Welcome in for another edition of the Morning Espresso here on the SDAH Network, brought to you by Oglethorpe University, Atlanta's premier undergraduate learning experience and soccer powerhouse. I'm Jason Longshore and this is our morning kind of start to the day to get you started on all the news you need to know about what's going on honestly worldwide.
As we're getting ready for a Club World Cup, as we're getting ready for the final round of matches in the Premier League in Saraa, in quite a few other competitions going on around the world. So if you check in with us on the Morning Espresso, it is your opportunity to just basically get caught up and start your day with all that knowledge you need to know around the water cooler. If you still do that, all right,
let's start with sarih Ah. The final weekend starts today and it's the two teams that are at the top of the table, Napoli an Inter and Napoli comes in with a one point lead. You could have a playoff between these two. That's why this game was moved up to Friday between both of them. Napoli is hosting Kaaliari and Como is hosting Inter, so remember one point advantage for Napoli when you go into these and obviously, as
I'm wearing a Napoli shirt, I'm a little biased. I have a Diego Maradona poster on my wall, so it's not really a shock who I'm pulling for in this. If Napoli wins, they win the title flat out. They have won nine of their last twelve league meetings at home Khaliari fourteenth place. They've got nothing to play for.
They are safe, they're not going to get relegated. They're just happy to be there and maybe they're not happy to be there because there were fireworks and all kinds of chaos going on outside their hotel room in Naples last night, so they might not be happy at the moment. Como an Inter interer or one point back, have won their last eight league matches against Como two zero win in the reverse fixture in Milan in this after posting
eight consecutive away wins with seven clean sheets. Inter since then have won just two of their last eight on the road. Questions too, because they have the Champions League final next week, they have injuries, they're battling too. Simonian Zagi is expected to name a rotated side for this
one just out of necessity. Altaro Martinez David Fratees they are expected to be back in the squad for this Doubts about Benjamin Pavard and Peter Zielinski according to the latest updates, and people aren't really sure how Inzagie is going to go with this. Is it going to be a super rotated squad just looking ahead to Champions League final next week? Is it going to be the best team that you can put together? Is it going to be maybe saving a few guys to come in off
the bench if needed. Napoli with the one point advantage. Those games kickoff later this afternoon on Saturday. Women's Champions League Final Barcelona and Arsenal. Barcelona trying to win their third straight their fourth in five years they have dominated the women's game in Europe. It's the fifth time these teams have met in the competition. Arsenal won both legs of around to thirty two. You're going back to twenty thirteen. In that one, Barcelona won both group stage matches. In
the twenty one to twenty two campaign. Barcelona have won their last nine Champions League matches. Arsenal do have a good record against the Spanish teams. They've progressed from all four knockout stage setups against such teams from Spain. OPTA gives Barcelona and just over fifty six percent chance of winning this inside of ninety minutes, they're the better team.
Arsenal would be pretty big underdog here. The cool story on the Arsenal side is last time Arsenal won the Champions League, Leo Williamson was one of the escorts, the young players you walk players out to the field. Now she gets a chance to win it herself. It would be a big surprise if they're able to knock off Barcelona, but should be a great match on Saturday in the UEFA Champions League Women's Final. Let's go to Sunday Final day in the Premier League, big event at the Battery.
I'm going to be there as part of it. Premier League NBC Sports hosting a watch party for Championship Sunday. It's going to start outside of Truest Park at ten am. Games kickoff at eleven. All ten matches you'll be able to watch them in one spot. If you're watching from home, and you can't make it out to the battery. You can watch on NBC Peacock, USA Networks, the NBC Sci Fi. This is kind of the kickoff to the Premier League coming back here to Atlanta at Mercedes Benz Stadium, final
leg of the twenty twenty five Summer Series. Bournemouth will play west Ham, Manchester United will play Everton. The storylines really it's down to the final three Champions League spots. Liverpool have theirs, Arsenal have theirs. Three four and five. Remember, the Premier League gets a fifth spot because of performance in European competitions this year. Three four and five are undecided.
There's five teams fighting for three spots. Chelsea manager Inzo Maresca, he was asked about does his team feel any extra pressure because they have this They also have the UAFA Conference League Final next week against ral Betty's. He says no, he's trying to figure out what his squad's going to look like. He's gonna field the best squat available. It sounds like for both of those games. I don't think he's going to rotate in league to wait for the
Conference League final. I think he's going to go forward in both and just make the decision on who's ready to go on that day. He said, we're quite lucky in this aspect. If we win, we do our job. We don't need to pay attention to the other results. Chelsea are visiting seventh place Nottingham Forced, who have to win to have any chance of getting back into a Champions League spot. They were there not that long ago. That's gonna be the game that I think most of
us will really be watching closely. Another one is Newcastle. They're facing Everton. Alexander Esak is making good progress. He's at a growin injury. He could be available on Sunday. I guess would probably be off the bench if he's needed as Newcastle faces Everton. After you come to the Battery and you hang out and you watch them Premier League, then you're gonna make your way down towards the Bends and you're gonna join us for a tailgate to celebrate
International Football Day. It's gonna be at Centennial Yards on the Steel Bridge. Myself, Madison Cruz, were hosting a show on the SDH network from four to five o'clock. We're gonna have our friends from the Georgia Impact who kicked off their season in the WPSL last night with their scrimmage, their intrasquad scrimmage. Good time up in woods are up in Canton for that one. Gonna be very cool to hang out with you guys on the Steel Ridge. Come
see us from four to five. Young soccer players will get the opportunity to take part in some little clinics and activities with Georgia. Impact is going to be a very cool vibe, something you're going to see more and more of over the next year and a half or so at Centennial Yards. We'll see you from four to
five on Sunday. Then we'll make our way into the Bend Sunday Night Soccer FC Cincinnati and Atlanta United kickoff will be at seven to ten Pregame coverage on ninety two nine in the game will start at six o'clock. Maddie and Abe Gordon will get you started. Mike Continent and I will take over. Garth Loggerway will join us at about six point thirty. You can listen on the Honyessey app. You can listen on ninety two nine the game, and you can listen on Apple TV mL Sason Pass.
Once the game starts. Choose home team radio there. Training ground dispatch will come out later this afternoon. We'll all be at training in Marietta later today. We'll see what Ronnie Diaila has to say, We'll see what players have to say, and we'll get you updated on everything that we're seeing in training this week. Pounce around the other bits of news around the league. Oh one more on to add to your calendar, because it's a very busy calendar at the moment. On Monday at ten am, myself
Knox Bardein of ninety two nine in the game. I think some others of the SDH network are going to make their way up to No Faux Brewing in coming. No Faux Brewing is a sponsor of Walsall and Walsall is in a promotion final to get into the third tier to get into League One next year. In England. They're facing AFC Wimbledon, so John Nelson is not allowed to come. As a shareholder of AFC Wimbledon, he's not allowed to come. This is a Walsaw viewing party at
No Faux Brewing on Monday morning at ten o'clock. If you're looking for something to do to start your Monday, Come join us, have a beer. It'll be a good time. Walsall and AFC Wimbledon, and we'll be getting a lot of content around no faux brewings partnership with Walsall. You might be wondering why a brewery based in Coming, Georgia is a sponsor with Walsall. Well, you're gonna find out when we talk about it on Monday. All right, US men's national team. That was a big talking point yesterday.
Christian Polistic not going to be part of the squad. A lot of people have a lot of takes. A lot of people might have missed that. ESPN reported that Polisic has been dealing with a chronic hip flexer injury. Yeah, I say that three times fast. Everybody went nuts about it. If he's injured, he doesn't need to be there. In my opinion, you know who he is at this point, you know what he means to the team, We know what the Gold Cup means, and you want to go
win this thing. But if he's injured or risking further injury, you need him a whole lot more next year than you need him this year. And you can't guarantee that Milan gives him an easy ride into the Areas season next year, because Milan's got a lot of pressure on them.
I think it's the right decision for everybody involved. I know it's not a popular one, and I get that, but we can't do the thing where on one side we complain about too many games for players and guys got to get a rest, and then when somebody asks for a rest and everybody sits down and says, you know what, that's probably the best thing to do right here because you can't rest next summer. Cool, let's do it now. We can't blow up. Then we can't do both.
I think Christian Polisic sounds like, especially if he's dealing with a hip flexer, he needs the break take it. I'd rather lose the Gold Cup and make a deeper run in the World Cup as a result. I would. I'm sorry, sorry, conquer Calf. Sorry, I know hot take artists. There's just nothing else you can do. If it's for some other reason, different conversation. If it's for an injury situation, especially something chronic, I think you have to do it here.
Time will tell if it ends up being the right play. Hopefully this will help him have a good season with Milan next year and come into the World Cup flying. Next year's going to be the key. That's the most important thing. None of the rest of it honestly matters if he comes in and has a great World Cup. Thursday, you got the release of the twenty seven player camp roster. A maximum of twenty six players will go to the Gold Cup. Pochettino said that, and I agree with this quote.
He said, many people can say it's really important for us to be all together for the last time before the World Cup, and J. T. Batson told me that before the Atlanta United media game. The whole conversation is available on the Off the Woodwork podcast at nineteen ninety game. Pochettino said about Polisic, we decided the best for him, the best for the team, the best for the national
team is the decision that we made. Sometimes we give too much importance knowing to be together, and sometimes the group maybe sometimes doesn't work in this way or building this way. I think you would have liked to have had everybody together. I think that would have been the ultimate goal, is to have an extended period of time with this group. This summer, circumstances didn't allow you to do that, so you have to pivot and you have to move on. You're not gonna have yunus Musa. Pochattino
described it as personal reasons. It sounds like as late as Monday he was still part of the squad. Anthony Robinson tendon injury. He hasn't been training consistently with Fulham, Pochattino said. The situation is it's still not clear. It's another one. You don't need to push it. Five World Cup starters plus Gio Orna not at the Gold Cup. No Joe Scally, no Cameron Carter Vickers, no Tanner Testaman,
no Josh Sargent all football decisions. According to Pochettino, nine out of twenty two outfield players from the Nations the league team picked for the Gold Cup. A lot of turnover, a lot of opportunity, Diego Luna, Jack McGlenn, Max Arston, Patrick Ogimon, Brian White all seem to be Maricio pochactino favorites.
They're back from the Nation's league. He gets Serginio dest And a full airon Balligan, first time that Pochettino gets them, Malik Tillman, Brendan Aarons, Luca del dore Hadji Wright all coming back uncapped, Alex Freeman, Sebastian Burhalter, Quinn Sullivan, Damien Downs, Burhalter and Freeman really more recent emergencies on the national team Radar. Burhlter has been amazing with the Vancouver white Caps in the run that they've had to start the season.
Deserves the call. Freeman deserves the call. If you haven't seen him play with Orlando, Well, you're gonna get a chance on Wednesday against Atlanta United. A right back who can rampage forward, comfortable cutting inside, can stay wide and put in crosses, can defend, big body, good in the air, all kinds of things that you want out of a defender. Alex Freeman gives you that. Does he need experience at this level? Yeah he does. He does. This is where you get it, and it might be at the Gold Cup.
We need to come around to the fact that Marizio po Chattino knows what he's doing, probably far better than a lot of us sitting on the sidelines. He knows the kind of players that he wants and he is absolutely unafraid to call them up for Major League soccer if he feels like they're the best option, big opportunity for these players now, and that's what it comes down to. Is the doors open. Take it. We'll see what this
looks like for the Gold Cup. I'm actually really excited about the Gold Cup this year because of these changes. I'm maybe more excited about the Gold Cup than I was going into it. Other news around the world, Casey current defender Alana Cook torn acl and mcl and meniscus that happened in the Casey Orlando Pride match. She's on the season ending injury list. Came to Kansas City middle of last season. Helped make Kansas City one of the best defensive teams in the NWSL. Ten clean sheets in
the nineteen games she's played. That's ridiculous. It's going to be out for the US women's national team for a while as well. She has thirty caps there. French national team coach Laurent Bonadet has dropped Wendy Renard, Eugenie Le Sommer and Kenza Dali Nations League matches against Switzerland and Iceland four hundred and forty four caps between those three. Their playing time has declined and it might be the
end of their international careers at this stage. According to Faprizzio Romano, Manchester United former manager Eric Tennagg has agreed to take over at Bayer Leverkusen. Final decision rests with Leverkusen. They had talked with a few other folks. Ten Hogg is excited about this opportunity. It sounds like he had an option to go back to Ias, going to Leverickusen instead if they sign off on it. Club World Cup updates. Luka Modrich he is gonna leave Real Madrid after the
Club World Cup this summer. Almost six hundred games for Real Madrid since joining in twenty twelve. Be curious to see where he goes next. He's thirty nine. He might still have some time left in those legs. He might not. We'll just have to wait and see what that looks like for Luca Madrich. But he's going to say audios to Real Madrid after the Club World Cup. Raoul who you might have forgotten, was the manager with the reserves for Real Madrid and he's been there for a minute.
He's set to leave the club as well at the end of the summer. He's been there since twenty nineteen. He's been linked with a few other jobs over the years. He's actually been linked with a return to Germany at various stages. Forty seven years old. I think he's ready for first team management and we'll see where Raoul pops up. CONCACAFF they have appointed Brazilian referee Wilton Sampeile to oversee the LAFC Clube America play in match for the Club
World Cup. Forty three years old. He's one of South America's most experienced trusted referees. He did referee at the last World Cup in Qatar, a lot of high profile games, got a lot of praise for his performances as well. Always interesting when you see referees from different confederations go somewhere else to referee, or you see a referee from a different confederation referee teams from other parts of the world in a World Cup situation, sometimes styles can clash
a little bit. We'll be curious to see how this one goes. That's a huge match next weekend. LAFC and Kloop America. Manchester United, we know they're not going to be in Europe next year. We know they are broke, broke, broke, just like Rene Zellweger said Jerry Maguire. We know they got to figure out the money situation. Al Hilal has put a large offer in front of them for Bruno for Anauje. Sounds like Manchester United is gonna say no. According to give Me sport, Al Hilal want to bring
him in ahead of the Club World Cup. They're trying to load up for the tournament. Doesn't sound like they're gonna get Bruno unless that money continues to rise and they present an offer to Manchester United that they cannot refuse. Considering they lost almost one hundred and fifteen hundred and twenty million dollars last year and they just lost another one hundred and fifteen hundred and twenty million in not qualifying for Champions League, there could be a number that
they can't refuse. Be very curious to see what that is. Last night in Liga MX in the Klausura Final first leg, Club America, who will be playing lafc Here very soon, scoreless draw in Mexico City against Teluca. Second leg is on Sunday at the Estadio Nemesio Diez, one of the best stadiums in the world, by the way, very difficult place to play. Te Luca will host it. Los Aguls are trying to come into that Club World Cup play
and match with four straight LEGA MX titles. It's been a long time since you've had a team dominate Mexico the way that Club America have as of late. Can he come into Club World Cup at least the play in game with momentum. We'll find out on Sunday. Can Mamalodi's Sundowns come into the Club World Cup with even more momentum? They begin their quest for the African Champions League trophy on Saturday. They host Pyramids FC in the
first leg in South Africa. Next week the second leg on Saturday will be in Cairo, Pyramids FC first time for them. At this stage of the competition, Mamalodi Sundowns they have won another South African League title. They clinched that last week. Last one on the board. Patchuka will go back to Mexico. Guillermo Almada he is the manager of Pachuca, but on Thursday he submitted his resignation, three weeks ahead of the Club World Cup. However, Pachuca has
yet to accept the resignation. Gets complicated. Pachuca said that the Uruguayan coach is under contract until twenty twenty six. If he's going somewhere else, either he or the club that he's going to has to pay a buyout clause for early termination. Quote. Guillermo has an existing contract with this institution until December of twenty twenty six. This contract establishes a possible early termination of his professional relationship with our team at the time the agreed buyout clause is paid.
Why does that part matter? Well, according to ESPN Mexico, kruz Asul wants Almada to be their next manager, So Pachuca wants either Almada or cruz Asoul to cut a check. We will see. If Patchuka was to accept the resignation, then there would be no need to pay any clauses, and that's not gonna happen right now. In Alamada's place, Gabrielle Caballero is slated to be the interim for Pachuca in the Club World Cup. They're gonna face Red Bull Salzburg, Al Hilal and but Real Madrid. Not an easy run
for Pachuca. Interesting one, though. Those matches with Al Hilal and Red Bull Salzburg could be very, very entertaining. All right, Look, that's gonna do it for me. On the morning Espresso SDHAM starts at nine toh five this morning, bouncing all around the world. John Nelson will take you through it. We'll have the Friday Free Kick with Beyond Goals mentoring. Either Michael Parkhurst or Greg Garza will be joining in.
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it is. All you got to do is sign up. It's ten dollars per year and you will get those discounts wherever you might be with your virtual discount card on the chant app. Thank you for watching, for listening, for viewing, for following, for subscribing, thank you for supporting the SDCH network and John Nelson. We'll be back with you in about twenty minutes. For sdh AN Audios, everybody