The Athletic.

Hello and welcome to the TIFO Football Podcast.

I'm Joe Devine, and I'm joined now by John McKenzie.

Hi, John.

Hello.

We're also delighted to be in the studio.

No Seb today, no remote Seb as a result of the technical issues that we had last week. But if anything, it's a blessing because in Seb's place, it's Liam Toomey of the Athletic. Hi, Liam. Hello. How are you doing, all right? Trying to enjoy a rare hours respite from news, hopefully, we'll see. Well, you know, if any news happens, you've got your phone. It's fine. In fact, it might cause a nice dramatic effect if you were to walk out halfway through. Pretend you're speaking to Graham Potter's agent or something. That would be a very exciting exclusive for the TIFO football podcast. We're not used to them here. But if you like exclusives, that was good. You should get The Athletic. Visit theathletic.com forward slash Tifo. Theathletic.com forward slash Tifo for all the world's exclusives. What's the best exclusive you've ever had at The Athletic, Liam? Oh, blimey. On the spot immediately. I'm going to lean into type. We do a bit on our podcast where I'm supposed to be a massive fan of kai havert's i'm going to say

doing an interview with kai havers breaking down aspects of his game using y-scout

nice was he nice guy yeah yeah it's very normal guy it was via zoom though unfortunately during

covid but um yeah he was very good i read he loves birds the animal he loves a lot of animals

does he yeah he's um he's got dogs he's got his own dogs right me yeah and any other

similarities between you and kai both left-footed oh okay yeah he's a bit taller than me but

a little bit other than that both good in tight spaces. You're unsure of your position on a football field, your best position on a football field. Yeah, but everyone's sure they have to have me out there. They just don't know where. Yeah, he loves horses, I think, as well. Right. Well, who doesn't love horses? Anyone here?

I'm not the biggest fan of horses, but I'm not an enemy of the horse either. Horse agnostic? Yeah, I think so. Well, you know they exist, but... John McKenzie, not an enemy of the horse. But if you want to read high-quality football writing, then you should visit The Athletic. Please do that. please please please do that I will leave you now

and the warm hands and the cool

embrace of the dog-owning Liam Toomey. Right, let's begin, shall we with Graham Potter, because of course, since we spoke last, Thomas Tugel has lost his job at Chelsea we'll come on to

talk about him a little bit later at Graham Potter was very swiftly anointed the new Chelsea

manager Liam almost as though there had been plans before Tugel had lost his job almost

almost we we weren't aware of them obviously before news of Tuchel Sacking broke.

But in the course of making calls and putting together our big long read on Tucal Sacking,

it became quite clear to us that the wheels have been in motion with Potter for a few weeks

and that when Chelsea were looking at Mark Koukorea from Brighton

...