Eddie

The reality is, 8-10m is probably fair for a soon to be 29 year old who's been plying his trade below the Championship for most of his career. He's had one very impressive season, but that's really it. We would have snapped anyone's hands off had they offered 8m a season ago and there's a good chance that 12 months from now he's coming off the back of a 10-15 goal season in the Championship where his value will drop. I'm against selling him because we won't see any of the money and it will just weaken our team, but it's actually somewhat fair value for a player of his skill level, experience, and age. Any club signing him will know that he will have virtually no re-sell value (assuming they hold onto him until he is 31/32).

I think there are more delicate ways of approaching both of those questions that might result in a conversation. Regarding his qualifications, I think speaking about inexperience is a legitimate line of questioning. When it comes to his refusal to play, I think we are more likely to ask something along the lines of how have his views on unhappy players changed now that he's in an admin role and how might he deal with players who are as frustrated or unhappy as he was during periods of his career. So, there are differences between softball interviews and coming across like an angry fan trying to shout down a club official.

You won't have to listen. I'm sure there's a fence somewhere that you can work on.

Good question.

It's a good question. I think we will likely have him on after the window has closed. That will give us the advantage of being able to properly judge the summer's transactions and also give him enough time in the role for us to feel like he can't just avoid questions by saying that he is still getting up to speed.

There's a difference between a softball interview and being so challenging with a guest that they either leave or don't consent to an episode being published. We could get him on and ask him very aggressively about his qualifications or his refusal to play when he was manufacturing a move and it would result in us not having an interview. I would suggest that you hold off any criticism until you hear the actual interview - if you ever even listen to it.

You can do that, but then you can't use actual results and success as assessment criteria.

Woke? 🙄

I like the shirts a lot, I just wish our sponsor looked better on them. That's not a knock on the sponsorship deal, it's just unfortunate that it isn't a logo suited to being on the front of a shirt (not that many are). I also find the logo to be a big oversized on the shirt itself.

I should have maybe included the fact that we won't plan on having questions that come across as being directly antagonistic. Happy to ask questions that ask for accountability and clarity, but there's no way we will get an interview out, or have future guests, if we treat this as an inquisition.

I don't think we will be asking the second part of that question.

We'll be having Rudy on our podcast, so if anyone wants to post questions they'd like asked we'll be happy to put them to him. No gotcha questions. Nothing rude. We're going to try to get a clearer understanding of what his role is. What the infrastructure of the club now looks like.

I think 'disgraceful' is an incredibly strong way to describe it. He's been a long way off his best, but he still contributes to the side in terms of the work he puts in defensively. I found it interesting that there were glowing remarks surrounding Morata's effort for Spain against France. It was a performance that almost perfectly resembled what Kane does for England. Often isolated up front, but does wonderful work tracking back, contributing defensively, and dropping into midfield. That effort comes at a cost and often means he's not in the areas of the pitch that you want him to be, but it's still useful effort. He's also not been helped by quality service in most matches. Even in the Switzerland match, where some examples were highlighted of him not gambling on a couple of balls Saka put across the face of goal, you can actually argue that he had dropped into excellent space around the penalty area but Saka failed to get his head up and instead blindly hit a ball into a 'good' area.

Yep, anyone who thinks otherwise has not been watching enough football over the past 5 years. I could find a similar example being given across major leagues in Europe every weekend.

I wasn't 'dissing' anything. I was responding to your original comment that their international record was 'far superior' to England's. A statement that certainly isn't true over the last 40 years, but is even questionable over the last 100. The only reason you might think it, which is sort of my point, is because you were probably around the perfect age to really enjoy a great Dutch side of the 1970s. So, it's possible that my 'youth' might actually be providing me with more perspective. I won't even get started on your thoughts on the penalty from last night; however, it is true that it wouldn't have been given as a penalty in 1974.

Since 1988 England have appeared in 2 world cup semifinals, two Euro finals (including this one), and one Euros semifinals (plus a host of quarterfinals in both records). You really want to tell me that record over the last 36 years is better? Compare and contrast. For all the 'great and successful footalling nation' talk, where would you rank them? In Europe, clearly behind France, Germany, Spain, and Italy in terms of pedigree and success. Then certainly behind Brazil and Argentina outside of Europe. Those are all givens. Maybe lessen your adjectives as we aren't then even moving into the the countries that would then produce debate (England, Uruguay, etc.). I'm 37. Not sure I can put myself in the 'youth' category anymore.

No luck with that penalty. It was absolutely stonewall based on how the laws are interpreted these days. Neville and the defenders union can lament the fact that it is harsh on defenders - which it may well be - but that doesn't change the fact that it is consistently given as a penalty across Europe now. It was reckless, it was studs up, and it impeded Kane's follow-through. The fact that no one on the ITV commentary team initially thought that it was a penalty shows that they probably don't pay enough attention to modern football. Zero luck. Penalty every day of the week until the laws or instructions given to referees are changed. *Sort of. They beat Germany in extra time, I'm not sure you can really count that as a win, although I know that stat has been bandied about.

It wasn't ignorance, I could list every winner and finalist of the World Cup, but it doesn't change the relevance. I don't consider Uruguay to be a great international footballing nation, but they've won a World Cup and lost in a final. That was before your time, so you probably don't add the same weight or significance to their success that you might to the performances from the Netherlands that you witnessed. The Dutch team of the 1970s was certainly one of the greatest of all-time and they did a lot to help revolutionize the game of football with their approach, but it's long enough ago that it's purely historical. I feel the same way about England winning the World Cup in 1966. Great for the history books, but not even remotely relevant to what happens on a football pitch nowadays. The Netherlands, much like England, are a team that have mostly been living in the past for the last 3/4 decades. The Southgate era has been changing that for England, but the Netherlands have yet to have a true resurgence (one appearance in a World Cup final aside). The answer wasn't meant to be smart. "Age" doesn't always translate into wisdom.

Some people just want to be miserable.

Maybe in your lifetime, not in mine.

When have the Dutch won anything in recent memory? 1988? Hardly recent.

Not to defend Venkys (I want them gone as much as the next person), but I suppose the bond situation could be a bit complicated. Say they send us 5m for the running of the club and we then go and sign a player for 4m. Is a court likely to look favourably on that? Even if they can point to running costs, there's a chance that it could be seen as them funding a transfer which would fall outside of the essential elements that they may be allowed to fund at this point. Now, the counter to that is that they are more than wealthy enough to risk losing 10-20m to keep funding this club in the way that a proper owner should. But they aren't proper owners.

At this rate we will have about 16 first team players by the time the season kicks off. It's easy to dismiss sales of squad players, but we are seeing the gradual reduction in quality across our entire squad. It's impossible to not be concerned by this number of departures when there are no signs of anyone new joining.

You do make your own luck to a certain extent. England have had easier draws by mainly winning their groups - something they often failed to do in the pre-Southgate era. They've also benefited from the expansion of tournaments leading to weaker groups and weaker early knockout stages. But I think we sometimes go overboard in dismissing some of England's opponents. Switzerland were good enough to totally outclass Italy, but it's a meaningless win for Southgate. Germany in the last Euros weren't any good. Colombia aren't up to scratch. Denmark, Senegal, and others were all pushovers. England pre-Southgate would have lost AT LEAST one of those matches - regardless of the talent available. Beating weaker opponents is one of the signs of being a very good side. Yes, England have tripped up against equal or tougher opponents, but only the Croatia match stands out as an example of a team that England really should have been beating (and they're still very talented and experienced). This semifinal and potential final will determine how the Southgate era is viewed, but I sometimes think that England fans don't know how good they've got it at the moment. Recent tournaments have seen sides like Germany, Spain, Italy, and others experience total embarrassment, yet England supporters are critical because we're ONLY making a semifinal and not doing it in the style that they had hoped for.

I wouldn't write England off against that Spanish side. England are better than France in virtually every department and France caused Spain plenty of issues over the course of the 90 minutes. Spain look very good and they're the in-form side of the tournament, but they still have a donkey up front and aren't great at the back. Carvajal being back will help sure them up defensively, but they still leave a ton of space in behind and England should be able to exploit that if they set themselves up correctly. On the Morata subject, it is interesting that he was being praised for doing all of the things that Kane gets criticised for. Dropping back, helping out defensively, basically becoming part of the midfield. He did a good job of winning cheap free kicks towards the end of the match, but he was anonymous aside from that. I don't think that match was any better than Portugal v France. It just had goals. But it does stand out in a tournament starved of enjoyable matches. Both the Netherlands and England will fancy their chances against Spain. It's the final of a major tournament, no one would expect to have an easy match.