Spurs or Forest to go down? And what will Arsenal win?
The Game
The Times
3.2 • 1.5K Ratings
🗓️ 16 February 2026
⏱️ 61 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Spurs and Forest have rolled the dice again...but will Igor Tudor or Vítor Pereira have the desired effect?
Is either appointment on merit, or a reflect of clubs who don't know who they really want? Will the instability mean a player exodus at either club come the summer?
Which club should be more worried, Forest or Spurs?
Was VAR so bad after all...well yes says Gregor robertson but many think the mistakes at the weekend - without VAR - are the bets advert for its continued use.
Arsenal are still in four competitions...what, if anything, will they win?
Gary Jacob, Gregor Robertson and Alyson Rudd join Tom Clarke
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hello and welcome to the game football podcast from The Times and Sunday Times. |
| 0:08.6 | Igor Tudor is Tottenham's interim manager until the end of the season and Vito Pereira is back |
| 0:13.8 | in the Premier League tasked with making sure Nottingham Forest avoid relegation as this season |
| 0:18.8 | just keeps delivering slightly mad storylines. |
| 0:21.7 | Speaking of Mad, we've gone one weekend without VAR and now lots of big names in the game |
| 0:25.6 | wanted to stay and brought in earlier in the FA Cup. |
| 0:28.9 | And also on today's show, we'll look ahead to a couple of big midweek games, including |
| 0:32.5 | Arsenal's trip to wolves. |
| 0:34.4 | I'm Tom Clark, and joining me today, we have the senior sports writer and Sunday Times columnist Alison Rudd, the football reporter who covers clubs in London with a particular focus on Arsenal. It's Gary Jacob and the former football return journalist. Gregor Robertson is here as usual. What a week. Alison, the last time we were on this podcast, me and you, Thomas Frank was still Topman manager. Frank out. Dish gone. New deal for Thomas Tuchel snuck in there as well. Greg, I only took a couple of days off. It's all madness. Absolutely madness. Left me to deal with it all. Yeah, I know. And deal with Martin Samuel and Tony Cascarino as well. That's hard enough. So lots of, lots to update us on and lots to catch up on over the weekend as well. Let's start with Tottenham and their new interim manager, Igor Tudor, in. Alison, first, your reaction to their decision about getting rid of Dear Thomas Frank. Dear Thomas, sir. Yeah. I didn't know whether to ask it at the end or get it out of the way early. But it was the subject of your Sunday Times column saying that he should now, despite a disastrous period as Tottenman manager, be the most sought-after manager in football. Is that right? Well, I first thought, I would like to point out that I was commissioned. I was commissioned to write it. I was commissioned to write it. |
| 1:44.4 | I didn't volunteer it. |
| 1:45.5 | No, but you are chief... |
| 1:46.5 | Like some obsessive. |
| 1:47.4 | You are chief executive of the Thomas Frank fan club. |
| 1:49.8 | That's all we should say. |
| 1:50.7 | But I was commissioned to write it. |
| 1:52.2 | Yes. |
| 1:52.6 | I was asked to write it and I wrote it. |
| 1:55.4 | And my main point, which I think is incredibly valid and insightful, |
| 2:04.8 | is that the main objections to Thomas, |
| 2:09.0 | or worries when Thomas Frank was first appointed Spurs manager, |
| 2:13.0 | were that he'd had it cushy at Brentford. |
| 2:16.1 | It was a well-run club, a relatively small club, |
... |
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