'Enzo Maresca should lock Pedro Neto in a room and feed him nothing but water and dog biscuits!'
36:23 Share

Seriously popular.

This episode is brought to you by LifeLock. The holidays mean more travel, more shopping, more time online, and more personal info in places that could expose you to identity theft. That's why LifeLock monitors millions of data points every second. If your identity is stolen, their U.S.-based restoration specialist will fix it, guaranteed, or your money back. Get more holiday fun and less holiday worry with LifeLock. Save up to 40% your first year. Visit LifeLock.com slash podcast. Terms apply.

Hello, this is your It's All Kicking Off Christmas Special Part 2. We are in that strange period in between Christmas and New Year. Nothing to do, nowhere to go.

and unable to fit into your trousers well to be honest that sounds like me most weeks happy christmas for yourself happy christmas everybody again hope everyone has been well fed and watered chris is here beset by man flu you okay champ you're bearing up yeah i'm just uh well i'd do anything to get on this podcast so you know i'd rather be tucked up in in bed of course i would but

You know, sometimes you have to put yourself out there, Ian, don't you? And, you know, I don't know how the listeners would cope, really, if I hadn't made this effort and dragged myself up this morning. Four days of man flu. You don't know how the listener would have coped. You were...

You could have done it from bed, you know. That would have been perfectly acceptable. This is not really a visual product. You could have done it from bed and just told no one. We don't want to turn the podcast into something seedy. It's not that type of podcast. Well, look, football rolls on. Boxing Day was quite a day in many ways. I enjoyed it. I was at Man City.

Then it was home. So then it was Man United on the sofa. Then it was Liverpool versus Leicester on the sofa. Liverpool had a bit of a squeak for a while. But we are going to pile through some... Oh, they didn't. We're going to pile through... They weren't very good in the first half. We're going to pile through some subjects quickly today, Chris. So get your motor running and let's get straight into events at Molineux. I have to say...

Manchester United are not improving. Ruben Amrim has had 10 games. I cannot believe he's had 10 games since I went and saw Marcus Rashford score after a minute at Ipswich. He's had 10 games. I'll say it again, 10 games in new Manchester United manager. And I have to say, having watched that, I don't see a lot of improvement there. New formation, some new faces, some have been cast aside, but the football isn't any better.

And the smiles disappeared, hasn't it, from Ruben Amber? And so I said, you know, I understand why. I mean, he can't be happy with the whole situation. I mean, it's like Eric Ten Hag Mark II, though, isn't it? Other than Ten Hag, you know, eventually did weather a bit of a storm at the start and had a decent first season, didn't he? But it just shows the magnitude of the job. There are no surprises for me.

that this is happening. And with the underlying Rashford nonsense and, you know, Bruno... Actually, I was doing 6-0-6 when that game was on, so I didn't see it. I watched the highlights this morning. I mean, I wasn't sure it was a second yellow, but watching it back this morning, absolutely nailed on second yellow. And just...

just, just sheer petulance. You're going to say could have been a straight red and, you know, possibly, you know, I understand that, but just sheer petulance. It looks like petulance from him and it looks like he's lost his head again. So, but this is, this is what I expected. I don't know what you expected. I,

I expected some improvement. I have to say they've become such a rabble under Ten Hag. I expected improvement. I did not expect them to be 14th the day after Boxing Day. They've lost four of their last five in the league. Amrim says he has no idea how long it will take. He says that it's

pointless talking about Europe. Rashford isn't getting nowhere near that squad. Heaven knows what he is doing not to be able to get near that squad. Amrim says, if he's not here, you can make your own mind up. Why? Like you say, the smile has gone from his face. The thing that strikes me particularly, Chris, is they look awesomely

utterly toothless up front. They do not look like they've got a goal in them if they play all day and I don't know how he fixes that. Onana becomes a second Man United goalkeeper in a week to concede a goal straight from a corner. Not sure what that is about and the thing about Manchester United is they've got Newcastle, Liverpool,

Arsenal up next albeit Arsenal in the FA Cup the Bruno thing briefly before we crack on because we're going to do this pod slightly different way today cover a lot of a lot of ground very quickly the Bruno thing the first yellow card is actually the one that's telling he thinks he's fouled in his own half and then goes seeking retribution and by the time he actually gets booked

the first year of the card. By the time he gets booked, he's had three hacks, one at one player and then two at the second player.

We've defended him, or I've defended him a little bit this season. I think he's shown some better signs. That isn't leadership. That is the way that you will drive your team further and further down into the mud. The new Wolves manager, Vito Pereira, despite what I said about him last week, is showing maybe just what a mess his predecessor, Gary O'Neill, had got Wolves into. Two games, two victories, two clean sheets. They'd only had one in the league previously this season.

Yeah, I mean, I think you're being slightly harsh on Gary O'Neill. It is only two games, isn't it? Says you. Okay, yeah, but it is only two games. Let's not, you know, one of my favourite phrases, get the bunting out for Pereira just yet. It's been a good start. It's been an excellent start, actually. And the clean sheets being the most important thing, which was...

something that, you know, huge problem, the goals they conceded under Gary O'Neill. So great start. They do have talent within the squad and they've shown it in the last two games. It's not an awful lot better on the other side of Manchester. Like I say, I was at the Etihad Stadium as City laboured a little bit to a one-all draw with Everton improving. Everton, lots of chat about Pep Guardiola over the last week.

couple of months. That is now one winning 13 for the defending champions. I want to talk briefly about the players. It may sound a little bit obvious, but they are failing Pep Guardiola. And what I mean by failing is that I'm sitting at that game yesterday thinking at 1-0, Haaland's missed his penalty, which can happen. I'm thinking, right, who's going to get a hold of this game? We've got half an hour left. Who's getting a hold of this game for City?

Who's going to get on the ball and say, I'm going to make sure we win this game? You know, is it going to be Phil Foden, for example? Is it going to be Bernardo Silva? Is it going to be Kevin De Bruyne when he came on? Is it going to be Harland himself? It was nobody. It was nobody. I don't know about you, Chris, but when teams are struggling, you look for the great players themselves.

to lift them. You look for the great players to set the example and to drag them forward. Roy Keane used to do it endlessly for Manchester United. Don't see that at City at the moment.

Going into the shells a little bit, they've been normalised, haven't they, Manchester City? Do you know the most telling thing from that game yesterday was Manuel Akanji's interview, I think it was to Five Live after the game, and he talked about players needing to run back. So that, I think, is a worrying sign where now within...

within the camp, within the dressing room, there are players now sort of pointing fingers at each other. They're just like every other team. There's a blame culture when things don't go right and things aren't going right. And, you know, with Haaland missing the penalty, the guy doesn't miss, does he? He hasn't missed since he's joined Manchester City and even he is showing his failings. But on the flip side of that, credit Everton, the goal and Jai's score.

I mean, what a finish! Yes, yes. Off balance, moving backwards. Don't quite sure how he managed to get that power from, and you'd know much better than me. Do you know what I mean when I say moving backwards? He was, well, you know, didn't have any momentum to get into the ball, did he?

It was pure, wasn't it? It was just such a pure strike. And no goalkeeper in the world would save that. But the accuracy and the way he took his first touch, got the second touch off. I mean, that was a goal of absolute beauty on Boxing Day.

It'd be interesting whether the new Everton owners continue or feel that they have to continue that policy that we've associated with Everton over the years of selling a big player or selling a good player every couple of summers. If so, he could be the next. I'm not wishing this on Everton, but he could be the next one. That sounds like it. He looks like a real talent. You mentioned Haaland. I mentioned Haaland.

I think if there was proper backup for Harlan, then he might be out of the team for a couple of days, for a couple of games. He's looks like a player who needs a rest and he talks like a player who needs a rest, but they haven't really got backup. We all need a rest Ian. Yeah, we do. Um, we look at, um, we look at Liverpool in that position. Uh,

they could feasibly play Nunes up front. They could play Jota up front. They could play Salah up front if they wanted to. Gakpo Diaz played up front at Tottenham. City don't have that option unless they want to go false nines and no nines and all the rest of it. Pep Guardiola takes his team to Leicester

on Sunday whilst Everton are at home so Forrest it's interesting that about a month ago when Everton lost 4-0 at Man United a game I was at when they actually played quite well and essentially fell apart on the back of individual errors

We talked about a horror run that was coming up for Everton after that, which involved a game against Liverpool, game against Arsenal, game against City, game against Chelsea. I'll tell you what, they didn't lose any of them. They didn't play the Liverpool one. It was postponed, but they've got draws against the other three. And once again, Sean Dice has Everton not in a position of comfort, but feeling a little bit better about themselves.

And they'll be fine, and they'll be fine because of the nature of, you know, the last three performances. And the sort of...

The results which they've got in those games against Chelsea, against Arsenal and against Manchester City pretty much epitomise what Sean Dyche is, you know, about his character and his resilience and his ability to carry on when I know there's a certain section of the Everton support who seem to have turned against him.

But fair play to him. And he's actually in a really interesting position now with the takeover, which has happened. And, you know, often when there are takeovers, we see a change of manager and Everton will probably wait to the end of the season to make that decision. But if Sean Dyche finishes the season strongly, then I know a lot of Everton fans have just said sort of,

I suspect, want him out. But he puts them in a hell of a position because he is a safe pair of hands, Sean Dyche. City are at Leicester on Sunday. They lost 3-1 at Liverpool last night. That was the last game of the day. It was hard to see what was going on at all, given some of the missed... Yeah, P Super. Is that what you call it?

the mist that was rolling in from the Mersey on Boxing Day. But what we did see in the end, it was another Liverpool dominant performance fell down, fell down, fell behind after six minutes. Laboured a little bit, got the job done in the end. It did make me laugh. You know, I don't know if you noticed, but Liverpool were doing their own version of the Arsenal corner. They've obviously been, obviously been watching and they started doing this thing where they all lined up beyond the back post like a,

I don't know, like horses at the start of the Grand National waiting to come to the tape. But it didn't work. It didn't work. They must have had about 10 of them. And they didn't create a chance from a single one. Have they got a set-piece coach now in Liverpool? If they haven't, they probably need one because they weren't very good at it. But they got it done anyway. I have to say, Leicester's time-wasting in the first half was an absolute...

If the goalkeeper had spent any more time standing in his own goal, waiting to take goal keeps, he might as well have been sitting on the front row of the Kop. What would you do? Let's get it right. I agree. I'm just going to say he might as well have been sitting on the front row of the Kop. Yeah, I'm not really cross with him, but I wasn't impressed with the referee. Two minutes. Two minutes added time at the end of the first half. Absolute joke. If you're going to stop...

clubs players doing this you've got to well you've got to stop them doing it the way to do it is to add the time don't know what the referee was playing at absolute joke daca was down for about four minutes with some kind of mythical foot injury that he seemed to run off that wasn't added on not uh good enough um decent rotation by arne slot diaz didn't play slobber's lie didn't play um they look in decent shape liverpool that's the understatement of the year mate

Yeah, Diaz not starting. Massive problem for me. I captained him in my fantasy team. Your Christmas isn't good, is it? I've really been impressed with Arneslot up until that moment and that decision to leave him out. And, you know, he went with Nunes, Kovacic,

Up top and, you know, ahead of Diaz. And he's able to, you mentioned earlier, he's able to rotate. They've got such strength in depth. Sobers lie on the bench. Curtis Jones, you know, came in and did a really fantastic job. But, I mean, no great surprise, Liverpool blowing away Leicester. Leicester worry me. I've said many times that they seem to be, because of their recent Premier League history, there seems to be...

a sort of entitlement from Leicester fans that since they've come up, they shouldn't only be staying up. They should be staying up comfortably, maybe pushing into the top half. Got to be careful. It's all about small steps. I mean, this was, I think, a section of the Leicester fans were really anti-Danny Ward, hence him getting dropped for this game. And it's a tough job for Ruud van Nisselrooy. And I think this is...

This is going to be a long, long season for Leicester City. Interesting what you say about Danny Ward. On the one hand, you could say, well, Van Nistelrooy's taken him out of the firing line because he got so much heat after his performance in the 3-0 home defeat to Wolves just before Christmas. But equally, if you're Danny Ward, you might look at that and think, well, one bad game and I'm out. The manager doesn't think I'm strong enough to come through this. Not sure which way you would look at that. They were slightly better

yesterday, Leicester, given that they were away against the league leaders. They were certainly a lot better than they were defensively in that game against Wolves, but it is another defeat for them. And you do wonder where they go from here. I have to say, mate, I'm going to say something which I didn't want to say, but I'm saying it. I've done a thing for Mail Sport this morning. It's running across our website. It's also in the pages of the D-roll print edition of the Daily Mail. I did my kind of end of season...

Awards And I'm afraid Darling Darwin Nunes has got my Disappointment of the year award I'm beginning to give up on him

You fell in love with him and now you're dumping him? Well, I fell in love with him and he let me down. You know, we all know about that, don't we? And, you know, he's not learning, mate. He's not learning. He's not learning. I don't know, he's 26 now, almost 26 now. If you don't know how to score goals at 26, will you ever know? Will you ever know?

For prescription only. Safety info found at FreestyleLibre.us.

This episode is brought to you by AWS. Amazon Q Business is the new generative AI assistant from AWS. Many tasks can make business slow, like wading through mud. Help! Luckily, there's a faster, easier, less messy choice. Amazon Q can securely understand your business data to help you streamline tasks, like summarizing quarterly results or doing complex analyses in no time. Q got this. Learn what Amazon Q Business can do for you at aws.com slash learn more.

Liverpool's lead at the top is a bit bigger than it was because Chelsea fluffed the lines at home to their neighbours, Fulham, on Boxing Day. Chelsea had been unbeaten in the league at home against Fulham since 1979. I was only nine years old. Marcus Silva had asked his players to do...

Can you remember? It wasn't even in the top division, I'm told. Marcus Silva, the Fulham manager, had asked his players to do it for the fans and they did, coming from behind to win it late on. Pedro Neto, Chris, you must have seen it. Yeah.

You must have seen it. Disgraceful. Pathetic. Utterly pathetic. If I was Enzo Maresco, I'd lock him in a room for a week with water and dog biscuits. Seriously, that was utterly ridiculous. He sees Alex Iwobi going by him. He tries to step across him. It doesn't work.

And there's two things about this. So he goes down clutching his face, right, and then rolls around for five minutes. You know better than I do, if you're really hurt, you don't roll around because you're really hurt. And secondly, he did that thing where he looked up. He looked up mid-theatrics. I think he was looking at the linesman to see if he'd got his free kick, realised he hadn't, put his head back in his hands and rolled around some more.

The lovely thing about that is that when he got home, he must have realised what he'd done. But the fact that, which I like, is that he looked up and then probably thought that there aren't any cameras there or whatever. I mean, how?

How do you think you can get away with that? Apart from the 10 TV cameras and the mobile phone cameras in the pocket. Exactly. All of the 45,000 people in the stadium, yeah, no cameras at all. He should have kept his head down, shouldn't he, though? Pathetic.

pathetic though I mean if I was his teammate if I was his teammate I'd be like come on mate you know if you want to embarrass yourself fine but don't embarrass us interesting line by Kieran Gill our Chelsea correspondent on Mail Online this morning Nani Mudueki not in the squad and the Chelsea squad and not injured and

Moresca, the Chelsea coach, wouldn't go into details as to where he was or why, but Kieran makes the point that the previous two times that has happened this season, it's been because of poor application in training. So it makes you wonder. Mm-hmm.

And fair play to Maresca actually for handling it in the manner which he has done. There are different ways to handle it. There are the Manchester United way where there's a public outing and Maresca's done it, seems to be doing it quietly and people ask questions, but managers have everything.

absolutely every right if players aren't applying themselves then to leave them out and then also leaving the door open it's like it's like this is a this is a new thing isn't it and just in you know 2024 that this whole you know that managers leave players out or star players out and there's a big sort of furor over it it's always happened I just think that you know that

It was not more accepted back then, but, you know, if players aren't participating in the manner which they should have been when I played, you were left out and you had to earn the right to get back into the team. And that's what's happening with, you know, with Maresca and that's what's happening with Rashford. So there's absolutely, you know, no issue for me in the way that both clubs have handled it. But, you know, everybody seems to be sort of outside the

you know, and possibly parts of the media reading far too much into these situations. But it just makes you wonder, play that Mudueke, who really should be living his best life at the moment. He's finally at a club that's doing well. He's in a Chelsea environment in which he can thrive. He's played for England a couple of times and got pretty good reviews, especially for that game against

Come on in, that game in Greece, I think it was, when he played pretty well on the right side. And yet, all of a sudden, he's not in the squad and there's questions swirling around about his training attitude. I mean, that baffles me a little bit. I know it's that time of year when games are coming thick and fast and players are beginning to feel the pace of the season. But, my God, he's in his early 20s, for God's sake. I mean, he shouldn't be feeling tired. He should be feeling...

absolutely full of life. But, but, but the whole point is, you know, is, is the bigger picture and where, where Marcus Rashford is a lot older than, uh, Madaweke. I think we can cut Madaweke's some slack, but you know, he, the penny eventually has to drop. He's a talented player. He's left out. Um, you know, he knows what he has to do. And, um,

You know, just knuckle down, get your head down, work hard, train hard, get yourself back into the team. It'll be interesting to see if he's in the squad when Chelsea go to Ipswich on Monday night. Fulham, meanwhile, are at home to Bournemouth on Sunday to see if they can continue their terrific progress up the Premier League under Marcus Silva. They are now level on points with Manchester City. You would have got pretty long odds had you taken that bet at the start.

of the season. Let us know what you think about Rudwijk. It's interesting. He's a popular player. Do you think he's, well, do you think, do you think Enzo Moresco is right to bomb him if he has been slightly off it in training? Do you think Marcus Rashford should be getting another chance from Ruben Amorim at... What would you do if you were manager? What would you do? If I had, if I saw things that weren't right,

I would do exactly the same. It's big, the big calls to make, especially when a team is doing poorly. Henry must look at Rashford and think, goodness me, I could do with you on top form. But if you're not seeing what you want to see, then I suppose you haven't got much of a choice. So yeah, let us know what you think. And also please, anybody got a view on Pedro Neto and his antics at Stamford Bridge, let us know. You can find us on the socials, that'd be x.com.

and Instagram, TikTok. If you look for It's All Kicking Off, you'll see excerpts from the show there, and you can leave your comments and your observations as you can, of course, on our ex-accounts. I'm the one with the silly name, and Chris is the one with the rather

famous name. Do you think in the new year, I'm going to challenge you in the new year to come, because that's a great, that's a really good sort of line now, I enjoy that, but you know, you've used that a lot. Can you come up with a new line for the new year? New year, new me, new podcast sell.

You never know. And finally, the traditional way to do it. Get yourself onto Spotify, Apple Podcasts, wherever it is you listen to this show. Have a mess around and you'll find the space for the comments and the reviews and, of course, that big follow button. One of our favourite listeners, Louise, sent us a lovely message over Christmas.

Chris, and it read, very funny brackets and interesting episode. Close brackets. Thank you and Merry Christmas to you all. Merry Christmas to you, Louise, and indeed to every... I enjoyed that quiz. Enjoyed the quiz, I did. Yeah, you enjoyed winning that quiz, that's for sure. I had a few messages...

on my friends, WhatsApp group. I have my friends pointing out that I'd come second out of two in that quiz. Anyone who fancies a bit of Christmas quiz activity, go back to the show that we did the other side of Christmas day and you'll find it there. I've given it away by saying that Chris wins, but yeah,

I haven't mentioned some of the questions, football questions, Christmas questions. People would know that anyway. Go and give it a go. One question that jumped out of the Newcastle-Aston Villa game, one-sided Newcastle-Aston Villa game, turned out to be Newcastle have now scored 10 goals in their last three Premier League games and 19 in their last six games in all competitions. But the question that leapt out of that game was around the John Duran sending off

Chris sent off for a stamp. I think it was on Fabian Shah. Did he mean it? All kinds of argy-bargy followed. Did he mean it?

Yeah, I think he did. Do you? Yeah, I do. I watch matches of the day and they have hours to sit and sort of analyse these situations. But I still don't think he can have any complaints. I do understand what Unai Emery said after the game about, you know, the referee has to make a call in real time and he did do it as a red card.

But I'm sure, what am I sure? I would, you know, I suspect that, well, VAR would have definitely checked it. There would have been some sort of communication. So, and I thought that, you know, you know where you're putting it.

your right foot in that situation so i thought that was a red card yeah match today did pick up on on the fact that duran's left ankle seemed to give way just yeah and that made him kind of lose his balance and stand with his other one um interesting if the match today cameras can spot that i'm not sure whether var cameras can't but also baffled there's a bit of argy-bargy then by the by the tunnel not quite sure why the villa staff didn't get duran down the tunnel a

quicker to prevent that happening. His manager, Una Emery, who looked generally pissed off all day, said afterwards that he thought Duran had been sent off on reputation. All I'll say about that is if you've got a reputation, Chris, for being a hothead or being a bit temperamental, surely you've got to take that into account yourself and moderate your behaviour and realise that you're already a target before you get on the pitch and behave accordingly.

Yeah, I do agree with that. And it was interesting because there was the...

I think a lot of people felt that Duran's head went because there was a free kick which he wanted to take. I don't know whether you saw that. Yes, I did see that, yes. And he clearly did want to take and he was clearly peeved that Luca Dina got the nod to take it over him. And then that did seem to affect him, whether that had any part to play in the actual red card or not. But...

look, I thought that was a, you know, really clumsy, reckless challenge anyway. But yeah, he said, you know, we say this a lot about young, talented players or we have done over the years about, you know, players, you know, they need to have that edge to be the player which they are. But you also, you know, you need to stay the right side of the line and stay on the pitch. And that's something that,

that John Duran has to control. Yeah, and he spent all this time trying to get into Emery's team, trying to be the first pick. And now he's got that. He's going to have to spend a couple of games. That's a great point, actually. Because that battle with Ollie Watkins, and I know you can rotate, but it does seem that Duran actually now has the first choice shirt. So he's absolutely killed himself.

Fair play to Eddie Howe. Every time Newcastle look as though they're getting sucked down towards mid-table, he manages to get another gear out of that team and get them heading north again. And that's what's happened recently. Howe admitted after this game, by the way, that there had been a mother of all brawls in the St. James' Park tunnel at half-time. It's a very narrow tunnel, that one. I'm not surprised that occasionally players...

come together there. Would you get involved in it? Where would you be if you were involved in a brawl? I'd be ducking under the punches, mate, and getting in there for me halftime orange. That's what I'd be doing. You wouldn't be sticking up for your team, mate? No, I'd come back out. I'd come back out with my mobile phone and film it all and stick it on Twitter by the time the second half had even started, give me social following. Disgrace.

Heaven knows it means one. There's a bit of an argy-bargy going on in the room next to the one that I'm sitting in at the moment, by the way. If anybody can hear any of that, I do apologise. Did Santa not come? I think Santa came. I think Santa was a little bit too generous in this house and everybody's getting a little bit over-emotional and tired. I think the phrase...

get her back to school is one that's quite appropriate in this house. She's got two weeks more. Get her back to school. No, no, she's not private school. Only one week more. Come on. Only one week more. Anyway, yeah, Eddie Howe admitted that there'd been a bit of argy-bargy in the tunnel. Jason Tindall as number two was sent off. Apparently, Eddie admitted that it was such a fracas that 10 or 15 could have gone. Not sure how the refs knew. There's no way Tindall would have got him

He wouldn't want somebody punching that beautiful face. I'm not sure why Jason Tindall was the one who was picked out by the referee, but maybe he was the only one whose face was glowing in the dark. I'm not sure. Anyway, that's me banned from St. James's Park.

Sorry, guys. Only joking. Right. Last but not least, mate. We've left Tottenham to the end. And let's focus on Forrest and Postacoglu's entertaining Tottenham side. Lost a 1-0. Rare for them. Lost a 1-0 at the city ground. Seemed to play reasonably well, actually, from what I saw on the highlights. But Forrest are third.

Wow. Can you believe that? Norsken Forest, third in the Premier League. My tip for relegation. They won the game on the back of less than 30% possession. It's the way that Nuno is doing it and he's doing it well. I wouldn't want to play against those two central defenders. Murillo, £10 million from Corinthians. Milenkovic, £12 million. I think it was from Fiorentina. Some combination, those two at the back.

Some combinations, Eminem. And you think right now, I think we've both sort of got a deep respect for Arsenal and their centre-half pairing, but...

You know, them aside, or even you could maybe look at the Forrester centre-back pairing this season and say, you know, is there a better pairing in the Premier League than them? Murillo's turn of pace is something to behold. For a big unit as well. He doesn't ask if he's going...

He's extremely dynamic and quick and powerful, isn't he? And then you've got Milenkovic. They work well in tandem, actually. And Milenkovic is a head on a stick, but he's more than that. Reads the game well. He's strong. He's robust. But

No, it was a combination there. Excellent. And I tell you the other one of that back four, who I think has had a phenomenal season, Ola Eina, the right back. I think he has been sensational in 1v1 situations. Actually gives them a fair bit going forward. You know, they play with lovely balance, Nottingham Forest do, and the full backs are always more back supports.

but they have an incredible balance and the patience they play with. And it's interesting because when Nuno first went into Nottingham Forest and because of the reputation he has as being quite a, not a negative manager, but he likes to play counter-attack football. But you mentioned 30% or less than 30% at home. A lot of

fans would be angry about that just with the nature of modern football and everybody wants to be entertained. But the Nottingham Forest fans, I think that they have a deep-rooted respect now for Nuno, for the job he's achieved there, and are happy for their team to play that way at the City ground, you know, and they're right behind the team. And the other one, I mean, Anthony Alanga, he's coming up with some goals, isn't he? And they are all walking down

10 feet tall, the Nottingham Forest players. Right, that's it. We wanted to get through a lot of subjects. We know you're all kind of flat out on the sofa at the moment. Attention spans are probably limited. Half of you probably haven't even got round to Gavin and Stacey. That's just me. Gavin and Stacey in Downton Abbey yet. So we don't want to take up too much of your time. But for those of you who've made the effort on this, well,

Well, the murky Manchester morning as I sit here. Thank you very much. More football over the weekend. It keeps coming. It keeps coming. So do we. We will see you on Monday for the next edition of It's All Kicking Off.