The Athletic

Hello and welcome to the weekend preview on the Athletic Football podcast sponsored by Bet365. I'm Ian Irving in each and every Friday. We preview the best of the weekend's Premier League action. And this week we've got Bet365, Steve 3, alongside of this to help as well. Hello, Steve. Ian, how are you, pal? You're okay? Very good, thank you, you? A bit better than Manchester United, Pearl, yeah. I can imagine, yes. Normal host, Dan Bardell, as you might have known by now. It's a bit under the weather, so get well soon. Danny's not here, but his regular co-host, George Elek, is here. George, are you excited for the return of the Premier League then? Yeah, I enjoyed some parts of the international break. I thought the Nations League, especially,

it was good. I didn't enjoy so much going to England, Hungary on Tuesday night.

It was, yeah, it wasn't the best game. The light show before kickoff is probably the best part

of the game itself. Yeah, interesting dynamic here, because normally Steve and Dan are

ribbing about their Albion villa, their rivalry there So interesting to see that Steve's already had a go at you for United When it's normally It's normally me having a go at United on this podcast But luckily you're not playing on TV this weekend So we won't talk about you That's all right, I couldn't even tell you where West Brom are in the table So it's not problem. Still in the Premier League? You sound like Dan already, Ian.

Don't worry about that.

That's exactly what he saves to me. And rightly so. And rightly so. Yeah, I've listened enough to know the level, so that's perfect. Let's get straight. The real rivalry here, though, is, you know, I'm an Oxford fan, and of course, Fergie's first game as United manager was a defeat at the manor about five years before I was born.

So there you go. That's the real history. That's one to boast about, isn't it? game as the United manager was a defeat at the manor about five years before I was born so there

you go that's the that's the real history that's one to boast about isn't it um I think we should

go back to what you're saying before though uh and try and move this on rather than me just getting

ribbed for like being here for five minutes um the England game against Hungary you said the

most exciting thing about it was a light show I thought thought it was the starting line up, to be honest.

It all went wrong after that.

Yeah, it did.

I think there were some issues with the lineup.

I don't necessarily think that 433 would always be as toothless as it was.

I think going behind against the side like Hungary was always going to cause its problems because

in fairness to them they didn't sit back nil-nil it wasn't the low block that we saw in the

first half in the in the return leg or the other leg but they were still very compact they looked

to move the ball well when they were on the ball and it is it's just very difficult to break down

a side who are in decent shape with a mid to low block as they were for as soon as they went one-nillade. You know, they went ahead with the penalty. On a different day, Harry Kane had a header in the first half that normally, you know, a normal Harry Kane would have buried. Southgate's decision to substitute Jack Grealish, who was quite clearly our most promising player

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