they've come up with, hasn't it? They're two points off the top. Obviously, Liverpool have got the game in hand. Are they in the title race look more officially? Yeah, of course they are. Absolutely. 100%. I told you, I'll feel about it, though. I said it when I spoke to Jim on Thursday. I said,

Arsenal, you know, they'll be disappointed to have lost out to Man City and now they're going to lose out to Liverpool. But Chelsea could have a say in it. Maybe Chelsea as well. And I'll tell you something, it does say quite a lot about what happened this weekend in the Premier League because we're basically ending on Liverpool and saying, yeah, Chelsea are in the title race. Yeah, exactly, because it's

It was the best weekend of the Premier League so far this season. How about that? Just because of the pure amount of information that we had to process. You can't take your eyes off it. No, and I think there might be another bloody second by the end of the week. You reckon? Could be. Pepe G? Why not? He won't be sacked, will he? Presume he's quit while we've done the show. I said it at the top. There's no way you sack a Guardiola. But dare I say, and rightly so... I'm just checking socials. LAUGHTER

Who knows? He said he's not good enough. Who knows? He was very hard on himself after the game. And you can understand why. Yeah, he's not going to be sacked this season. Thank you very much for listening to the Football Ramble, part of the NCOS Creator Network. Jim and I will be back tonight for Ramble Reacts after Bournemouth versus West Ham. Do follow us on XBlueSky, TikTok and Instagram at FootballRamble and subscribe on YouTube or wherever you get your pods. Thanks, Luke. Thank you. Thanks, Jimmy. Thank you. And thank you, Manchester City.

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