Is a new manager's arrival a genuine "clean slate" for every player, or does confidence take more than one 0-0 draw to restore?
Welcome back to the Sutton United Talk Time on Podcast, in association with Lucky Star Gin, where we dive into the latest at Gander Green Lane! This week, host Mike Dowling is joined by long-standing fan and seasoned traveller Andy K. Andy offers his candid perspective on the significant changes at the club, reflecting on the departure of Steve Morison and the arrival of new Head Coach Chris Agutter. The main focus is on the immediate aftermath of the Braintree Town 0-0 draw, where the Sutton squad faced terrible conditions and the pressure of a new manager's debut.
Mike Dowling
Hello and welcome to another episode of Sutton United Talk Time on podcast. It's the Sutton podcast in association with LuckySideGin. I'm your host Mike. If you are a regular listener, thank you very much.
Mike Dowling
Welcome back. If you are a new listener, More than welcome. Hope you stick around. We have Andy Kay talking to us today.
Mike Dowling
He's going to talk us through the start of the Aggie era. The Aggie do. I don't know. We'll work out what we do as we go along.
Mike Dowling
We love hearing from you. Join the conversation. Stay connected. Give us all the likes and the thumbs up and all the rest of it on social medias at Sutton Podcast.
Mike Dowling
Anyone who wants to join the panel as well, let us know and we'll get you on at some point ASAP. Andy, you've been on your travels with all the food and all sorts.
Andy
How are you? I'm all right. I'm all right. Slightly weird.
Andy
I mean, the day I left my holiday, Steve Morrison was still manager. So, yeah,
Mike Dowling
yeah, yeah. Come back. We've had, well, two managers.
Andy
So what felt like an eternity for you guys rushed by for me.
Mike Dowling
Absolutely. But I know it's a while ago now, but what did you feel about the situation with Steve? Mutual consent. We're told, obviously, that can mean
Andy
a great many different
Mike Dowling
things, but him leaving in general.
Andy
I was a little sad. I really wanted him to do well. I was very impressed with him when he came along. For one reason or another, it just wasn't working out for him.
Andy
I was impressed with the signings he made over the summer. I was very impressed with the pre-season. We looked really, really good, and then it just all fell apart. I mean, it's never nice having someone leave their position.
Andy
I will go with the mutual consent that both parties felt like it wasn't working for them. And I really wish him all the best. He's a decent chap, quite introverted, which I know rubbed quite a few people up the wrong way. It doesn't matter if you're a football manager.
Andy
So yeah, I wish him all the best. But maybe it got to a point where it was just like we weren't going anywhere. And having learned from two years ago, maybe it was the right time to do it rather than leaving it till much later. So best of luck to him.
Andy
And I hope he does well where he does, except, of course, when he plays us.
Mike Dowling
Absolutely. The knock-on is what a lot of people don't necessarily realize is when a manager goes, often his backroom staff change as well. And the very, very popular John Meaney has also left as well now. So best of luck for him.
Mike Dowling
He's done an awful lot. He lived and breathed Sutton for 18 months or so. He was with us. He absolutely, I can tell you the things he's done for Sutton.
Mike Dowling
And also I believe Sean, is leaving, not 100% sure, but I think Sean is also leaving. I think he's handed his notice, which I thought was a weird thing, but I've never really seen it before, but never mind. And we can obviously talk about new chat soon. You and I have very similar views is you support whoever's there, and it's the club you support, and whoever's in post is the person that gets your support.
Mike Dowling
But the ladies' side, we were just chatting, they've not actually finished yet, so they're still playing, but it's now 5-2 in the 90th minute, so one would assume they're going to get through. god oh no thank god for that i just suddenly panicked there thinking christ it's possible but into the hat they go is the last is the last tweet so well done for ladies on the five to win it literally just happening as i'm speaking so that's excellent um we are gonna little chat about the game straight into it rather than do all the other no mean no new stuff um what was your thoughts ahead. Obviously, Chris had 90 minutes preparation.
Mike Dowling
60. 60
Andy
minutes preparation. 60
Mike Dowling
was what I
Andy
heard, yeah.
Mike Dowling
So, I think he did say there wasn't going to be too much changes, but what were your thoughts and expectations ahead of the game and what did you think of the line-up? Was anyone missing that you were expecting to see?
Andy
Well, the expectations were not lose. Particularly by the time I got to the ground where I thought the main stand was going to fly off because of the wind. You had trees bashing into the back of it. It was really quite unpleasant.
Andy
So, you know, a windy game like that, yeah, I mean, it throws a really bizarre variable into it and anything could happen. So it's kind of like, yeah, well, let's just hope that the wind doesn't have a factor in making a freak result or somebody scores a freak goal because of the wind or whatever. So my expectations were, yeah, don't lose. My second expectation was it's going to be very similar to what we've had already.
Andy
Like I said, the guys had 60 minutes with the squad. Nothing's going to change in the one game. And to all intents and purposes, it didn't. The lineups were very, very similar.
Andy
The formation was very, very similar. The way we played was very, very similar to quite a few games I've seen this season. Yeah, my expectations were low for those reasons. But yeah, you're not going to get a miracle overnight.
Andy
I mean, what I was really pleased with was the fact that we didn't concede. We kept a clean sheet, which is something we've really struggled to do this season. So yeah, so actually, that's my strongest positive from yesterday.
Mike Dowling
Well, yeah, because there's, I mean, we'll go on to that in two seconds. I did kind of think that Jack Wadham would get in, because I think he's played under Chris previously. So I know he came in part way through the previous season, not last year, the previous one. And I think Jack was at Worthing
Speaker 1
at that
Mike Dowling
point. And he did make a point of saying he knew some of the players so far. That's going to be one of them. Also, Simmo back, obviously.
Mike Dowling
was not quite there, so David and I had to sort of start with a bit more prep this time then. We had a match where he's probably sitting there thinking, oh, I wonder if I'll warm up or whatever, and suddenly he's thrown into it. But I mean, It was challenging conditions for both teams, because even as I was speaking, I was sitting there thinking, here is a typical Sutton United sport. The wind playing its part, it's a free goal.
Mike Dowling
We never think the free goal is going to go for us. We always
Speaker 1
think it's going to go
Mike Dowling
against us. But the nil-nil draw, gritty away point, is that almost the perfect way to start to kind of go, OK, we've set a little Set a little marker down now.
Andy
You've been watching football as long as I have. The perfect way to start is to win 6-0. I think it's a solid start. I think you got to see players As Chris said in his post-match, really lacking in confidence.
Andy
But as the game went on, you could see them starting to grow a little bit in confidence as well. So I think it's going to be, yeah, I think with the full, personally, I think with the full week's training, I think we're going to see quite a different side next Saturday at Flaming.
Mike Dowling
Yeah. I mean, what I was thinking is obviously the defensive side, because the four games under John.
Speaker 4
Yeah.
Mike Dowling
they have been quite tight and defensively a bit, we haven't had a clean sheet, but a bit more solid and not giving away as much. And maybe this is a combination of all that work that's gone on. I mean, we're still in the bottom four, and I think I've read somewhere, I haven't looked because I don't dare look at these things. Someone said that we're a little bit, the safety zone's already dropping away.
Mike Dowling
Obviously, we're only, what, third into the season, so it's not going to panic me at the moment, especially as I still think we're going to win the title. But, I mean, Was it a defensive masterclass? Were we defending, or was it just Braintree weren't making any opportunities? Was it just two sides just battling out a difficult
Andy
game? I think it was the last. I don't think we were particularly defensive at all. We were not putting about 10 men behind the ball.
Andy
We weren't parking the bus, nothing like that. And there were a couple of times where we got away with it. There was one mistake, I think, by Pruti. in the second half where, you know, they could have easily taken the lead, but they're not a very strong side.
Andy
But then again, nor are we. So, at the moment, I think we've got the pieces to be, but we're not. So, I know it wasn't a particularly defensive performance at all, but I think it was just, it was a relief, I think, to the players as well that we kept a clean sheet.
Mike Dowling
Yeah, because it's only our second in the season. An interesting the other one was a nil-nil as well. I mean, Pruti seemed to, well not just him, Jack as well, seemed to be sort of coming out. There was one particular run from Jack.
Andy
He
Mike Dowling
took a
Andy
shot, yeah. If he had a bit more power of that, he would have really tested the keeper. But it was quite a lame shot, really.
Mike Dowling
Yeah, probably knackered.
Andy
Exactly, nosebleed.
Mike Dowling
Yeah, where am I? And let's, I mean, Difficult to see. His intention, he said in his interview, is attack, attack, attack. I mean, difficult game to judge it on, or not a game to judge it on.
Mike Dowling
But how does that make you feel, as a fan, with this attack? We're going to score one more than you. Aussie is our idealist type of football.
Andy
Well, the one I was thinking of was Kevin Keegan. Yeah, yeah. That was very much that kind of, we're going to score loads, but let in loads. It fills me with confidence and horror by equal measure.
Andy
Confidence because you need to score goals to win games. But the horror part of it is you can only do that if you've got real confidence in your defense. And as we've seen with the results, we haven't got confidence in our defense yet. So there needs to be some defensive work.
Andy
That unit needs to be as solid as possible. And people have been saying, How different would the results have been if Kirk had been not injured? Or if Woodyard had been not injured? Both of those would have a significant positive effect.
Andy
I would say probably Woodyard more than Kirk, weirdly enough, on how the defensive unit goes. So, you know, if Sanan's pots and pans, But, yeah, we need to make sure our defence is as solid as it can possibly be before we can really go for that kind of full-out attack. Once we get that problem sorted, I'll be more than happy, yeah.
Mike Dowling
Yeah, as long as it's like one goal, one goal, one goal, not going like three down, sitting come back. It's like, no, no, we can't take this. No, no, no, no. I mean, you mentioned the midfield there.
Mike Dowling
Do you think it is just the experience missing? Because, um, obviously Mo's in there now being that defensive shield almost. Um, you think it's that experience that we're missing? Or do you think it's just something that's going to click at some point?
Andy
I don't think it's necessarily experience. I think it's more of the ability. I mean, Mo's in there doing that defensive thing, but that's not his natural game. He's a much more forward playing.
Andy
You want a kind of a Craig Eastman type. And I think the closest we've got is Woodyard. the fifth So it's having that kind of that anchor in the kind of defensive position midfield that is telling all the players around him what to do and so forth to protect that defense. And yeah, I think that's what we're missing.
Andy
That could be a 22, 23 year old. That could be a 32, 33 year old with loads of experience. I don't think it matters. It's more about the ability of having that insight into kind of defending whilst creating chances for the midfield going forward.
Mike Dowling
And apologies, I can't actually remember who I was speaking to about it, but someone did suggest that one player that could do that could be Aaron. Yeah. Sticking there, junior, doing very well out on the right, probably better than we expected at this stage of the season. Yeah.
Mike Dowling
Do you think that that could be something that they would experiment with? I mean, we've got a lot of midfielders.
Andy
Yeah, I think it's worth experimenting with who we've got. Work out in training. Give several or eight players the ability to go into that position and see what they can do and see which one comes out as best and have a pecking order. If so-and-so is the first choice in that position, then the second one is on the list, we'll then cover if that player has to do something else and work on it from there.
Andy
I think, get that central point right. I think that's the difference between us losing by the odd goal, as we've been doing so often this season, to getting draws and getting wins.
Mike Dowling
And just to realise, it's probably been your first glimpse of Charlie Bell breaking through. Yep. What did you think of him?
Andy
I thought he was OK. He's enthusiastic. He's got a lot of energy. He did a howling mistake quite near the end, which I think led to their last attack.
Andy
Just literally, he almost tripped himself up over the ball and they took possession and they went on a run. He's a young player. He's obviously going to learn a lot. He's definitely got talent.
Andy
But again, it's managing that talent. Can't rush his players in too quickly. Also, you can't rely on the younger players so much. We're now lacking so much experience.
Andy
They need to be... A good manager will manage these players carefully, which is why someone like Junior, who I don't even know if he still is an academy player, but he might... No, he's just graduated from that, hasn't he? Yeah.
Andy
I think he has been successfully managed by Morrison and the first team before to come out and actually be, I think, a really good quality player this year.
Mike Dowling
and
Andy
hopefully Charlie Bell will be the same.
Mike Dowling
Yeah, we've got a few of the Academy. We've got, obviously, Jack's in there.
Andy
Jimmy's in
Mike Dowling
there. Charlie's sort of staking a claim to say, well, OK, I'm establishing myself now. So that's good. And it's interesting.
Mike Dowling
Like you said, it's managing them better. But some of the performances of those three in particular have probably been the highlights of some of the more recent games, because I think they are kind of just going, oh, well, let's give it a go, see what happens. I mean, it's a difficult one because you mentioned, and Chris has also mentioned, the confidence of the players, which is odd for me because obviously Steve did an awful lot of work with the psychological side. I think Aidan said there was something about not being complicated in the build-up, and I'm wondering if he was meaning that complicated as in the new managers saying just do what you've been doing, or complicated as in the previous managers were saying do this, do that, do the
Mike Dowling
other, and just overcomplicating things for them. How do we get the confidence back? What do we do? these players to get them back because if they're in this rut and they're constantly going to be losing games and things aren't going their way for whatever reason, how do we get it back?
Andy
I think if we knew the answer to that we'd both be like top paid sports psychologists really. It's not easy. The only way you can really get that confidence back is by winning games.
Speaker 4
So
Andy
it's a bit chicken leg. You need a little bit of luck to go your way, absolutely. What you can't say is like, oh come on lads, show more confidence. Because that's like saying, don't be depressed.
Andy
It's like, well, that's not real or don't be stressed about something unless you can offer an alternative is, you know, people's mindset isn't going to change. And I think the confidence will come back. I mean, we've got a new manager, a new management team. It's a clean slate.
Andy
No players have been prejudged. They're going to be viewed on with a black wall based on a blank sheet of paper in the same way that our fans are going to be looking at the manager in the same way or should be looking at the manager in the same way. And there is an opportunity here for them to grab that. And I think there was one player yesterday which I thought really took that opportunity.
Andy
And that was David O'Connor. I thought
Speaker 1
he was
Andy
superb. And oddly enough, he was brimming with confidence. You could just see by the way he was playing. He was willing to take on four or five players.
Andy
He wasn't scared of anything yesterday, whilst others were kind of a bit more, oh, I've got to pass it quick. I've got to get it over here. I don't know what to do. To be honest, I think maybe one of the hindrances of the Morrison period was maybe he did make it too complicated for the people.
Andy
And he wasn't giving them, not necessarily clear instructions, but I think his ideas were just something that this group of players could not fully take on board. And that was, and that might have been the disconnect. So maybe a fresh set of ideas might be enough for these players to be thinking, oh yeah. Oh, great.
Andy
Okay. Well, I can do this now and I can do that. So I think that, that, that could be part of it, but it's going to be, it's going to be a slow road. It's not going to happen overnight.
Andy
Winning next week in the FA Cup would be a really big confidence boost. Win that, get a draw against a decent sized league club. These players are going to be up for it and the mindset will change.
Mike Dowling
Yeah, I mean, just as you were saying then, don't be depressed, don't be distressed. Literally, people do say that. But Steve has often said, I want the players to be brave. Be brave.
Mike Dowling
I keep telling them, be brave. But
Andy
again,
Mike Dowling
I'm wondering now, as you're saying that, if the the I can say his name. He has been on fire recently, and he's quite a confident chap anyway. But what about David Azaya as well, as we already spoke?
Andy
Oddly enough, there's two saves he made yesterday which were absolutely superb, shot-stopping saves. I mean, really top draw saves. And weirdly enough, I would say that in that sort of situation, I think he might be stronger than Sims. I don't think he's as strong a keeper as Jack Sims at the moment.
Andy
But I think in that situation, his natural talent, he's very, very good in that situation. I thought we had a very good game. He did absolutely nothing wrong. Everything he, when he was called up to do something, he did it.
Andy
I think he had, well, last week he had, what, 15 minutes to prepare for a first
Speaker 1
team
Andy
game. Obviously this week he had a bit more time. I think he's a very, very good number two keeper. Keep on with performances like that.
Andy
I think Sims should be looking over his shoulder because I think there's something there. I think he's a very good signing for us. You
Mike Dowling
mentioned last week you had only a few minutes to prepare, but again, the goals he conceded last week, one was a deflection. and one was a penguin so it's like okay that's pretty harsh and the other sort of major game he's been involved in was the Brighton one where we got absolutely hammered but it was kind of although we got hammered a lot of people who watched it were like pretty much they just cut us apart and they were so good attacking obviously it would have knocked his confidence but hopefully now he's like, okay, yeah, yeah, I can do this. No, no,
Andy
no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,
Mike Dowling
no, no, no Before the game, I think Chris was coming over, doing some photos, chatting and talking to people. Did you get a chance to actually chat to him, say hello?
Andy
No, not at all. I generally, yeah, you know me, I don't want to be mates who manage this. I was too distracted by Buddy the Boar, the British remastered bot, who was awesome. and definitely got France's endorsement on that one.
Andy
No, I mean, what I did watch, because I was kind of sitting in the stand just saying, right, well, whenever teams come out for a warm-up under Steve Morrison, he would stand the dugout and leave his coaching staff to do the warm-up and so forth. I was thinking, right, what's Chris going to do? Is he going to take a similar approach? Is he going to be more in with the players?
Andy
He was a bit more in with the players. He wasn't completely there all the time like Matt Gray would have been, but he was there. I did notice that the warming up was different as well. There's one point where all the players were on the floor stretching their legs.
Andy
I was like, oh, I've never seen that before. It's like, OK. On their backs, like wood lice. So there's already been a couple of things that have been introduced that are slightly different, but no, he was, I, yeah, I didn't really notice that.
Mike Dowling
Fair enough. His two interviews so far, the one sort of
Speaker 1
joining
Mike Dowling
and the one just after the match, what did you kind of think of him, the way he's talking, what he's saying? Has anything given you a lot of confidence or a bit of a, whoa,
Andy
Yeah, I mean, they're both fine. I mean, obviously, he's more comfortable in front of a camera than Steve Morrison ever was, which is his personality, which is fine. His joining interview was, yeah, kind of as you expected, there was nothing, nothing there, which I thought, I mean, he was obviously talking about getting us back into the football league where we belong. I'm like, yeah, okay, if that's what you think, that's fine.
Andy
Maybe we don't belong there, I don't know. The interesting one for me was his post-match yesterday where he said, on a couple of occasions, this is the worst you're going to see us play. Yeah. And that's either extremely confident or extremely cocky.
Andy
And I don't know which one yet. Because I think we probably will play worse than that at some point during the season. it's not going to be a pattern that we're going to follow. Does that make sense?
Mike Dowling
Yeah, it does. I mean, on both of those points, I've got actually them to talk about. So, um, we'll do that now. Yeah, it's fine.
Mike Dowling
We'll play this season. I have to say, I'm not going to go back through all the interviews, but I'm pretty sure I heard Steve say about three or four times this season, that's the worst we'll play. Please stop saying that. But the League Two one, Now, I know a couple of people, Mike Nicholson, a couple of others have gone, can we stop saying this kind of thing, please, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, because we're not.
Mike Dowling
We've always been at this level. I don't know whether that's more of a propaganda type thing, where we're getting into the players' heads to say, we're getting back into that league. Any potential new signings, this is what we're looking to do. send to investors.
Mike Dowling
This is where we want to be. So it's not necessarily a bad thing to keep saying it, but I do get what everyone says about Hang on, we've only been a league club for a tiny bit of our history, not a long time. But I do get both sides of it. But yeah, you're right.
Mike Dowling
It's a little bit like when they were doing the tweets of day 16 of a club getting back into the football league.
Andy
I mean, yeah, a lot of it. How should I put this? When someone says something in public to a large audience, let's say to a hundred people, there's going to be a hundred different views on what they've said and a hundred different interpretations of what they said on the same words. Sometimes you have to kind of you know, separate the wheat from the chaff and say, well, what's being said for bravado?
Andy
What's being said specifically for audience member X? What's being said specifically for audience member Y? And it may well be that something is being said isn't aimed at you. So I think there is an obvious ambition from the club to return to the Football League.
Andy
I think we can all be happy with that. Whether that's realistic with the current setup or whether that's realistic with the current funding we have or the players or whatever, I don't know. Because I'm still very much of the opinion that we became a football league club because we happened to be in the right place at the right time. And we got a bit lucky.
Andy
It was the COVID season. We had hardly any injuries. And as a club, we dealt with lockdown better than most clubs. If COVID hadn't have happened, we might never have been a league team.
Andy
And that discussion may never have happened. You can't be in this league and not want to try and be a league club. You've got to have ambition. I'm sure Truro at the bottom of the moment have ambitions of being a league club.
Andy
Braintree probably have ambitions of being a league club, even though I think financially they're probably in a more dire straits than we are. So it's, yeah, you kind of have to realize that not everything someone says in public is aimed specifically at you.
Mike Dowling
On that, I wasn't going to mention this one because it's just like just full of it when you say it's been on the forum quite a bit of bashing, but bringing up the fact that both Gary Otto and Tim Allison in their statement for the AGM had said, we want to be a League One club within whatever time frame they've said. One of them might have said five years, one of them might have said 15. I think one of them said, yeah, for 15 years or in my lifetime or something, I can't remember exactly that.
Mike Dowling
but that's now turning into a bit of a stick to go well if they expect us to do this it's like i don't think they said we were going to expect to be an equal club i think they said they
Andy
would like us to be but that's just what i mean it's kind of a phrase can be taken so many different ways exactly the same phrase so i to be honest i i ignored that statement i was like because I learned from the whole kind of AFC filed football league by 2022 thing, which they just got laughed at. So anyone that comes out of that statement, just like that, forget it. I'll be honest.
Andy
I did follow it up. Can you
Mike Dowling
excuse me? Are you mad? And like, I did get a response kind of basically saying I can want what I want. It's fine.
Mike Dowling
I'm allowed to want things. But, um, So, on yesterday, we brought 90 people on a horrific, windy
Andy
day. I don't know how you got that number because it wasn't segregated and I don't think anyone actually knew. They weren't counting and they only announced the attendance. So, I mean, you might have been told that number but that's probably just a guess.
Mike Dowling
Okay, fair enough. Yeah. I'd
Andy
say it's probably
Mike Dowling
quite an accurate guess. Yeah, makes the rest of these points almost silly then. If we weren't so great, I was going to say, how was the atmosphere amongst the away fans? But obviously, if we're all together,
Andy
it's... I mean, it was generally quite a pleasant atmosphere. Some of the fans were getting quite frustrated with how we were playing. But it was a case of, you're seeing exactly the same as what we've seen before.
Andy
There isn't going to be a change today. But I can understand the frustration. It's not, it's not like it's not criticism or anything. Um, it seemed fine.
Andy
I mean, it was actually quite, it wasn't, it wasn't an unpleasant visit. The Braintree fans were fine. People could walk where they want. There was no trouble.
Andy
There was no kind of, even between the two supporters. And actually, you do get this. When you don't get segregation, supporters who would be generally cocky and shout abuse at other supporters suddenly become very quiet because they realize there is not a physical barrier between the two of them. So segregation obviously has its place, but sometimes if you don't need it, you don't need it.
Andy
So yeah, it was fine, absolutely fine.
Mike Dowling
Tyson had a very good phrase for that, social media has made people too comfortable not getting a smack in the mouth. So yeah, you can say what you like, but when there's someone standing in front of you going, pardon? I didn't say that. I didn't mean it.
Mike Dowling
Yeah, move on. There is two games this week. Obviously, to some people's disdain, the Surrey Senior Cup has kind of lost its luster over the years, partly because it doesn't count as a first team game and you can kind of understand why people would go, well, OK, then we're not going to take it as a first team game.
Mike Dowling
If you were the manager, which you're not, obviously,
Speaker 1
but
Mike Dowling
if you were the manager, would you then say, actually, I'm going to take this as an opportunity to try out and see a few new players, a few players I haven't seen? Or would you just say, no, over to the academy with a little bit of a bolster?
Andy
I would ask the academy if there are players that obviously have not had many minutes recently, which I don't think there's that many of them, if they could get like a 15, 20 minute run out. in that game. But I wouldn't I wouldn't do anything of that because because the opponents are so low with I think they're I think brought with combined county south or something like that. I think they got four points in 12 games.
Andy
They're even lower than we are. Um, the opponents are so weak. Um, these players are not going to learn anything, right? That the manager will not learn anything.
Andy
from that level of opponent, it will be better for them to organize a behind closed doors friendly with someone. That would be much, much better for that purpose. But if there are players that need legs in their minutes or minutes in their legs, then actually it could be quite good. Legs in their minutes?
Andy
That might be quite a good opportunity. A whole new thing, legs in your minutes. Legs in the
Mike Dowling
minutes.
Andy
There we go. There's the title of the podcast, legs
Mike Dowling
in the minutes. We got Farnborough. I'm not Farnborough, Farnham. Oh, I can see
Andy
your face.
Mike Dowling
Oh, I can hear you. I can't see you, though.
Andy
Oh, OK. I don't know what happened there. The last thing you said was we've got Farnborough, and I corrected you.
Mike Dowling
Yeah, yeah. I got that. Yeah. Anyway,
Andy
where were we? I'm just so
Mike Dowling
used to us getting Farnborough. It's close enough to me to make a boo-boo, but Farnham, I'm hoping, but timing isn't looking great for me, I'm hoping to get Kai Tanner on with either Junior, Jack Taylor, or both, and we'll do a little preview, which could be interesting because they all played sort of similar time in the Academy. But what are you feeling about that match?
Mike Dowling
Obviously, they've been doing really well over the last two or three years, promotions, good cup runs. And although they're two divisions below us, if things go badly for us and well for them, we could be in the same division next season.
Andy
How
Mike Dowling
do you see the game going?
Andy
A tough, gritty FA Cup, Ty. There's no... Because there are two divisions below us, we're going to do well. I think there's a possibility that it was chosen because of the proximity of the clubs and the position of the clubs as well.
Andy
Yeah, I think it's going to be a tough ask. I mean, we have the players to win the game. There's no doubt about that. Do we have the system to win the game?
Andy
Don't know. Do we have the confidence to win the game? Don't know. It's going to be tough whichever way it goes.
Andy
If we come away with a 1-0 victory or even a victory on penalties, fine. Don't care as long as we get through. It got your reply, wouldn't it? I was really still replacing football.
Mike Dowling
Yeah, it's it's one of those. If we were drawn against the league one side, we're not gonna be sitting there going, Oh God, we're gonna get battered. We're gonna give this a go. So there's no reason why they're not gonna do the same.
Mike Dowling
Although there are a few things in our favor is if we can kind of see wear them out almost in the last half hour should be in our hands. I'm going to regret saying that. And how would they respond to the early kickoff? Yeah.
Mike Dowling
Do you think that's something that is in our favour or do we not get enough of them to make a difference?
Andy
How have we responded to early kickoffs this season? We've lost both of them.
Mike Dowling
Yes, but we've lost normal kickoffs as well.
Andy
I don't think the early kick off is going to be a deciding factor. I think possibly the fitness level might be. I hear that as a side, they're not a particularly big side either.
Speaker 1
So maybe our
Andy
physicality might work in our favour as well. But yeah, taking nothing for granted. I mean, we saw it with Birmingham last season. We were I think what mid mid to lower the National League at that point, Birmingham would clearly top and they end up obviously going up that season as well.
Andy
They came to us, they sneak to one nil win. That was actually slightly unfortunate. So it's, um, yeah, it's the FA Cup rules don't apply.
Mike Dowling
Right. You say that, but I'm going to ask for a prediction. Do you want me to tell you what the AI has gone for first or do you want to give yours first?
Andy
Uh, Prediction will be a single goal win for us. But I'm not going to say if it's going to be 1-0, 2-1, 3-2, 4-3, 5-4.
Mike Dowling
Fair enough. 5-4.
Andy
Go on,
Mike Dowling
that'll
Andy
be
Mike Dowling
great. Gemini's gone for David to score in a 3-1 win. I also chose 3-1, but I went for Brandon to score. Is
Andy
David up on a leading scorer, you mean?
Mike Dowling
Yes. Listen, don't mock it because that's good because last week it went for Lewis to score only after I told it that Josh Coley had left us in the summer and I had to tell it that Omer Bagil had left two, three summers ago. So the fact that it managed to get someone who's actually a current player and scoring,
Andy
I was quite pleased with it. So what you're basically saying is you're using AI but it's rubbish.
Mike Dowling
It might be rubbish, but it's second in the league, which means everyone else. Yeah, fair
Speaker 4
enough.
Mike Dowling
So it's like, OK, you've got no up-to-date details. How on earth are you so high? But anyway, if it wins, it pays you the price of buying a cup for someone. So
Speaker 1
yay, go on
Mike Dowling
AI. Right, we're going to wrap it up. It's lovely to chat to you as always. We appreciate everyone's attention and feedback.
Mike Dowling
Get involved in the Knowing Me, Knowing You segment, which I didn't do. I don't know why I said that. Follow, like and share this episode in Sutton Podcasts on all social medias. Subscribe to our podcast on your preferred platform.
Mike Dowling
Give us a thumbs up on YouTube. We love that. I have got a new camera, so you can see my face a lot more clearly. So sorry about that, everyone.
Mike Dowling
And as always, thank you to our sponsors, Lucky Star Gin. Big thank you to today's guest, Andy. I'm not sure if you can still see him. I can't.
Mike Dowling
But we will catch you up, too. That's another bad thing. Yeah, you haven't got a pretty camera like me. That's the thing.
Mike Dowling
Take care, and we'll see you soon. Bye-bye. Take care. See you.
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