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- [00:01]
Host 1
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- [01:14]
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- [01:50]
Host 1
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- [03:12]
Ayo Akimolere
The Athletic FC welcome to the Athletic FC podcast with me, Ayo Akimolere. In the last two seasons, the three promoted clubs have been relegated. So will Leeds, Sunderland or Burnley survive this time around? All right, with us today we've got John McKenzie. We've also got Nick Miller as well. So, gents, the saying goes, whatever comes up must go down. That's been the case for promoted sides in the Premier League in the most recent times. John, can you give us a reason as to why this time things might be different?
- [03:50]
John McKenzie
I think for me, the thing that people aren't talking about is that the bottom half of the table is probably weaker than it's been for a long time. So a lot of the teams towards the top of the table are now treating some of the teams in the bottom half as almost feeder clubs that they can pick talent up from. Nick will know this. As a Forest fan, there's been a few clubs who've had their eye on some of Forest's players. We've seen Wolves lose a few players, Brentford lose a few players, and I think that as a result of this, what we actually have is a landscape at the bottom of the table which is maybe a bit more open than it's been for. We always talk about how weak the promoted sides are coming up, but I actually think the Premier League has had relatively strong bottom halves for the last few seasons and I think this time around it's slightly different.
- [04:33]
Nick Miller
Yeah.
- [04:34]
Ayo Akimolere
What do you reckon?
- [04:34]
Chris Weatherspoon
Nick can only agree, really. I mean, we may come to like some of the established teams that might struggle later on. But you know you've got Brentford taken a big gamble on a coach and lost two of their best players, probably going to lose a third. Bournemouth, they've lost four of their first choice back, five from last season. Wolves lost Matteo, Kunja ran out Nori and they were rubbish for long spells of last season with those players. So who knows what they're going to be like when they lose them. Forests could be kind of regression candidates and they've got to deal with Europe as well. Fulham are a bit weird. They probably won't get dragged into it, but they haven't done a single thing yet in terms of transfers this season. Not necessarily a bad thing, but they might be losing Muniz and Yes. So there are a few kind of candidates that drop in and give the. The promoted three a bit of hope.
- [05:24]
Nick Miller
Yeah.
- [05:25]
Ayo Akimolere
Does it matter though that the three promoted clubs keep getting relegated?
- [05:29]
Chris Weatherspoon
It does from a neutral perspective, mostly because it's just boring, you know. And it's not just that the in the last two seasons all three promoted clubs have gone down, it's that all three promoter clubs have gone down and for the most part have just been enormously uncompetitive. Last season they only managed 59 points between them. 66 season before was by a long way the lowest combined in the Premier League history. Southampton got 12 points, obviously only one more than the record lowest, but almost kind of more. I don't know, importantly or worryingly, Leicester got. Only got 25 and you would have finished bottom with that total in. I think I worked it out as 20 of the previous Premier League seasons. So it's not like. It's not just that these teams are dropping, it's that they aren't really providing anything like the last three months of last season. We knew who was going to win the league, we knew who was going to get relegated. Some of the teams kept things interesting with some of the stuff they were doing, but to a point we had to get excited about who's going to qualify for the Champions League, which is fine, but it's not quite as entertaining as seeing teams battle against relegation or fight for the title. So in terms of an entertaining competitive league, you need at least kind of five, six teams that could feasibly get relegated. Otherwise it just becomes quite boring.
- [06:52]
John McKenzie
I think it's also worth adding to this as well, that every time the promade sides go down, it's another two windows for the sides that stay up to get stronger. And so the longer that this run goes on for, the longer it Is that the teams who are not going down, the more time they have to actually build as well. So we need to have the mix up because what's starting to happen is we're starting to see a sort of set of middle class clubs who end up sitting between the Premier League and the Championship. And they're making the Championship weaker as well because there's no one who can compete for the championship given the reality of those teams. So we're going to go on and talk about it. But Leeds and Burnley Both finished on 100 points last season. That's a very rare occurrence. Sheffield United could have finished on 100 points if they didn't fall away at the end. That's indicating that, you know, what we're talking about in terms of the Premier League is also being repeated in the Championship as well. And I think that's just a bad state of affairs for everyone involved, Championship clubs and Premiership clubs alike.
- [07:47]
Ayo Akimolere
Okay, I want you to give us a little glimpse as to what kind of playing style we're to expect from these teams. John Leeds and Burnley most recently have been in the, in the Premier League. Sunderland, it's been a while a lot of people might not remember when they were last in the Premier League. Tell me what differentiates these teams in style.
- [08:03]
John McKenzie
Yeah, so Leeds, I think are more of the sort of what you might expect for a dominant team at the top of a table. So controlling games a lot. They had the best defensive record, but they, they managed to do that mainly by controlling the ball. Whereas I think Burnley are interesting because they were sort of the other way around. They would go into games qu quite hot. They would try and get a goal early on and then they would sit back and defend in a deep block in order to hold on to those leads. Interestingly enough, the story with Burnley is they had an incredible performance when it comes to conceding goals. So they only conceded 16 goals in the league last season, which in a 46 game league is an incredible performance, technically an over performance because I think they were expected to concede around 38 goals. And a big chunk of that over performance came from James Trafford who is now at Manchester City. And if you look at underlying numbers, it suggests that he saved around 12.5 goals more than you might expect him to save. And we could talk about the underlying numbers all we want, but essentially Burnley were able to ride that through and, and, and get promoted off the back of that. And then with Sunderland, I think it's more a case of this is the team that went through on the playoffs. So you're talking a little bit more of a sort of upper mid table team. They play quite interesting football under Reggie Debris last season they, they like to play counter attacking football. But I think as the season wore on it was definitely the case that they, they deeper into blocks as well and playing a bit more of a pragmatic game as well. Whether or not that's because they have a younger squad and they were getting tired in the course of a 46 game season, I don't know. But I think that that doesn't necessarily mean that any of these teams are going to play the way that they played in the championship in the Premier League. And we've seen Sunderland now have quite a nice talent advantage over what Reggie Liberty was working with last season. For example. Leeds are definitely lent into the defenses, keep you in the Premier League. So they've done a lot of defensive solidifying. Big questions about whether or not attack are going to be able to provide enough to work from that base. And then with Burnley, as Nick says, they've lost a lot of players in that battle line. They've gone for a lot of experienced options. So your Carl Walkers, your Axel Tuanzebe, they brought in Kolinchi Harman who is the fullback that slot had at Feyenoord. But yeah, I think all three of those teams still have a lot of work to do and you need things to go well as well as to do things right in order to stay up. So yeah, it's going to be a fascinating season from that point of view.
- [10:23]
Ayo Akimolere
Yeah. From a manager's perspective, Nick, Daniel Farker and also Scott Parker have both promoted clubs into the Premier League and both haven't fared that well in the Premier League. I mean, how much is there to prove? From their perspective?
- [10:36]
Chris Weatherspoon
Quite a lot. I mean, it's interesting that there was a little period of time there just after the end of last season where it looked like Leeds might actually get rid of Daniel Farker. I mean, I don't know exactly how close that was to happening, but it was clearly a conversation and that's kind of significant enough. I mean, John will know more about this than me, but the fact that they were even talking about that, that is an indication of the point you're making that he's a manager who's got promoted from the championship a few times but hasn't really done much in the Premier League. And the last set of results that he had at Norwich were, I mean, not just bad, but pretty embarrassing really. So he obviously has a Lot to prove there. Scott Parker as well is kind of interesting because it feels like he has shifted a little bit in his playing style, certainly from when he was at Fulham and Bournemouth. Whether he has actually changed his mind, changes philosophy, if you want to use that word, which try not to, but. Or whether he's actually just a little bit more pragmatic than we initially thought and he's just sort of adapting to the situation. And it almost felt sometimes last season, not quite that it was a sort of season long audition for how they would play in the Premier League, but it did seem to be a significant shift in that if you don't concede many goals, then quite evidently you're more likely to pick up points and stay in the Premier League. It just feels like he was preparing to play in the Premier League while still in the Championship and sort of trusting that the players he had would get them there anyway, which turned out to be the case. So, yeah, I think he's going to be really interesting this season just to see if they continue to play the way that they did in the Championship because one of the reasons that they did so badly under Vincent Kompany was that they played pretty much for most of the season they played pretty much the same way that they did in the championship, just with much worse players. Obviously this is a very different style of play, but it might be a kind of similar theory as to whether they might not be able to defend as well as they did. And obviously they've kind of lost those key players as well. So, yeah, it's going to be really, really interesting to see how both managers approach it, particularly, I think, Scott Parker.
- [12:48]
Ayo Akimolere
Yeah, John, I really want to touch on that a little later on in terms of what formula you need to succeed in the Premier League as a team. But Nick brings up a really interesting point about someone like Daniel Farker, for instance, and it's such a strange position teams that are promoted find themselves in, in that there was a time in which people didn't think he would be staying on at Leeds, but it seems to have worked to get them promoted. But then do you stick or twist? It's such a precarious situation because you're also thinking about bolstering the squad in terms of buying new players as well.
- [13:19]
John McKenzie
Yeah. And I think to add to that, you go from a position where you're expected to win every game to a position where you're trying to win as many games as you can to survive, and it's a completely different style of football. I've just said that Leeds played in this way where they control possession and therefore they were able to defend pretty well, relatively speaking. But in the Premier League, they're not going to be defending with the ball as much. They're going to have to start defending without the ball in lower blocks, and that changes the dynamic entirely. They were attempting to attack in quite dynamic ways in the wide areas and they could pull apart blocks around the edges in the Championship, but in the Premier League, they're so adept at not being pulled apart in those ways that again, they're going to lose a little bit of threat. So, yeah, it's a really tricky dynamic, I think, for managers to balance going from being a dominant, dominant team in one league to being a team that's sort of trying to survive in the other.
- [14:09]
Ayo Akimolere
Okay, well, next we'll assess the best way to approach survival. Having unlocked the riches of the Premier League is the key. Spend, spend, spend.
- [14:24]
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- [14:58]
Host 1
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- [15:17]
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- [15:48]
Ayo Akimolere
All right, joining us now, we've got Chris Weatherspoon, our dedicated football finance writer. Chris. He joined us back in May after Sunderland had secured promotion back to the Premier League and spoke about the investment they would need now. They've been the busiest of the promoted clubs, spending over £120 million. I want you to look into your crystal ball here. Do you think it's going to work?
- [16:11]
Nick Miller
Oh, oh, I don't like that question. Can I Answer a question you didn't ask. Can I say that they've given themselves the best possible chance?
- [16:20]
Ayo Akimolere
That's not a bad answer.
- [16:21]
Nick Miller
Is that okay? Yeah, I think it's really difficult. I think any team that comes up, as we've just been discussing, is kind of up against it certainly now. I think the thing with something is it's easily forgotten just how far behind named some of the starting from my summer in League one four years ago and truthfully, I think if you, you know, you hooked one of the hierarchy up to a lie detector, I think they would struggle to say yes. We definitely expected to go up last season. Don't get me wrong, it was clearly a name, but I think it was maybe a year ahead of schedule possibly. You know, I could be wrong on that, but it just felt like that. And so they had a really low base to start from, so they've had to spend really. I mean every club that comes up has to and I think that's because the teams in the league continue to spend and the ones that don't worry that they're going to fall behind. So they've had no real choice. I think one of the kind of nuances of what some of them have done is they've almost taken what got them to this point and just upgraded it. So they don't get me wrong, they've spent money on Granit Jaguar, they've spent money on Almaretti, the new center half they just bought. But those are really the first instances in years where they actually spent money on players aged over 24. I think it's easy to look at it and think, oh, they're just throwing money at it like it's very scattergirl and I don't think that's what's happening. And I think actually possibly the most telling thing is that some of them were the last promoted team to get promoted, obviously because they went through the playoffs, but they've done the most business and they've done it very quickly now. They had to partially because, look, the squad was never going to be enough and also because they've got as in as much as it can be in the Premier League. They've got a fairly favorable opening for games, so they really need to get points on the board early, but they're not going to die.
- [18:08]
Ayo Akimolere
100 okay, John, what do you make of that? The profile of the players that Chris has just mentioned, especially the ones that Sunderland have gone after because look, they have spent a whole heap of money.
- [18:17]
John McKenzie
Yeah, well, I think they've gone for two very different types of profile of player. I think they've gone for young, exciting players around Europe so you can get them for maybe slightly better value with the hope that they will improve in value. A little bit of risk to that. So they brought in players like Habib Diarra, who had a great season in Ligue 1 last season with Strasbourg. Noah Siddiqui, everyone was excited about him in the Dupla Pro League in Belgium. They've also managed to bring in Simone Odinga as well. He's only 23. We know what he can do from Brighton. So a lot of youngsters coming through. Kemsuddin Talby as well, another Belgian league player. But then they've. Those are all mainly attacking talents they brought in there. But then there's a. They brought in an older, more experienced spine, I think in the lower positions in the team. So Granit Xhaka, obviously everyone knows him from his time in Arsenal, had a great period with Leverkusen as well. He's going to be knitting everything together, knitting the defensive unit to the attacking unit. But they've also gone for players like Ronaldo Mandava is again an experienced left back, 31 years of age. So very different to the sort of 20s, early 20s, mid-20s that they've been buying in more advanced positions. Arthur Mazuaku as well, again another former Premier League player, he's been away in Turkey recently, brought in on a free transfer. So they're definitely bringing in exciting youngsters in attacking positions and then bolstering them with maybe more experienced players in the backline.
- [19:41]
Ayo Akimolere
Yeah, Nick, you know, last season both Ipswich and Southampton, what, spent over £100 million. So look, people know you do have to spend to try and compete in the Premier League. Burnley under Vincent Kompany were also big spenders. But how difficult is it to create Premier League ready squads, especially from scratch? I mean, there is the conversation about Nottingham Forest spent, you know, spending quite a lot of money and bringing in around 20 odd players in in a season.
- [20:07]
Chris Weatherspoon
29 to be exact.
- [20:09]
Ayo Akimolere
All right, okay. If you want to be accurate, let's go with it.
- [20:11]
Chris Weatherspoon
We are almost as proud of that as they are about the European Cups, I think. So you got it. I would like to get the numbers right. It is really interesting because I think one of the things that the last couple of seasons have, have showed us is that it is incredibly easy to burn through, as you say, £120 million without actually seemingly making much difference to your team, or I should rather say making much difference to how you perform in the Premier League. The problem is that there isn't really a kind of a blueprint or format. You could try the Forest way of just kind of throwing enough against the wall and some of those players will stick and some of those players will be good enough and that might be just enough to help you stick around and then you kind of filter it a little bit in the following seasons and you kind of build on that. We do talk a lot about transfers and it is for good reason that obviously the three promeric clubs have to upgrade in many positions. But I wonder whether a slightly more significant thing is that of the three promoted clubs, Leeds are the only one that haven't really lost anyone significant. Matteo Joseph has gone but he. I mean again John will know more about this than me, but he wasn't really a factor for the much of a factor anyway for the second half of the season. And Sunderland have lost Joe Bellingham and then sort of, most significantly we've mentioned it before, Burnley lost James Trafford and CJ Ian Riley. So while they have brought in players to replace them, who knows whether they'll actually they will be as good as the ones they had or the ones they've had to replace from the championship. So there is a lot of emphasis on the new players that come in but it might be kind of even more significant the players that they want lost.
- [21:54]
Ayo Akimolere
Do you buy that in terms of the. I guess a much more succinct squad John, from a Lee's perspective anyway.
- [21:59]
John McKenzie
Yeah, I think that it's always good if you can keep as many players as you can. I think Junior Furpo left but he's been replaced by Gabriel Goodmanson. So sort of relatively like for like replacement and yeah, I think beyond that it's just been looking for profiles that now match the club's idea about how you best stay up in the Premier League. And I think they've, they've done a good job of doing that certainly in terms of the defensive roles that they've. They've employed. But they. Yeah. Looking around now to fill the final pieces of the attacking puzzle, I think.
- [22:30]
Ayo Akimolere
Okay, Chris, I want to talk to you about that. The clear gap between the Premier League clubs and also EFL clubs in the past couple of seasons, you know, is that a reflection of the finances that are in check? Because by this I basically I'm trying to talk about constraints around psr, let's be honest.
- [22:50]
Nick Miller
Yeah, I think it is. I mean, I mean I think it's increasingly difficult to. To separate the finances from what goes on, on the pitch, Maybe that's always been the case. And of course I'm going to say that, given the role that I work in. But I think, yeah, the gap has grown and continues to grow. I mean, I think part of the problem right now is really you've got 17 clubs who have been consistently in the league. This will be three years in a row those same 17 clubs have been in the league because we've had two successive years of the promoted teams going straight back down. So at a basic level, when we talk about psr, that that means those clubs are allowed to lose more money because if you're in the Premier League, you get a higher loss of them. And I think just in terms of even just ability really to. To kind of spend. You know, I know obviously different owners have different resources and stuff, but being in the Premier League gives you kind of that scope to. To go and spend, to build. And like, like I say, if you look at like, summon the amount. Summon squad cost comparative to the rest of the league. A year ago, Sunderland's squad was 10 times lower than Burnley's, never mind the rest of the division. Like Burnley's squad a year ago had cost 180 million pounds to compile and Sunderland has cost 18. So there's just that huge gap. And we're almost kind of seeing we kind of have like the 17 Premier League teams. Then we have like five or six teams that are jumping between the divisions because they all get parachute payments, and then we've got the rest. Now, obviously some of them have broken through from there, but Lewton did it and we've seen what happened with Luton. So it's very, very difficult to kind of separate the finances from it. I think that there are some good examples of clubs that have managed to overcome it. I think Brentford, as always, are the good example. Brentford didn't spend hugely when they came up. They didn't have a massive wage bill and they've managed to consolidate. But there's a reason we always talk about Brentford. They are the outlier. It's very difficult to replicate that. I don't think it would be fair to say something that are exactly analogous to Brentford, but I think they're trying to certainly mirror some elements of what Brentford have done. Obviously we talked about, like Ipswich last year spent over £100 million and came back down. I think the profile of players that have been brought between the two clubs is quite different. I think last year, I mean, I'm sure they would never admit to this, but Ipswich had almost felt like almost building for this season. They basically got a squad of all the best championship players. Like, they. They're certainly my favorite to go straight back up. Whereas with summer, it feels, as I said, it feels like it continued. They've been big on kind of resale value. Like they sold, obviously, Joe Bellingham, who Nick just mentioned, and they sold Jack Clark last summer and the summer before that they sold Ross Stewart. Those are all players that they brought in for pretty minimal money and sold them for elective in the region, about £40 million. And I think really what, what they've done this summer hints at them thinking, actually, even if we get relegated this year, we're going to have some young players who they hope the resale value either won't have dropped or might have actually gone up. I think Diarra is the one that stands out for me. They've broken their transfer record for him, but actually, I think they will be of the view that even if they get relegated this season, he might be able to display that he's a very good footballer and they can actually make money on him. So it's a very nuanced thing, I think, and I don't think there's any one route to success. In the last two seasons, there have been zero routes to success. So I. I guess we'll. We will see if someone prove successful in what they've done this summer.
- [26:22]
Host 1
Yeah.
- [26:22]
Ayo Akimolere
I'm trying to gauge your optimism because Sunderland sit fourth in the Athletics Hope o meter for the new season. The athletic survey of fans ahead of this new season. Now, is it just the joy of being back since 2017, it's been eight years. Being out of the top flight in the Premier League in particular, or do you actually have confidence and optimism? Or is it just the joy of Sunderland being back?
- [26:45]
Nick Miller
I don't want to be a killjoy. I think probably the majority of it at the minute is just the feeling. You got to think, like, Sunderland went up in the best way possible. They didn't just win the playoff five, they won it in the 95th minute. They got through to the playoff final in the 122nd minute. Like it was this heady two weeks. That kind of makes 30 years ago and all worth it. And that obviously that engenders good feeling. And then. And you know, whether it's seeing or not, I think football fans generally, when their team's buying players, when they're active in the transfer market, that gets people optimistic. And the assumption is all these players are going to be great. So I Think there's a lot of that. But I think in part it is also that there was a potential worry that actually someone would get promoted and then, you know, not really do much about. Like I said, they hadn't spent much at all to get. Get to the Premier League. So even though they have kind of continued their policy, but they've injected a lot more money into that, that wasn't always a guarantee they would do that. So I think that's the prize people, in a nice way. And there's a good feeling around the place, you know, like people like the new kits, which is always a good thing. They're flying off the shelves.
- [27:53]
Ayo Akimolere
Well, I was going to mention the marketing team have had a blinder. That third kit is divine. All black for Sunderland is unbelievable.
- [28:01]
Nick Miller
Yeah. And obviously in Phil Bucknham's piece this week, they talked about, like, how the sales of the kits have like tripled in the last year or something. So they're smashing it off the part. There's loads of good stuff going on around the ground, like they've painted murals and also there's things going up around the city this week on the walk down to the ground. So there's a huge goodwill around it. I think that is probably what is pushing us to fourth. I think we should also clarify that that does not mean anyone thinks we're going to finish fourth. But yeah, I. It's a weird one where there's an optimism, but there's also a realism in that. For all the good work that's been done and is ongoing, it's a huge challenge that's before them.
- [28:42]
Ayo Akimolere
Yeah. Enjoy. Prepare yourself for West Ham on the 16th of August against Sunderland. Chris, thanks for joining us. Appreciate your time.
- [28:50]
Nick Miller
Cheers, all.
- [28:51]
Ayo Akimolere
Okay, John, looking beyond the finances companies, Burnley, Russell, Martin, Southampton, and to an extent, what Kieran McKenna's Ipswich all stuck to, a ball dominant playing styles. And we talked about this earlier after promotion. Does there need to be, how can I put this, a much more pragmatic approach to the Premier League?
- [29:08]
John McKenzie
Yeah, pragmatism is an interesting word, right, because people use it to mean, like defensive, like don't give up much going forwards and try and sit back. But I mean, as I understand it, pragmatism is do what you have to do to win enough games to stay up. Right. And I think ball dominant playing styles, I think in general are just on the slight decline. There's teams who are now less worried about having to possess the ball all the time, less worried about having those sort of long buildup periods. Where they start from the back and move the ball, ball in an ordered fashion into the final third. And so I think that yeah, in part the ball dominant style is declining itself. There's been teams who've done that. They've come up into the Premier League and survived playing in that way. So Brendan Rodgers, Swansea is the one that everyone likes to talk about Bielsa's leads, they did it. And you can definitely stay up by scoring more goals than worrying about defending and preventing goals. But I think the data is just so clear that the easiest way to survive is to make sure that you're reducing the amount of goals that the opposition is scoring against you, because it's just so much more difficult to score goals in the Premier League. So if you're consistently conceding two goals a game, you have to score three goals a game to win, to get three points. That's a big ask for a lot of promoted sides. If you're able to keep the opponents to no goals or one goal, I mean, you're guaranteeing yourself at least a point if you keep it to no goals, but you're giving yourself a base then that it's much easier for your attackers to be able to perform to. So, yeah, I think it's clear that if you are going to come up and play a maybe more progressive approach that you might expect from teams higher up the table, you've got to be really good at it in order for it to work. And it's definitely the case that you'll be better served by being a more defensive team. But as we said before, these teams that are coming up are not necessarily all playing in high defensive ways. They're playing in this more progressive attacking styles because they are dominant teams in that league. So I think the gamble that maybe Kompany made, Russell Martin made with was that this is the way that we play well. So let's try and play this way well rather than having to tear up the copybook in the summer window and try and reinvent the way we play. So I understand why it goes both ways, but it is a massive risk, I think, to stick with that kind of style.
- [31:17]
Ayo Akimolere
Okay, well, let's move on because I really want to know next who could be dragged into the fight for survival.
- [31:30]
Host 1
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Host 1
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John McKenzie
Avocado, my heart yearns to chew thee. Alas, I've devoured a small action figure and have taken ill, unable to partake.
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Chris Weatherspoon
In our jubilant squeakings.
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Chris Weatherspoon
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- [33:44]
John McKenzie
Yours, Jerry.
- [33:52]
Ayo Akimolere
Nick this one's for you if any of the promoted sides are to survive. Who else do you see is at most risk of going down?
- [33:59]
Chris Weatherspoon
Well, I mean, we kind of mentioned a few of the candidates earlier on and you know, Brentford are kind of the obvious one because of how much change that has kind of gone on there. Keith Andrews might turn out to be great, but it's a pretty significant risk to replace Thomas Frank with someone who has a little experience as Andrews. They've also obviously lost two of their three best players. The third, Johan Whisse, currently doesn't want to play for them and probably will leave by the end of the transfer window. That's not great. You know, as we record this, it looks like they were trying to sign striker Kali Mundo from Liguer and it looks like Forest might have gozent them for him. So it's not even kind of buying the replacements for the players that were lost. Doesn't seem to be going brilliantly, but I am always nagged by the Philly. Well, actually no, not the feeling, the knowledge that Brentford are just a lot smarter than I am. So while it might look like things are not in a kind of ideal situation, which they're not, but they kind of know what they're doing and they will find the players to keep them out of trouble. I think probably the one that I would be most concerned about is Wolves. As I kind of mentioned earlier on, they were pretty bad for long stretches of last season with Matthias Cunhe and Ryan Ait Nori. They've now now lost both of those. They have brought in kind of players to theoretically replace them. I know a lot of people were excited about John Arias earlier in the summer. Pretty good addition. I'd be slightly concerned about Vito Pereira as well. He obviously did a really good job in kind of patching Wolves up and keeping them in the Premier League last season. But he doesn't tend to stick around very much at these jobs, either by his choice or by someone else's choice. I think wolves were his fifth job since 2020. So you know, he's got a patchy record in the past and you know, his success might not continue to the detriment of the Pubs and Wolverhampton, obviously. And again, I mentioned Bournemouth now. I mean, you would think that if nothing else, the manager is so good that they would be able to cope with the kind of the losses they made. But having lost both the centre backs that were so good last season, that's a lot of upheaval in one summer. And clubs that are as kind of smart as Bournemouth and Brentford, you certainly trust them to deal with a little bit of upheaval, but that sort of level of it could prove too much. And then you have got a couple of other clubs who could surprise everyone by just kind of falling through the floor. I mentioned Fulham earlier on, who haven't really done much transfer business at all. Again, you would think that the manager is, is solid enough, assuming he sticks around, that they won't get dragged into it too much forest. It would be a hell of a kind of drop for them to go to challenging for the Champions League for most of last season to co relegation candidates this season. But while some of the signings that they're making do seem pretty promising, it's possible that they could get dragged into it with the kind of stresses of Europa League having to deal with with the classic old Thursday Sunday routine that could damage them. So while I've been talking about all this, I do kind of half wonder whether I'm trying to talk myself into a slightly more interesting bottom six, seven teams at the table and whether any of that is realistic. And the most likely scenario is that the three promoted clubs will just drop straight back down again. But I think there are enough weaknesses in some of those teams that are a little bit above lower mid table kind of clubs that they might get kind of dragged into it. So who knows, there might be a bit more of a battle at the bottom than there was last season.
- [37:57]
Ayo Akimolere
Yeah, you know you talk about a bottom six. For a much more interesting bottom six, the Athletic writers have done a predicted table and their bottom six reads 15th West Ham, 16th Brentford, 17th Leeds. So it looks like Leeds make it out 18th Sunderland, John, 19th Wolves as Nick has mentioned and 20th Burnley. What do you make of that bottom three in particular with Wolves being that particular name that could make potentially be relegated next season?
- [38:28]
John McKenzie
Yeah, I mean I think this is exactly the same as the predicted table maybe with the exception of West Ham that I've got for the Athletic FC weekend in football show that we've just recorded. So yeah, I've got one Wolfs just above Burnley here again like losing Ryan Ake, Nouri losing Matthias Kuna. Those are two big players that they don't seem to have replaced to the same level. And you know, last season were it not for the level of the promoted sides, they may well have ended up going down themselves. So I think I can understand why so many people are a little bit pessimistic about Wolves.
- [39:00]
Ayo Akimolere
Okay, fantastic. Well gents, let's leave it there. Really appreciate your time. John, Nick, thanks for joining us. Also Chris as well, who joined us a little earlier as well. Thank you guys for listening. Preview is back tomorrow here on the Athletic FC with a new host, Matt Davis Adams. Here's Matt with a taster of what to expect.
- [39:18]
Chris Weatherspoon
Thanks IO I can't wait to get going on the preview. Every Friday we'll look ahead to the weekend's Premier League action in the company of some of the Athletic's best and brightest. Expect in depth coverage of the marquee matchups as well as everything you need to know to get you set for the weekend.
- [39:33]
Ayo Akimolere
Well, nice one Matt. Appreciate it. Can't wait to listen. I'll be back with you on Monday. We'll catch you then.
- [39:41]
John McKenzie
You've been listening to the Athletic FC podcast.
- [39:44]
Chris Weatherspoon
The producers were Guy Clark, Mike Stavro and Jay Beal.
- [39:46]
Host 1
The executive producer was a morehead to.
- [39:49]
Chris Weatherspoon
Listen to other great athletic podcasts for free. Search for the Athletic on Apple, Spotify and all the usual places.
- [39:55]
John McKenzie
The Athletic FC podcast is an athletic.
- [39:57]
Host 1
Media company Production.
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John McKenzie
Foreign.
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