61: Statements Made

Ederson, right side, the square, and they score 7! Hello and welcome to, say, a spotlight season 2 episode 21, we are your hosts Jake and Matt. Good to be back and bringing you another episode. As you guys heard from our intro, our goal of the week was Ederson's strike against his former team in Salernetana. That was the 6th goal out of 8 that took place for Atalanta against Salernetana with 10 goals being the total tally in that match.

What a goal that was, what a game that was, we'll talk about that very soon my brother. Our bet this week, say, a spotlight slips was a Milan outright win and a Roma win or draw. Perhaps it was a little bit audacious of us to bet that Milan would outright beat Lecce, considering that they've been struggling and have looked like quite the formidable side. But yes, another loss on the slips baby, we'll be back next week. Yes sir, we'll be back and probably disappointed again to say the least.

Don't forget guys, if you want to keep track of our bets and just track of us in general, make sure to follow us on Instagram, Twitter and TikTok at SerialSpotlight. Don't forget to give us a follow and a rating wherever you're listening, be it Spotify, be it Google Play or Apple Podcasts. Wherever we are, we hope to see you guys. Yes, excuse my voice by the way guys, this episode is going to be a little bit raspy.

I didn't have a voice on Friday and Saturday, I got a throat infection, I couldn't even speak. I couldn't even breathe or swallow, man, I'm telling you. You're a nightmare when you're sick. Bro, I get so sick. You never get. I get man flu. No, you never get sick. You always get fucked up. Like why can't you never have a cold? It needs to be a throat infection. Why can't you have gastric, you'd have an infection in your fucking, what was it, kidneys? Or cyst on your head and stuff like that.

You're fucking weird, man. I'm fucked, when I'm older, it's going to be something way worse. I had a spit bucket for two days, dude. Yeah, the spit bucket for two days. So I wouldn't have to go through the pain of swallowing, I was just spitting into a bucket. Fucking respect, bro. You do what you have to do. And then at one point I just fucking puked it with my spit, I couldn't take it anymore. I went to spit it and there's a site of it, I just puked right into it.

Bro, that was fucking disgusting. You were communicating with us through what I was doing. You were typing on Google Translate and just hitting play. Literally typing on Google Translate, hitting play, like get me water. And then I think it was yesterday or the day before that you got your voice back and you had so much to say. You just wouldn't shut the fuck up after two days of pure radio silence. If you guys have never met Jake, no, he's quite a chatterbox.

Both of us are, which is why we essentially have a fucking podcast together. He doesn't stop. Because he spent two days not speaking, he spent 24 hours, bro. Every topic under the sun. I had 48 hours of points to make. I watched Milan Lettre in pure silence alone with Sarah sleep next to me like a serial killer, bro. Just glaring at the TV. I can't breathe, I can't fucking speak, nothing. It was amazing. It was amazing. It was amazing. It was an amazing sight, I guess.

Yeah, we did have a very good week of Football Man. I mean, not many close encounters that took place. Obviously there was Kremaneze Monza that was quite tight. There was Empoli Sampdoria that was very tight. Torino Spezia. But I mean, we had a 5-1, we had an 8-2. We had a couple of 2-0s here and there as well. So I feel like things are really starting to take shape now and we can kind of see what teams are suffering, what teams are going to progress this season.

I think, yeah, matchday, I think we're on matchday 18 now. Matchday 18. I think now is the time we start seeing that like if you're going to do well, you need to get your shit together now. I think in a couple of matchdays times, it'll be too late. And I think we're starting to see that. We're starting to see shape being taken in the standings. Yeah, I think so. Like for example, you know, like with Deniz's start. Yeah. We got to see what it really was. Exactly. Exactly. Fair enough, fair point.

So let's go through the happenings of this matchday. So on Friday night, there was Napoli-Uventos, which was much anticipated. We're all here saying who could Napoli get their second defeat of the season? Juve are on hot form. They've been really, you know, they've been a really well-structured team getting three points in every match. Napoli-Cruz passed Juve 5-1, the most embarrassing scoreline we've seen for Juve in the past few years.

After that, it was Lecce 2-Milan, 2-Milan pulling back from behind to equalise. They had 20 minutes to get a victory and they did not manage to do that. Inter scored in the third minute against Verona. Then there were no more goals in the game as they won 1-0. Roma beat Fiorentina 2-0, a masterclass by Debala in that match. Atalanta 8. Salernitana 2. Crazy, just crazy. And as a result of that, Davide Nicola was immediately sacked after the match.

It seemed like they were trying to find every reason to sack him after they survived because of him and they became the team that they are because of him. But that did lead to him getting sacked. Sasuolo 0-2, no big surprises over there. Odinese 1-2, stylistically a great match between these two Bologna coming out the better team. Torino 0-1, quite a big upset over there. Cromineze 2-0, Monza 3-0, Alvini was sacked after this match as well. It was a brilliant attacking display by Monza.

They made a few subs that kind of got them off the train for a while over there. Empoli 1-0, San Vadoria 0-1 in a very tight and entertaining display with a lot of last-minute drama. What did you make, bro? We're blessed to get the opportunity to watch most of the games this weekend. We were very, very chill. And impressive stuff all around, man. It was a great match, man. Lots of entertaining games all around. In fact, I don't think there were many boring ones at all.

Inter-Varona, granted, won the lonely and they only scored in the third minute and they kind of just kept it for the rest of the game. But there was a lot of stress for Inter at that game, like towards the end. It became quite stressful the fact that they didn't add to their advantage. Spezia managed to hold the one that lead against Torino. It was a very brave performance. No, no, it was a great match there overall. Agreed, man. Agreed. I think without further ado, we could head into it.

Shall I start? Shall we do it that way? Sure. Okay. So we'll start with obviously the Friday night match, the biggest match that we had this weekend. It was Napoli 5-1. So for Napoli, it was their 4-3-3 formation. They had Alex Maret in goal and what a performance it was by him. They had Di Lorenzo out on right back, Mario Rui out on left back with Minje and Rahmani forming the back two. Zieliński, Lobotka and Anguissa in the midfield, potentially the best midfield in the league this season.

Kwaratskelia out on the left, Poletano out on the right and Viktor Ossimen up front. For Juve, it was a 3-5-2 formation with Cezny in goal and a backline of Danilo, Bremer and Sandro. They had Chiesa getting his first start in a while. He played out on the right. Kostic played out on the left and it was McKennie, Locatelli and Rabiot in midfield with Millec and Di Maria playing up front. So in the 14th minute, Ossimen scored.

He headed in rebound after Chiesna saved Kwaratskelia's bicycle kick that made it 1-0. Mask off immediately. In the 20th minute, Di Maria hit the crossbar from distance after a brilliant attempt, making it seem like this was going to be quite a close encounter. However, in the 38th minute, Kwaratskelia scored, the Georgians slotted into the bottom corner after a square ball by Viktor Ossimen.

Bremer initially failed to deal with a long ball to the Nigerian and subsequently that is why his rating is so low in this match. He wasn't exactly on the top of his form in this game. In the 41st minute, Di Maria pulled one back for Juve. He finished cleanly into the bottom corner after a Millec layoff. Kim was caught wrong-footed in the build-up and Di Maria made the most of it. In the 47th minute, still in the first half, there was an incredible save by Alex Mered to deny a Rahmani own goal.

He kept his side still in the lead heading into half-time. You'd think Allegri would have had a word with his team and his team would have come out a stronger team essentially, but in the 54th minute, there was a low out-swinging corner to Rahmani from Kwaratskelia and he finished on a powerful half-volley keeper absolutely rooted to the spot. A rare goal you would see by Rahmani over there. In the 64th minute, Ossimen got his second of the night and a fourth for Napoli.

He headed in after a great cross by Kwaratskelia. Bremer initially lost the ball to Mario Rui in defence and there's another Bremer error over there, very uncharacteristic of him. In the 71st minute and then Elmas just killed all hopes that Juve had. He received the ball in space. He cut him past Kostic and his finish was deflected in by the sliding Alex Sandro. Napoli 5, Juve 1. Obviously, I don't think either of us expected that, bro.

No, and to be honest, it looked like it was going to be one-sided from the get-go. Napoli started much better than Juve. It was only when Di Maria equalised that Juve managed to get some momentum and I thought, okay, this might be a comeback for Juve over here, but that didn't last very long at all because even before the first half even ended, they managed to get another one back. Yeah. Napoli. Yeah. They had the opportunity over here to trim Napoli's lead from 7 to 4.

Yeah. They would have announced themselves as like serious Scudetto contenders, but that did not happen. They got absolutely annihilated and Napoli tore them a new one quite quickly. This was Juve's worst loss in any competition in 30 years, bro. Oh my God. And the last time they had a loss this bad, this calibre, it was a 5-1 loss away to Pescara in 1993 and ironically enough, Allegri scored two goals against Juve for Pescara that game. How do you find that shit, man? It's so good.

So good, man. It's just such a coincidence, right? Yeah. I think one strange thing about this game, well, it's not exactly strange. I think one thing we couldn't really put our finger on about Juve is that obviously they dictated the play in most of their games and most of their one-nil victories. It's because they hung onto possession for as long as they can.

And when they didn't have possession, they gathered everyone behind the ball in the park, the bus system, so to say, and they didn't let anyone get even close to their box, essentially. Napoli over here where you don't need to give Napoli space for Napoli to have space. They created their space. They attacked directly. Every time they got the ball, they were going for a goal like they wanted to score every single time they got the ball. The midfield are worlds apart.

I think you compare the midfield of Zieliński, Lobotka and Anguissa to McKennie, Locatelli and Rabiot, worlds apart, absolute worlds apart. And I think that is essentially where Juve lost the game in the midfield. It was highly dominated by Napoli. And then just that front three up against Juve's defense, which has been the best defense in the league so far. They had conceded seven goals in the opening 18 matches. They conceded five in a single game.

That's almost as many goals as they had conceded the season before, all of the season, actually. Do you think Juve have a problem with their defense and it just hasn't been exposed enough? Or do you think Napoli are just out of this world? I think that what went wrong with Napoli over here, sorry with Juve over here, the antibiotics. So obviously when you have Kézer available, you play him. Yeah. Right. If he's at your disposal, he's saying, play me coach, play me, you're going to play him.

Now sure, fair enough, but you're going to play him as a right wing back. He has played as a right wing back before at Fiorentina, not magnificently. No. You don't want a player of that caliber once again with that offensive potential to waste so much of his energy on defensive duties. It's the same thing with Mbappe. You don't ask Mbappe to track back all the time, lay out. You see him walking around a lot.

If you get him to make three of their amazing runs, a half, you have three good goalscoring opportunities. Agreed. Now he played, Allegri deployed, Kézer is a fullback over here. Against who? Against Guaratzkelia. Probably top two wingers in the league at the moment. In fact, it was not only Kézer, it was also Kostas, because of their offensive prowess, they often found themselves exposed with Guaratzkelia and Poletano going in behind. What does that mean?

Dani Lobremer Sandro all of a sudden stretches the back three to try to contain it. And then you have the likes of Zilinski, Osemen, Poletano, and all these fucking guys running in behind you. It was just a recipe for a disaster. I think Allegri set them up for failure over here. I think so as well. And not only because Kézer is out on the right, so on and so forth. I think, look, Kézer out as a right wingback is definitely not the way that Allegri wants to play the team moving forward.

And we can argue that this is a case of the injuries that they have, and maybe they needed someone who could run back and forth and back and forth for a full 90 minutes. And in that case, that man is Kézer. But again, he's not a right wingback, and that's not where his strengths lie. He needs to be played as close to goal as possible because that's where he is dangerous 100%. I think Juve are addicted to this two up front system.

And I think had they reshuffled it to a 4-3-3, they would have been a way more well balanced team. They could have had Kostichat left back. They could have had Danilo out at right back and had Bremer and Sandro, for example, as the two center backs. Then they would have had Kézer as a right winger going forward, DeMaria as a left winger going forward, and Millic up front. I don't get it. Sure. But then Allegri risks the criticism of it going tits up and everything going wrong, right?

And everyone saying, oh, you've just won eight in a row without conceding with a 3-5-2 formation, you're going to change it against Napoli? Yeah, but then he deployed Kézer as a right wingback to maintain that. And halfway through the game, he changed to a 4-2-3-1, they scored like three more. No, two more, two more. But yeah, this was a fucking fireworks display over here. Yeah. I think it's more good for Napoli than it is bad Juve.

I think personally that Juve are going to get back and keep on winning games 1-0. Yeah, that'll be fine. This is just a... They played against one of the most modern football teams in the world at the moment. By the way, guys, Napoli are currently playing in the Coppa Italia and their kit is a San Valentino special kit and it's disgusting. I'm going to throw up. They've got these lips right above their junk, dude. It's gross. It's terrible. And Balladini's first game in charge. Look at that.

Oh my God, he's already been appointed. Wow. Congratulations. Oh, look, Spalletti. Did you see that moment he had with Allegri? Oh my God, man. That was hilarious. I think Allegri saw him from the corner of his eye and tried to ignore him to not shake his hand because of the pregame beef where basically Allegri was playing the, you know, we're not set up to beat teams of this caliber kind of card.

And Spalletti basically said you're set up to win the league and the Champions League, dude, with the signings you made. And he's probably right. But Spalletti is about to do that, I feel, man. I didn't like that with the fucking team he created, man. I genuinely think, bro. I genuinely think that Napoli look like fucking Real Madrid here, man. I'm not talking about Real Madrid this year. I'm talking about fucking Real Madrid. Like, you know what I mean? They look fucking good, bro.

And I can't stress enough those three players to me that stand out, head and shoulders above the rest, Kvaratskaya, obviously, Ossimen, obviously, and Lobotka. I think because you look at the additions that they made and the additions that they made were Kim Minjae and Kvaratskaya. Lobotka came in to replace Fabian Ruiz. Got two so-calleds and fattened and put him on the bench. Literally. He was fattened on the bench for a while, Lobotka. He came in.

We've previously seen him line up in a kind of alongside them when they're not fielding their best squad, Napoli last season, and they always look good together. Yeah. But Lobotka has come in and he's just this guy is honestly one of the best registrars in the league. Yeah. I think it's him and Benassir. I think it is him and Benassir. This season, I think it's him. Benassir has been quality, but Lobotka has just been on a different level.

Now, obviously, he has the movement of his teammates up front. He has a certain understanding with his teammates. He's surrounded by two other midfielders rather than the single midfielder, which is Tonali in Benassir's case. But he's an artist, man. He's an artist, Lobotka, and he should get all the shirt sales in the world because he is a star in that team, an absolute star in that team. But he's an unsung star, you know? Yeah. Like so. But at Scalia and Ozymen, obviously, sell more shirts.

Yeah. Alex Maret had a good game. He is a much improved goalkeeper to the goalkeeper we saw last year. It's no wonder Napoli didn't bring in Keiler Navas and they didn't bring in any of these guys that they were rumored to bring in. He had a spectacular performance over here. He had one of the saves of the season when Rahmani almost turned the ball into his own net and he got down in the 47th minute, still laser focused, acrobatically got down and palm the ball away.

I heard something about him having a new goalkeeper coach, and that is part of the reason as to why he improved so much. And apparently Spalletti was the guy that appointed this guy. I mean, I wouldn't be surprised, man. Spalletti is a very good man, manager, particularly. And he deals really well with situations like this where you have kind of a good goalkeeper or a good player who's underperforming. Give them Spalletti, he'll bring the best out of them.

He's a very good man, I think it takes us what it takes to do that. I wanted to mention as well, bro, Juve have only scored six goals away from home in Serie A this season. Six goals all season away from home only. Wow. They do the majority of their scoring. At home, like us. How many times this year have you scored away from home, bro? Why am I answering? Like, what am I thinking? How about that? Four or five? I much prefer to score at home as well. It's good here. It's nice here.

The bed's comfy. Well, I mean, regarding that stat that you brought up, there's also a point to be made that they've missed Vlachovic for so long. Yeah, they've missed many starters, to be honest. So I wouldn't be surprised if they're set up to play on the counter during these away games. Yeah, for sure. I mean, there's no need to mention the list. I think we're all very aware of the list of injuries that they've had.

It was also interesting just not to see the Marettis playing this game, the Fagioli. There's an interesting case to be made about McKennie starting. A very interesting case to be made because he hasn't been great. Exactly. And it put all of the creative pressure on Locatelli.

So you have Rabiot, Locatelli, and then you have McKennie, when you could have easily put in Maretti or Fagioli, granted the game of this caliber maybe you don't want to throw in your youth, but they're on better form than McKennie right now. They both look better. 100%. No, I agree. I don't think the midfield was well, not well balanced because I mean, it's perfectly balanced when you think that Locatelli plays between the defense and the midfield.

You have McKennie, that's more box to box and Rabiot, that's more offensive, but there's a bit of a lack of creativity over there. Rabiot obviously has that magical... He's a box to box, ideally. As well, as well. I wouldn't say he's the attacking outlet either. They really missed having someone who could play that final ball over there. And then that put a lot of pressure on Di Maria.

Di Maria was doing a lot of work over there and he got the goal and he hit the post as well and he was the one creating. Chiesa was wasted way out on the right. I barely saw him all game. Kostič the same, he really couldn't get involved in the game because they were just getting ground over constantly. And there was no excitement by Juve. There was no spark whatsoever and they just got absolutely, absolutely battered by the Snopoli team. Allegri praised Snopoli in the post-match interview.

He said there's no need to be depressed. Just like there's no need to get ahead of ourselves after eight consecutive wins. It's a defeat and we move on. It was Mourinho who initially said he'd rather lose one game 5-0 than five games 1-0. And that's the essential point that Allegri could be making over here as well. It's the same thing in principle. He also blamed himself and Juve for having less energy than Napoli, a very vague thing to say.

Juve still have, ironically after this game, the best defence in the league with 12 goals conceded, second to Napoli who have 14 goals conceded. So they've just conceded five and they still have the best defence in the league. That's very impressive. It's very impressive. We'll see how they recover. Considering Allegri's point about having less energy than Napoli, I mean, Napoli, it's like their own performance enhancers.

The energy that they have and how they're constantly attacking and defending and running up and down and running into spaces and finding that pass and just the confidence that they have in every single 50-50 is ridiculous. I don't think there's a side in the world that has Napoli's energy this season to be fair to Allegri. They're like the football equivalent of Jeremy Fragrance at the moment. Bang on. Bang on.

Napoli are obviously still in first and they now lead Milan by nine points, whereas Juve are in third, just one point behind Milan on 37 points. The next game we're going to be covering is Lecce 2-Milan 2. Lecce lined up with their 4-3-3 formation. Falcone was in goal, Petzella on the left, Jean Drey on the right, with Umtiti and Basqueroz as the centre-back pairing. Gonzalez, Hülmend and Blin played in the middle with Di Francesco on the left, Streffetza on the right and Colombo up front.

The Milan loney. Tatarasano was in goal for Milan with their 4-2-3-1 formation. Calabria was on the right, Theo Hernandez on the left with Tomori and Calullo as the centre-back duo. A double midfield pivot of Pobega and Benassir due to Tanali's suspension. Salah Makars was on the right, Lea on the left and Diaz playing off the shoulder of Olivier Giroud. Are you sure Calullo and Calabria were playing man? Yeah, I mean, Calullo was definitely there because he was responsible for both goals.

It's like there was absolutely on that side of the defence, it's like there was no one. You see five ledger players running and Calabria and Calullo sprinting back. They opened Milan up so many times. Wave after the first half, I thought it was going to be a disaster. At one point Milan should have been like 4-0 down. 100%. It was a joke. It was a joke.

It all started in the third minute when Theo Hernandez knocked the ball into his own net with his shoulder after a Di Francesco cross as he tracked back. The attack was initiated after a terrible short pass by Calullo at the back. In the 23rd minute, Basquerotto headed in as Hulman's cross found him unmarked as Calullo failed to challenge the beast to a header.

In the 57th minute Milan got one back, Leao slot the ball into the near corner from a tight angle moments after Falcone had denied Olivier Giroud. And in the 70th minute Calabria scored, it was Pobega's ball into the box that was headed by Giroud towards Calabria who slotted it in with his own header. That means Milan had over 20 minutes to get the winner. In fact at this point I thought Milan are going to do it.

I was very confident so much so that I started tending to errands around the house while the game was on. I was like okay now we can get one. Finally the game is back to normal, we're back to square one, we have 20 minutes to find the goal. The errands must have been really urgent. We're getting ready to go out to dinner at that point. So I thought in the last 20 minutes that's where Milan are very dangerous.

Not exactly when they need a goal late on but when the stakes are high Milan are very powerful and I thought that something was going to happen over there. I was very disappointed that they managed to do virtually nothing in the last 20 minutes of the game and especially after scoring two in quick succession like that and the momentum in Milan's favour I did expect them to get the winner man.

It's true, especially with the substitutions Milan are meant to strengthen their team while Lefthuja are meant to weaken their team. But in reality the way this Lefthuja team was set up, by the way I'm a massive fan, I know I've said this a million times of this Baroni-Lefthuja team, everything is so methodological, everything is so thought out like well planned. It's amazing. And the fact that he leaves players like Banda, Gallo and Malle on the bench.

He can actually keep up with the changes as the game goes on. Great great team over here, great little team. I also want to highlight Basquerotto, I've done some reading on him and I want to address this titan at the back for Lefthuja. So Basquerotto is first of all very versatile, he can play as a right back, he can play as a centre back, he can play anywhere in defence to be honest. He's six foot tall, he's a bodybuilder essentially. Look at him, he's shredded.

He has abs that Cristiano Ronaldo would be jealous of. And the first time I noticed how shredded he was was when he scored against Atalanta and he flexed his muscles to the crowd and I was like Jesus Christ that's not a normal arm. He did that in this game as well, he did like a proper bodybuilder pose. Yeah exactly, he did the sideways one. My god. And apparently according to his teammates he only eats chicken and rice. Now please note this guy is Italian.

So they tell him like please please let's go out, let's have a good piece of steak or a good plate of pasta and he's like no chicken and rice. And like dessert, the word dessert isn't even in his vocabulary. I mean respect to him man. He's honestly built like the incredible Holocaust. He scored two goals, a season one against Atalanta and one against Milan. He wears the number six on his back under the name Basquerotta, not to represent himself but to represent the Basquerotta family.

There's six people, there's his mother, his father and his four brothers. Very nice little gesture over there. His centre-back partner and World Cup winner Sam Wellum Titti hailed Basquerotta to be one of the best defenders in the league. This season he has been, he really has been one of the best defenders in the league.

Incredibly versatile, he's obviously naturally a right-back, he was placed as a centre-back early on in the campaign when Lecce were really struggling in the defensive region with injuries. I remember we had that clip that we posted on Instagram as well where Basquerotta and a defensive midfielder, Blin I believe it was, started as the two centre-backs against Inter and Inter won one-nil with our last fucking second goal and we're saying what a shift these two guys put in.

Like he's been fantastic, he's been super, he can really play the ball for, holy shit, Cremonezza just scored against Napoli in the Coppa and I'm sorry I got incredibly sidetracked. It's Piquel with the goal. Exciting stuff. But yeah, very well-rounded defender, he's very mature and he's very explosive as well. This is his first season in Serie A, quite late at 26 but he most definitely deserves it for his hard work and humility.

And I think he'll go down as a Lecce legend one day unless obviously he gets a move upwards. I wouldn't be surprised if he gets a big money move. Big money move isn't for Lecce's standards, big money move. Or for himself rather, get a better salary. But yeah, Lecce have a good thing going over here. Milan, bro, how will Milan recover from this? There's the Supercoppa Italiana on Wednesday night, that's tomorrow.

The last time Milan and Inter went head-to-head in the trophy was in 2011 and Milan won it. I was watching clips today about that. I believe it was 2-1. Milan brought it back from behind. It was a Wesley Snyder free kick that opened the scoring and Boateng got the winner in that game because that happened. To answer your question, how do Milan recover?

It's very interesting because I think purely it's going to need to, number one, take a bit of responsibility and make the necessary changes in order for Milan to turn things around. So for example, how come in this match there was such a massive gap between Calhulu and Calabria throughout the entire match? Lecce constantly had a very easy avenue to attack down from. Di Francesco looked like Mbappe down that wing because he was constantly in bags of space.

There was no pressure by Calabria, no pressure by Calhulu. Calhulu was essentially a cone in that match and I mean no disrespect to them. I love them to bits, but they really struggled over there. I think the distribution from defense to midfield was poor. We saw Benassé coming very deep to collect the ball and that kept Milan on the back foot. It kept them very low when they were trying to build the ball up from the back.

I think over there we need to see a bit more of a ball playing midfielder in certain scenarios. You brought up the point that Kier should be given a shout in certain matches. Exactly. What did I say? Midfielder. A ball playing midfielder. Benassé center back baby. I think maybe seeing Kier play a couple of games over there and obviously not to throw Calhulu under the bus because he's been doing a brilliant job as center back. But that was something that was very concerning in the past two games.

It's true. It's true. In fact, there were talks of purely considering starting Kier on Wednesday. In fact, I think that would be wise against him right now. You have a young player in a poor run of form. Give him a rest during the final. Play him again in the league. See how he does. It's not the end of the world if you bench a young player in a final. No, it's definitely not the end of the world.

It's very dependent on who interplay as well because if they're playing Korea and Lautaro, for example, you'd probably want someone more pacey than Kier. For example, you might want Calhulu to play over there. So obviously we could sit here and criticize Paulie for whatever decision he makes over there. It's not a tough task when you have someone like Calhulu who had such a poor performance in the last game and you have essentially a versatile, you have players like Gabia and Kier.

I thought you did something really weird. You have people like Gabia and Kier who are dying for minutes and are chaining their asses off for minutes. And it's tough to say because you want to know the opposition starting 11 before you make yours, no? Fair enough. And I think they will leave it until tomorrow. You know, decision to be. I'm not sure. Do you think right now, Tuesday night, Paulie's mind's made up? I would think so. I'd like to think so. I think his mind's made up.

We'll see what he does. And there's also the shout of rotation. Like it wouldn't be a match. There's not going to be any rotation. No, but if he plays Kier, there could be the excuse of we need to save our players for the league, so on and so forth. Yeah, but it's a trophy, man. One game that gives you a trophy. You know, everyone wants to win this. Even though people say, oh, it's just the Super Cup.

We all know how, like Milan fans know how they felt when they beat Juve in the Super Cup when Pasalic scored the winning penalty. It was Donnarumma saved the ball last penalty. That was mad. That was a crazy game. Yeah. Yes, I don't know. I feel like Milan, they do this thing where they rush all their maneuvers too early on, almost as though it's the 80th minute from the get go. Piole pointed that out after the Torino game in the build up to the Lettre game. And it still happened against Lettre.

Theo Hernandez had the worst performance I've ever seen by him ever. I can't believe it took us this long actually to discuss it. The own goal, I think the own goal confused him. And especially in the first half, he was dreadful, man. Listen to these. So he played 45 minutes. He was subbed at halftime. He blocked one shot. He had two tackles out of four attempted. He scored one own goal. He had four ground duels. He won two of them. He lost possession 14 times.

He had one foul, 41 touches, 61% accurate passes. One key pass, okay, not bad. Six long balls, three of them accurate and one shot blocked. My God, man. It's the 14 shots. No, sorry, 14 times possession lost. And the passing accuracy, 61%, like Jesus Christ. And obviously it's for that reason that he was subbed off at halftime. I think when Milan need a goal, you'd keep Theo Hernandez on and not replace him with Sergio Nio Dest. Who played quite well. He was decent.

He was decent Dest. I don't mind him out on the left. I don't mind him in general post-World Cup. I think his World Cup was good and it gave him confidence. Fair enough, man. Fair enough. What did you make of Pobega in this game? Because we're in a Milan chat and everyone in that Milan chat, anytime Pobega makes a slight error, then they shit on him. Yes. Essentially. Him and Tata Rossano are scapegoated. It used to be Brahim. And Tata, I've seen him being blamed for this loss.

And I saw him get beat. And I saw him wear a tunnel down and someone was like, you know, fucking Tata Rossano. What the hell? What the hell can he do when he has 10 men in front of him and no one's putting in a shift? Like what the hell do you expect Tata Rossano to do? I mean, he's made his mistakes, but not every goal you can see this is for. Exactly. Pobega, for me, had a decent performance, man. It wasn't the worst performance I've seen. He was instrumental in both Milan goals. That he was.

Coming back into it. And in the first half, it's just like, I don't even count the performance because everyone was shit. That's true. That's true. And he did have one of the few attempts that Milan had in the first half as well. He took a snapshot on the turn, could have curled in on his day. Why the fuck not? I often see Pobega playing quite high up the pitch because he's got a rocket in his pocket. I do, however, think that that's not his place to be.

And I think his place should be, he can't link up play going forward. That's not his strong point. Yeah, the flick on season. It's not his thing. Exactly. So I think it should be utilized further down and maybe you'd hope that like Brahim would be a little bit more active in, which he was to be honest, in going forward and tracking back and filling in that hole in the midfield essentially. I think Pobega's link up play wasn't great at all in this match.

And I think the main thing we could take home from this is how important Tonali is to Milan. The way he moves the ball around him and Benassir playing together. It's like just having the best midfielder in the world, having those two together. And Pobega disrupted a lot of that play with his decision making, with certain passes, his output, so on, so forth. However, and then this wall bites me in the ass because he was involved in the two goals. Yes, that's the thing.

But he didn't help Milan when it came to controlling the match, is my point. Yeah, he's not the Tonali type player. It's true. No. But again, 23 years old, super versatile, can be played in the hole. Like where the others played to a different style though, not for as quick like link up. But yes, I think there's a bright future for Tommy P. I'm not sure if it's at Milan, but we'll see. The management seem very happy with him. Agreed.

Milan currently sit in second with 38 points, while Sletje sit in 14th with 20 points. The next game we're going to be covering is Inter 1-0 Verona. So Inter started in their 3-5-2 formation with Onana and goal, and the back line of Bastoni, Acerbi and Skriniar. They had De Marca out on the left with Darmian out on the right. They had Mkhitaryan, Chalano-Blue and Gagliardini as the three midfielders. Barela was rested and Brozo still injured.

Tlautaro Martinez and Zerko up front with Lukaku injured. Verona fielded a 3-4-2-1 formation with Monte-Pao between the sticks, Davidovich, Heane and Cecharini at the back, De Pauli out on the right with Faroni still injured, Doeg out on the left and a midfield two of Tamez and Ilic, Kalon and Lazović behind Juric. So the only goal, as we mentioned earlier in this game, came from Tlautaro Martinez in the third minute of the match.

He slotted the ball past five defenders and into the bottom corner from just inside the area. Very good finish by the Argentine over there. He did think he got the second of the night and made it 2 for Inter in the 62nd minute but his goal was disallowed after his tussle with Davidovich was deemed a foul. The finish was once again super clean as he chipped the out coming Monte-Pao. So Inter scored early and looked to slow down the tempo and control the game from then on.

Their plan worked, they came away with three points but how convincing did they look against Verona? I mean, they had a game plan, clearly. You can see Onana was trying to play the ball out quickly to attack on the counter and then you see the likes of Skriniar telling him, slow it down, slow it down. In fact there were quite a few disagreements between Onana and Skriniar in particular who clearly had different ideas on how to play the game. Onana doesn't agree with anyone.

No, apparently he has personality issues. What drinks and drives? What was it again? Something like that. But Inter dominated the game, 56% ball possession, they were unlucky not to double their lead and it almost cost them at the end but it was a stressful end to the game for Inter fans but in reality they never really looked troubled by this Verona. Absolutely not.

I have to give credit where it's due and I have to give a shout out to Acheerbi over here because Inter's defence did not look good at all in the beginning of the season and it seems like when they made the direct swap of Dev Rai out for Acheerbi, Acheerbi has really gotten his shit together and he's gelled, with his experience he's really gelled this back three together and that's another former Lazio player under Simone and Zaghi's

system he knows how this guy operates and being a bit of a captain in that back three as well man. Especially when they play with a low line Acheerbi is super. Bastoni was back to his best this game, that's what I did notice, he was very very good. Bastoni's had a good couple of games, after the World Cup he's been brilliant.

Gagliardini had a decent game and he spoke after the game and he said I have to be honest, I feel like I've grown in the past few years, I'm 28 years old now, I need to play, I need to feel important. He said that the team selection doesn't really make sense to him, it's not really logical, it's just kind of name based, the fact that he's never considered, he feels like he should be. So we'll see, he said he'll see what happens next season.

I think he's wrong, I think players are played over him because they're more talented than him and they fit the system more than him. I don't think it's because they have another name, a name that is different to his, but I mean I was going to say that's the spirit but no it's not, you need to train, how are they to be better than these guys? No he's been an exemplary professional for all these years, no I think they're... I mean he has been but to me that comment's a bit weird man.

It is a strange one but probably he's like I'm leaving next year, fuck them, time to hear my side of the story. Well he did have a good game, Gagliardini, and obviously I wasn't expecting it from him.

Firstly those significant changes to Inter's team, I mean Virtri, Cialnoglu is the only midfielder that normally starts in that team and he was playing in the Registrar role, in Brozovic's role, so it was a much different looking Inter team and Gagliardini was good, he was very mature, he was patient on the ball, his tackling was good as well, so shout out to him man, shout out to him.

Inter have conceded four goals at home this season only and they conceded 20 away from home this season, what the hell? It seems to be a fear of crowds, you know, foreign crowds. After Covid.

Maybe that's the case, no but this is something common, teams tend to struggle away from home and that's still the case, you know, people say because nowadays with the way you can travel and how easy life has become home and the way games don't really make a difference anymore, that's not the case at all of course.

Playing away from home is extremely difficult, no matter who you're playing against, you could be going fucking Croatia, you could be going to Finland, you know, you could be going anywhere, it's going to be a difficult game and even in Italy itself, travelling around, it's always difficult to play in a stadium that isn't yours, the pitch can be slightly different, you know, slight differences can change everything, make you feel really

weak and put you off, like for the first half, in fact you see Milan half the time in away games, first half, nothing, nothing is done. Could be that, that could be a different dimension in the pitch that throws them off completely. 100% man, 100%. Inter have had a very mixed time returning from the World Cup, they obviously in the first match they handed Napoli their first and only loss of the season, 1-0.

They then had a 2-0 lead against Monza and Monza brought it back to 2-2, a game which they ended up drawing and they scraped past Parma in the Coppa and now they scraped past Verona, one goal to nil, amateur display but they didn't also, they didn't really seem very convincing, they didn't seem dangerous, they just beat Verona who have really been struggling this season.

But look, it's, we say this often, it's three points, it's a clean sheet and they rested many of their key players before a final. So they won compared to Milan, you know, their competitors in the final. Milan are going to arrive way more fatigued, way more distracted, Inter are going to arrive with more confidence. Yes sir, a Milan derby in Saudi Arabia, I don't know if we've ever seen that before, but we're very, very excited to see what's going to happen over there.

At the moment it is Inter who sit in fourth place on 37 points, 11 with Juve and 3 ahead of Lazio, Atalanta and Roma. Why is Verona sitting 18th on 9 points and they're still 7 points behind Sassuolo in 17th. The next game we're going to be covering is Roma 2 Fiorentina nil.

Roma lined up with their 3-4-1-2 formation with Rui Patricio in goal, Kumbulla smalling a Mancini at the back, Kumbulla was replacing the suspended Ibanez, Zalefsky played on the left, Kčelic on the right, Kristante and Bove in the middle, Pellegrini played behind Abraham and Debala. It's pronounced Bove. Bove, yeah. I'm joking, alright guys. Don't take that seriously.

Fiorentina lined up with their 4-2-3-1 formation with Terracciano in goal, Dodo on the right, Biragi on the left, Igor and Milenkovic as the centre back duo, Duncan and Amrabat in the middle, Ikona on the right, Kwame on the left and Bonaventura behind Jovic. In the 23rd minute the game was pretty much over for Fiorentina as Dodo got a red card.

Yeah, I think his name couldn't be more accurate as the Dodo bird was extinct due to its lack of intelligence, launched unnecessarily into a challenge which earned him a second yellow card of the match. What an absolute idiot, no? Bro, honestly it was so reckless, so rash. You can tell these players, but when this happens they'd be so into the game.

They'd be so gassed, so much adrenaline, really playing the occasion, he's at the Olympiago, the whole Roma, Roma, Roma, he was probably dying to go. Gas, 23 minutes he gets two yellows. Poor guy, you can't help but feel for him. But it was a dumb move. Yeah, it was a stupid decision to commit to a sliding tackle for that kind of challenge. Like in no way was a sliding tackle a good idea over there.

He should have stood his ground and just tried to nick the ball over there, but he overcommitted to it out of pure excitement probably. You're right bro, the last Dodo bird was killed in 1681, but the last Dodo footballer was sent off in 2023. Fantastic, fantastic. Sorry Dodo. In the 40th minute, Debala opened up the scoring. It was Tammy Abraham who chested the ball to Debala. It was a long ball from the back, it was amazing.

Who unleashed a volley which deflected off Melenkovic ever so slightly and crept under Terracciano. It was a great, great goal. Well you keep on saying that that was a great goal. You know what I saw? Obviously it was good play. You saw a lot of bullshit. Very, very good play. And Debala connected on the volley. Well sure, but I saw a whole lot of bullshit. The ball essentially rolled down the middle and it went underneath the keeper because of the deflection it took.

Everyone was like, oh what a goal. It was sensational. I'm expecting to look at the screen and see a ball fly into the top corner, keeper clattered into the bro's. Bro, that goal was sensational. The long ball, Tammy chested it so well towards Debala as well. You can hear the off his chest, you know, like perfectly he laid it off to him. And then Debala just connected so sweetly. Granted, took a deflection, it slowed down a bit and then Terracciano went right under him and all that.

But you know, you have to appreciate the move. The fact that the move led to a goal, beautiful goal. The build up was great. Yes, the build up to the goal was great. I agree. It was underwhelming. But it was an under, exactly. I was very disappointed with the finish. In the 82nd minute there was a brilliant ball by Cristante de Tammy Abraham who squared the ball to Debala, finished into an empty net and just pointed straight to Tammy telling him like you're the man. This is because of you.

And to be honest, this is how you build up your confidence as a striker. One late goal against Milan, you know, from a corner scrappy. He doesn't even know how it happened. Like you know, it just fell to him and he hit it falling backwards, scored. Had a few nice moments where he rounded a few players to hear the Olympian going, oh, you know, a few nice touches like for a six foot five player, he's got quite good technique. Now this game to assists, you know, he's winning the fans back, man.

He's getting his confidence. Debala is saying like he's the man, he's the man. He'll be back, Tammy. How did Roma ever cope without Debala in their team? How did they do anything last season without Debala? It seems like he's been there for so long. The performances that he puts in for this team. He's getting Tammy ticking now as well. Mourinho has recently been asked as well. This is a really funny Mourinho piece. They asked him why doesn't your team perform well when Debala isn't on the pitch?

He's like, you want to know? You want to know? After this interview, we'll go out to the back and I will tell you, but not in front of the cameras. So I'm like Mourinho agrees. You know what I mean? No, no, he's right. Debala is the type of difference maker. He said that if you're lucky, you have won Debala on your team. He said in the modern game, a few of these teams have 11 Debalas. Guys the Mourinho impression is something we've been doing. We've been watching all or nothing spurs.

Mourinho and it's amazing. Just fun to watch. Man, it's excellent. It's excellent. It's so much fun to watch. If you're somewhat intrigued by Mourinho, which you should be, if you're a football fan, you should be 100%. You should be intrigued by this man. Watch spurs all or nothing. Spurs till I die, whatever the hell it's called. You get to see so much of him. And one thing that really impressed me, I'm straying off topic. I know, but it's Mourinho. Fuck it. Was his team was down.

So spurs were down to one in the Champions League group stage and they needed a win to progress. I believe it was against Olympiacos. Something like that. They got a late goal. They got a late goal and they all went in and Dele Alli was smashing shit and everyone was smashing shit. Everyone was smashing shit and Mourinho just walks in and he goes, calm, calm, everyone calm down. And then he started taking the piss over. Why you go, ooh, ooh, ooh, ball comes in panic. Panic, panic, panic.

He's just breathing his play. He's just taking them to shit. I liked it. It's good. No, I mean, had they not scored that goal in the first half to make it to one, he would have been a different approach completely. But yes, he's a fantastic, fantastic manager, Mourinho. 11th. And a great, great character. Definitely. But yes, Debala is the difference maker over here. I have no idea how they got things done before him.

But yeah, man, this was a very comfortable win for Roma thanks to once again, Dodo. Yeah. Thank you very much, Dodo. I think it would have been a different game. I think Fiorentina have looked decent recently. They had Amr Abat in the team as well, which was obviously going to improve stuff for them. But again, a clumsy decision. Normally Roma aren't known to be a very attacking, high attacking team, but they allowed them to be because of the red card.

And we got to see Roma at full flow, at least because of that. Yeah, true. This is how they would play ideally. Roma sit seventh with 34 points, while Fiorentina sit tenth with 23 points. The next game we're going to be covering and Lord, please help me with this is Atalanta 8, Salernitana 2. So Atalanta started in a 3-4-3 formation with Mussongol and the back line of Scalvini, Palomino and Toloi. They had Ruggeri out on the left and Zappacosta out on the right.

Amitfield 2 of their own and Koopminers. They had Bogha out on the left, Lukman out on the right and Huelund up front. For Salernitana, it was a 3-4-1-2 formation with Ochoa in goal. A back line of Lovato, Fazio and Pirola. They had Candreva on the right, Broderich on the left and Amitfield 3 of Cullibaly, Caviglia and Villana just behind the strikers with Piontek and Dia up front. So in the fourth minute, Bogha opened the scoring.

He cut in and took on three defenders, whilst his shot from distance took a significant deflection and headed into the back of the net that made it 1-0. Dia pulled one back shortly after to make it 1-1 in the 10th minute. It was a long ball by Ochoa that was flicked on by the head of Piontek to Dia who slotted in between the legs of Mussongol.

In the 20th minute, Lukman only just slotted in a penalty which was awarded after VAR noticed that Fazio's foul on Hoyland was just inside the area that made it 2-1. Two minutes later, Scalvini got his name to the scoresheet making it 3-1. The youngster headed in a Coupe Miners corner when he was totally unmarked. The 37th minute, Coupe Miners made it 4-1. His penalty was saved by Ochoa but he slotted in the rebound shortly after. The penalty was once again given away by Fazio on Hoyland.

In the 40th minute, it was Hoyland's turn and he made it 5-1. Lovato failed to intercept a ball on the halfway line which Hoyland carried all the way to the opposition area and finished brilliantly. Kind of looked like Avlaović or Aronosymen over there. He looked very very good to carry the ball forward and finish in the way that he did. 54th minute in the second half, Lukman made it 6-1.

Lukman striked from the edge of the area, took a slight deflection of Pirola and flew into the top corner making it 6-1. In the 56th minute, just two minutes later, Caviglia pulled one back. Dia pulled the ball back to Caviglia who placed the ball into the bottom corner from just outside the area making it 6-2. In the 61st minute, Ederson scored with an unstoppable drive from distance into the top corner against his former team that was our goal of the week.

And in the 85th minute, Zortje made it 8-2 after Duvan Zapata found Zortje finishing to the bottom corner from a tight angle making it 8-2. Say something whilst I take a bit of a break. So David and Nicola, the miracle man who miraculously saved Salernitana from relegation last season, I believe they were on a record of only three wins, four draws and double digits in defeats. I can't remember right now but yes, everyone had them out.

David and Nicola came in and he saved them and this season they're nine points clear of the relegation pool. Right now they're establishing themselves as a decent side with an identity in Italy, right? But of course he was sacked after this result as it is uncommon in Italy for defeats of this nature to go unpunished. You get embarrassed, the board takes revenge on the man who was responsible for that embarrassment. That's the way it works in Italy.

And in fact in the Premier League we see scorelines like this and they just keep going. It's normal. Especially a team that currently sits mid-table-ish. When last season they were bottom of, they were out, dead and out for so long and now they've just sacked the manager just because of a result. For me it seems a little bit narrow-minded, a little bit stupid, impulsive.

Because the only thing they can do is take two comparisons, Salernitana with David and Nicola and Salernitana with the two managers they had before that last season. Tell me which side was the better side, the side with David and Nicola. There aren't a significant amount of players or a system in place, so on and so forth that allows this team to thrive. It is literally the manager that made them thrive.

It is this manager that turned things around and made them somewhat of a mid-table team, bottom-tier mid-table, but a much better team than they were. They now have a bit of respect. People are joining the team. We see the likes of Ochoa, the likes of Candreva joining the team. Piontek, Dira, Nigerol, it's hot property. Yeah, okay, they're in Salerno, so people are going to want to go there, but people are going to want to play good football and not get embarrassed.

Now they've been finding reasons to sack him. Even in the beginning of the season when results weren't going their way, there was a certain period even though they got off to a flying start, man. There were shots that he was going to get the sack and an 8-2 score line put them on the verge, not put them on the verge, it got them to finally sack him. Ahead of the derby against Napoli as well.

How are the players going to feel, do the players agree with this decision, do they disagree with this decision? That I'd be interested to find out, but I doubt they would agree with it when he made the change that he did. He's done miracles for this team. Unfortunately this is common for Davide Nicola. He also pulled off a miracle in Croton and was only there for one year. The most he's ever managed a club for, the longest stretch of time, was a two-year period.

So he's kind of a fix-it manager, which is unfortunate because I thought he was building something solid over here, but now we'll see who they bring in. They're probably bringing in like D'Aversa or someone like that, uninspiring, supporting with worse and worse. Exactly. We'll see. With that point about the managers, to be honest, Piole didn't exactly have a great resume managing the likes of Inter and Fiorentina when they were weaker sides and he turned Milan to a Scudetto winning team.

So as long as the manager fits the squad and he gets them ticking, then I think that's enough man. I also have to add that I felt terrible for Ochoa. He looked like he was having a nightmare. He pulled five saves off. He saved the second penalty. They scored the rebound. He tracked the first penalty and just over it. He touched, he got a hand to the ball and it went just under him. It was very frustrating for him.

Fosio gave away both penalties so I just imagined Ochoa going to the dressing room and seeing Fosio on Lovato playing a game of FIFA or something. Bring me the playtation. Disconnected. Bring me the playtation. Right here. It's uncanny. It's uncanny. Bring me the playtation. But I think the person who should have been sacked for this performance was Fosio. And in fact, Fosio got injured and they're going to need to send their back to replacement.

They haven't even signed the manager but they're linked to Omar Koli. Okay, okay. That would be a good signing for Sallernetahana. They have pull man. They have full power. Yeah, everyone wants to live in fucking Sallernetahana. And they have a very, very, very strong fan base over there. A fan base like no other man. Sallernetahana. A bunch of shirtless unemployed men. No, no, I'm kidding. But they're great fans. They have great songs like Unchained. It's always a great vibe in Sallerno.

But yes, dude, this was extremely lopsided. Sallernetahana just couldn't keep up with the attacking prowess of Atalanta. They looked a little bit one-dimensional this game. It is true. It has to be said. It was always the same system. They kept trying it. They kept failing and they kept getting exposed and exploited. I don't know. I think I guess Davide Nicola should have just parked the bus to minimize damage and keep his job.

Like, you know, letting eight goals in, I guess, especially when you're 11 against 11. It's not great, is it? Massive, massive shout out to Gasperini's Atalanta. What a fucking performance by them has to be said. Sallernetahana hasn't an easy side to face and they managed to score. Eight goals against them. We've criticized Atalanta for their output this year. Obviously, they've taken a bit more of a pragmatic approach. We all know that.

However, they have lacked a certain amount of pace moving forward. They lacked the danger men that they had in Muriel, Duván Zapata, Papo Gómez, Gossens, so on and so forth in the past, Malinowski as well. Off to Marseille. Off to Marseille now. But they have now found Boga in good form and Luckmann in good form. And those two on the flanks are very, very quick. They're very, very direct. Boga likes to cut in. Luckmann likes to play very close to goal.

And having Hoylind up front, that is some great balance over their brother. It really is. And finally, they're playing Boga on the wing. And he's looking really disciplined. That's something that he's always lacked. So it's nice to see that things are finally working out for him. Erling Hoylind now. What a player. He's 19 years old. He's very good. He's so strong. I'm telling you, man, that goal that he scored where he carried the ball upfield, wow. He scores in so many different ways.

So they have a 19-year-old really impressive talent at the back with Scalvini. They have a 20-year-old impressive fullback with Ruggeri, who does a lot of running and a lot of hard work. They have a 19-year-old Hoylind up front who's scoring for fun at the moment. Atalanta is just a factory for a talent man. And it's crazy how a team with three teenagers, just off the top of my head, can absolutely decimate a squad with experienced players such as Fazio, Ochoa, Candreva, Piontek.

It's crazy how they tore them apart. 100%, man, 100%. The midfield was also very good. Cope Miners, as usual. What a fucking player over there. I feel like a player that often goes under the radar because of the type of player that he is, is De Hoon. But what a fantastic player. He's been for years, huh? For years with Atalanta. This guy has been very solid. Palomino, again, what a performance by him. What a defender. One of the greatest we have in Italy at the moment.

For Atalanta, it's heaps of praise at the moment. We saw their former selves. We saw them, you know, how they were two seasons ago. Just attack, attack, attack, attack, attack, attack, attack, attack, attack, attack, attack, attack, attack. Obviously Salernitana, where left exposed a lot. You had Lovato with errors leading to goals. We had Fazio with errors leading to goals. We had penalties as well. Massive gaps in the defense. But Atalanta managed to exploit that.

And let me tell you what, it's very difficult to score eight goals in a game, even if you're playing fucking nine year olds, man. It's true, man. It takes a lot. These guys scored their first goals ever for Atalanta, who was Zortea, Boga and Ederson. Ederson, fun fact, scored his last Serie A goal for Salernitana against Atalanta. And now he's scored his first goal for Atalanta. Incredible. He's a little bit like Claudel and X now. So many romantic stories in Italy.

I do think that Bia, Bia my God, Bia is about to get a big money mover. Bia, even the fact that he had a decent World Cup, that'll put him on the radar for a lot of teams. I think, for example, the likes of Fiorentina wouldn't mind having him as a reserve for Jovic, for example. I don't even think Milan would mind picking him up at this point. Definitely, man. He's a very good player. He's a very good player and people shouldn't overlook him. They shouldn't overlook him.

So this brings Atalanta up to sixth place. They're level on points with Lazio and Inter. Keep in mind, Inter are in fourth, Lazio in fifth. And they're only three points behind Juventus and four points behind Milan. So still time to turn things around for Atalanta. This was a start and that brings their goal difference up to a positive 14. On the other hand, Salernitana in 16th on 18 points level with Spezia and two clear of Sassuolo.

Speaking of Sassuolo, the next game we're going to be covering is Sassuolo, Nil Lazio 2. Sassuolo lined up with their 4-2-3-1 formation with Pagolo in goal to replace the injured Consigli, Rogerio on the left, Tholian on the right with Erlic and Rouan at the back, Obiang and Frattesi as the double pivot with Lauriente on the left, Berardi on the right and Traore playing behind Alvarez who replaced the injured Pinamonti.

Providel was in goal for Lazio as they played their 4-3-3 formation, Hisaio on the right, Kcassale and Romagnoli at the back with Marosic on the left, Cataldi was the regista with Luis Alberto and Milinkovic alongside him. Anderson was on the right, Zaccani on the left and Immobile up front who got injured I believe 30 minutes in, something like that. Yeah 15 minutes in, Immobile was injured and will miss the Milan game.

So yes it was 15 minutes in where Immobile was replaced by Pedro, he was clutching his hamstring which has already caused him to miss four games this season. I'm sure all those Fanta, L'Anatole who took Immobile are freaking out right now. There's someone I think the Milan group chat mentioned, it's someone that spent 660 credits to get Immobile out of 1000. It's crazy man.

In the 46th minute Zaccani scored from the spot after VAR spotted the most obvious handball ever in history by Trollian who reached his arms out like a newborn frothing for some fresh meat. I'm gonna give some context. So I write the goal descriptions right? Jake does the stats and sometimes I like tossing something in to throw Jake off. And this is what he wrote, I'm gonna read it again from the get go.

So in the 46th minute Zaccani scored from the spot after VAR spotted the most obvious handball ever in history by Trollian who reached his arms out like a newborn frothing for some fresh milky from Mami Boomi. It's so true bro he's reaching out like a toddler. What an idiot. I hate covering such swallows this season. I can't stand them this year.

It's the same thing, what else am I meant to say apart from, ah so Swallow played a decent game, they played this Lazio's level especially in the first half but two individual errors one from Ruan and one from Trollian cost them the game. It's just that every game but with different names. Exactly. Fucking hell man. And if it's not them it's Ferrari. Ferrari with two mistakes in two matches as well. Algeria gets his fair share as well, you know what I mean come on dude.

But anyway in the 93rd minute Philipp Anderson scored what confirmed the game. Ruan was very slow to clear an oncoming ball which was snatched by Philipp Anderson who finished rounding Pagolo. Exactly, Ponsili obviously out injured. Yes exactly I don't know if he could have done much about that. Philipp Anderson is the best shit player I've ever seen. He's a really good shit player. Now these are two teams, Sasuolo and Lazio guys who have not had a good start to the year.

You look at Lazio for example they lost to Lecce after leading 1-0. They drew to Ample after leading 2-0 late on. Sarri was furious, he underlined the squad's mental drops in matches as something that he wanted to see resolved. You look at Sasuolo, they had 2-2-1 losses, one to Sampdoria, shouldn't have happened, one to Fiorentina, fair enough. But now they have another 2-0 loss, well 2-0 loss this time even worse to Lazio.

I was interested to see what Dionisi had to say about the team and he said this basically. We didn't experience what we were experiencing this year last year. We even complicated our lives on our own. Everything depends on the home game against Sampdoria. We have to bring out more personalities, not find excuses and assume responsibility. The kids aren't scared and they have to continue not to be.

He was also asked about the decision to take out Loriente who was one of the most dangerous players and he said that he only took him out because there's a player who's just as capable in Sadie, I believe that's how it's pronounced. But things did not go well for him again. So he's addressing the poor fortune, he's saying that we have to assume responsibility, you know he's doing well. I think he's a man walking on a thin thread right now, Dionisi.

I think the results need to come as soon as next week and that's the only way he'll keep his job because right now they're just free falling. It does seem like he's the next manager out which is a shame because we all had high hopes for him at Sassuolo. I still like him as a manager. I think he's a bit cursed with the squad he has in front of him and just the system in which Sassuolo has run that Mintov highlighted, that you highlighted, so on so forth. It's a very, very tough team to manage.

It was masked by a bunch of stars that managed to get everything ticking but yeah it's not looking good for Sassuolo at all. They have to start investing the money more intelligently, more maturely, they have to sort out that defense, they have to sort out well, the concentration as well. They need professionals, they need professionals, it's as simple as that. It's true, I mean you look at the statistics and even just watch the first half, Sassuolo played to Lazio's level, it is true.

In the first half, yes. In the first half, yes. It's just the mistakes man, the first half, yes. It's true, the second half they were worse. But yeah, we might as well conclude this one. I mean I don't have anything else to add. Sassuolo have fallen to 17th with 16 points while Lazio are in 5th with 34 points. Yes sir, the next game we're going to be covering is Odinese 1-Bologna 2. Stylistically this was one of the matches I was looking forward to the most man I would say.

So Odinese lined up in their 3-5-2 formation, Silvestri in goal, Neuen peres, Bijole and Bacau at the back, Odoggi out on the left, Pereira out on the right, Mackengo, Wallace and Lovric in the midfield with Sakses and Beato up front. Every single player there wins their 1v1 in physicality. It's true. This is a tank of a team, he just went all out strength for this one. Yeah, 100%. It feels like when Odinese aren't performing too well we just say how strong they are.

That's the thing though, I mean you look at the way it's true, they were playing before, they were popping in some hard Zildjian De Olefeo of course. De Olefeo was meant to start this game but apparently he's rumoured to be going to Aston Villa. So I think they just took a physical approach to this game, they're like we'll win on the pitch with our biceps. Bologna are quite a physical team as well, maybe not in their stature but in their play style I would say.

They lined up in a 4-3-3 formation, Arnautovic was still out over there, they started with Skorupski in goal, Posz and Likojans has the two full backs with Samoura and Lukumi as the two centre backs, it was Ferguson shouting and Morrow in midfield with Orsolini out on the right, Abesheur out on the left and Sansone up front. So in the 9th minute Beato opened, the scoring was an early low cross by success, that was the first time on the half volley by Beato into the top corner.

In the 14th minute Beato slid in and finished after a square ball by Bacow but Bacow was off by the slightest of margins and was called by VAR, it was very very tight. The player in fact, the defender that was marking Bacow had his arm around him but since the arm doesn't count and the shoulder counts, he was offside for that reason but technically his arm was keeping him onside but obviously the arm needs to be chopped out in that scenario.

It was literally a millimetre, one of the closest calls I've seen in Serie A. Harsh. Very harsh. But fair. 46th minute, again, consistency you know, and it's okay if they're all harsh as long as it's consistent. Exactly. 46th minute still in the first half, it was a brilliant team goal for Bologna which was cancelled after a VAR check due to Sansone, the finisher, being caught offside. So two goals cancelled in the first half.

In the 58th minute, I don't know if you guys can hear but my dog is behind me snoring, probably won't hear him because we edited this podcast. So every time we talk about our dog, we're like, dude we can't hear anything. But I hope you guys don't is the point. 58th minute, Sansone scored a legitimate goal this time after he controlled the ball with his back towards goal and struck the ball on the turn and on the bounce on the half volley and into the bottom corner.

It was a brilliant, brilliant goal by Sansone over there. 88th minute, Posch scored, shout and flicked on a corner to the oncoming Posch who headed in with no problem whatsoever. In the 83rd minute, I felt the need to highlight this success missed an open goal after a deflected shot put him in a great position with Skorupski grounded. What a miss by Isaac's success who could have given Odinese a very, very well needed point over there. But he didn't.

It was a brave performance by Bologna who played in a historically difficult stadium for them. Odinese were unbeaten in nine of their last 10 Serie A meetings against Bologna. They won four and drew five with their own defeat coming back in September 2018, which was a 2-1 defeat at the Dallara. Yeah. Again, they would have sealed the game with Odinese if they got that second goal. They were unlucky and Bologna grew into the game.

Yeah. They grew into the game and I think that Bologna fans right now can be ecstatic. They should be ecstatic and they clearly are. A brave, courageous display. Yet another one. Their ambitions right now, let's say coming into the season, Bologna aimed for a 10th place finish. At a point they were like, there's no way we'd be lucky to survive relegation, they were saying. Exactly. It's looking likely again that they'd be on the left side of the standings.

Yeah. They were just one point behind Fiorentina who are in 10th, you know what I mean? And one point behind Torino who are in 9th and just three points behind Odinese who are in 8th. Bologna really managed to turn things around. We're seeing a bit of a similar situation to how Verona were last season. They started off terribly with a certain manager, they made one change and then suddenly they're shooting for a top 10 over there. They're a very, very good side.

This Bologna team, they're better than Odinese at the moment. It's as simple as that. I think so, yes. They put in a better performance, it was quite tight but they got it done. So if you're wondering by the way what my co-host Matthew looks like, he looks like Sansone. That's the vibe, that's the aesthetic. You think? Yeah man. I'm gonna need to Google Sansone. I know what he looks like but I just have to see him in front of me. This is the mustache and the hair, bro. Let's have a look.

Alright, so I got a photo of him from what seems to be 2007. I guess... That's the vibe now. I guess, the hair is a bit different. Yeah, the hair is a bit different but that's the vibe, no? I guess, I'll take that. Yeah, and then I look like either Saponar or Amrabat. Or Amrabat, one of them. Or both basically. Yeah, their love child. But yeah, Odinese, Bologna. The stats were very even.

You know, we had 51% ball possession to Odinese, 20 goal attempts for Odinese, 15 for Bologna and 4 shots on goal for Odinese. And 2 for Bologna and they both went in. Power to Bologna. I hope they keep climbing, man. Yep, Bologna are in fact in 11th place like I mentioned earlier. One second because I lost the table. Yep, they're in 11th place on 22 points level on points with Empoli and 1 clear of Monza. While Sudinese are in 8th place on 25 points, just 2 ahead of Torino and Fiorentina.

I just want to highlight quickly, just the point I want to make, that second goal by Bologna is a perfect example on how to get a set piece working against a team that is much bigger and stronger than you. 100%. Fantastic low block. Play it to the near post, flick onto the back runner in behind, goal. And that was so smart by Bologna. Yes, there's this wonderful page that Bologna have that breaks down this play beautifully. What's the website called?

Bolognasportsnews.it. Bolognasportsnews.it, like Drake said you can translate the page and some really good insight on very particular plays over there. So look it up and enjoy it guys. Speaking of heroic performances, Torino nil, Spezia 1 is the next game we're going to be covering. Spezia the only team in the bottom 5 that can do that, man. Man oh man oh man dude, the Spezia team right now. I'm telling you they're winning me over bro. Are they? They're winning me over dude.

The likes of Agudelo, Ampadu, Jazi and Zola, these guys spit blood for their team. They don't stop man and this was a heroic performance again. Let's get into it. So Torino lined up with a 3-4-2-1 formation, the usual. The spear right? So they had Vanja Miljkovic-Savic in goal with Bonjorno, Schuurs and Gigi at the back, Voivoda on the left, Singo out on the right with Ricci and Lukic in the middle and Vlasic and Mirancuk playing off Sanabria.

Spezia played a 3-5-2 with Dragovski in goal, Amjank Aldar and Nicola with the back, with Holm and Reka out wide and Agudelo, Ampadu and Borabiya in the middle. Jazi and Zola played together up front. No way. In the 28th minute, Zola scored the penalty. Miljkovic-Savic got very close but couldn't stop and Zola's perfectly struck penalty to the right. It was awarded and the yellow card was brandished to Gigi after he blocked the strike with his hand. So similar to a Tolyan situation there.

Yeah but to be honest, it wasn't that clear. Gigi was clearly putting his arm towards his body but I think that rule doesn't matter anymore if your arm is going towards your body and it's still extended in an unnatural position it's still a handball. Exactly and initially it looked like it hit his tricep which was against his body but it actually went through his tricep and it hit a stray hand bro.

It hit a stray flopping hand essentially whereas there's no need to speak about the Tolyan one because his arms were extended outwards like an idiot. Mommy milky. Mommy milky. In the 66th minute, Gjazi almost made it too but his powerful shot from inside the air rattled across the board to the point that I thought they were going to need to replace the goal post. It rattled so aggressively. He shot that with all his might. He just once I go over the board.

And then the 93rd minute, Dragovski produced a great save after a header from Gigi. So again like Dragovski, heroic, everyone heroic dude over here. And that's what they've become, a team of heroes, a squadron of warriors, a pack of wolves. You heard that, that was Spezia. When you see Torino nil Spezia 1 you expect absolute shithousery no? Yes. But that's not how this game went. No. Not at all, not at all, not at all. Granted Spezia had 33% ball position.

But because they were picking their moments. Exactly, and it's because Torino are a side that dominates the game. Yeah, even against Milan. Yes. They have five shots on target man. Torino had four just to compare. They took more shots on target than Torino and their shots were of better quality as well in my opinion. They were fucking fighting man. They picked their moments and they played the ball around. They have these little patterns that they play. I really like Gotti in charge over here.

It's almost like Gotti's gone under the radar now. He has less pressure than he had on him at Udinese. He definitely has less pressure. He did get off to a slightly slow start. We saw Spezia really flirting with that bottom three over there, but they have a healthy gap now man. They do, they do. And they have decent options over there. João Moutinho can come on. Apparently Pato told João Moutinho to go to Italy. Okay, fair enough. He had a good split in Italy Pato.

Zurkowski came off the bench, Ekdal came off the bench. These are decent options. As for Spezia, I'm telling you, I have quite a unit at the moment. Someone we shouldn't bet against at the moment. That's true. Who is their next match against? That's something I would love to know. And I'm going to find out right this second. It only takes me a five, a four, a three, a two, a one. They're away against Atalanta and then after that they're home against Roma.

So these two games will be very telling for Spezia. They picked up points where they needed to pick them up. Two losses wouldn't even be that bad for them right now. Yeah, that's true. That's the importance of picking up points when you need to man. Exactly. Like probably right now a draw against Torino, they would have been like, all right, we'll take that. But they actually went on and won it.

Yeah. Yeah. Great win for Spezia, like I said, the only bottom five team that could go and beat Torino like that. They currently sit in 15th with 18 points, while Torino sit in ninth with 23 points. The next game we're going to be covering was a Serie A bear match last year. It was Cremonaese 2, Monza 3. So for Cremonaese, it was a 3-4-2-1 formation with Karinasecki in goal and a back line of Qualiata, Bianchetti and Ferrari.

They had Valeri out on the left and Guglione out on the right with Mete and Piccoli in the midfield. Okereke out on the left, Sajou out on the right and Dessers up front. Pardon me. For Monza, it was also a 3-4-2-1 formation, Di Gregorio on goal, a back line of Itzo, Amari and Kaldiralla, Birindelli out on the right and Carlos Augusto out on the left with Pessina and Maschin in the double pivot. Churia out on the right, Caprari out on the left with Petania, the king with his back towards goal.

Petania playing up front. He's a unit, eh, Petania? I'm telling you, he's the type of guy you'd want to spearhead the team of this caliber. You know, like who else would you rather have up front on a team that you've just been promoted to lead the line? Good point. He's got a lot of space, but he has way better players around him. Good point. He's got two mobile attacking players playing off him in Churia and Caprari who can do all the running for him.

He's got Birindelli and Augusto playing out wide who can cross the ball into him and Pessina and Maschin playing in the middle or Sensi who can also ping him a good ball. Exactly. I'm telling you right now, Monza look really nice. They look good. 100% and they were attacking so well in the first half. Let me get into it.

In the seventh minute, Churia opened the scoring, he tapped in after some brilliant one touch football in the opposition area, which ended in Petania squaring the ball to him as Churia finished into what was virtually an empty net. A few moments later in the 15th minute, there was a penalty and Caprari sent Karneseki the wrong way. The penalty was awarded after VAR caught a foul by Guglione on Itso, making it 2-0. In the 51st minute, Di Gregorio got the save of the season so far.

He dropped down to deny a great Piquel header. What a goalkeeper keeps on proving it. Time after time Di Gregorio is the real deal. In the 54th minute, Caprari scored his second of the match and Monza's third. It was another beautiful attack by Monza, fast, accurate and creative. The attack ended with Caprari finishing cleanly after Petania pulled the ball back for him to get his second assist of the match and Caprari's second goal of the match. Monza then made a couple of changes.

Cremonezza made a couple of changes. Monza were settling. Cremonezza wanted something out of the match. In the 67th minute, Cioffani pulled one back as he headed in after a Valeri cross. And the 82nd minute, Dessert scored after a very long ball over the top fell to him and he managed to squeeze it in on the half volley from a very tight angle. Brilliant first half by Monza. Even the beginning of the second half, it was the changes that slowed them down. But wow, a lot to be impressed by, man.

Definitely, bro. Monza, with the help of a few master strokes from the legendary sporting director Adriano Galliani, have risen from the tired, depleting testicles of Silvio Berlusconi. Up his dusty urethra and out an impressive volume, drenching Serie A with their dazzling play and cult hero type players. So essentially, Monza are an artificial cum shot. That's what they represent, man. They represent Berlusconi. Monza are old money, baby. Monza are old money. That's what I like about them.

Look at the squad they managed to build with that old money. Itso at the back, very underrated. He was even underrated. At Torino, he's a very versatile defender that gets involved going up front a lot. And you often see him straying out wide as well. Pessina in the midfield. Wow, what a player. Maschin goes totally under the radar. He wasn't even playing. He wasn't even playing. I'm happy he's playing now. He looks really good. He's so fucking good.

He's a seven for a reason, before they were in. Exactly. Carlos Augusto. And then there's no need to say anything about Caprari. He's a fucking star. And then Petania up front just to glue everything together. And they're still missing the likes of Rovella, for example. No, this team is amazing. Sensi. Sensi. And they're picking it up. They are where we expected them to be in our earlier prediction of the league table. I think I had them in 11th or 12th. Haha, Matt is so stupid. 13th. 13th.

One point behind Bologna and Empoli. Two points behind Fiorentina and Torino. They're good. They look good. But it has to be said that their substitutions really weakened them this game. And they almost allowed Cremona to equalise. Towards the end there, it was a massive de Gregorio save that actually kept them in it. So yeah, they were flirting a little bit with an upset over there. They have those injuries, so they don't have a lot of depth in their squad at the minute.

Imagine they brought on Rovella, for example. It's true, they do have injuries, but they have a capably deep squad. They're capable again. Their offensive manoeuvres, as we highlighted, are so varied. They can cross out wide, they can play it cleanly through the middle, like they can try to flick it off of Petania, long ball from the back. They're a very good side. And I'm surprised with the manager, Palladino. He's really done well as the caretaker manager.

That's what he was initially after the sacking of Strappa. Exactly. I think he has a good future ahead of him, man. He does. That guy. Definitely. He does. So yeah, great to see here. I'm going to highlight Di Gregorio one more time, because genuinely it was the save of the season so far. You know the one I'm referring to. I know the one. He dropped down. No really. Bro. Like, you know they say the greatest save was Gordon Banks on Pele. I believe. Okay, that was obviously better.

I don't want to sound like a sensation list, but it was similar. It was that kind of save, guys. You should look it up. What a fucking save by Di Gregorio. Bonzo? Yes, Cremones are still struggling over here. They always fucking put in a shift, but they never managed to get away with anything. One of the two teams in Europe's top five without a victory, Cremones. And they play much better than the other team. The other team, I can't even pronounce the name, is Elche, La Liga. Elche.

Elche. But they're terrible in La Liga. They're a horrible team. I remember Elche a couple of years ago, they're obviously a much different team now. Like they're shit this year apparently, but Cremones, it's surprising because they play some good football, the poor guys, quality football. They do, man. Right now we're watching them drawing away against Napoli. Just so you guys know. Yeah, they're giving them two extra times at the Coppa Italia.

But Cremones are lost with seven points, still winless, while Monza are 13th with 21 points. Yes sir, Europe. The last game we're going to be covering is Empoli 1-Sampdoria nil. Empoli lined up with a 4-3-1-2 formation with Vicario on goal, Parisi, Loperto, Ismaelie and Ebuwehi at the back, Bandinelli, Mardin and Akpro as the midfield three with Baldanzi, Caputo and Satriano.

Sampdoria played their 3-4-1-2 formation without their own goal, Nuiting, Camione and Colli at the back with Leris on the right, Augel on the left, Juricic and Viera in the middle with Viera in the pocket and Lammeres and Gabiardini up front. Now in the 55th minute Mardin's corner found Ebuwehi at the near post who towered over a sea of shirts and headed the ball into the back of the net, without their own coming out to collect it rather, hopefully, perhaps a little bit recklessly.

It was very crowded, there was no way he was getting to that. So it's the 100th minute of the game. Sampdoria sit the 19th with 9 points. They're playing against Tempoli, right? They're losing 1-0. Audero's up, everyone's up. They have bodies in the box, they need to equalise. Cross comes in, whatever confusion, Audero manages to contribute somehow. He fucking chipped it into the part of the striker. And then Colli gets a goal.

Scenes, everyone freaking out, celebrating, they manage to get a crucial point in the relegation, escape. That's it, that's all you hear. Then all of a sudden drama, you know when the camera pans to the referee and everyone's like staring and looking around, people are trying to talk to him but his fingers are on his ear so you can tell he's not listening to anyone. He goes to the bar board, the monitor, and he's taking a look, the very calm is back and he cancels the goal.

Apparently, not apparently, now we know why, to the referee's logic. Gabi Addimi handled the ball in the box but it was while he was being fouled from the back by Luperto. So in reality, according to a professional ex-referee, I forgot who it was, but he was speaking on Sky and he said that if anything you go to the bar board, you see okay, the hand interfered with play of your team, granted you can't allow the goal but you give a penalty because he was fouled.

But that wasn't the case at all and Stankovic charged onto the pitch with his arms wide open, we're playing for our lives. Saying that to the referee, you don't blame him, you don't blame the guy. And apparently the fighting and the brawling continued in the tunnel and one of Sampdoria's coaching staff was sent off and all that was massive drama towards the end of the game. I'm upset for Sampdoria, I do like Empoli but I am upset for Sampdoria.

So obviously because of the situation, getting an equaliser in the 100th minute, all the emotions are going to be high, just like when Juve conceded against Real Madrid from a penalty and Buffon told the referee that he has a trash can for a heart for example. But the same thing essentially happened here when both calls were correct in my opinion. So the referee clearly did not deem the challenge by Luperto on Gabbiadini as a foul, because had it been a foul, he would have given the penalty.

Because then there was the handball, so advantage is over, so it's a penalty. Obviously since he didn't deem it a foul, then it's just a handball. And it's obviously harsh because Gabbiadini definitely didn't go to ground for nothing. But was it enough to be a penalty? I thought it was bro. His backwards towards goal who was on the edge of the area, there were a bunch of bodies behind him inside of the area that basically didn't put Gabbiadini in a goal scoring position.

I feel like Luperto was closer to the ball than Gabbiadini. Gabbiadini stretched his leg out to get to the ball, which caused him to collide with Luperto. I don't feel like Luperto did anything wrong in that situation to bring him down. The man before the ball? But I don't think the ball was Gabbiadini's to take. I feel like Gabbiadini put himself in a situation where you know how it is, you stretch your leg out and you purposely get caught.

That's the why street smart strikers way of getting a penalty. It's cheap perhaps, but it's fair. You got clipped and you got a penalty. Now to be completely fair, the camera angles that I saw were in portrait with the front of Gabbiadini and the front of Luperto. So I didn't see any clips going on. I just saw two men colliding and Gabbiadini already being slightly off balance. So that's why I don't think that it was a foul.

Now if there was a clip, if there was a trip, so on so forth, then in that case perhaps then yes it should have been a penalty, but I didn't see that. We'll go and look at it more, we'll post it on our stories as well. The Dazen guy, the guy on Dazen, not Sky by the way, so I got two things wrong. I didn't know the referee's name and I said he was on Sky, he was on Dazen. It was Luca Marelli by the way. Luca Madonna. Luca Allal Madonna.

Luca Madoffi. He said Samp's goal should have been disallowed, but they deserve the penalty kick anyway. Interesting. Ebuehie got his first Serie A goal. I like Ebuehie a lot. He was one of Venezia's men when they were in Serie A. Venezia could be going down to Serie A too, so we really were lucky to see them in Serie A. Definitely man, definitely. They could have all the nice kids in the world, but unfortunately they are significantly struggling and they still do have one of the better teams.

They have good investors, they have American owners, so I don't know how the hell they're doing so badly. But yes, this was a cagey, cagey, cagey game guys. It was 50-50 ball possession, 16 shots each, like 5 shots on target for Empoli, 7 for Sampdoria. I really think Sampdoria deserved something from this game. 100% and even coming into this game I did think that Sampdoria were going to get something out of it. I didn't know if it was going to be 3 points.

I thought they'd be very motivated and that their goal would have been 3 points. They've looked a much improved side, man. They look really good and they'll be disappointed to take nothing out of a game against Empoli. But Empoli once again held their own and they managed to get away with 3 points. A bit of a miracle at the end obviously as we discussed, but massive kudos to Empoli and Sampdoria's story isn't over yet this season. They're going to fight as much as they can for survival, man.

Yep, so that's it guys. That's it from us. Thank you very much for listening. One second, because one thing we didn't really address that we only addressed in the intro after the Cremones M1 ZAMACH. Zapata to Everton, because that might happen. That's interesting. But no, Alvini was sacked. Ah, fuck yes, you're right. We forgot to talk about that. Alvini was sacked and perhaps yes, you know, you hate to see it, but fair, you know. That's a fair one.

When you look at Davide and Nicola, that's not a fair one. Like they still haven't won a game. It is what it is. They haven't won a single game yet. And now he's been replaced, no? He has been replaced and it was Ballardini, the relegation expert who has come in to take his place, the coolest man in the league. You see these guys always with his beanie, with his glasses on. He's a really cool old dude. He tends to take a very pragmatic approach in his football and his style of play.

Yeah, he's the military man. What do you mean the military man? Didn't he line them up like, no, that was... Who the hell was that? I think Mazzarri. Mazzarri, Mazzarri. He has them jog like back and forth, like in files and he stands there like a sergeant or something. But yeah, so we have Ballardini back, coolest guy in the league. He definitely won't be there for more than a year. No. Caretaker manager. But we'll see. We'll see what he manages to do with Cremona.

So currently he has them, as you mentioned, going to extra time against Napoli in the Coppa Italia. Exactly. One other thing we have to say is obviously where Empoli and Sampdoria stand in the table and it's actually Sampdoria. I tried to win this way too quickly. You just really want to watch Love Island, man. No, I want to watch the rest of this game. Matthew's like, dude, let's try finish recording before 10 o'clock so we can watch Love Island. I'm like, what the fuck are you talking about?

There's Napoli-Cremona. Day one and the thrill is like Empoli-Sampdoria in the 100th minute. I mean, who is it? That guy that has three girls after whatever. This isn't a fucking Love Island podcast. We'll start one. OK, Sampdoria are in 19th on nine points level with Verona. Guys, these guys, as much as we still want to see them in Serie A and we have high hopes that we will next year, they are far behind Sassuolo. They're far behind safety. Still seven points for them to gain.

Thankfully for them, there's about 33 points to be played for. So Sampdoria 19th on nine points level with Verona, whilst Empoli are in 12th place on 22 points level with Bologna and just one behind Fiorentina and Torino. Guys, it's been a pleasure as always. Do make sure to give us a follow on Instagram, TikTok and Twitter to stay up to date and also check out our fun little snippets. Give us a rating wherever you're listening. We love you all. Thank you so much for listening to us.

As always, we've been Serie A Spotlight. We'll see you guys next week.