72+: The EFL Podcast
Football Daily
BBC
4.3 • 4.6K Ratings
🗓️ 7 August 2025
⏱️ 47 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Aaron Paul, Jobi McAnuff, Tommy Smith and Alex Bruce preview the 2025/26 Championship season, which kicks off this weekend.
Are Ipswich Town the best positioned, newly relegated, side to be promoted straight back up? What are Leicester City and Southampton’s main concerns?
Charlton Athletic manager, Nathan Jones, joins the pod after his side won promotion to the second tier via the League One play-offs. He shares how he thinks his side are progressing.
Wrexham have made statement signings this summer, can they go for an unprecedented fourth successive promotion? And what about similarly ambitious recruiters, Birmingham City?
BBC Radio Sheffield’s Rob Staton brings us up to date with the financial and ownership situation at Sheffield Wednesday. What hope is there for their fans? And for the other half of the city; what next for Sheffield United after their failed play off campaign?
Elsewhere in the league, who are the other contenders for having an impressive season?
Plus, the panel make their second picks in the 72+ Ultimate All-time EFL XI.
TIMECODES: 3:21 The chances of the teams newly relegated from the Premier League 15:39 Charlton Athletic manager Nathan Jones 21:12 Can Wrexham keep dreaming? 25:21 Are Birmingham City carrying enough momentum to stay up? 26:45 Birmingham City manager, Chris Davies, audio 30:04 What’s the latest from Sheffield Wednesday? 39:10 What next for Sheffield United? 40:54 Who are the other contenders for a strong season? 44:06 Ultimate All-time EFL XI
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, music, radio, podcasts. |
| 0:05.5 | On the Football Daily, 72 Plus, the EFL podcast with Aaron Paul and Jobie McEnough. |
| 0:13.3 | Hello and welcome to 72 Plus, the home of the EFL from Five Live Support right here on the Football Daily with me, Aaron Paul. |
| 0:19.6 | Looking ahead to the 2025, |
| 0:22.1 | 2026 championship season and we're joined by the former Huddersfield captain Tommy Smith. |
| 0:26.5 | Smudge, welcome back to 72 plus of the season. A bit weird without a preseason. |
| 0:31.5 | A little bit strange, as yeah. I won't lie. It's been a bit, it's been difficult. |
| 0:35.2 | Certainly from a mentality point of view, obviously, first season out of the game, preseason out of the game. So yeah, a little bit of adjusting to do, but glad to be back here with yourself and obviously our guest today. I'm looking forward to another classic championship season. Can't wait. All change at Salford City in the boardroom, but not on the bench. He is firmly. |
| 0:55.6 | It got his cheeks in the groove on that seat. |
| 0:58.0 | Alex Bruce, Salford City first team coaches with us. |
| 1:01.0 | How's the summer been? |
| 1:01.9 | Summer's been great, loved it. |
| 1:03.1 | Had a great time in Portugal with the family and I had a few days in Ibiza with the |
| 1:08.1 | misses and some friends. |
| 1:09.7 | And back to it now with a bang. |
| 1:11.7 | Obviously we were disappointed last week with the first game of the season against crew. |
| 1:14.9 | We had a difficult start. |
| 1:16.6 | Missed a penalty in the first five minutes, |
| 1:18.1 | which is never a good thing in the game and it affected us. |
| 1:21.6 | But hopefully we can bounce back against Knox County on Saturday. |
| 1:26.2 | Also with us a man so committed to the NFL, he got it shaved into the side of his head. Welcome back. Joby Wackenoff. I do need to give a little bit of context to getting EFL shaved in my head. So every season we try and come up with a bit of a promo vid and it started a few years ago. Ended up at a theme park and one that hadn't been to since I was probably about 12 or 13. Really, really good, I've got to say. But we had to try and say lines going around this roller coaster and by about the 7th or 8th time, you can imagine it got a little bit tricky when we're feeling a bit sick. The next year, it was like, right, what can we come up with with now and I said to the guy who's sorting it |
| 2:02.2 | all out listen as long as it doesn't involve a shark tank I'm pretty much down for whatever |
... |
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