Transcript of Mauricio Pochettino to Manchester United and record breaker Kane - Football Weekly podcast

We'll preview the rest of the home nation's fixtures, pay tribute to a true legend of British broadcasting with the news of Danny Kelly's passing. Take your questions, and that's today's Guardian Football Weekly. On the panel today, Lars Siverten. Good morning.

After a disappointing start to the season, the club has come to the extremely difficult conclusion that a change is necessary in order to achieve our ambitions. Michael is and always will be a Manchester United legend, just as he did as a player. He has conducted himself with the highest standards of dedication and professionalism throughout his time. Back with the club, his leadership and achievements last season will always be fondly remembered. The club intends to appoint a permanent successor as quickly as possible. We'll get to the permanent successor in a minute. But Jacob, I guess that statement is, "Please don't hate us, because we know you love Michael Carrick."

Clearly, this decision, I guess, had to be made. I guess, what do you make of the kind of last few days' events?

And the way it's played out this week with Michael Carrick taking training while everybody's just been waiting for that moment when the sacking comes, it's just felt really grubby. I mean, look, obviously, most managers don't get to walk out on their terms. It's pretty rare that somebody goes out in the way that Klopp did at Liverpool or Pep did at Manchester City. But at the same time, there's a way to do these things, and it feels particularly low as well when it's done to someone like Michael Carrick, who is not only behaving with dignity but also is just a Manchester United club legend, won the Champions League, won multiple Premier League titles.

He doesn't necessarily mean us to feel sorry for him. He's walking away with a big load of money and everything, but at the same time, it feels emblematic of the way that club is run at the moment. And you just sort of look at it and go, someone like Carrick, who's probably, it's a fair bet that he'll have done more for Manchester United at any point in his career than any of these guys who have been making his life a bit of a misery over the last week will. So yeah, it just feels bad and feels like it just sums up where the club is at the moment, just not in connection with its identity or values.

So yeah, I think nobody is angry, I would say, with Michael Carrick. He's done the best he can. He's obviously come to a point where he can't go any further. I was stunned he continued, or they let him continue after the Como game. I felt like for me, that was very clearly chapter closed. And I suppose what was going on was they were scrabbling behind the scenes to find someone they could usher in straight away, and they haven't managed to do that cleanly, and they've really botched it. And as you say, no one should ever have that situation where they are.

Carrick was effectively Schrödinger's Man United manager. He was Man United manager, and he also was very clearly sacked. There was no chance he was going to turn this around. So he had this horrible shred of him being there on the sidelines, him being photographed in his car, everyone waiting for him to be sacked. There was no way he could turn this around. There was no string of results that was going to happen. And yet they didn't have the competence to do this cleanly.

This idea that everyone kind of knew a couple of days earlier, and it was reported a couple of days earlier, but they couldn't do it because apparently they had to fly to a foreign country to speak to the minority owner to get a signed off. This is nonsense. I often ask myself, how much does Sir Jim Ratcliffe get away with because of his passport sometimes? If this guy was a Kazakh—and nothing against Kazakhs, I've played golf with some Kazakhs, wonderful people—but if he was from some sort of country where we had no cultural references, if he didn't speak with a recognizable accent, some of the things he says and some of the things he does and the way in which he's gone about things at Old Trafford, he would be absolutely slaughtered in the press for the way he's conducted himself.

And this idea that he's come in representing some sort of best practice thinking, it's all nonsense. I think this is just really inexcusable treatment of someone who is a club legend at the end of the day, someone who's won many titles for Manchester United, someone whose heart is clearly in the right place. The idea that he took training several times whilst knowing he was going to be fired, but he couldn't fire him yet because some directors had to fly to Monaco first to have a conversation. This is nonsense. What is this man up to? So I think that needs to be dwelled on a little bit.

And that would be something that I would—if you're Pochettino, it's clear that he wants to return to elite-level European management. It's clear that—well, it's not clear, but I suspect he maybe was hoping to get some offers after the World Cup that maybe didn't materialize. So he will jump at the chance. But I think the thing that gives you pause is, who are you working for? Are these people you can actually have a good professional working relationship with? Because everything I've seen from the way INEOS have been running Man United since they come in suggests that I'm not sure these are great people to work for, to be honest.

In the last year, I don't think they even really wanted to give Michael Carrick the job and kind of convinced themselves into doing it. And now we're in this position where they very predictably have got rid of him and are now going for an international manager during an international break when he could have been got in the summer for nothing. And instead, now it's another payout and a release clause to be triggered for Pochettino and his quite extensive backroom staff as well.

But yeah, this has been something that's been coming for a long time. There's this story, obviously, that's doing the rounds this week of when he sat with some British journalists, I think, around the World Cup, and Jesus Perez, his very close number two and guy who's been around Poch his kind of whole career. They were talking about how they like to go up to Manchester to the National Football Museum, and I think they turned around and said, "You want to go to Manchester United one day?" And Poch started going, "Future, future." So it's come around very quickly.

There's been points in the past where Poch's reputation was much higher than I think it is now when they were going for him, when he was at Tottenham and they were going for the title and the Champions League final and everything. But it feels now a little bit like, is he the force that he was? Has football—I don't know. You don't want to say that it's left him behind, but his IP was that when he turned up at Southampton in 2013 and he was this new, young, fresh guy who nobody knew anything about and very quickly turned Southampton into this ultra-exciting young pressing team, getting through those academy players, like turning Djalala and Shaw into brilliant players and getting them big moves and everything.

Now everybody presses. So is that going to be something that's going to surprise people, or is he going to have to show a little bit more than that? It's going to be really interesting, especially because I'm not sure that this Manchester United squad is necessarily geared towards a Pochettino style of play. That's been one of the big things, that lack of athleticism and lack of people who seem willing to run. With him coming in mid-season, is he going to be able to even get them up to speed quickly? Not only because it's mid-season, but they've also got Champions League.

He's not going to have—he's not going to have loads of time on the training ground to work on them. So it is very interesting to see whether or not he can recapture those Tottenham days.

I think it's a lot harder to deal with being in charge of a club where if you lose a couple of games, it immediately becomes an entire referendum, a global referendum on the state of that football club post Sir Alex Ferguson. And you're never too far away from drama and crisis. And I think the extra mental toll that takes on the players is significant. So I think what you do need, above everything, in a modern United coach, if he has to have any chance of being successful, is that he has to be able to build a dressing room culture that is rock solid. He has to build an atmosphere in that dressing room where the players manage to shut out the noise, manage to not care, manage to just do their jobs, and completely believe in what they're doing.

I think that's something Pochettino is good at. I think that's what he's—when he has worked, when he has done well at clubs and at the US briefly, what he's done best of all is create a tight group in the dressing room. Most recently at the US, I know that's a part of his career people kind of overlook a little bit, but it's interesting listening to the players talk about him because they're big on how he set standards. He expected more. He's openly criticized the US men's team players for turning up to play golf with their buddies in the international weeks. And you have to—if you come here, you have to live this.

And setting that level of expecting that level of buying from the players and raising those standards, I mean, maybe that is something United could do with. The second thing I also want to say, I think, is a huge challenge of United is they have huge levels of expectations, huge levels of discourse, huge levels of global attention. But I don't think they're in a position anymore where they can just buy their way out of stuff. I think the finances are starting to get stretched after years and years of overspending and not always being in the Champions League and running a huge wage bill. We saw that this summer. They've been criticized for not giving Carrick more players to work with.

I don't think they can afford it. I think they have to be careful. And that means, what do you do then? Well, I think it's very natural for them to look to the academy, to look at younger players, and try to develop. And if there's one thing we know Pochettino is good at, it is that. And I think now that he comes in, this is hugely exciting. If you are in the United Under-21s team and if you're sort of 18, 19, 20, one of those players who are like, "Maybe I'll make it, maybe not," this is a couple of really exciting months for you. Because if you can show that you are more committed, that you are willing to run harder, that you're willing to follow instructions, do exactly what you are told, and completely live that life, then he will play you.

He basically has just experienced enormous pressure, everyone picking apart his every move, the weight of expectation of an entire nation's football history on him, with all the added pressure of the craziness of Donald Trump and not being able to offend him. So I think Pochettino won't massively find this that different. And I think it's been said quite widely that I think he does suit club football better. And I think that goes into what Lars was saying about his expectations of the players. I think it drove him a bit mad that he's a club manager.

He likes the control of the players. He likes to set his environments. I think it drove him a bit crazy not having access to the players, not being able to control them as much as he wanted to. He'll have a lot more control at United, and he'll have a lot more grounds to draw the standards he wants to see across the board. That's not to say he won't go absolutely out of his mind very quickly, but I just think this kind of could suit him. I think the big thing, as with any manager coming into this, is are they willing to weather it? It's not going to be a quick turnaround.

Is he willing to have this honeymoon period, and then there'll be a few months where he just has to do grim, just keeping it going while he can slightly kind of turn it around a little bit here, turn it around a little bit there? Because you're not going to turn this around quickly. It's going to be a long slog. And is he really, in his heart of hearts, does he want to do that slog?

And you worry at times that he's being a bit of a nearly man and almost man. And the one that you go back to over and over again, he obviously won stuff at PSG, having finished second in that first half of season, then won the title in his second year. But I go back to that cup final against Liverpool at Chelsea, when they were playing against a depleted Liverpool. No Salah. Gravenberch got his leg snapped in two in the first half.

And they ended up in that game, Liverpool, against Chelsea's pretty much first team with Virgil van Dijk and a bunch of children. And they still won the game. And you just sort of came away from it going, "Is this just a mentality thing that he can't quite get teams over the line?" And at Tottenham, his thing was that they were one of the lower-paying big sides in the league. And for them to repeatedly kind of punch above their weight and challenge for the title and almost win it and qualify for the Champions League over and over again, that for them was success.

At Manchester United, it's, "Okay, first of all, they're going to have to get them out of a relegation battle, which they shouldn't be in. And I don't think they'll go down because it's probably too much there." Then what does it next look like? Is it for them just to get into the Champions League? I don't think that for Manchester United, that level of expectation cuts it with supporters, with the club. So it's, "Can he turn them in time into a title-winning force?" And you kind of look at that and go, "Well, not with these players. It's going to have to be a massive turnaround." And then the timing comes into it.

How long does it take for that to come into reality with this Manchester United? How long the cleanup job is? Is there the patience from above? Is there the patience from around? Is the patience from the media, from the fans? I'm not sure that there would be. And then is he able to do it? Is he the man who's able to do that? Because he's never really shown, as well as he did at Tottenham, that he can. And that Tottenham job was a long, long time ago. He had that one year at Chelsea where it was difficult.

It was really difficult given that that was a new ownership, much like this one. And there were issues going on behind the scenes at the time and everything. And there were a lot of injuries that he had to contend with. And he was kind of rebuilding a culture and stabilizing a club. But that one season at Chelsea, it wasn't great. A lot of the football wasn't fantastic that year. And he ultimately did struggle with some of the things that were going on. He was happy to walk away at the end. And it makes you worry a little bit what went on there with that kind of ownership, with what might go on here when he really walks in and realizes what it's like to work for these people.

I think that's where it is. And actually, I don't yes, they make a lot of money from commercial avenues and things, especially if Sir Jim Ratcliffe is serious about trying to get a stadium built. We're probably heading into a half-decade decade where Man United are no longer going to be the top sort of the apex predators in the transfer market. They're just not going to be. And the job then does actually become to do what Spurs did, which is to punch up against more financially potent clubs around them. And actually, if United could be in the Champions League every year for four years, actually, that kind of starts to improve the finances and it's possible to build a little more.

And maybe people think finishing fourth, third, and being in the Champions League is not enough for United. But if you can do that consistently for a couple of years, that'd be a heck of an upgrade on what's been going on for them.

Jacob, it was pretty clear what was wrong. Do you feel that I mean, 16 games isn't a lot, but did you also feel that perhaps Pierre Sarge was kind of not the man to turn this around?

And it just felt like this is not this doesn't feel right. This doesn't feel like it's going to work. I don't see it lasting. And he's clearly a good coach, given what he did last season in France. And I'd be interested to see whether he ends up back there at his old job immediately because that's been mooted. But basically, it's just an appointment, a gamble they've made that hasn't worked out. It feels like they kind of they've hired a manager for a different situation. While they play the same system, Sarge and Glasner, Sarge wants to be far more open than Glasner was.

Glasner's much more about playing on the break, much more physical. Sarge wants to be more open, more possession and everything. And he's doing that at a time when Palace, they sold Guehi, didn't really replace him, lost Lecoeur in the summer and replaced him with Disasi, who hasn't really worked out so far. And you've got those issues as well with Mateta and Sarr, who've seemed to be not so happy, given they didn't get their moves. So it's kind of suddenly shifted into that feeling of you actually need to be just this a really horrible, dirty, nasty team to play against.

And it feels like he's not been the guy to do that. It's a shame. I mean, I'm sure he'll go and do something else and be really, really good at it and quite successful. And Palace fans might look at it and go, "That guy, was he actually better than we thought, but not for this situation?" And they were just yeah, I mean, they were worried, I think, before the game against Liverpool. And they were extremely panicky afterwards. And I think they can see that the change was needed and they hadn't made it where this is going.

You do have to start from the back in terms of putting a team together. And it doesn't you usually don't have time to make it look nice. If you're trying to do anything more expensive than that, then the risk of you just getting trounced all over the place is too large. Palace have got the highest xG conceded in the league after 10 games. And you just can't do that. I don't care what he was trying to do in possession. You're going to get relegated. You need to build a structure that just doesn't get played off the park every week. And it's looked like that every time I've seen Palace this year, which isn't all 10 games, I'll admit.

But every time I've seen them, I just think these look very easy to play through. These are very this is just too soft. And I thought there was a hint to that to Fulham under Arbeloa in the beginning. But he seems to have really tightened that up a little bit in a way Disage just couldn't do. And I think, yeah, turning from him to that falls very neatly into the Larry Seaverson ex-girlfriend theory of managerial appointments, which is I see this mirrored in my own life, in other people's lives. If you have a relationship that breaks down, the next incumbent whatever the last person lacked, the next one's going to have a lot of that.

This is always true. People always overcorrect. It always happens. And it's fine. It's a normal human reaction. And in this case, yeah, we had this Frenchman who had ideas of fancy things in possession. And suddenly, there you are. You're leaking goals all over the gaff. And you're worried about getting relegated. Fire up the Thomas Frank bat phone. Get the Danish guy in. Bring some of that Brentford magic. Let everyone should know where to stand. Make the set pieces good. No nonsense. Long balls out to the flanks.

And no, I think it makes total sense. I'm very sure I'm sure he'll keep them up. And I think that's what Palace need to do now from there until the end of the season.

I mean, Paul, it's been an incredible few weeks, hasn't it? And I was just thinking about this. He's almost he's really a player to be proud of for England. He's almost sort of the anti-Ronaldo, isn't he? I mean, I'm sure he's got an ego, but we don't really see it very often. He just delivers.

And he just seems to carry so little pretention with him. And I feel like if there was any England is, as a country, we are brilliant at hating our best players. We have a long and proud tradition of despising anyone who shows excellence in this country. But I really don't know anyone who dislikes Harry Kane who is English and dislikes Harry Kane in any genuine sense, except for obviously Spurs-related things. And you obviously have your tribal rivalries. But as a man and as a player, he is just such a fantastic person and example.

And it's just lovely to see him out there hoisting the Ballon d'Or around. It's still something quite surreal about it. But it's yeah, it was amazing. And I love him. So there you go. I'm not going to be that. I'm not going to do the Barry job here. I have nothing bad to say about him.

And England just ran through them. And Croatia played a bizarre PR Sarge-esque high line against Antony Gordon and Bukayo Saka and Bellingham. And this time, they played a back five. And it was a little bit more awkward for England to work out. And I think one of the differences between that game and this one last night was there was a little shift in midfield. Alex Scott played in Rijeka. He was obviously out with Thijndree. Declan Rice was back.

So reprising that partnership from the World Cup with Elliot Anderson. And that's going to be an interesting part of the team, I think, because Alex Scott and Elliot Anderson had that great relationship at the Under-21s when England won it. And this just feels like there's this little challenge to Rice as absolutely incredible player. I bow to no one in my admiration of the West Ham's Conference League-winning captain. He does have a challenge from somebody who's a little bit different to him.

And there's maybe that question of, are Rice and Anderson a little bit similar? Have we seen that with England before? I can't think of any major midfield examples where we kind of sit there going, "Just it'll be fine. Just one of them sits and one of them holds. And that'll be OK. They'll work it out themselves." But you know, Tuchel was really positive about Rice before the game, saying he's a massive player for him. And he said he's like a coach on the pitch.

He tells people where to be and everything. So that was just one little shift, though, that maybe made it a little bit of a different game. And then also, Saka wasn't there on the right wing. So Rodgers continued that partnership with Trent that we saw in the Czechia game at the end of the last camp. And I'm not sure, although Rodgers scored, if that sort of left England without a little bit of natural width last night. I'm not sure that's Rodgers' best position.

I think he's better off on the left or as a 10. It felt like they got a little bit bogged down. At the same time, it felt like they were holding themselves back a bit for Sunday because if they beat Spain, in Spain, they win their group. And they go through as top seeds into the quarterfinals because there was a lot of there was a lot of untidy play. And you could kind of feel it coming on the way to the Croatia equalizer. When it came, although Croatia didn't play very well, it felt like that's not a surprise. And then they very quickly got the penalty for Harry Kane.

And after that, Joel Kwanza, who had made the mistake, he kind of redeemed himself not only by winning the penalty, but a huge late tackle on a I think it was Budimir who went through for Croatia. So it was just one of those nights where you kind of need to get through it. There wasn't loads to come, but you kind of worried a little bit about the defense before we play Spain.

Northern Ireland are top of their group and chasing promotion into it. And Republic of Ireland need a win in Lins to stop Austria wrapping up their group with a game to spare. We'll cover all of those games on Monday's pod, of course. But first of all, Lars, a word on Norway against Wales while we have you. That was a I mean, the reverse victory was a big win for Wales in particular.

I've been enjoying the social media content of the players coming back. We've had videos of Erling Haaland eating a carrot because he famously loves the carrots in Norway. We've had videos of Erling Haaland checking a snowball at the goalkeeping coach for the Goldos, formerly of Chelsea. This sort of stuff is also always very nice. But no, on a serious note, this is actually quite an important game, I think, for the team because that last international break was not good at all. And they completely got a pass, obviously, because of the stuff during the summer.

I guess for the Welsh, I'm not exactly giving away state secrets by saying that Antonio Nusa is currently absolutely on fire, the winger who is very good. He was a heroic figure in our qualifying campaign for the World Cup. But he's got four goals and seven assists in eight games in the Bundesliga so far this season. So look out for him to score some kind of wonder goal against you, I would imagine and hope.

Lars, you were the one today on the panel, at least. You worked with him an awful lot on the Trans-Europe Express on Talk Sport. Just tell us a bit about him.

And Danny was one of the first people you just noticed, even if this wasn't your mother tongue, if you were from a different language, if you were a completely different cultural background. It was impossible not to notice Danny because he brought so much joy. He brought so much enthusiasm. He brought so much passion for everything he did. And yeah, he's instantly recognizable. And so because I knew very well who he was, even though I didn't grow up in England, I was really quite sort of starstruck the first couple of times I worked with him. But the thing that you'll have heard a lot of people say about Danny is that as much as he was an incredible broadcaster, he was an infinitely better person.

And it's remarkable now. And you see it that there's such a breadth of people of different ages, different backgrounds who are now coming forward and talking about how much he actually meant to them because he genuinely did take an interest in the people he worked with. You know, people in England are very polite. You know, as eventually as an immigrant in England, as a foreigner who got used to English culture, it took me a while to realize that someone asking, "How are you?" is really not a request for information. Like they really it's just the thing that you guys say because you're polite.

But in the case of Danny, he always did want to know how you were and genuinely cared. You know, I would get WhatsApp messages from him like in the middle of nothing on an afternoon because he's watched and he's ended up watching a Norwegian film from the '60s on a television channel and wanted to talk to me about it. You know him as a football broadcaster, a music journalist. I get that. But he had just this sort of endless curiosity about the world, about people, about their stories.

And there was nothing fake about Danny. There never was. And he's just such an incredible person. And it's really I started listening. There were so many nice tribute podcasts and things put together. And I started listening to a few. And I had to turn it off. I just can't because it just doesn't make any sense to me that he's gone. Because the last few voice messages I had from him, he sounded so much like himself. And you know that this illness is horrible. And you know it's tough. But he just sounded so much like himself.

So I thought for sure he was going to make it. And I don't know. It's so bad they didn't.

So it is a shame Max and Barry aren't on today. I'm sure they'll want to pay their own tributes when they're back on the pod. We'll leave it there for part two. In part three, we'll have a look at some of the other fixtures in the Nations League and do Watson's World. Well, we're at part three of The Guardian Football Weekly. Italy 3, France 1. Italy now top on 10 points level with France but ahead on head-to-head in their Nations League group.

Belgium third on nine, Turkey bottom on zero after five straight defeats. That dark horse tag is really starting to disappear, isn't it?

And I think they've had this striker issue for quite a long time. And Pio Esposito scoring two goals, one from the spot, of course. But yeah, maybe there's something happening there. And yeah, I think that's interesting.

And they have very strong ties with Venezuela, who took in thousands of Basque political exiles during the Spanish Civil War. So this fixture in itself isn't particularly remarkable. But the fact they're using it now to try and lobby again for UEFA membership is really interesting. UEFA is pretty much a closed shop. Under the current regulations, they tightened these up to mean that basically, you have to be an independent state recognized by the United Nations. There isn't really a lot of wiggle room here, which is why Greenland have found themselves completely isolated.

The only people who have got through this are people who like Gibraltar, for example, who got around this because they'd already applied before this rule was put into place. So it seems incredibly unlikely that the Basque country could force their way. And they're trying to say that they could use this Spanish law, the Article 48.2 of the law 3922, some massive gibberish. But they basically say that there is a statement in Spanish law that Spain will recognize the Basque country's right to sports teams.

That's effectively what they're saying. But the reality is Spain's football federation would have to back their bid to UEFA. And there is absolutely no reason why they would do that to even sort of start the conversation. There's no reason they would do that. They'd be terrified that then Catalonia would obviously follow suit. And you know, there was no reason this will happen. But I did think that was really interesting. And I also thought it was really interesting how strong a Basque country team would be in theory, right? You look at this. They only get to play about once a year at best. They get like this window where they're allowed to play. And even then, they can't call players who are selected by Spain if there's a Spanish team being picked in that window.

But they've still got a load of good results. They've beaten a load of teams, Costa Rica, Tunisia, Peru, Ghana, Morocco, Wales, drew with Uruguay in 2024. But you know, you look at all the best players from Athletic, Real Sociedad, Osasuna, Laves. It would be a really strong team. And I wonder how they would get on if it were possible for them to join UEFA.

They had Ralph Little, for example, play for them once. But they've actually relaunched. And they're taking it a bit more seriously that they're actually trying to create a proper national team. And they're encouraging people from all over the world to apply to play for the team. You can get a citizenship online. And that qualifies you to play for them. And it's quite interesting because they're actually looking to play against proper recognized FIFA members. And they reckon they've got some who are interested in playing against them. So for a lot of people out there, if you think you maybe missed the boat for an international call-up, Sealand might be your answer.

It's really good. So he's a very unusual figure to have a I can only think of Steve Bruce, who have been you know, people who have been literally giants and also football coaches, right? I don't think there's many coaches out there with a novel behind them. But yeah, Faroe Islands are doing really well, second in their Nations League group, way behind Slovakia. But they are really doing very well at the moment. And it's amazing to see how this nation has gone from being the traditional laughing stock when I was growing up. That was a byword for a team you would thrash, wasn't it? You know, the Faroe Islands. And now they really are, you know, slugging it out in group C and, you know, theoretically aiming for promotion.

They look likely they could get in a promotion playoff there.

We ended up giving around, I think, 2,000 in that first year. And we've done it every year since now that you can donate to Kipmas. We have a crowdfunding page, which we use to buy new shirts and give to community centers around the country that give out to families who, yeah, are worried about Christmas and whether there'll be anything for their kids. So our page is crowdfunder.co.uk/kipmas26. It's called Kiptmas, K-I-T-M-A-S. And yeah, it's just a really nice thing we do just to sort of hopefully give a few kids that feeling that you got when you opened a football shirt for Christmas, which.

So we tend to give, you know, recognizable clubs, Barcelona's, Real Madrid's, but also some quirkier ones. And you know, it could be anything. But we give a kid a football shirt.