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Episode 15: Round 22 and Danish football deep-dive w/ Christian Wolny
475 Plays1 year ago
In part 1 I review the action from a crazy round 22 of the 2022-23 Superliga season. And in part 2 I'm joined by Right To Dream Strategic Director and Danish football O.G. Christian Wolny for an in-depth discussion on all things Danish football, from how the Superliga has evolved to why people outside of Denmark should care about this amazing league.
As ever a huge thank you to all of the Patreons for their support. If you want to join them in supporting Football In Denmark please head to the Patreon page where you can sign up for the cost of a coffee a month.
Also come check out the Football In Denmark website for more Danish football content.
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Transcript
Introduction & Challenges of Solo Podcasting
00:00:16
Speaker
Welcome to Danish Dynamite. We're on episode 15 now and I read a statistic a few weeks back that said that the vast majority of podcasts don't make it to 20 episodes. So we still got that milestone to hit, but things are, things are going strong. Sorry. I missed last week's show. Things got in the way when a podcast is essentially a one man operation.
00:00:37
Speaker
in terms of recording, scheduling, editing, producing, all of that stuff. It does mean that when work and family and those other priorities intervene, it does make it difficult to do a show. So forgive me for no show last week. I think that.
00:00:51
Speaker
trying to keep it on a one-week cadence is the plan. There will obviously be hiccups in that, but let's try to keep it going. But we've got so much to reflect on, and I'm kind of glad that the international break was here to give us this chance to just reflect on what was a pretty crazy round 22 in the Super
Super League Round 22 Highlights
00:01:09
Speaker
League. On today's show, I've got a very special guest coming up in the second part, but for this first part, I just thought I'd recap a little bit and talk about what happened in round 22 and
00:01:20
Speaker
how that's affected the rest of the season because obviously in this situation where after 22 games, the league splits into two parts and throws up a whole bunch of new storylines. So it was the last minute scramble with two places still available going into round 22 and a lot of drama at both ends of the table.
00:01:39
Speaker
I guess if we look at the games, it probably makes sense to start with the most dramatic, and it's hard to call which is the most dramatic actually, but I'm going to start in Silkeborg, where both Silkeborg and FC Michelin were in with a shout of reaching the top six.
00:01:55
Speaker
And it was a thrilling game, six goals in the end, three all, it finished back and forth. I think the standout goal was fantastic break from Gustav Isaksson and finished really coolly on his left foot. And that goal really highlighted what clinical finishing he's had recently. Of course, there was injury time drama when FC Michelin scored to make it 4-3 and that goal would have taken them into the championship group. So that was a really pivotal moment for them. And the goal was ruled out for offside.
00:02:25
Speaker
It was a correct decision, but not much in it. And with that goal being chalked off, both teams had to settle for a point, a point which suited neither team really, because it places both of them because of the other results in the bottom
Managerial Changes at FC Midtjylland
00:02:37
Speaker
half of the table. So both Silkerborg, last year's bronze medal winners, and FC Michelin, last year's silver medal winners, head into the relegation group for the remainder of the season.
00:02:47
Speaker
And of course, FC Michelin parted ways with Albert Capellas, a manager who came in partway through the season to replace Bo Henriksen and never really got FC Michelin firing. You know, I don't think he, I didn't notice a discernible style. I didn't notice an uptick in their fortunes. They were still a team who one week could look like world beaters and the next week could look terrible. And they parted ways with him. He's been replaced by Rana's manager, Thomas Thomasberg, who's done some fantastic work there.
00:03:13
Speaker
recent years and I think it's as close to a safe pair of hands as they can get. The guy knows the league very well, he's outperformed with a round of squad that has never really had a huge amount of money to spend. Whether he's a manager who can take them back to the days of Champions League group stages and
00:03:32
Speaker
being favourites for the title. I'm not sure. He might very well be able to, but I think what he is almost certainly going to be able to do is get more from the group that he's got. There's undoubted talent in that Michelin squad, and I just don't feel that Capellas was getting the best out of it. I think that having ended up in the relegation group, the focus is going to be on finishing seventh and trying to finish strong, and seventh place gets you a spot in that European play-off.
00:04:00
Speaker
There's still a chance that this season can be salvaged, but I think that he's got to hit the ground running going into the games this coming weekend. But that game was incredibly dramatic and finished 3
Thrilling Comeback by FC Nordsjælland
00:04:12
Speaker
-3. There was more late drama over in Farum where FC Norjland were hosting
00:04:17
Speaker
Bronbe, who themselves were looking to get a place in the top six. FC Nordsland, of course, have been pegged back by FC Copenhagen and so really needed to come away from this game with three points if they wanted to end the
00:04:32
Speaker
round in top spot. Gombe actually took the lead when Kian Hansen and Andreas Hansen, can't make another Hansen joke surely, but when they collided and it left the goal wide open for Hakon Evian to score the opener and they went into half time
00:04:48
Speaker
with the score 1-0 to Wombe and I think this was a real big test for FC Nordsland. Coming into the second half 1-0 down, I don't know if they checked the scores but if they had they'd have seen that FC Copenhagen were leading, all these games were played at the same time. So they went into that second half and scored an extraordinary equaliser through Ernest Noama. This is a guy who I've talked about plenty on the podcast but he is really going places. He just took the game by the scruff of the neck, it was a sort of
00:05:14
Speaker
Arjen Robin-esque finish from outside the area, curled it into the corner. Incredible goal. There was then in the 88th minute a penalty awarded thanks to VAR. I'm sure that you've seen it by now but Mads Hermansen made quite incredible triple save. They saved the penalty from Nuama and then two follow-ups.
00:05:34
Speaker
And those saves were so good that Bronbe actually made a t-shirt of the saves, which got a bit of flack on social media, given the ultimate result in the game. But I think that was a real standout moment for him as one of the brightest young talents in the league. And, you know, perhaps one of the brightest goalkeeping talents Denmark have produced for some time. With Luamos missing that penalty or having the penalty saved in the 88th minute, his head could have very justifiably gone down. You know, the game was petering out. Instead, he took the ball.
00:06:03
Speaker
in injury time.
00:06:05
Speaker
slalom through the midfield and the defence and absolutely smashed it with his left foot so hard that even with a strong hand from Hermanson, he couldn't keep it out. And that goal gave FC Nordsland the win. And I think at the end of the season, if Nordsland go on to win the league, which is still very much undecided, you know, the bookies have FC Copenhagen as big favourites still, but if they go on and win it, I think people will look back on that goal as being absolutely pivotal to come back from 1-0 down
00:06:33
Speaker
against a team like Bronby and having missed the penalty in the 80th minute, I think that can't overestimate how important that is both from a points perspective but also from a mentality perspective. Moving on from there, there was a game in Copenhagen that was really pivotal for
Title Race Impact: FC Copenhagen vs. Viborg
00:06:50
Speaker
the title race. It was FC Copenhagen against Vybor who obviously sat in third and there were huge ramifications if Vybor could get something from this.
00:06:59
Speaker
The visitors shot themselves in the foot with the first goal. Lucas Lune-Pederson playing a careless pass out from the back and just gifting it to Haraldson. He still had to chip the keeper. It still required a cool head, but really FC Copenhagen were gifted that first goal. Then the second goal was some smart work from Mohamed Darami down the left. He fired in a shot which I'm almost certain that was a cross. If you guys disagree, let me know.
00:07:22
Speaker
But it looked like a cross that no one got on the end of and it actually deceived the goalkeeper and went in off the post. And, you know, a lovely goal. If he meant it, huge kudos to him. I'm not sure he did. But anyway, there it was. Mortimer managed to get a goal back for V-Borg with 20 minutes to go. And you did wonder, could this be the shot in the arm for them to go on and claim a point or better?
00:07:41
Speaker
But really after that, the chances were few and far between. I think they had one more chance from a corner, but there was nothing else to write home about really. And FC Copenhagen came away with the win, a win that keeps them hot on the heels of FC Neuzhel. And then it's going to be fascinating with those two teams playing each other.
00:07:57
Speaker
a couple of times before the end of the season what's going to what's going to happen there but yeah three very dramatic games to kick things off the other games were less dramatic shall i say agf got a one nil win against obi when i tell you the goal was from towering header is it any surprise that it was patrick mortinson he's on some incredible form at the moment and yeah he's really
00:08:17
Speaker
been responsible for a number of key goals for AGF that have won the points for them.
AGF's Form and OB's Struggles
00:08:24
Speaker
OB looked a little bit in disarray at the moment and AGF were able to assert their dominance. Looby were, again, slightly unlucky not to get the win. They were playing Horsons in a game that
00:08:37
Speaker
neither team could really afford to lose. It finished one all. There was a big defensive blunder by Horsons to put Finn Bogerson in for the opener for Loongby. Aaron Sigurdarson. I don't know if this reference will resonate, but there's a famous miss by Ronnie Rosenthal when he was playing for Liverpool.
00:08:55
Speaker
and it's often held up as the worst miss of all time. Aaron Sigurdarson had a chance. It maybe wasn't quite as much of a clanger, but it wasn't far off. He missed a completely open goal for Horsons and you wondered if that was their chance gone. But they kept on going and got a goal to take one all.
00:09:14
Speaker
that result doesn't really help either team but as I said neither could lose and so to come away with the point keeps hopes alive for both teams. Finally in Alborg it was OB against Ranas and what proved to be the final game for Alborg manager Eric Hamron
00:09:31
Speaker
They went down 1-0 at home to Ranas, a goal from Copland that squirmed under Theo Sander. Perhaps he could have done a little better there. Nicolas Hellenius had the ball in the net, it got ruled out correctly for offside, but they signed him in January. He was supposed to be the guy who got the goals for them to keep them up and it just really hasn't happened for him.
00:09:49
Speaker
I think you know if you had to find some encouragement for our book i'd say in the second half they really came back into it and if it wasn't for an inspired performance by patrick kalgren i wonder if they wouldn't have come away from that with a point or more but as it happened they lost again
00:10:04
Speaker
Loongbi are now ahead of them in the table by a point and yeah things don't look good
Alborg's Managerial Challenges
00:10:09
Speaker
for them. Something I've been saying almost every week something's got to change but maybe now in the relegation group without the six strongest teams to play maybe that will help them. Maybe a change of manager will also give them a bit of a new manager bounce. Eric Hamrin was another manager who came in midway through the season and like Albert Capellas I don't think really managed to get a tune out of the team. I really felt like he wasn't perhaps connecting with the players there was a period of time where
00:10:33
Speaker
where certain players were being frozen out. Alan Sousa is unquestionably the most dangerous player, Albert Kavan. He went weeks at a time, sat on the bench or being brought on for a few minutes at a time. It was kind of puzzling.
00:10:46
Speaker
So as it stands, Alborg are still only eight points away from safety. So it's not insurmountable, but they're, like Loongby, they're going to have to start picking up some wins now that they're playing in the relegation group. And, you know, Silkerborg and FC Michelin are not going to be easy opponents for these relegation group teams. It's just a question of whether, whether Horsons get sucked into the relegation race, because I think OB with 28 points and a 12 point gap, I think that they're safe. For me, it's a three horse race for relegation and
00:11:15
Speaker
Yeah, it looks like it could get quite tasty. So that was how round 22 went down.
00:11:21
Speaker
I have to say it was really exciting having all the games at the same time and seeing things move in real time. I know that's something that only happens a couple of times in the season, but yeah, that was great
Drama in the Danish League Structure
00:11:31
Speaker
entertainment. I think I've said before, I quite enjoy this relegation group, championship group split. I know that it wasn't always how the league was set up. It did used to be a more traditional league system. And I think that what that creates is that towards the end of the season, you get these mid table teams who aren't getting relegated, aren't
00:11:49
Speaker
pushing for Europe. And so you get a lot of dead fixtures. And I think that what the championship group and the, the relegation group does is it made the artificially so, but it creates drama throughout the season. And the fact that seventh place is now so desirable for the relegation group teams. You know, we saw, for example, V-Borg finished seventh last season.
00:12:07
Speaker
won the playoff against Alborg and had this amazing experience in Europe, you know, where they got to play against West Ham in London. And it was really an incredible experience for the fans and the players alike. So that carrot is there. And I would say that for OB, for FC Michelin and for Silkeborg, that's going to be an amazing battle. Similarly in the top six that a lot still undecided, you know, the title race is still top three are only divided by six points and
00:12:32
Speaker
as we've seen in years gone by, things move quite quickly because you get effectively six pointers almost every weekend. So lots to look forward to. And it all kicks off this week. In fact, on Friday, we've got Odancer playing FC Michelin on Friday, which should be interesting to see how Thomas Berg sets up the team, what 11 he goes with to start with, and what changes he rings there. I'm going to put it on record. I am wondering whether he goes for Patrick Karlgren this summer as a transfer.
00:13:02
Speaker
haven't been convinced by Jonas Loicel. He got a one-game ban for his post-match interview, so it should be Elias Olufsen in goal for FC Michelin. Dangerous time to allow a new keeper to start under the first game of a new manager. You wonder if he puts in a good performance. Loicel might be out of the team for the
00:13:19
Speaker
for the foreseeable. So let's see what happens there. But yeah, that should be a really interesting game on Friday evening. And then we've got four fixtures on Sunday. So Lingbe play Silkeborg at lunchtime, as do Horsons against Alborg. That's a massive game in the context of the relegation race.
00:13:36
Speaker
So, yeah, two big lunchtime games. In the afternoon, we've got Bronby against Wieberg. This is always a really fascinating fixture, so keep an eye on that one. And then S.C. Copenhagen, play Nordschuland, first versus second. Whoever can come away with three points from that is going to be top of the league. And you would say that that would be a body blow to whoever loses that. So, keep your eye on that. And then the Monday night game, AGF, Rannes, an all-Yuland clash there.
00:14:04
Speaker
I'm not expecting that one to be a classic necessarily. It feels like it's got a 1-0 on it, but having said that now, it's going to be 4-0. Enjoy that. Great to be back into the thick of the action. Ten more rounds of this to enjoy.
00:14:17
Speaker
And then obviously the European playoff, got the cup final.
Christian Volney's Football Journey
00:14:21
Speaker
So lots of stuff to look forward to as we head into the summer months. We're going to take a short interlude now, but coming up after the break, I'm super, super excited to have Christian Volney on the show, one of the OGs of Danish football. And it was a really fascinating conversation. So I'm really looking forward to sharing it with you after this.
00:14:44
Speaker
Welcome back to part two, and I'm delighted to be joined by Christian Volney, Strategic Director of Right to Dream, and formerly of FC Copenhagen, FC Nordsland, TV2, and host of Football Ministeria, which I think I'm right in saying was the biggest football podcast in Denmark. Christian, welcome to the show. It's a real pleasure to have you here. Thank you. The pleasure is all mine. You've had a really interesting journey in Danish football. Could you just talk a little bit about how you got into working in Danish football and how you found yourself now working at Right to Dream?
00:15:13
Speaker
Well, it's a long story, because I'm not young anymore. But I started out when I was just a kid, and I used to love football. And it's so, so far back in the days that there was no internet back then. And I used to, there was a Danish football newspaper that came out every Friday called tips, but it was different back then from what it is today. And that's the that was the only place you could get your fix if you really wanted to understand more about football. So every time it came out, around lunchtime on Fridays, I used to skip school and then run to this and then
00:15:43
Speaker
buy it and suck everything I got out of it into me and I used to on my school desk at school I used to with a pencil update the leak in the Danish First Division goal scores and everything until my parents got a ticket from the school because they had to clean that table. That's how I started and later on I got into the school of journalism and everyone around me or lots of brilliant people there I don't know how I got in and all the people wanted to
00:16:11
Speaker
uh, expose governments or change the world. And I just wanted someone to pay me too much football. Um, that was the plan all along. And when I ended education and I went to Italy to live with my, my future wife and then suddenly TV to call me and said, they had some freelance jobs for me if I wanted to come home. And that's how it started. I did for eight years, the national team and the Danish league and European football back then there was no, it wasn't like today where everything is on one channel and
00:16:41
Speaker
no one else back then they were sharing it. And then eight years later, TV2, if the Norton came to me, it was a small club back then. I had never won anything always struggling for litigation, but they had an idea they could change things. They could, they could do things off the pitch. My first day of work was also the first day of work for Kaspar Yulman and a lot of other people. And I was there for four years. Interesting times, part of
00:17:10
Speaker
I was there and won the Cup twice and won the Championship. And the club just kept developing from there. I wasn't the reason to why that I worked today, but I was part of the first journey and that was an interesting experience. And I learned so much, that was four years. You think, you know, everything about football. And then when you start working inside the club, you understand that you know nothing of how things actually
00:17:36
Speaker
everyday life is and the strategies and plans and man management and the connection between the different departments of the club and academy work. And it's such a it's such a big world. And I don't think anyone will ever fully understand, no matter how long time they spend, what it actually demands from people and how you can make people flourish. But I learned something and I went to FC Copenhagen for a little bit more than three years to help them
00:18:06
Speaker
re-established the job description back then was to re-establish the belief in their ambitions, because at the time they were struggling, they were cutting down on the budgets, to build a department, to open up, to start their FC Copenhagen TV production, which today has grown to be what I would call a flagship within the business. Again, they did it without me. I was just there when we started it.
00:18:34
Speaker
And then after that, I felt, I don't know how to explain that, I felt tired of football, not the sport, but the business of football. I needed a break. And I went to do other kinds of work. I was still doing sports. I was doing, I was helping Olympic committees in Denmark or national federations to educate coaches or whatever they needed of help. And then suddenly,
00:19:00
Speaker
A headhunter called me and he said, I think I need you to come and meet someone. I said, that's fine, but this is about football. He said, it's not really football. I said, well, is it wrong football? Or what do you mean? I said, no, but you shouldn't meet this guy. I said, I'm not interested. No, thanks. And then a week later, they called me again. He said, you should really meet this guy. So I went and I sat down with a man called Tom Vernon, who purchased FC Northland about some six, eight months before that. And after an hour with him,
00:19:29
Speaker
I remember I thought to myself, shit, you're not getting out of this one, because this guy is so different. And his visions and his look upon football is just so different. And either you join him and help knowing that it's going to be difficult, or you will be a hypocrite and should keep your mouth shut for the rest of your life. So I joined him at that time. And I've been there ever since. Now I'm just a consultant, which means that I can also work on other projects, World Cups, Euros and stuff like that. But that's the
00:19:57
Speaker
short version of the long story and it was already too long I can hear what I'm talking but that's how I got to where I am today.
00:20:04
Speaker
Wow. Incredible to also come full circle on the FC Nordsland story because obviously that first championship happened way before Right to Dream and all of that. And to see the team now in first place, the youngest team, youngest squad in the league must be very pleasing that everything that Tom and yourself and everyone else at the club and the organisation has put in place has started to bear some pretty significant fruit. The strange thing about that young profile is that it was never the
00:20:35
Speaker
goal to have a young team. It was never the ambition. It's the thing that a lot of people talk about, but it's just a consequence of what they want to achieve. It's kind of a consequence of the strategy that the team becomes so young, but that was never the goal in itself. But there's a strong history and there's a strong storyline and that's where the main attention has always been from outside. From the inside, it's never about age. It's just how it ended up doing what the club is doing.
00:21:05
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. And I think that, you know, the addition of, uh, perhaps not a veteran player, but a more mature player like, uh, Andreas Hansen was really part of what sort of turned things around from last season to this. And that probably goes under the radar for people outside of Denmark, but it's certainly something that I noticed. Yeah. If you, if you, like I said, if you're part of an everyday life in the club, you, you start to understand the mechanisms and of course they're different from club to club, depending on the culture and the strategy, but in a club like Northland having
00:21:35
Speaker
older players is it's probably the hardest position you can have in that squad is being the older player because you one one thing is you need to be at a certain level that has to be steady you have to be one of the best players every single game but you also have to be a person that can teach all the young players what they need to know to reach their level at the right speed if they don't do that the team will struggle the team will not be ready to play because
00:22:01
Speaker
your talent will not do it for you. You have to be ready, you have to be mentally developed, you have to be in full understanding of what's necessary for you to succeed and also have the ambitions not to every second Sunday and not show up and of course not physically but mentally. So the three or four established players in that squad have a huge responsibility
00:22:22
Speaker
In long-term, the vision is, of course, that those players should be someone who's been through what the young players are going through. So, Emiliano Macondas is the first in, if I should write a dream scenario for that club in, let's say, eight years, it will be Mikl Damsko, Victor Nilsen, Marcos Ingvatsen, and someone in that category, people who've been through the same education, who've come back to finish their careers, giving something back to the next generation, understanding what they're going through. Right now, since the club is young,
00:22:52
Speaker
players like Andreas Hansen and Kian Hansen are filling out those roles in a very impressive way because they don't have that background. They had to learn a lot in a short time and sell, give their own. So it's a system that can grow alone from the fact that it will be stronger when people who've been through the same will come back and give something in return.
00:23:15
Speaker
Yeah, for sure. I'm looking forward to that. Right to Dream is obviously more than just FC Nordsland.
Right to Dream's Global Expansion
00:23:21
Speaker
It's that the whole Academy set ups with the Academy in Ghana, the Academy in Egypt and in Denmark. How important was the creation of a second Academy, a second African Academy in Egypt to the kind of the overall Right to Dream strategy?
00:23:39
Speaker
It's a step because the goal has always been that there should be a global, you can call it organization or movement or whatever you want. The core idea was always to create more opportunities for as many young people as possible. And that is not limited by numbers or by borders. So it was always the plan, but it cost money. And at the same time, you want to give everything you have to the kids you promised in education, you promised football development.
00:24:09
Speaker
So how do you spend the money you're getting in transfers on opening new academies when you're still trying to make the ones you have the best possible versions of themselves? But when the Mansoor family came in, they wanted to invest in this. They had the same vision for this project. So that was the game changer here. And it was, of course, obvious the first one, a new one could be in Egypt where they're from, where they want to make a difference.
00:24:37
Speaker
where girls and boys should have that opportunity as well. You look at Egypt and you look at the incredible amount of talent you have there. So I have a feeling that in a few years, Denmark and the Superleggo will see what that can mean. But it's not going to be limited to that. You just can't open 10 academies at the same time because then you cannot make them fully established when it comes to culture and strategies and philosophies.
00:25:06
Speaker
Also, we have to understand every time we go to a new country that there's a local culture, you have to mix into this and what you can learn. If you think you can just put the same model everywhere, then you're going to fail. So it has to be in a certain tempo. You cannot do it quicker, but it's going to happen much faster now than it's been before, because I think within a year, new plans will come out on a new academy and a new club somewhere. And then maybe in two years from that, one more. So I think within the next 10 years, it's going to grow massively.
00:25:36
Speaker
Yeah, I think what's always been such a refreshing change for me about Right to Dream is that it really feels like it does have the best interests at heart of the kids that come through the academy. And it's one of the few examples in football where someone isn't just trying to line their own pockets, there's a bigger ambition here. One of the statistics has stuck in my mind, and I think it was 95%, but correct me if I'm wrong, that 95% of graduates from Right to Dream either become pro footballers or get a college scholarship.
00:26:05
Speaker
in the US. It's around those numbers, but the ones that do not achieve one of those, there's always some kind of sad story behind. It can be a family issue, it can be other things, but until kids are the age of 16, it's not defined if they should go one way or the other. So once you turn 16, you can normally see who has the talent and the potential to
00:26:34
Speaker
to Korean football. And if that's not realistic, the academy work is upgraded so that they can go on a scholarship in the US and achieve a greater education through their football. So football will always be the platform for them to achieve either one or the other.
00:26:48
Speaker
And then there are the ones that actually achieve both, go to the US and through school, get the education, but then also be drafted for the MLS afterwards and actually get a professional career. So it's actually possible to achieve both through the US, but we aim for everyone to at least achieve one of them so that they can make a change in impact in the community they come from and
00:27:14
Speaker
and also achieve their own life goals because when you meet those young people, it's incredible how determined they are, how much they put in school, how much they put on the training pitch. In Ghana, the first time I came there, I was amazed to see them get up six in the morning, go train, have breakfast, go to school, have a short break, train in the afternoon, and then at night, there's extra school for the ones that need a little extra.
00:27:36
Speaker
That's how you understand what incredible people they can become when you see them put in the effort. I've never done it when I was a kid. That's for sure. I wasn't even close to putting in anything compared to those young boys and girls. But the people training them, educating them, have the same passion. And everything comes down to those people. The same with the coaches.
00:27:58
Speaker
in an academy in Denmark is also people makes a difference and that's not just in Northland. It goes to any club that has success in the academy. It's because of the people that put in so much effort and wants those kids to succeed. For the kids who don't make it into that 25% cohort or whatever, what does Right to Dream do to still support their ambitions? Well, some of them return later on as there's a few coaches that actually
00:28:23
Speaker
because they never made it because of course they make it but maybe they didn't make it all the way as a professional or to the US but some of them come to work as coaches if they have the mentality. Some you lose contact with because they maybe went a different way in their lives or whatever happened to them in their families but some of them actually do come back even if they never made any of the two goals that were set up for them and some of them are
00:28:52
Speaker
in the system today. We have people, roles that are kind of caretakers, the kids that go to the US. We have people there who look after them, make sure they're doing well in school and keep them connected because some go to California, some go
00:29:07
Speaker
to the east and west and north and south and someone needs to make sure there's still contact with everyone and that they have a social platform over there. So there are different roles that you can have even if you didn't become a footballer yourself, if you have the passion for it and if you want to. So some of them actually come back in roles like that. Fantastic.
00:29:29
Speaker
I wanted to take it back to Danish football and you mentioned your work on FCEco TV and how the formation of that was quite important to Copenhagen, getting back to where they are.
International Appeal of Danish Football
00:29:41
Speaker
It was actually a documentary, I don't know if it was produced by FC Copenhagen or by someone else, but it was a documentary on Thomas Delaney with English subtitles that that's what got me into Danish football in the first place. There you go.
00:29:51
Speaker
Exactly. And I wondered, in terms of trying to get people outside of Denmark interested in the league, do you think it's possible? Do you think what I'm trying to do is feasible? And if so, what is it that you love most about Danish football that you think people need to know? I love the point you're making. And the fact that we're having this conversation proves that there is something here that can attract people, that can win their hearts, even if you're not local. I think the Super League and Danish football have
00:30:20
Speaker
We will never be competitive compared to Bundesliga or the Premier League when it comes to football terms on the pitch. But there are stories here that can relate to anyone, especially the ones that normally follow big teams in big leagues. The system we have is very open to our surroundings. Danish football, if you look at it in a bigger perspective, it's probably just a business case, to be honest.
00:30:50
Speaker
I think 400,000 people here in Denmark that would call themselves fans, real fans. But you have 12 clubs in the Super League battling, trying to make a living from these 400,000 people. And it's not even split evenly there because one probably has most and then Copenhagen has second most. So the rest are really fighting for their lives and their businesses on a very little, they're trying to feed from a very small field of crops here.
00:31:19
Speaker
And that has forced the clubs to constantly think, how can we make everyone interested in this? How can we make sure that no one loses interest in us? Which makes the clubs open to sharing, which makes the clubs open to sharing with people around them, but also each other. There's a lot of, in Danish football, there's a lot of knowledge sharing between the clubs, even if they're competitors, they're still trying to help the league grow. Also on academy level.
00:31:46
Speaker
So it's a very open league for you. When you come here, you can come visit the players, you can watch your trainings, you can even talk to them afterwards. And then there's the element of surprise that I never stop. It never stops to amaze me in the Super League. I've followed it since it was started in, was in 92. And there's always a shock. There's never something you can take for granted. And to be honest, I don't think you will see in the, you can see surprises in the Premier League, but if you compare this season in Denmark,
00:32:17
Speaker
it will mean that what Southampton would be first, two thirds in the league and Nottingham Forest would be third and Man United would be in the bottom half. You don't see things like that in other leagues, but you can see it in Denmark. And it doesn't mean that it's broken or it's wrong. It means that it's healthy. And it means that in Denmark you still have that every given Sunday element, maybe in a stronger sense than you have elsewhere, but it's still a professional league. And if you come here, you feel that it's a professional league. When you go to the stadiums,
00:32:46
Speaker
It's not Sunday football and some leagues probably would be that experienced, but here you can actually feel that it matters and it's worth traveling for. And if you go to Copenhagen this season, you'll see that it's on a level that can compete with most European leagues from a fan perspective, but they're not number one, 20 points ahead. It's still a league where you have to play every Sunday to get your points. And I just love it. I love this league and I love every club that comes up and goes down and
00:33:14
Speaker
You know, the only, the only thing I wish we could avoid once in a while was the bankruptcies because they really damaged your club. But fortunately it's not that often anymore. Yeah. I don't know whether it's recency bias, but is this the highest quality the league's ever been? And I also wanted to find out, given you were around at the start of the super leaguer, how's the league changed over time, whether it's, you know, playing styles, popularity, whatever it might be. It changes all the time. And, but you only notice when you stop and look back.
00:33:41
Speaker
because it feels like a natural flow. I think it's a general thing in football. If you stop and look 10 years back, everything is different except there's 11 players from each team on the pitch. But in the Super League it's probably more than in other leagues when you look at the change. The culture is what changed the most, the professionalism. You ask if it's now the strongest Super League ever.
00:34:02
Speaker
Probably not in a European context, not in an international perspective. But if you look at where we are selling players to, which leagues, it's probably the strongest we've ever been. We're selling now directly to the biggest leagues, which hasn't been, it was always a goal, but it hasn't been a fact for years. It is now. The number of spectators, when the Super League was created, the goal was to have 8,000 people as an average for every game. And everyone was laughing at that. That's not realistic. And now we have 10.
00:34:32
Speaker
So in those terms, Super League has never been stronger. Also, if you look at the professionalism of the 12 clubs, the smallest clubs are much closer to that level that you would hope for than they used to be. So I think in many ways the league is probably the strongest it's ever been. But when I think back at when I started as a TV journalist,
00:34:55
Speaker
in the late 90s or something like that. We used to be able to go in the dressing room with the cameras and do interviews. And I saw people smoking in the dressing rooms. It was completely different world. And it's what 25 years ago. Today, no one would ever say that's possible. So a lot of things change without actually we actually notice that the now that the way the the League Association have very strong
00:35:20
Speaker
demands for teams that you play in the Super League, which means the stadiums have to be up to a certain standard, has to be a lot of facilities for fans, for sponsors. All these things we take for granted, but it's changed so much. It gives the league a completely different impression and level. And it's really been, Super League has been on a huge journey. And I don't see a league around me where the journey has been
00:35:47
Speaker
at the same speed, especially if you look in Norway, Sweden, they're not even close. Yeah. And that professionalism has a trickle down effect. You know, you look at the likes of Helsingor and Viola in the first division, they're run like proper teams in terms of player routines, player fitness, training, all of that stuff, analytics. Yeah, but they're looking, it's important because you're looking into your food chain here. You cannot be just the 12. It has to be a
00:36:15
Speaker
If you want football to live and you want that any given Sunday story, which is so important for us as fans watching the league, you have to have a food chain where miracles can actually happen, where clubs can accelerate through the leagues and make it. So you need to make sure that the next level and the next level are also taking steps in the right direction. We have a license system here when it comes to talent development, academy systems, where even the clubs that don't have that much money and don't have the resources,
00:36:45
Speaker
But there's still a license system for them to improve all the things that they can improve so that talent can also be developed in Helsinki and not just in FC Copenhagen, even if Copenhagen has a lot more money. And so there's a lot of thoughts going into the full picture in Danish football when it comes to the clubs. And I think the work that's been done there by the League Association over the years has been
00:37:09
Speaker
When you look at it now, it's been the absolute right thing to do, and it's been an incredible work. And the clubs that come up in the beginning, you'll feel, oh, there's a lot of demands here. There's a lot of things that we're being asked to do. But there's also a lot of help to get, and everyone makes it. No one is being left behind. So I think it's a model that soon you'll see Sweden and Norway start adapting. Strong sense they'll do that. And it's because it works. It's been a good thing.
00:37:36
Speaker
When you were talking about your career in football, you didn't mention the podcast, but I wanted to ask you, you know, what did you most enjoy about doing football ministerial?
The Impact of Football Ministeria Podcast
00:37:45
Speaker
I think when I look back, because we never really, when we, when we started doing it, we just started doing it. There was never a plan. There was never a business case. There was no, we just, I worked with Lars for all the years in FC Copenhagen. He was the captain and I was handling the media. We knew each other from before.
00:38:02
Speaker
And we always had that idea that when we were not locked down by whoever we were employed by, we would start doing something where we could just talk about it the way we wanted to. And that we always missed. And this is, I should be careful what I'm saying now, because I don't want to step from a colleagues on their toes. But to be honest, the way football media is today and has been for a few years, maybe now it's starting to get better, but for many years.
00:38:30
Speaker
it's always been about the click, it's been about the headline. If you're a football fan and you just want to get to know more about football, it was actually easy before internet like when people like me went to the supermarket and got the newspaper and maybe I didn't care about Argentinian football, but that's what I got that week. And then I read that and I understood that. But today, internet sometimes just makes you
00:38:57
Speaker
more stupid, to be honest, it's become a shouting contest, the media just come clicks. So we were kind of like, where can we do something where people can get to know what we experienced and how we see it and put things that happens now in a perspective of our world, and have a tone that is like we were sitting in a dressing room and just talking like ourselves. And that was the only thoughts behind it. There was nothing more
00:39:20
Speaker
We picked up Stuart, our producer along the way. He was an intern at the place that we started doing it and suddenly he was part of it as well. The format changed as we went along and suddenly we were the most downloaded podcast in sports in Denmark and we never aimed to be. We never understood why but that's just how it ended up. So it was
00:39:48
Speaker
It was a journey for us as well. And it was incredible to understand how many people suddenly had an interest in it. And when you do podcasts and people listen to it, it's not just something you hear, it's something you invite home. And there's a huge amount of trust in that. There's a huge amount of recognition when, let's say, a normal person has four hours a week to spend on that, even when you cut the grass, or you do your gym work, or you go walk the dog, wherever. And then you pick
00:40:16
Speaker
the four hours of company you want. And to be part of those four hours is, for us, it was mind blowing when we understood how much it mattered to a lot of people, how everyone intervened with it when we're walking down the street or last is on TV. And it used to be on the Danish national team for 10 years. And when people stop in the street, the first thing they want to talk to me about is the podcast. So it became something much more than we ever thought it would be. And in the end, it probably also scared us a bit.
00:40:45
Speaker
So we needed a break. Yeah, it's a really interesting point that certain podcasts tend to find their way into certain times of your life. So I have a particular podcast that I listen to always on the school run in the morning. And that becomes part of my day. It's like you invite someone home. It's like, you know, you're part of that company. And when we started, we decided it's just the three of us.
00:41:07
Speaker
At first it was the two of us and then Stu came along. And everyone told us we were mad because people are going to get tired of that. You need guests. You need something new. We went the other way. We said no. People should know what they're getting. And now I see everyone doing it. So with podcasts, it was a new media and no one knew. People thought they knew. But now we know more. There's probably a lot we don't know yet. But when you invite someone home, you want to know who they are.
00:41:36
Speaker
And you want to know which kind of company you're tapping into. People should be very picky with which podcast they listen to for a reason. And apparently a lot of people thought that the three of us was either good company or something you could laugh at. Maybe both.
00:41:54
Speaker
Yeah, and the amazing thing with podcasts, unlike TV or other mediums, is that people vote with their feet, right? You see in real time how many people download and listen to something, and if what you're saying is interesting to them or not. Yeah, and you can see the numbers. Some people count how many times were my podcast downloaded, and that makes sense. If you subscribe, then automatically you download when it comes out.
00:42:17
Speaker
But we always looked at the number, how many listened it through, how many has actually went all the way through it, because that was the only number. We didn't have any commercial interest. We didn't have to care about the numbers. We were just interested in if people actually listened to it. And I think it was 96% of the downloads that actually listened to it, which is a number that I've never heard anyone else have. And that just made us, yeah.
00:42:44
Speaker
It was, and it even reached the UK at some point. It was in Danish, but at some point we were headlined in the UK because of, we did a special where we visited our first legend, a former striker called Søren Anderson, the Mandarin. And he talked about Sean Dyche eating worms, a training. And one of the listeners translated that and sent it to a UK podcast, and then they brought it, and then another podcast brought it.
00:43:12
Speaker
And then suddenly, at that time, Sean Dyche was actually mentioned as a new English national team coach. And he was asked at a press conference in the Premier League about him meeting Williams and it was absolutely mad. Absolutely mad.
00:43:25
Speaker
I fully believe that story is true, by the way. No, it is. If John says it, it's true. He's a legend, remember. That situation aside, what's the craziest football situation you've been in, whether it's an angry manager or something that's gone wrong? What's the craziest place you found yourself?
00:43:45
Speaker
There's been a few and some of them are not funny, but you learn a lot from them. The one that will always stick with me and has just become part of how I see a lot of things, not just work-related, was the time in Northland when one of our players was struck by lightning on the pitch and died there and was
00:44:08
Speaker
Fortunately, he's with us today, but they had to empty check one of his his legs. What we went through in those weeks as a group is something that will never leave you and you learn so much from it. Seeing people strong, some people just fall apart and seeing some rise and take responsibility for the others. And and that all came back to the reason I know that it will never leave me is because last last summer when
00:44:38
Speaker
there was a Euros in Denmark and Christian Ericsson, well, basically died on the pitch as well. It was like a flashback. I was in the stadium and it was like I was back 10 years earlier with Jonas and Richter and I immediately started thinking, as soon as I knew Christian was okay, I started thinking, okay, what happens now? And I went to see the national team the morning after and
00:45:05
Speaker
Kaspar Yumen came to me, he looked me in the eyes and said, you have a flashback yesterday with the owner. And I said, yeah, it's exactly. He felt exactly the same. The leader of the national team in Denmark, as Naka, was also emotional at that time. So there were people there who had an experience. And I believe that was maybe also part of Denmark handling the Ericsson episode so well, is that these guys felt like I felt that they had a knowledge and experience that, um,
00:45:32
Speaker
They had changed the way they look at things and know how to react when you're in a situation like that. You know what can come out of positives. You know what are the dangers. Where should you be aware? Some people look like they're okay, but they're going to crack in a few days because we've seen it happen before. How can you support the person himself? What does he need? What does his family need? Those things are just...
00:45:56
Speaker
That situation is probably the one that changed the most for me as a private person. Of course, work-related, there was a lot to look after. Even Cristiano Ronaldo was contacting us to hear how this play was doing. It was incredible the amount of attention. The football world is a family when it comes down to things like that. You really experience that. It matters. We were getting shirts from everywhere around the world with clubs. I hope so. When he woke up at the hospital in his room, that was about a month later,
00:46:24
Speaker
there were hatreds hanging everywhere in his room from clubs and countries that he never heard about. Everyone just sent him messages. And so I guess he has a pretty good collection today. You want to send if you look it through. But I think that will be the episode for me that stands out as the biggest one, not for, you know, not because it was a World Cup or anything, it was a reserve game. But what came after it and what I learned myself, that will be the one.
00:46:52
Speaker
Yeah. Wow. I can imagine that's, that's incredibly powerful. One of the things you were saying earlier was that, you know, you've been into football since a really early age. Was there a, was there a team that you followed? I know that, I know that you've been drawn to the wrong side of North London, which we didn't know. But that's, that's the funny thing is that I'm a football fan myself and I fully respect and understand what, what everyone thinks and believes and, and
00:47:19
Speaker
It becomes an identity for people. And after the internet came, it's become probably more than just your personal identity. It's something that you shared and then other people connect you with it. And it puts you in a box. And my box has always been top. It's always been. I saw my first first game in 89. The stadium went on a school trip to London in the public school. And then while you go, I think it's in the eighth and ninth grade, you go on a trip with the class. I always was in London.
00:47:49
Speaker
And then Saturday came and I just wanted to watch some football with one of the other boys in the class, Mikkel. And she just said, you can't go anywhere. And Saturday came and we had some hours off, we just left. And we looked in the newspaper, where's the closest stadium? Who's playing? And there was Queens Park Rangers and Tottenham playing at home that day. So we went for Tottenham.
00:48:11
Speaker
And it wasn't more complicated than that. And I went there and it was the old White Hart Lane and Gary Lineker scored. It was against Chelsea at the time. Chelsea was an elevated team going up and down. Paul Gascoigne was carried off, as always. It was 1-1. But that's where it started for me. And I've been following them ever since. And before, like I said, there was no internet. So I was trying to buy books about the club so I could learn more. And there was no internet forum where you could go and share with other people.
00:48:40
Speaker
That's how it started for me, and it's been like that all the time. But when it comes to Denmark, I've been a fan of many clubs, and no one understands that, and people can call other people a club prostitute or whatever they want. But I know from myself that when you're part of a project, you become a fan of that project. It's quite simple. It's the same when you see a player change clubs, and people say, oh, you should be from this club. You can't go to that club, and you will always be a fan of this club. And you can be a fan of more clubs. You can be.
00:49:08
Speaker
But it's hard to understand if you haven't tried it yourself. There are not many clubs in the world who can live up to the expectations that fans of them actually have. I don't think I know any. So if you're a fan of Wampi or Inter Milan or Boca Juniors, if you have a week inside the club, I think you'll learn that it's probably not what you thought. It's not what you hoped. But that's the beauty of being a fan, that you can allow
00:49:36
Speaker
yourself to believe your club is everything you want it to be for the lifelong support you give it. And no club is the same. So for me, it's, it's been a journey when it comes to that. I've loved more than one club in Denmark, and I've never not loved the club that I leave. And fans, most fans cannot understand that. And I'm not
00:49:58
Speaker
trying to un-internet when someone rides in it. It's fine with me, but the only club I ever had a lifelong relationship with was Tottenham, and that's probably because it's the only one of those clubs that I haven't actually been part of and that I haven't seen from the inside, because I don't think many clubs will survive that check from the family.
00:50:15
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. And I think that's part of what I love about Danish football is that I don't have an affiliation in the same way I do with Arsenal in England.
Rivalry and Surprises in Danish Football
00:50:25
Speaker
You can be taken in by the stories, the individual circumstances. At the moment, I'm loving what's happening with Nordsland, loving what's happening with V-Borg. Yeah, and also remember that
00:50:35
Speaker
In England, it's a huge story when a guy comes up like, what was his name, the top school in Leicester? Vadi. Yeah, Vadi. So that was what he used to do. It was brick, some making bricks or something like that. In Denmark, we have those stores everywhere. Baker is becoming close. And, you know, it's just something you can relate to. And there's a lot of local attachments to most clubs here. And what, for me, an important part of the Super League is it unites it more than it separates for me.
00:51:04
Speaker
because our rivalries here are not based on religion or politics like you see in other countries where it's something you can never overcome. It's something that is doomed to be a conflict.
00:51:16
Speaker
Our priorities are built on either geographical things that you're from the same city or the same region or something historical, which I really appreciate because it's not really something that needs to separate to the level where you cannot have a Christmas together if you're in a family or something like that.
00:51:35
Speaker
And for me, that's important. I really appreciate that. We're never further apart than you can work together and have a laugh the day after. And I think that makes it also easier to like the league and to understand the league that it's a welcoming league. It's not something where you have to be either one or the other. Yeah. Certain teams in Italy, like I can think of Inter and Milan both describe each other as cousins. So like there's a healthy rivalry, but it's never to the point where they
00:52:01
Speaker
hate each other and you get people in the same family supporting different teams. I traveled a lot literally because of my wife and I've been to the Derby in Milan and you're right you can have fans of both teams in the stadium. It used to be a political thing but it's not really anymore because it used to be Milan was the
00:52:21
Speaker
the left wing and Inter was the right wing, but then Berlusconi came to Milan and he was the right wing, but they still loved him because they were winning. There is tradition in Milan that separates them. It's not something more, but you have places in Italy where it comes down to politics.
00:52:36
Speaker
and there's nothing you can do. If these teams play each other in the third league, you'll still have a war in the train station. Those are the rivalries that for me is hard to work with because you can never change. It's the same with religion. What are you going to do? It's just football, but it becomes more when that thing is involved.
00:52:54
Speaker
You talked about the closeness between players and fans in the Super League. How much of that do you think is down to the fact that the players in the Super League aren't earning the sort of money that Premier League players are that give them the ability to retire at 30 for the rest of their life? You know, players in the Super League know that, for the most part, when they retire, they still need a career. And do you think that grounds them in a way that makes people connect?
00:53:33
Speaker
A lot of players are now leaving the Superleaguer to have a career abroad, which means they're going to make a lot more money, and it's become a realistic target for most of them. But we spoke about our podcast a little bit ago, and I remember that we wanted guests who were part of that time where Superleaguer was kind of, that's where I'm getting to. Superleaguer is what it is. Some of the players there spent 15 years in the Superleaguer, and that was fine. They spent 15 years in the same club, and that was fine.
00:53:41
Speaker
closer to them?
00:54:03
Speaker
You don't see that anymore in the same way. If you're good enough to play 15 years for the same club, you're probably also good enough to move abroad. And then that's what you're going to do. So I appreciate that time of history with the Super Leaguer in the 90s, probably more than what we see now in that context. But there is still, of course, a strong element in the Super Leaguer that you are closer to the players, even the foreigners that come here.
00:54:30
Speaker
who stay here three years, four years, they still feel that they have to be part of their surroundings. Even if they're very ambitious young men like, let's say, a goalkeeper from Poland, let's say Copenhagen, who has a very ambitious personality.
00:54:49
Speaker
He still connects with the fans. He still understands that he needs to be something for them, whether they like it or not, but he plays a role. I think that's the most important thing in the Super League. Everyone wants to get involved in it. Everyone has a responsibility to play a part in the Super League. You can't just come and sit back and then leave. And I feel even foreign players understand that here. So I think that helps the Super League to maintain
00:55:16
Speaker
that thing that became for me a big thing in the 90s, but still today in some ways still exist. They have to be part of what we like about the Super League. They kind of just take care of their own.
00:55:28
Speaker
Yeah, I hope that can continue for some time, sometimes still. I wanted to ask you about a couple of things that are more recent developments in the Super League, specifically the advent of VAR and the advent of the European playoff, i.e. 7th place playing 3rd or 4th place. What do you think about those two things and have they positively impacted the league?
Effect of VAR and Playoffs in Denmark
00:55:51
Speaker
The thing about the 7th position playoff plays against number 4.
00:55:55
Speaker
I think if you asked me 20 years ago, I would probably be very angry man and start shouting about how unfair it is and that it's not right. But I've also through all the years I worked in football and Denmark, I also realized that it cannot all be perfect. It has to be what's best for the most.
00:56:15
Speaker
And when you look at what this structure we have now has brought, because it's been, to be honest, it's been incredible to see how people react to around 19, 20, 21, 22, because you're reaching the point where you have to separate into top six and bottom six. It's given so much to this league and also the top six playoffs. It prepares the players in a completely different way in their development because you're playing top teams every week.
00:56:41
Speaker
I think it benefits the national team. I think it benefits their potential for a future career in bigger leagues. And if the price I have to pay for that is that once a year, number four plays number seven to get the most kind of kind of say in a nice way, but to get the least important. I mean, because it's really hard to qualify for anything through that
00:57:04
Speaker
ticket, it's the lowest ticket, it's the fourth class ticket, it's not business class, it's behind in the train where you have to fight your way up. If that's the price I have to pay for all the other things, I'm okay with that. Even if it's one year is unlucky for my team or lucky for your team, I'm okay with that. And when four out of five ends up with number four winning against number seven, it makes it easier for me to swallow that pill.
00:57:28
Speaker
So I think, like I said, it's never going to be perfect, but it's probably the right solution for me. When I look at what it's given, it's only that one day a year where you say, okay, maybe if the number seven wins, is that okay? But I think it has given the league a lot to have that system. And if you don't have that playoff, then relegation will, I mean, this year, if Hostens wins the first game against Albo,
00:57:52
Speaker
then why should we watch the rest of the relegation play off? If there's no seventh position to play for. With VAR, I was for it in the beginning, then I had a crisis. Now, I've accepted the fact that it's here. I'm just sorry that it's not being used to its full potential. I still feel that it's not... I was told when it came that it's going to make football more fair, and I still don't feel that, and that's a problem for me, to be honest.
00:58:22
Speaker
One of the things that's dawned on me, particularly seeing VAR at play in the Premier League, I think to an extent it's still true in the Super League too, is that it's being used almost like a goal prevention system rather than its intended purpose. Almost every goal gets checked on VAR now, and I'm not sure that that makes for a good experience for players or for fans.
00:58:45
Speaker
Now, my biggest problem is that I feel it's taken a lot away from the referees. We have to understand, because this is a major foundation in football, is that referee has always been the highest authority in the stadium. It's always been like that. Referee can call off a game. Referee can say the game is not going to be played. Referee is the highest authority. And now we have a system where he can be called out by his teacher to say, maybe you may just come out here and then
00:59:14
Speaker
Basically, he's more or less forced to follow whatever advice he got. If he made a call in the pitch, and if you haven't seen something as a ref, and VAR sees it, that's fine, let's use it. But if the ref seen something and he made a call,
00:59:31
Speaker
then leave it with that, unless it's absolutely wrong. But we've seen a lot of cases where it's been, if not 50-50 and 40-60, and they still call him out because he went for the 40 and not for the 60, but then why do we have a ref? So that's my problem. And then when you see VAR intervening in all these things, and then they still make wrong decisions, that's where I feel we have the biggest problem, that if you cannot trust that they're actually bringing justice, then why should they be there? And I would understand if there are coaches or players or fans
00:59:59
Speaker
that feels it's not bringing full justice. I can understand that. And as long as we have that, I feel it's a problem.
01:00:04
Speaker
I think that's very well put. And yeah, I agree. And I think also to an even greater degree, the linesmen have become redundant. Half the time they don't even flag because they know it's going to be checked. That's now you're getting me started because when you see those offsides and everyone can see there's an offside, especially linesmen that is trained to be on a very high level, it can be a meter offside, but they still leave the flag down because your buy is going to catch it anyway if it was offside. So you let the attack go.
01:00:31
Speaker
And then a player goes for the goal and a defender comes and struggles. What if that defender goes down and tackles the injured in bone? Why are you letting it? Because if you're not whistling, then they have to play that situation till the end. What if the goalie comes out, sprains something or crashes into the player? Why do you leave those situations when you know there's no side? I can't stand it. It's just for me, it's incredible. And it's just, it's at any level. It's not a super leaguer problem. You see it everywhere.
01:00:59
Speaker
It's become kind of a security thing with the VAR, but the linesmen are there to raise their flag when they know there's an offside and it protects the players for a situation that can be dangerous. So, honestly, I'm with you. It's ridiculous. Taking VAR out of the equation, if you could change anything about Danish football, whether it's a rule, whether it's something to do with the stadium experience, if you could change any one thing to make it better, what would you do?
Debate on Changing League Calendar
01:01:29
Speaker
Oh, that's a tough one because I really love the Super League. I really feel that it's moved in the direction where I can relate to most of it. If I should, I would, to be honest, I would consider the calendar year season. It was changed in Denmark many years ago to follow the European leagues because we felt, that was the explanation back then, we felt that it would be better for the European Cup with Danish teams there.
01:01:56
Speaker
At the time, remember, Barnaby was in the semi-final. Change teams were going far. And we were thinking, how can we tweak it so that we get the small advantage? By looking back, I would seriously consider to play a year calendar year. At least try it, at least have the discussion from, let's say, March to October, whatever.
01:02:19
Speaker
to get the best months out of the Danish year. It's really sad that once the weather gets, the nights are longer, the weather is fine, that's where we stop. And then we force matches into snow and frost and shit weather where people have to come to the stadium anyway and the pitches are shit. I think I understand everything, the reasoning behind it is as it is. And I also understand that
01:02:46
Speaker
People are on vacation during the summer and maybe they won't come, but there's lots of people who don't come in the winter as well because there's a snowstorm or because it's just cold. I feel we're missing out on something. And when I look at Sweden and Norway, who still plays calendar year, they're doing better in Europe than we are. So the argument of being better in Europe doesn't really, for me, make sense right now.
01:03:08
Speaker
So it's more of a question what's best for us. And I would like that discussion because I keep feeling in the summer that we could be using these months to something instead of throwing the best months away.
01:03:21
Speaker
Yeah, I think that's a really interesting suggestion. And also it's kind of around the summer when the key moments are happening in terms of European qualifying. And so to be at the point where the teams are well into their season and in their groove at a point where you're playing other teams who have only just begun preseason in many cases, like that could be a big advantage. You look at, we used to say that if we don't play
01:03:47
Speaker
the European calendar, then if Danish teams qualify for Europe over the winter, then we're going to start from nothing and we don't have a chance. But you see Michelin against sports in Lisbon, it's not like they had a huge chance anyway. And Swedish teams, Norwegian teams are actually doing okay after winter breaks. It's true that of course your season is not going well, but
01:04:09
Speaker
you have a lot of time to prepare for that single European match if you want to. So I don't see those arguments anymore as effective as they used to be because when I heard them back then they all make sense. But I just feel now when we actually know what we're talking about, we've tried this for many years now, is it worth having the discussion? I think it is. I think a lot of people, imagine you coming here in the end of June as an Englishman
01:04:35
Speaker
to visit the Super League and you have a day, a full summer and a night where it doesn't get dark before 11. Imagine how you could enjoy that day with your Danish friends going to the stadium and after you go out and it's still warm and it's light. I just feel we're missing out on something that could make Danish football even more special because you wouldn't see those nights anywhere else. I feel we're missing out on something that could be good for everyone else except maybe for the clubs themselves in
01:05:01
Speaker
in whatever strategies they have, but it's not all about them. It's built on what we think as fans. It's built on what we can give and take from that league. And if you as an Englishman are willing to come here, it means that there's something worth traveling for here. So why not fully expand it and do something about it? I think it would be easier for you to bring your UK mates on that trip end of June than it is in March.
01:05:27
Speaker
Definitely true because I've tried both and it's a lot easier to get yeses for the summer. There you go. The MLS obviously have a huge marketing budget to play with but it feels like they're trying to own being the summer league that people can watch when the Premier League La Liga Bundesliga is finished and maybe the Super Liga could could credibly compete in terms of quality if they were to go down that route. You have a point because the Danish league I think is the
01:05:51
Speaker
Second most expensive leak in the world when it comes to TV rights if you mention it from you know How many people we have and so on I think only Premier League is more expensive It's we have an incredible TV deal here and we have it for reason. It's because the league has a strong local and
01:06:05
Speaker
connection. That's why it's worth those money. TV companies don't pay that for fun. It's actually worth it. But the international rights, as far as I remember, has always just been pulled out. It's not like there's a there's a country where Tuesday says we want to buy specifically the Danish League and exclusively have it. So it's kind of pulled out. You can buy highlights or whatever. But the Monday night game
01:06:27
Speaker
which is not very popular in Denmark, but it's at a time where there's no other matches in Europe really. There's a Premier League game that starts after the Super League game is over. So that game has actually had a lot of interest from Asia and wherever because there are no other games to watch at that time if you want to watch football. So I think you have a point. If you played through the summer as the only league or the best league available on that market,
01:06:53
Speaker
It might have a commercial value for the clubs to sell as an international TV right. I think you have a point there, where market has changed throughout the years, where that wasn't relevant 20 years ago. But it is now, and you can see that from the Monday night game, that that has a lot of traction in, for example, Asia. And it might be, I don't know, gamblers or whatever watching it, but it does have interest because there's nothing else if you want to watch football than the Super League again Monday night. The Summer League movement starts here. Yeah, that's what happened here, it started here.
01:07:24
Speaker
I've got one final question. I know you've been very generous with your time,
FC Nordsjælland's League Winning Potential
01:07:27
Speaker
so thank you. But given you're closer to this than most, I wanted to just ask a question about FC Nordsland. And they're obviously top of the league at the moment. Finished ninth last season and sold arguably one of the best two players at the club, perhaps, in Simon O'Dingra. What's been responsible for the turnaround in fortunes? And do you think that even with a managerial change mid-season, even with a big sale in January, do you think there's enough in the tank to bring the title to Faram?
01:07:53
Speaker
I have no doubt that ESN can do what they need to do. What they cannot do is limit the potential in FC Copenhagen. You have to look at that team now and say, how good are they? Can they become better? If they win all their games, even if they don't win, let's say, the two against ESN, they can still be champions in FC Copenhagen. And there's nothing Norton can do about that. But if you're asking me if Norton can have the quality to keep their average of, let's say, two points per game, the answer is yes. I don't see anything there.
01:08:23
Speaker
You can look at all the stats and numbers and say, okay, so they didn't win all their games yet in the spring, but they actually put in the performance that was necessary to win those games. And then you can always talk about marginals and posts and lucky punches from opponents. But as a coach, you have to look at how we're performing. And I think the coaching notion say we are, we can see that maybe even better than in the autumn. So I think Norton has the quality to do it.
01:08:48
Speaker
But they cannot limit FC Copenhagen for having a bigger possibility or bigger potential. They can reach through their coaching staff and the work they do. So I think it's impossible to call now. I think right now, some months ago, people were underestimating Copenhagen and what they could reach. Now they're underestimating what Norshen can do. And that's how we all look at football from the outside. And it's about momentum. And you feel this is definite to happen, but it's not.
01:09:17
Speaker
For me it's a two-horse race, and this weekend there's an important game coming up. But I know how they work there, I know the people working there, and I've never seen anyone being nervous in Northern last season when they were almost relegated. I didn't see anyone doubt the plan, I didn't see anyone starting looking different at each other.
01:09:39
Speaker
And that's the key for success is that you know what you're doing and you believe in it and you keep doing it. And that club knows exactly what it's doing. Fantastic. Well, there's, there's plenty of twists and turns to come in the season, but yeah, really looking forward to the game this weekend. And thank you so much for giving up your time to talk. I loved it. And I, I was honored to be part of this and I just want to, in the end, if I can, I think it's great what you're doing. I love hearing it. And I admire you for doing it and I hope you'll find
01:10:07
Speaker
It's worth for you to do as well that you don't suddenly lose three years of your life and say, what did I do this for the Danish league? But I listened to the first episode you did with Liam who lives here and works with Danish football. And if you listen to that today, if anyone listening to this, haven't done it, I would recommend that you do it because of course he knows Danish football. He works with it. But everything he says in that podcast turns out to be wrong when he guesses. It's incredible. Every single guess yet. And that for me is a super league and a nutshell.
01:10:35
Speaker
that even us who believe we know, we're still surprised. Everything he said, every single point is wrong. Just go and listen to it. I love this. I'm going to go back and listen to it. I know that I predicted Al Borg to finish third. I think he was worse than you, to be honest. Fantastic. Thank you so much and appreciate the kind words and yeah, let's do it again in the future if you have time. I'll be listening until then.
01:11:03
Speaker
If you would like to support the podcast and the website and all the stuff that is going on at Football in Denmark, please head on over to Patreon at patreon.com forward slash Football in Denmark and you can become a Patreon for the price of a coffee a month and that helps keep everything ticking along here at Football in Denmark Towers. A huge thank you to Christian Volme for today and thank you to you for listening. Catch you next time on Danish Dining Mic.