The Athletic

Hello and welcome to the TIFO football podcast.

I'm John McKenzie and I'm joined as I always am by my good friend and producer Mike Zimmerman.

Mike, how are you doing?

I'm so excited for this episode, John.

Yeah, me too.

It's very hot here in the UK.

It's also very hot in the US. We've been comparing our heats and, yeah, arguing about who has it harder. But yeah, when it comes to hot things, the episode itself is what we're most excited about. It's a really good one. We got to talk to George and Ali of the Not the Top 20 podcast about everything outside the Premier League happening in English professional

football. Mike, you listen to that conversation. What did you make of it? Well, this podcast, Antifa

itself has the DNA of diving into really interesting narratives, giving insight into not well-known

topics. Well, this episode does exactly that. We all know that the Premier League

gets all the media coverage and hype, but today we talk about the English Championship,

League 1, League 2, and about those clubs and those stories. Yeah, it's really, really fun.

Loads and loads to get through because it covers 72 teams, and so I think probably the best

thing for us to do is just jump straight in. So the next few voices that you will hear will be George Ehrlich and Ali Maxwell over

the not at the top 20 podcast.

For many of us, it's tempting to equate English football with the Premier League.

But of course, one of the beautiful things about English football with the Premier League, but of course,

one of the beautiful things about league football in England is that you can trace your way down

the pyramid until you get right to the grassroots level, meaning that in theory, any club

could make it to the very top.

And if you do trace your way down the pyramid, you'll find yourself passing through three

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