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Episode 382: Matchday Review: Beating Leicester again!
107 Plays2 days ago
Southampton – We did the very quick double over Leicester and got our name into the hat for the next round of the cup. And we got a good run out for all the academy lads, what more could you ask for?!
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Transcript
Victory Over Leicester and FA Cup Dynamics
00:00:13
DailySaintsPod
Hello and welcome back to the Daily Saints pod. My name is Greg and as always today joined by my good friend and wonderful co-host Zach and mate the winds just keep on coming.
00:00:25
DailySaintsPod
Can we play Leicester every week?
00:00:27
Zak
I don't think Leicester would be too happy with that at the moment, unless they, you know, won nine, was it, early the other day?
00:00:33
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:00:37
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:00:38
Zak
That sure was an FA Cup game.
00:00:42
DailySaintsPod
I would argue that it was exactly how we said in the preview would go.
00:00:47
Zak
What we predicted.
00:00:50
Zak
One of games of all time.
00:00:51
DailySaintsPod
magnitude of changes. Yeah. I think that, I mean, I think it speaks volumes to... It's hard as a championship club to take the cup seriously because the championship is such a competitive league with so many games.
00:01:05
Zak
True.
00:01:11
DailySaintsPod
And realistically speaking, your chances of actually going on to win the cup are not in your favor.
00:01:20
DailySaintsPod
Let's put it that way. Yeah.
00:01:21
Zak
Yeah, they're very here or there, right? Like, you know, considering nowadays you're watching some other sort bigger teams completely cruise past your position.
00:01:24
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:01:30
Zak
Other teams, not so much. Mansfield Town had a good day out.
00:01:34
DailySaintsPod
Yeah. Yeah, I mean, there's been some great results, and that is part of the reason we love the Cup. And if you're a team in that sort of middle bit of the Premier League, I think we said this in the preview, right?
00:01:45
Zak
Hmm.
00:01:55
DailySaintsPod
It's just another game clogging up fixtures and...
00:01:58
Zak
It does very much feel like there was a lot of... Because obviously we recorded our preview before the ridiculously late Tonda-esque classic, oh, damn, I need to do a press conference. Let's just quickly knock one out now, where he tried to prepare for all of the 11 changes we basically prepared, right? which we assumed would happen. But partly, you know, building up the fact that, no, it's not because we don't respect this, because of all the injuries we have and, you know, the fact that all the players have been played on painkillers, which I think does show you how, know, don't there's any reason he'd lie about that. It shows you how congested the fictionalist really does become. So looking at the extremely changed lineup, I wasn't hugely surprised.
00:02:41
Zak
But it was very sluggish game where it took a while for a lot to happen and then not really a huge lot happened.
00:02:49
DailySaintsPod
And I'm sure that what every single one of the 17,000 in attendance wanted on Valentine's Day, Zach, was extra time. That's...
00:02:58
Zak
100%. Yeah, everybody was really, really happy to get extra time. Leicester especially, and then we could rip out the rug from underneath them, where James Bree likes to score as he does in a cup. I think it's the first time he's scored in the FA Cup, but he was like, you know, the unsung hero of our absolutely terrible Premier League campaign, because I very distinctly remember him scoring a really good goal, I want to say in the pink kit.
00:03:24
Zak
Who was it against Cardiff, was it? Somebody? Some really good football.
00:03:28
DailySaintsPod
He scored in, I think it was the third, it was either the fourth and fifth or the third and fourth round of the Carabao Cup. And then he scored the winning penalty, I think also in the Carabao Cup.
00:03:42
DailySaintsPod
So, mean, he just loves a cup gold, doesn't he? Yeah, it was the second round and the fourth round of the Carabao Cup and the winning penalty in the third round at Everton that year.
00:03:54
DailySaintsPod
And now, yeah, the winner in this game.
00:03:56
Zak
Well, he clearly wasn't meant to play.
Impact of Injuries and Player Situations
00:03:59
Zak
It was only because Gillette went down, which kind of puts us in a bit of a crisis if anything happens to Bree at this point, because that's Roroslev now confirmed out basically for the season.
00:04:09
Zak
I think he's just had ACL surgery, which shows really how bad...
00:04:10
DailySaintsPod
Hmm.
00:04:14
Zak
it's been for him. And I do think that it will end up going down as one of those signings where like, we just kind of kind of forget he's here. just feel bad for him more than anything else. That's just really, really bad way to end your season.
00:04:25
Zak
But obviously with Gillette, you know, extending past the 90 minute mark and clearly not being able to manage that, it does potentially leave us with just Bree, who, you know, there was probably a chance we would have never maybe recorded.
00:04:26
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:04:40
DailySaintsPod
Yeah, and I mean, someone that's out of contract in the summer, and if you've seen any of the post-match stuff, the club is aware, but he's out of contract in the summer, which is, mean, specifically ominous, right?
00:04:53
DailySaintsPod
It's...
00:04:54
Zak
Yeah, it really depends, right? From his perspective, now he's come back in and we're doing really, really well. But He went out on loan because clearly we weren't that interested in having him. He struggled for game time last season. He went to Charlton under a manager that, you know, does really, really like him. And according to that manager, whether it's stirring the pot or not, you know, he wanted to stay at Charlton, didn't really want to go back. And if he did, he'd be expecting first team football. And boy, howdy has he been given it.
00:05:25
Zak
But, you know, what's to stop them? What's to stop next season the same thing happening again? Like, Sturowara, they're trying to buy him a discounted price in Germany. So he may be back whether, you know, we like it not.
00:05:41
Zak
Obviously, I don't really think that would displace Bree, to be perfectly honest, at the moment. But it also wouldn't surprise me if he's just like, nah, thank you very much, and off I go. You know, by the sounds of it, like, we probably would have just let him...
00:05:49
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:05:54
Zak
We would probably just let him have his contract down unless we had a bit of a right-back crisis, right? If Roroslav stayed fit... and Gillette stayed fit, and they didn't have these injuries, even if they weren't playing that well, I don't think we'd have brought back, personally.
00:06:08
Zak
And, you know, it's kind of damning indictment to our lack of understanding about Championship football.
00:06:09
DailySaintsPod
Yeah. And it's a shame because he's... It's a shame because he's proved that he's one of the most important pieces of the puzzle at the moment. So, don't know. I'm sure that we'll...
00:06:24
DailySaintsPod
follow that story as it sort progresses through the remainder of the season. never know, maybe we'll just get, like, happy days. This is the perfect opportunity to announce that Bree's renewed for three years or whatever.
00:06:36
DailySaintsPod
So, I don't know. Keeping the ball rolling and that, I suppose. But, I mean, other good stuff to come out of the match.
00:06:42
Zak
sure.
00:06:43
DailySaintsPod
Like, we've been a bit down on it, but, I mean, apart from, know, having to take it to extra time, kind of feels like... a win-win-win, right?
00:06:51
DailySaintsPod
Ariel Romelu raised from the dead and got 60 minutes in on the pitch. That's great.
00:06:56
Zak
Necromancer's working hard to bring him back. He pretty did right. I remember him putting in a lot of defensive blocks, which means that if maybe controlled the midfield a bit better, it wouldn't have had to have been defensive blocks.
00:07:04
DailySaintsPod
Hmm.
00:07:08
Zak
But it meant that he put in defensive blocks, which previously seemed to have a little bit more fitness.
00:07:11
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:07:13
Zak
He managed 60 minutes, which considering... You know, he's been out for a while. I'm quite surprised. And that was kind of nice. Adozi had a really solid game. Again, like really, really good at running the ball up.
00:07:26
Zak
Just really bad at not making sure it stays in.
00:07:29
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:07:32
Zak
But he also won the penalty.
00:07:32
DailySaintsPod
That's not new though, is it? But that's also something that hopefully you can coach a player to do.
00:07:34
Zak
So...
00:07:37
Zak
Train out, right?
00:07:38
DailySaintsPod
Right, yeah. But, you know...
00:07:39
Zak
More experience, more exposure...
00:07:41
DailySaintsPod
It's nice to see him getting minutes and getting back in. And like we said, Leo is so important to the team on that sort of left-hand side. Having, frankly, a fairly explosive option in a doze is great.
00:07:55
Zak
Yeah.
00:07:58
DailySaintsPod
I mean, we scored a penalty, so that's better than normal as well,
Penalty Success and Academy Players
00:08:03
Zak
Well, to be fair, Arma wasn't taking it. And that's Lahren's second goal, so two out of three, which then doubles his tally to his time spent at Feyenoord.
00:08:03
DailySaintsPod
right?
00:08:05
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:08:11
Zak
So... pretty good you know admittedly like he had a shot at goal without having to do much but at the same time we've also seen what happens with a couple of our players with penalties and again that was one by a dozy
00:08:13
DailySaintsPod
Yeah. Yeah.
00:08:23
DailySaintsPod
Yeah. I mean, our top goal scorer and the top goal scorer in the league had like a 50% miss rate on penalties this season. So I think we can chalk it up as a win.
00:08:33
Zak
yeah no 100 yeah
00:08:37
DailySaintsPod
Cam Bragg with a man of the match performance as well is great to see.
00:08:40
DailySaintsPod
Just showing why he's sort of, you know, making his marking and being around the first team and another piece of quality coming through. It's great, isn't it, to have that midfield and have enough depth in that midfield.
00:08:56
DailySaintsPod
That's the, I would say, our strongest position at the moment, right?
00:09:00
Zak
Yeah, for sure.
00:09:00
DailySaintsPod
Can Bragg, Charles, Flynn Downs, Yander, yeah, Romelu, Williams, yeah.
00:09:05
Zak
Caspi and Williams came on for his second game. So yeah, it was pretty solid for where we've been.
00:09:12
DailySaintsPod
That's great. It's all good stuff, mate. You know, we did the job. Thoughts on Leicester's gold that's been described truly spectacular?
00:09:23
Zak
Ballkeeper should have done better.
00:09:24
Zak
I mean, it's always fun to see any sort of level of bicycle kick, right? So it's always going to, you know...
00:09:30
Zak
I saw an attempt at a bicycle kick in a J League game was watching today, mate, and, like, went straight to the keeper's hands. So if it come off, it'd be incredible. And that's kind of where it feels with, you know... wasn't like it was put with such power in the corner and it completely, like, took off the hands of George Long.
00:09:47
DailySaintsPod
Yeah, it's not like Rudy-esque, is it?
00:09:47
Zak
It was just...
00:09:49
DailySaintsPod
But it was an overhead kick and it did go in, I suppose,
00:09:51
Zak
Yeah, and you've got to give them credit for, know, I'm not trying to say they're too much of a charity case considering, you know, the level that Leicester wanted to put us to the sort the other day. But, you know, one of the cup they had like a 17-year-old come off for like, you know, as like a starter. So they were pretty struggle-busting through that game with the players they had and, you know,
00:10:13
Zak
It gave the away fans at least something to enjoy. But unfortunately, did drag us to extra time where I expected them to want to put the game to bed. And in actuality, what we did was put the entirety of the academy because with the whole, we don't really care if we lose this ethos, that seemed to very much the case, right? Yes, okay.
00:10:34
Zak
Benazza's first team player came on the 75th minute. for Archer, who I don't want to talk much about him. bit anonymous. Missed an absolute sitter from a really good board as well.
00:10:48
Zak
Okay. I'm
00:11:04
DailySaintsPod
How did he put it wide?
00:11:06
Zak
it's a bit of a struggle, isn't
00:11:07
DailySaintsPod
Talk about, like, when you're down, you're down, and these things just don't go your way. man, like that.
00:11:12
Zak
You can't get given better opportunity than that, right? I think is the problem.
00:11:17
Zak
And, know, know there'll be some sides that's like, oh, need to support him and get behind him. But also it's like, where we are league position, the time we have left to try and get to the playoffs and, you know, was an opportunity without as much pressure,
00:11:45
DailySaintsPod
Mm-hmm.
00:11:46
Zak
So yeah, really like down and out for the moment. And again, I don't know, there were rumours knocking around that he was incredibly disappointed that his move to Rangers collapsed.
00:11:56
Zak
And like, I don't know what was said behind the scenes by the club, considering we've had a little bit of information from those that have come back and gone, such as Bree, who said like, yeah, it was fine, apart from the fact that no one told me anything.
00:12:12
Zak
And I very much feel like that's probably been similar situation here. I don't know they sat down with him and said, if Armstrong goes to Wolves, this entire move collapses and we keep you.
00:12:22
Zak
Or, like, that was being discussed about in the media and we were, like, aware of it, and behind the scenes they didn't think that was going to be the case, right? Who really knows?
00:12:32
Zak
But, like, either way, it's going to do something to your psyche, and then clearly that's had an effect on the field more than it probably should have.
00:12:37
DailySaintsPod
For sure.
00:12:40
Zak
And I don't really know what you do to fix it, like maybe give some time out in the under-21s, but would you take that as an insult? Really, don't know, because they need something else, but the same time, like,
00:12:53
Zak
Kourne came on and a pretty okay cameo performance, didn't think of a goal. But again, that was like all of the academy players were brought on. Do you give him a run out from A.U.
00:13:03
Zak
in the under-21s, get him scoring some goals in PL2 and go from there? I don't really know what you'd do, to be honest.
00:13:12
DailySaintsPod
Yeah, I don't know either.
00:13:13
Zak
It's a difficult situation.
00:13:13
DailySaintsPod
I mean, you kind of feel like... I know. You kind of feel like if Laren and Stuart between them have enough fitness to make 90 minutes, that would be the play in the first team.
00:13:28
DailySaintsPod
So... Yeah.
00:13:29
Zak
If he's supposed to offer something different at the moment, it's like something different is us not going to, like us definitely not scoring, right?
00:13:37
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:13:37
Zak
And that's the problem. And, you know, I don't know if it's just a matter of confidence. And like we've seen him scored some good goals. And I think we chatted about some statistics and you said like the statistics don't really make sense.
00:13:48
Zak
Don't make sort of good viewing, but also, you know, when you count five minutes off the bench as an appearance, as a full appearance, that's a problem. It's the same thing we actually discussed about Kyle Lahren before in our profile episode about him.
00:13:57
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:14:00
Zak
It's, yeah, okay, he's had X, amount of appearances. Same with his appearances this year for Feyenoord, right? And then how many of those have been five-minute cameos, you know?
00:14:06
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:14:08
DailySaintsPod
That's it, right? It's the context that's important. But that said, we have seen in four or five games across the course of this season, Tuesday and Saturday included, that he's had games where he's been able to start and not really had the impact that you'd want for one reason or another. And, you know, like say, sometimes he's been hard done by by just not...
00:14:34
DailySaintsPod
playing the way that's going to suit his strengths, but... But also, it's really difficult. And it's such a position on the pitch that's so entirely based on confidence. I don't see any way to build his confidence back up.
00:14:50
DailySaintsPod
At this point, it's such a struggle. Aside from one just bouncing off him and going in, but you just feel like nothing's going for him at the moment. And it's such a tough thing when...
00:15:02
DailySaintsPod
We're now heading to the stage of the season where every game is... We talked about every game being basically a six-pointer, right? So...
00:15:10
Zak
Yeah, and I'd also point out, like, the Scottish Premiership isn't, know, an absolute walkover. Like, you can tell by the fact that Russell Martin thought he'd walk in with his tactics and get, like... I know that you might, you know, shrug... You know, you might put your eyebrows up at it, mate, at the same time, to put him into those teams, you know, put star striker, in a team that currently is, like, essentially pushing to... You know, they're currently second.
00:15:36
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:15:37
Zak
If you then have a, you know, if you then have a striker that's firing blanks come in, it could have ended up being worse for him. But I don't really know.
00:15:45
Zak
I just feel bad to the guy.
00:15:59
DailySaintsPod
It's just... Yeah, something... don't know. It's a shame, but
Defensive Struggles and Apathy Towards FA Cup
00:16:04
DailySaintsPod
I don't know what the answer is.
00:16:04
Zak
Yeah, it wasn't a... Either way, it wasn't the performance we guessed we hoped for that would be in the FA Cup, right?
00:16:10
DailySaintsPod
No.
00:16:13
Zak
It wasn't the most ideal situation. But there was some other good performance to self-spare, right? Like Raji said, Rene, think Khorchi struggled a little bit.
00:16:19
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:16:23
Zak
Bazzi struggled probably more. I think it was just a very physical battle and kept losing it. It's not really his fault, but it just happened to be of the things I picked up. I've been out of practice a little bit, not really with, you know, not been partnered with one in a while.
00:16:40
Zak
So I'm not really surprised. But other than that, Manning had an all right game, apart from picking up a card towards the end. But, you know, considering, especially with, from what we were told, Wellington is out with an injury.
00:16:52
Zak
So it wasn't just like a knock. I think that's slightly worrying because if he's picked up something bad again, it might be in the victory man again Saturday. And I don't know if I'd be devastated by that, but we know that he has been one of the places that defensive frailty has, you know, taken hold.
00:17:12
DailySaintsPod
Yeah, we definitely looked
00:17:12
Zak
But he's right to come on towards the end, right?
00:17:30
DailySaintsPod
It's not like he is always the problem, right, that's caused the goals.
00:17:33
Zak
No, not at all.
00:17:34
DailySaintsPod
So, mean, it is what it is, and at least we've got a full week of recovery before we have to... think about it too much heading into the next game.
00:17:45
DailySaintsPod
What about Matski? Matski, nice for him to get more minutes. Seems like he is going to be player more in the mix going forward.
00:17:54
Zak
He had a really good game. And this is the kind of stuff that when we covered him in our profile that I was talking about, he was definitely capable of. And the problem is, you sometimes need a little bit more than two, three minutes to show that.
00:18:06
Zak
And this is why brought him back from Gestepi, right? It's clearly has the ability to be in and around the first team. And he's showing it. And that's just really, really nice to see. For me, it's finally
00:18:15
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:18:17
Zak
good part of the multi-club model coming into show, even though he was always a Saints player, right? And it could have been, know, just gets lost in Gestepi and we never saw anything good from it.
00:18:32
Zak
But instead, he had a good season there, come back into a strong season with us. And, you know, he just seems to be getting better and sort being played in different positions and he seems to kind of manage to play wherever he's been asked to play, which is quite nice as well.
00:18:47
Zak
But, you know, him getting some solid minutes as well. Again, almost a fully rotated side, pretty much what we expected to see.
00:18:50
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:18:53
Zak
You thought Azaz would start. I was relatively sure he wouldn't. I was right. Azaz did come on later on, though. He had a little bit of a cameo. I say cameo, you know, solid 50 minutes you add on at a time. So I guess more than a little bit of a cameo.
00:19:10
Zak
would have been nice to see him maybe score maybe get his confidence in goal scoring up a little bit other than that the rest of the story is going be the fact that we had what like how much of our academy on the pitch by the end of the game again like in a weird point of like when we expected us to maybe bring on some first team players and try and win it in the 90 what actually happened was I remembered that our bench barely had any first team players and instead they just brought on the entirety of the academy and fair play to them because between it they won like you know
00:19:33
DailySaintsPod
Yeah, great.
00:19:37
DailySaintsPod
Yeah, look, that's great.
00:19:37
Zak
There some names on that bench that I did not know about, Greg.
00:19:38
DailySaintsPod
Look, it's...
00:19:41
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:19:41
Zak
I'm not going lie.
00:19:43
DailySaintsPod
Look, it's great. It's great that that is the case because... Look, we talked about the rest the season, how important it is. And it's going to be important for a lot of those players on the pitch, not just the 11 that played on...
00:19:58
DailySaintsPod
on Tuesday because it's a lot of games left like fitness and rotation is going to be a thing and it's nice for a lot of these players to put the game away and get a win under the belt and you know get more minutes in them and feel that confidence and you know it's another win which keeps the momentum going that's what three and four now So, you know, things are starting to look good. Things are on the up.
00:20:27
DailySaintsPod
And, you know, we're in the hat on Monday and can look forward to some awful away day, I'm sure, because that's just how the cookie crumbles, right?
00:20:40
Zak
One more year Liverpool.
00:20:44
DailySaintsPod
Yeah. And...
00:20:47
Zak
Let's do it again.
00:21:02
DailySaintsPod
Especially so many more games and you play in midweek and then you've got to throw these Cup games about as well. But like, I don't know if you... Obviously, we had a drastically lower attendance yesterday than we've seen.
00:21:13
Zak
Yeah, for sure. Well, you didn't go, did you?
00:21:15
DailySaintsPod
And, you know,
00:21:17
Zak
I didn't go, so...
00:21:20
DailySaintsPod
we alluded to the club sending out emails about what can we do to get you to go to club cup games.
00:21:20
Zak
that was even with cheap tickets.
00:21:27
DailySaintsPod
And don't know if you saw on social media, there was a photo doing the rounds of the Fulham family taken at Stoke, where it looked like they had a grand total of about 65 people present for their FA Cup fixture.
00:21:49
DailySaintsPod
Or is there something deeper to it than that?
00:21:51
Zak
I think it's a...
00:21:51
DailySaintsPod
Is it now that it's all on TNT, it's not as, like, present in our minds because it's not on, like, the free channels and the free games?
00:21:58
Zak
It should be.
00:21:59
DailySaintsPod
You don't have much the magic?
00:21:59
Zak
I think it should be significantly more accessible, right? Like, I think it's a bit a joke that they're trying to treat it like it's just another commodity to be sold.
00:22:03
DailySaintsPod
Hmm.
00:22:07
Zak
And I think...
00:22:08
DailySaintsPod
Well, it's worth mentioning before you get too deep into it, mate. I couldn't even find the highlights initially because they didn't call it highlights. They called it key moments. Like, absolute utter woke nonsense is that?
00:22:18
Zak
Well, they...
00:22:20
DailySaintsPod
Like...
00:22:23
Zak
No, I do remember you complaining to me about that. But it is, yeah, just, I don't know if that's necessarily the case. But also, when you've got teams like even us chucking out our B team, when you're chucking a B team out of a B team, like, the attendance of the under-21s is going to be significantly lower, right? The only time I've ever seen a big under-21s is when we played Real Madrid's under-21s. Right. That's it. Even that wasn't, you know, it wasn't out of the stadium. And then if you're a Premier League team, you know, you've said that, yeah, OK, it slightly matters more. But then if you are like, don't know, a championship club that's struggling and you get put up against or struggling with the amount of games you've got, you're put up against a Premier League team that is probably going to have a bench that can just absolutely demolish you.
00:23:07
Zak
Is anyone really going to want to go and see that? Like, you know, lower league teams, like, yeah, they'll get behind their team because, you know, they'll throw out their best 11 because usually some of those clubs have 11 players and that's basically it.
00:23:18
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:23:19
Zak
Right? Like, this is Phil.
00:23:20
DailySaintsPod
Well, that's the magic and the...
00:23:21
Zak
He's also a plumber. Like...
00:23:22
DailySaintsPod
And that's also, like, the magic and the story of the Cup, right? Like, if you're in League 1 or League 2 and you get, like, a big... Or, you know, even the non-league teams, get a big historic day out massive club to cheer on your team.
00:23:35
DailySaintsPod
That's fantastic. That's excellent. If you're a championship club, especially, like, a recently relegated championship club, like, an away day at a Premier League team is not, like, a big fantastic day out, is it?
00:23:46
DailySaintsPod
It's like, ugh. Really though, especially think is it the next round that is a midweek fixture anyway? you really want to do a big away day on a midweek game?
00:23:57
Zak
it's not even that. It's just like the, it's the oversaturation of it, right?
00:24:00
Zak
Like if you're going to have that many games, it's a game that a lot of people can go, well, actually I want to go go and take like the kids to like the park this weekend. This is a game I could probably afford to not watch or go to, or like, actually this is a weekend I can ignore. Oh, it's only the cup.
00:24:16
Zak
And then, like, people will turn around and get really defensive about it.
00:24:17
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:24:19
Zak
But at the same time, like, a lot of the people that I've seen that get quite defensive are also the ones that just, like, won't bother because it's the FA Cup. Or people will go to this game who usually won't go because it's slightly cheaper.
00:24:30
Zak
And, you know, it's quite a quieter experience.
00:24:30
DailySaintsPod
Yeah, that's great.
00:24:32
Zak
And that is also great. But I don't know. I think a combination of things. Like, ultimately, who ends up winning it? It was like, yeah, okay, last year, it's nice to see Palace win it, right? But still a Premier League team against another Premier League team.
00:24:42
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:24:44
Zak
Yeah. That's the other problem. If Liverpool can throw, if Man City can throw a billion pound bunch of players your nothing squad, the outcome is going to be 90% the time.
00:24:55
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:24:55
Zak
I think that more than anything, it's the complete amount of golfs. You want to switch things up? Have a rule so that top Premier League clubs can only play most of their second tier players.
00:25:05
Zak
Something like that. Mix it up a little bit, you know? But then they already have cups like that.
00:25:07
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:25:09
Zak
So then the problem is you don't want to mess with the integrity of what the competition means. But I think that that's already happened by the fact that it's being broadcast now pretty much exclusively on American channel anyway.
00:25:19
Zak
It's what it is, isn't it?
00:25:19
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:25:22
Zak
I just think that it's just not as in the zeitgeist.
00:25:23
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:25:26
Zak
And I think with the more games that you have across the board, across the clubs now, and the fact that there's a desire for that,
00:25:32
DailySaintsPod
Hmm.
00:25:34
Zak
The cup is either a place to go when you want to go because it's cheap, a game to go to because it's slightly calmer, or if you're somebody that consumes every piece of Saints content like we do, yeah, of course, we'll watch it.
00:25:48
Zak
But at the same time, it's like, do I care? Not as much because of exactly the reasons you pointed out, which I'm not repeat. So, yeah, I do think, though, that there is part of it that kind of dies. I think early rounds are significantly more fun.
00:26:04
Zak
And then once you get to sort of the end where it's like our great and away day to Liverpool again, woo.
00:26:11
DailySaintsPod
You're absolutely right. I'd be 100%, you know, first of all, like, I pay a lot money for my season ticket, right? And on top of the season ticket, it costs me £6 a time to park, plus petrol, plus drink and food at the ground, right? Like, it's not like it's a free day out and it's not season ticket. And then if you add a cup game into that, sure, the tickets were the minimum they could charge this time around, and that's great. And it was a couple of quid for kids, and I think it was £15 for adults. But I'm still looking at £50, £60 for the day out if I had elected to go this time around. And I'd be more excited, genuinely more excited and more willing to spend that if we had drawn someone like...
00:26:56
DailySaintsPod
you know, like Grimsby or, or like Mansfield, right? That's like an exciting draw. That's got bit of cup magic to it. I'm far more likely to attend a fixture like that than, mean, literally the team that we were supposed to play on this day in the league anyway, different venue, right? It's,
00:27:22
Zak
that also definitely took away from it as well. Like we'd won such a historic victory. It didn't really matter what the next result was. It'd be nice if we got a win, but clearly Tonda felt that way as well. Or otherwise, you know, for us, the shining part of it is the fact that a bunch of academy players got running, right?
00:27:38
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:27:46
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:27:47
Zak
To be fair, it could be both, but yeah, just wasn't.
00:27:49
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:27:51
Zak
it wasn't thrilling and it's it's i think it's just a struggle when it gets to this big and maybe you know maybe they got to figure out a way to try and make it more fair but at the same time that ruins the cup magic so so what do you do i just think that it will continue as the status quo goes for the foreseeable to be perfectly honest but you're right i don't think people care about as much and i think that putting it as part of your season ticket would make would also make a huge difference uh but you know
00:28:08
DailySaintsPod
Yeah. No, I just...
00:28:18
Zak
then they won't get the extra revenue from people paying separately to attend.
00:28:18
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
00:28:22
Zak
So it swings roundabouts, isn't
00:28:22
DailySaintsPod
Yeah.
Listener Engagement and Future Content
00:28:24
Zak
it?
00:28:24
DailySaintsPod
You're right. If it was included in my season ticket, I would have gone and I'd have still moaned about it. there go.
00:28:28
Zak
Yeah, exactly.
00:28:34
DailySaintsPod
Right, that's just about all we've got time for, mate. But look, another win. The positive energy and momentum keeps going. The high-energy train of results heading into the running of the season where we look up, hopefully, and look up at where we're going.
00:28:53
DailySaintsPod
And, yeah.
00:28:53
Zak
Good run out for the academy as well, which is always something nice to hear. See, good goal for Laren, good goal for Bree. You know, minutes in the bank for Dozie, Romay and that lot.
00:29:04
Zak
And a double over Leicester in less than a couple of days. So, what can you ask for, you know?
00:29:08
DailySaintsPod
Yeah, and a triple over Leicester in the season, right?
00:29:11
Zak
Yeah, there you go.
00:29:11
DailySaintsPod
That's, yeah.
00:29:14
Zak
Happy days.
00:29:14
DailySaintsPod
Unfortunately for Leicester, they, without even playing in the league, drop into the relegation zone. So not a great week from that side of the turnstile, but there we go.
00:29:27
Zak
but Greg, they want nine.
00:29:31
DailySaintsPod
Indeed. All right. Well, look, that is all we've got time for. So thank you, Zach, as always, for joining me. And thank you, everyone, for listening. Let us know your opinions. How excited are you to be in the next round of the FA Cup? Let us know who you would like to draw. We are Daily Saints Pod everywhere on all of the social media. X, Blue Sky, TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, everywhere. Hit us up.
00:30:00
DailySaintsPod
Let us know how you're feeling and while you're there, why not drop a like and a subscribe? It goes a long way to help and we love hearing from you. We will be back tomorrow to talk some more Saints and football goodness. But until then, hope you'll have a wonderful day and we'll see you then.
00:30:28
Zak
Liverpool away, away, away.