In this spirited episode of Sutton United Talk Time, I'm joined by familiar voices Andy and Joe. Andy brings his rich history with Sutton, recalling memories and bringing invaluable perspective, while Joe offers a fresh take and a lively outlook as he celebrates turning 18. Together, we dive deep into recent matches against Aldershot and Barnet and explore the excitement around Sutton United reaching a notable cup final.
00:58 - 01:35
Hello and welcome to another episode of Sutton United Talk Time on podcast. It's a Sutton podcast in association with Lucky Star Gin. I'm your host, Mike. And with me today, we have Andy and Joe, mostly. And he's going to dip in and out because he's got problems. That's his end, not mine. We are going to be talking about both Aldershot and Barnet. and I'm going to pretend that the absolute match just didn't happen, so we're going to ignore that completely, we're not going to talk about it, and yeah, we'll move on very quickly. We love hearing from you, we love the engagement, the likes, shares, retweets, all the rest of it, whatever the next call now re-exes.
Speaker 7
01:36 - 01:47
Follow us on all social medias, at Sutton Podcast, and please join in the conversation. Right, I'm going to introduce you both, and I'm going to say to both of you, Andy, happy recent birthday.
Speaker 6
01:48 - 02:03
Thank you. more than welcome. How have you been? I've been fine. Thank you. Yeah. Good. Good. Good. Nice little trip. Little trip off where you went away. I keep seeing food. Oh, okay. That
Speaker 3
02:03 - 02:03
was
Speaker 6
02:03 - 02:05
like months ago. Okay. Fair
Speaker 7
02:06 - 02:15
enough. I don't keep my finger on the pulse. No. Um and talking of almost months ago, it's nearly a month ago but Joe, happy birthday.
Speaker 5
02:17 - 02:17
You're eighteen.
Speaker 3
02:17 - 02:17
Thank you very
Speaker 5
02:18 - 02:24
much. Yes, I'm 18. I'm an 18, yes. Yeah,
Speaker 3
02:24 - 02:24
so
Speaker 5
02:24 - 02:29
all you fan people coming to my DMs now, you know, it's all okay.
Speaker 3
02:30 - 02:35
Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Easy. No, no, no,
Speaker 5
02:35 - 02:35
no.
Speaker 3
02:36 - 02:36
Let's not
Speaker 5
02:36 - 02:53
encourage that. Right, don't. Say nice words of encouragement. Okay. That's what I want. Nothing else. Just encouragement. Because all my DMs blocked before, but now they're, now they're... Okay. Let's move on, say something, say something. Let's move on
Speaker 7
02:53 - 03:20
very quickly, that was very weird. Right, I didn't even send you guys a Knowing Me, Knowing You question, so we'll skip that bit. Club news. Differing thoughts, I'm sure. Lots of people with different thoughts. We have reached a cup final. I will give you both my thoughts on it. But, Joe, you did a fist pump. What do you feel about this cup final?
Speaker 5
03:21 - 03:57
It was a slightly over-exaggerated, somewhat sarcastic fist pump, but it's a cup final. I'm taking it. It's not the cup final any of us would have wanted. It doesn't seem to be the cup final that the club particularly wanted, or the rest of the footballing participants in it, or the footballing community more widely. But we're in it. And I wouldn't be surprised if the competition was shelved next year because of how unpopular it's been. So we could be the only winners of this competition. So that's how I'm seeing it. We could be the only ever winners, making us
Speaker 1
03:57 - 03:57
the best
Speaker 5
03:57 - 04:18
team that has ever competed in this competition. And there are very few teams that can say that about competitions around the world. So that's how I'm looking at it. Leeds. I also just want to start, I want to be singing Leeds are Falling Apart again on Tuesday night. So, well, to be fair, I think I'm on PA on Tuesday night, so I don't think I'll be allowed, but you know.
Speaker 7
04:22 - 04:25
Andy, you've said this is not a new competition.
Speaker 2
04:26 - 05:12
Yeah, well, it's new in its format, but it's a competition that has existed. And it's a competition, of course, we've won. Back in 1991, beating Barra over two legs. I remember the second leg. I was stewarding that day. Chucked it down with rain. We won 5-0, I think. And it was the most muted celebration for winning a cup I've ever seen, because we got relegated the following week. So yeah, but if we do consider it as a new competition, then yeah, nice, nice. I'm really looking forward to it. I mean, it's not often. If you take the Surrey Senior Cup out of it, which really is, it's not a first team competition anymore.
Speaker 2
05:12 - 05:50
How many finals do we get to? Obviously, there was Wembley. Take the Surrey Senior Cup out, you're kind of looking at the Guardian Insurance Cup in the mid-90s. And then before that, again, another couple of League Cups and the FA Trophy back in 81. So it's not something that comes around every day. It's weird. I mean, Joe, you're absolutely right. With a lot of clubs, it really has been popular. But weirdly enough, in terms of non-league clubs, ours has been probably one of the best attended overall entire competition to anyone else. It's kind of like we're getting like 800, 900, even over 1,000 for games.
Speaker 2
05:50 - 06:20
Most other teams are getting 100. So it's really odd. And it's been a good chance to get match minutes into legs as well. No, I think it's been great. And a lot of people really, really down on the competition. Some for good reasons, some for wild reasons. But no, I'm really looking forward to it. I mean, it's the only thing we've got left to play for this season. So let's enjoy it. Yeah,
Speaker 7
06:21 - 06:43
I mean, I sort of cautiously go both sides. I see absolutely both points of why people don't like it, why people don't want it. I absolutely get that. I'm a big fan of the FA Cup replays because you never know and it can be I mean, I think Crawley basically put most of their success down to, I think they did a replay at Man United at one stage
Speaker 1
06:44 - 06:44
or something,
Speaker 7
06:44 - 07:21
years and years ago, and it kind of set them up for a long, long time. So yeah, that side of it, I'm not a fan of that at all. But we are in a cup final. Our club has taken it seriously from the start and they've sort of targeted it, so that's a success. And to everyone else who hates the competition because of the under-21s in there, we're the only team that can stop an under-21 side winning it. So realistically you need to come and support us because otherwise an under-21 side is going to win it and it will prove the Premier League's point and they'll start trying to push for their B-teams to be allowed into the pyramid, which obviously we don't want.
Speaker 7
07:21 - 08:10
So everyone in the country, get behind Sutton United. Last I heard, about a thousand tickets, and it's still a week away, so ticket sales are going well. a lot more leads than perhaps we thought might make it. But yeah, it's something we can win and hopefully start the process of winning and we'll see winning breeds winning. Other news, the awards dinner. Different reactions, with everyone getting very upset that it's going to cost money. But, I know Andy you know this, but it used to cost money back in the day when DOZ decided, I'm not having this split over two nights, we'll do it over one.
Speaker 7
08:11 - 08:24
But yeah, so the awards dinner, you can't have it open to everyone because it's just like herding cattle, herding fish, it's just impossible. But Andy, what did you want to jump in? Do you remember three days?
Speaker 2
08:25 - 09:15
Yeah, I mean, I never went to a formal one, but I did go to some of the kind of informal ones. And actually, by the end of it, it was just free for all. People were trying to present prizes to players and awards. You couldn't hear anyone. I can see exactly why the club want to go back to something a bit more formal. People are moaning about the price. Actually, formal dinners, It's actually not bad, the price. And yeah, I think it's absolutely fine. There was one supporter who shall remain nameless, who claims to have had connections with the club for over 40 years, saying to Dave Fairbrother that they've never had a formal dinner in the past, to which Dave Fairbrother replied, yeah, I organized it for 20 years, so you're wrong.
Speaker 2
09:18 - 09:29
Yeah, I think it's fine. I mean, again, everyone's getting what they want. You've got the formal side of it, you've got the kind of, you know, the proper sort of dinner side, and you've got the end of season party at the end of it, so I don't see what the problem
Speaker 7
09:30 - 09:46
is. Yeah, it makes more sense to me to give out awards in a sort of structured thing. It does mean I can't sneak in a podcast player of the year award, just go up and take the microphone and just give it a whirl, but I might try anyway. Yes, you can. I might
Speaker 4
09:46 - 09:48
try anyway. Yeah, you can.
Speaker 7
09:48 - 09:58
Yeah. Well, I'm doing the podcast player of the year in a couple of weeks. Same group, same format as the World Cup thing. You vote in the groups and then they go through. It was one head-to-head, so that should be
Speaker 5
09:58 - 10:04
fun. Can I hedge a bet for the four finalists? You
Speaker 7
10:04 - 10:14
can do what you like. I'm not paying out any money. Continue. No, I'm not paying money out, so don't be mad. All the winner's gonna
Speaker 5
10:14 - 10:14
get
Speaker 7
10:14 - 10:17
is a little A-I.
Speaker 5
10:19 - 10:25
I was gonna put a tenner, I was gonna put a tenner on Jackson, Will Davies, Lindy Barbrook and Nathan.
Speaker 7
10:26 - 10:29
Yeah, but I do the draw, so I might make you
Speaker 4
10:29 - 10:34
go all in one group. You're getting played. Also, don't
Speaker 7
10:34 - 11:09
forget, the fans match is coming up. Please come along and support them. You'll be pleased to know I am not walking around the pitch. Well, I'm going to walk around the pitch, but I'm not going to be walking around on the pitch. And also, Dundoe's match. I hope you guys caught the interview with Dundoe. If you haven't yet, lots of nice things have been said about it. So, I suspect that's all for Dundoe, but not me. there is a second part coming up with different people in his journey, so Doz, Matt, hopefully, Jamie Collins is on there, and Eastie, if I ever pin him down to actually take the damn video call.
Speaker 7
11:11 - 11:37
I'm unlikely to do Yovo, my poor doggie's going to go to the vets on Friday, and I'm just not going to fancy doing anything on the Sunday, because I'll be coming with my poor doggie. Yeah, yeah. But let's get to the matches. Let's start with Aldershot. Joe, what were you feeling ahead of that game? Do you kind of feel we got what we expected out of it?
Speaker 3
11:40 - 11:42
Tough team.
Speaker 5
11:42 - 12:26
Aldershot, they've had a good last few months. We're better away than we are at home. We're like 19th or 18th in the form table at home. We're like 9th or 10th in a way, which is very contrary to previous years. I think a point was minimum. They are a good team. They're not as flying as they were right at the start of the season when they seemed like banging goals was fine. Very leaky defence. They've sorted themselves out over recent months. Yeah, I was going into it thinking, hang on, if we get three points here, Barnett's having a bit of a wobble.
Speaker 5
12:28 - 13:05
Three points there and, you know, it's a good, not a big stadium, but it's not a bad stadium to go play in. Good set of fans. Had a busy last two or three years, you know, cup runs and all this. So, yeah, I think we going into it. I think I'm actually a bit more confident going to away matches as of late than going to home matches. So, I was hoping we could sneak a win, hoping we could come back to set my three points. But, you know, in an away game, even though our form suggests otherwise, a point's a point and you can't really sniff at it really.
Speaker 7
13:07 - 13:27
Yeah, I mean, Andy, both teams were going into that game on the end of disappointing results. So it was always going to be fairly tight and neither team wanted to give anything away. I mean, it was a game of two halves, but this time there was a reason for it. But what do you think of that game?
Speaker 2
13:29 - 14:09
Well, you said it yourself, it's a game of two halves, isn't it? Yeah, it's But that's kind of been the story of Sutton this season. We can play really well for 45 minutes, but we can't do it for 90. And Aldershot, I think, was a perfect example of that. First half, we were great, clearly in control, probably should have been more than one goal up. And the second half, we kind of, I wouldn't say we switched off, we just they worked us out. Yeah. I would say it's probably a better way of putting it. Um so yeah, point is is okay.
Speaker 2
14:09 - 14:53
Maybe a bit disappointing. Um Aldershot, I didn't think we're a very good side. Um they're obviously saving themselves a little bit for Wembley. Um yeah, there's nothing particularly special about that. I was although I was quite pleased that Kwame Thomas didn't get anywhere close to scoring because that's sort of an insult to injury. Um the grounds um It's a fantastic ground for 1953, I think I said. Yeah, I mean, some of it was just awful. Disabled access was shocking. Poor old Tony Torch, it took seven people to push him up the hill a little bit from the car park to get him into the ground.
Speaker 2
14:53 - 15:36
And even when he got to the turnstile in his mobility chair, basically it was like, oh, you have to get up and go through the turnstile. it's just what what what is this about? You know, and you go in and it's like a portaloos and yeah, it's really not set up well for away fans at all. Um once you're in, it's fine. The view is good. The terrace we were in is fantastic. You could, you know, the Sutton fans are really making a lot of noise. Uh show him a couple of videos to spoil it with the flare but um but yeah, apart from that, once you're once you're in there, it's fine but yeah, they need, they need to think a little bit more about how to accommodate people who are less fortunate than the average person because I just thought that was really cool.
Speaker 7
15:37 - 15:43
Yeah I mean there was a few things I sort of saw from there, it was as you mentioned the loo's and it was just all just grab a loo that wasn't men's or ladies.
Speaker 3
15:44 - 15:44
Yeah. And
Speaker 7
15:44 - 16:18
it was like okay mostly blokes listen to this and we're minging so let's be honest it's like oh no. But I don't know where I was going to go with that, but the experience for the away fans, obviously I don't get it much, but then you see the difference when Sutton, lots of comments and compliments for our away, the stewards especially, because it's like, The guys said years ago that they want people to see Sutton in the fixtures calendar and go, yes, I'm going there, it was a good experience, I want to go back again.
Speaker 7
16:19 - 16:35
So there was more, I know we jumped ahead to the Barnet game, but even they were like, the stewards were fantastic at Sutton United. But yeah, they definitely need to learn more. Andy, Lewis' goal and Ashley's assist I'm giving Ashley all the assists he wants now.
Speaker 2
16:36 - 16:38
Well, yeah, but he's not getting a bonus for it. He's not on a
Speaker 7
16:38 - 16:42
bonus. He can have as many as he wants. I'm not taking any more away from him.
Speaker 2
16:43 - 17:11
Yeah, I mean, yeah, if we're doing a goal of the season competition, it's Lewis. He's angry at me, isn't he? It's just, although it wasn't, it was slightly different, his goal. Normally, the Lewis goals coming from a distance are like real pile drivers and the keeper has no chance. But watching that goal again, it was such a clever little dink. be on the keeper. He knew where the keeper was, he knew where the keeper was going to go and he keeps it in the place where the keeper wasn't going to go. It was a lovely bit of football from a quality player.
Speaker 2
17:13 - 17:13
Joe, how did you see it?
Speaker 3
17:15 - 17:16
Yeah, again,
Speaker 5
17:17 - 17:56
I think Andy put it perfectly. You know, think of goals against Gateshead, think of goals against Woking, away. You think of goals you score, they are, you know, They're smashed and they're hit hard. This was placed. This had a certain amount of finesse to it. A really nice goal. As much as I love it for Lewis, I'm slightly more concerned about the fact that he's really having a bit of… Not shown by our results, but he's had a good last few months. Goals and performances. I think he's another one we can… perhaps expect to see on the way out in the summer if an EFL side takes a punt on him, you know, playing in League 1 with Cambridge.
Speaker 5
17:56 - 18:35
I saw something earlier today that Northampton, even in League 1, have been looking at him. And, you know, Brock's a good fielder, good on the ball, he's great at lining. I don't know why you wouldn't want him. Northampton's a way away, but he obviously lives up in Cambridge, it would make sense. So, him, you know, we're starting to see who With the line-ups, you're starting to see different combinations. You're starting to see different players given minutes as the season fizzles out and seeing who we want to keep. If they're on a longer contract, do we want to try and move them on or do we want to try and make them a part of the background of next season?
Speaker 5
18:35 - 18:37
I think we're
Speaker 3
18:37 - 18:38
starting
Speaker 5
18:38 - 18:55
to see it. I know Will Davis has had knocks here and there and this and that. But I think there's a general understanding he will, you know, his contract ends. I think he will move on. He's in a very, very good season. Does the
Speaker 3
18:55 - 18:55
contract not end?
Speaker 7
18:56 - 19:01
I don't think it does. I think he might be on a two. I'm not sure. Definitely don't quote
Speaker 5
19:02 - 19:09
me. Yeah, I don't want to say definitely. I thought he was on a one, but he might be on a two. But even so, you know, 50-50.
Speaker 2
19:12 - 19:16
How can you use that? I'll see what I can find. Carry on, guys. I saw the quizzical look on your
Speaker 5
19:17 - 19:49
face. 15-plus goals in a National League season isn't to be sniffed at, and a Bromley and a... I know they've got Michael Cheek, but a Bromley and Wimbledon, even a Barnet. Well, it's the kind of teams that could could take a part of him, Jackson, Lewis and Di. And it's slightly sad to see, because I don't think if you'd asked Steve Morrison three months ago, if we were in a bit more of a playoff fight, would Ananda voting up front be the plan or, you know, just the midfield he's been using, Sige kind of playing a bit more advanced?
Speaker 5
19:49 - 20:29
I think it's just interesting. But, you know, we're getting to see different groups of players work together. and they're not working badly, you know, first half you said Andy against Aldershot, first half-ish parts of it yesterday and second half at the start to an extent, it wasn't bad. So, only positive things from that. But, yes, Simms' strike was excellent. He is a player who, I think, will go under the radar in terms of, if you look back at this season in a year or two's time, you look back on it and you'll think Jack Simms, Will Davies as the two standouts.
Speaker 5
20:30 - 21:04
Ashley Nadesan from his golf tournament late last year. Simms has scored goals, but I think also in terms of the kind of, when he was injured, And obviously we miss Jadon Harris as well, but I think he's a much more integral cog to that team than we thought. We've been lucky with kind of Barbrook not being too badly, not having really any injuries all season, and Will not having too many injuries all season, and Sims having too many injuries all season. I look back on it now and I'm like, I think if we had had a bad injury to one or two of those guys, would our season be in a slightly different place?
Speaker 5
21:04 - 21:13
And my answer is starting to lean towards yes, which maybe makes me think, look, recruitment this summer needs to be slightly more varied. But, I mean, that's what you get at the end of the season. You start to see the plans going forward.
Speaker 7
21:16 - 21:44
There's a couple of things. With Will, we said he's always had a couple of knocks. I reckon he's just literally got to that point of he's playing and playing and playing, and then he did have a knock and had a rest, and it's now kind of a point of everything's hurting. And it's like he's been going on and running on adrenaline for so long, but when he's had a chance of a rest, it's like, oh, actually, this is hurting, that's hurting, that's hurting. But talk about Jack Sims. I mean, in the all-shot game, he did make another crucial save or two.
Speaker 7
21:44 - 21:51
I mean, how good has he been for this season, and how many times has he saved us? Joe?
Speaker 3
21:52 - 21:54
Well, yeah, he
Speaker 5
21:56 - 22:35
loves Steve. The difference between the first month and a bit of our season, and then Jack coming in. The moment I knew this guy's a proper keeper was the Churchill game in the FA Cup. He made one ridiculous save. He can play. Great distribution. Connection with the fans. Distribution the way we wanted to play. The way we wanted to play with the ball. Steve Arnold you saw throughout the start. He's not that type of keeper. Southend springs to mind away with the pass out the back. Very good keeper. Penalty saves. You back him in most penalty save situations.
Speaker 5
22:38 - 23:16
The number of reaction saves, I'm not going to name them obviously, but there are at least 10 instances this season where saves which really should go in don't, just because of sheer instinct. That's an amazing thing to have. Just a shame he wasn't in the side a little bit sooner, picking up a bit of an injury in pre-season. He's been massive and there's a reason why he was top of clean sheets last season in the NLS and in the Team of the Year. You look at the goalkeepers, and I was looking at just goalkeepers for the National League.
Speaker 5
23:16 - 23:46
You've got a few names. You've got kind of Harrison Marley for York. You've got Halifax's keepers kept a ridiculous number of clean sheets because they just draw or win by 1-0 all the time or, you know, stuff like that. And you think of kind of Barnet have had a bit of a weird situation, same with Forrest Green. It's been here and there. I think Jack Sims definitely has to be in that conversation because I think without him, again, like I said, for Simpa, and it makes it a little bit more worrying, the fact that we're talking about individuals a little bit more.
Speaker 5
23:47 - 24:11
It's kind of Simpa-Davis-Sims, because if you take away Jack Sims from this team and you put Steve Arnold or you say George Evans has a six-month loan stay for the rest of the season instead. Again, are we in the same position? No, I don't want to say that we would be because I think he is so good. I would not be surprised if, as much
Speaker 1
24:11 - 24:11
as it
Speaker 5
24:11 - 24:41
hurts me, a Bromley or a Wimbledon go and snap him up because Owen Goodman is leaving on a loan at the end of the season for Wimbledon and Bromley have an ageing keeper. Jack Simms, 24-25, that's where Bromley are. I'm just warning for anyone listening, if you see a little notification on our Twitter in June that says Jack Simms signed a two-and-a-half or two-year
Speaker 3
24:41 - 24:41
deal
Speaker 5
24:41 - 24:46
from Sutton United, don't say I didn't tell what you said, because I think it's something that could very honestly happen.
Speaker 7
24:47 - 25:12
I can't remember who I was speaking to. It might have been you, Andy, or it might have been Chalmers. I can't remember, but that's the model we're going to be. We're going to be picking up players, improving them, showing off, showcasing them and moving on. They basically want to do the Brighton Brentford model and bring players through and sell them on. Andy, talk to us about Jack Sims. Well,
Speaker 2
25:12 - 25:17
firstly, I did check Will Davies is on a two-year deal. Give me a fee! Give me a fee!
Speaker 4
25:17 - 25:18
Give me a fee!
Speaker 2
25:18 - 25:19
Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give
Speaker 4
25:19 - 25:21
me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give
Speaker 2
25:21 - 25:22
me a fee! Give me
Speaker 4
25:22 - 25:22
a fee! Give me a fee!
Speaker 2
25:23 - 25:38
Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee!
Speaker 2
25:39 - 26:16
Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee! Give me a fee Arnold started off the season and then made some Buzanis style clangers and lost his place and Sims jumped at the chance and made it his own. Yeah, he's been fantastic. I've not seen a goalkeeper for us so good at stopping penalties as Sims in a very long time. Probably going back to kind of Gary McCann era. So that's, you know, we're looking 25 years there. Yeah, he's great. I mean, for a club like us, you're right.
Speaker 2
26:16 - 26:50
We are going to be in a position where we're going to have some players leave who we didn't want to leave. And that, I mean, obviously that was exaggerated when we had relegation last season. The number of players that Steve wanted to keep who we couldn't because they had relegation release courses or a club came in and made them an offer that we couldn't really refuse. The three players we carried from last season were not meant to be the entire carryover of the squad. Goodlift was supposed to be there. Suomini was supposed to be there.
Speaker 2
26:50 - 27:42
Harry Smith was supposed to be there. Sam Hart. I mean, you could go on. All of these, even Harry Buteman. All of those players were this kind of starting point, but every manager will have that point where they have to build a squad around a lot of unknowns. They will know who they think probably needs to move on and can't go forward with the club, but there'll be other players who will who will move on regardless because really for them they need to be playing at a high level and probably Jack Sims is one of them and there's no point in trying to even if he is on a contract there's no point trying to stand in his way because you know you don't block players moves if they want to move somewhere else because that player doesn't play for you Particularly with the psychological aspect that Steve's a big fan of, he knows that.
Speaker 2
27:43 - 28:16
So, we will be losing some club favourites that we've got from this year. Who? I don't know. It all depends on how persuasive Steve can be to say, look, actually, yep, you could move on now, but you'll be languishing in the reserves and you won't get regular game time. Have one more season here. improve even more, and then you'd either go to a higher club playing regularly, or you could go to an even higher club and learn from there. So, yeah, I mean, it's the thing. That's what individuals are. They'll all have their own decision on that one.
Speaker 2
28:17 - 28:23
But it wouldn't surprise me if probably the number one that would go actually would be Jack Sims.
Speaker 7
28:25 - 28:58
Yeah. Steve Morrison. is very fair to the players and if he thinks they should be playing higher he will not encourage them to leave but he will be telling them you should be aiming higher you shouldn't be settling for this and I say not encouraging them to leave but saying Yeah, you should do that. But it gives us kudos as well. Remember we had that years and years ago when players were coming here, moving on, and it's always nice that you can go, oh look, one of our players is playing football league. I mean it's not so big now because obviously we've just, we've been there, done that.
Speaker 7
28:58 - 29:41
So yeah, but yeah. Right, all the shot done. And in fairness, you both separately said the same thing when we came on. So I'm going to say that you both said that the really good thing about the Barnet match, and I love the fact that we're being positive, was that everyone was united, from the manager all the way through to the players, to the fans. We all felt the same. So yes, well done, everyone. Andy, you can go first. Where do you want to start with Barnet? A competitive
Speaker 2
29:41 - 29:43
game killed by the referee.
Speaker 7
29:44 - 30:06
Thank you very much. Goodbye. Yeah, people, it's astonishing, I mean, I've seen people who, yes, they don't always like referees, but using words I've never really seen them before, with the word cheat being bandied around, and it's like, okay,
Speaker 1
30:06 - 30:06
I know
Speaker 7
30:06 - 30:11
you'll say the incompetent, stupid, and all the rest of it, but I've never really heard cheat being chucked around.
Speaker 2
30:13 - 30:58
I mean, I'll put it in a bit more perspective, okay. A lot of times, a lot of fans from any club will basically have a go at the ref, say the ref is a cheat, you're favouring so-and-so side because you're not giving us every decision, etc, etc. 99 times out of 100, it's not the case. Yeah, it might be a referee makes a cook-up or he's a bit incompetent, but generally, a ref is fair. And refs very, very rarely affect a game with a poor or really dodgy decision. It happened at Aldershot in the FA Trophy semi-final against Woking, where Woodrington pretended to be elbowed by Harry Buteman, sent off, nothing happened.
Speaker 2
30:59 - 31:08
Woking went out and Harry's red card got turned over straight away. That changed the game. That was probably due to incompetence.
Speaker 7
31:09 - 31:15
I'd say that's more to the player G. The referee, I think, was done there.
Speaker 2
31:17 - 31:54
I mean, what you've got there is you've got a referee and you've got a linesman. It was a corner. The linesman should have been watching this as well. And it's kind of like, yeah, you'd have to be in very, very specific positions on the pitch to get that so wrong, you know. But I think with us, it was just, I mean, Simper's, the goalkeepers double foul on Simper. And the first, the first one, the first one was almost identical to Brad House's sending off at Rochdale last season, two seasons ago. It was just absolutely nuts.
Speaker 2
31:54 - 32:36
And we get nothing for it. And then the handball as well within that. Awful. None of boating being literally smacked into the hoardings. It's nothing. And then Tyler French. Okay. It was a bit of a tug. It wasn't anything, you know, I don't even think it was a goal scoring opportunity because looking where the player was, he wasn't going to hit that into the goal. It was too far, too far forward. So it wasn't even a goal scoring opportunity, but red card penalty penalty. Yeah. Maybe yellow card at best, not a red car. So you've got, It's a pattern of behaviour here rather than just one really rubbish decision.
Speaker 2
32:36 - 33:01
Yeah, I was flabbergasted. I just thought it was an utterly appalling refereeing display. A lot of the Barnet fans and the Barnet manager pretty much agree. Obviously, they're happy with the result, but actually I thought, yeah, we kind of cheated on this a little bit. So, yeah, I mean, but again, as I said on the forum, there's not one criticism of the team. The team are great. They're
Speaker 1
33:01 - 33:01
really,
Speaker 2
33:01 - 33:26
really good. Whilst it was level, it was, you know, we matched the best team in the division. We matched the pretty much champions elect, like we did on Boxing Day. We were really, really good against them. And I can see why they're going up. They totally deserve to win this league. They're probably the best team I've seen this season. Yeah, players are great. Referee, shockingly bad. Yeah, I mean, the
Speaker 7
33:27 - 33:27
fact the players
Speaker 2
33:27 - 33:27
carried on, I
Speaker 7
33:28 - 34:02
mean, it was great. And the, who knows? I mean, I don't think the other thing is any Sutton family sitting there going, oh, we would have won that, or we would have got a definite result, because teams that are going for championships tend to find a way. Yeah. we didn't get the chance to try, because had the desire, had that keeper been gone for either the foul or the handball or the foul, then it would have been a different game, really. But Joe, go on, you have your little, your little thought about the referee and, no, come on, you must have something else.
Speaker 7
34:03 - 34:06
Andy didn't mention the foul throw. Or the
Speaker 5
34:06 - 34:50
shooting 10 yards. That throw was awful. It was like taking 15 yards forward. I actually don't understand. Like 5 yards, referees, even 5, 7, 8 yards, referees are like, yeah, move it back. 10, yeah, right, you spot it. Linesman spots. Someone spots it. He literally just kept walking, didn't have a clue, and just took it. And then ball goes bouncing again. Yellow, fine. Red, never. Penalty. From the moment Tyler had made any contact, he was going down, bouncing ball from a throw which shouldn't have been taken anywhere, ridiculous. First one was a pen, second one was a pen, third of them was a pen, ref was shocking.
Speaker 5
34:51 - 35:03
He didn't, like, and some of his decisions were just, even the ones which weren't even the big contentious affecting ones, just seemed like once he'd made that mistake, it was almost like he
Speaker 3
35:05 - 35:09
just didn't... I don't know how to put it. It
Speaker 5
35:09 - 35:30
was like, he didn't lose control, because that would suggest that things wouldn't have happened. It was more that like, oh... I... I'm just going to do whatever I want now. I'm going to do what I want to do. I'm going to make this, and I'm going to put my imprint on this game. I've made three big mistakes. Why not make it 10? And at
Speaker 1
35:30 - 35:30
that
Speaker 5
35:31 - 35:38
point, I was just like, you know what? Fair play. Because if you're going to do a bad refereeing performance, you,
Speaker 4
35:38 - 35:38
sir,
Speaker 5
35:38 - 36:01
have done an excellent job. You are officially the best at bad refereeing performances in the league. And you can have that award. Come to our awards evening. You'll get a trophy. That's your trophy for this year, Mike. Go up on the stage with the mic. It's a bonus. Yeah, it's a bonus. Open top bus parade and we just get all the Sutton fans in refereeing. Say red card for anything. No.
Speaker 7
36:04 - 36:14
there is, it's a hard job and I actually really, really rarely go in on referees and tend to only try and do it when we've won the game because it is always a convenient, oh it's the ref's fault,
Speaker 1
36:15 - 36:15
and I know
Speaker 7
36:15 - 36:26
Andy that's one of your pet peeves of, it's whenever we lose, oh it's the ref's fault, it's the ref's fault, or it was most, most years it's the ref's fault, this year it's Mauro's fault, but it's
Speaker 5
36:26 - 36:26
something I
Speaker 7
36:26 - 36:31
don't like doing, but yeah he made it so easy to go, what are
Speaker 5
36:31 - 36:31
you
Speaker 7
36:31 - 36:31
doing?
Speaker 5
36:34 - 37:13
I also think that, and I think you guys will agree, I have massive respect for all referees because it's a horrible job sometimes and it only gets harder the more fans that are around you. And, you know, they were obeying Barnett a lot who were watching the York game with one hand, knowing that, you know, if Holden scored another, then before you know it, you've got to you've won the league. So, and I'm not saying that had an impact, but it is an awful job. And by no means, if this is your first time and you're a Barnet fan watching a podcast, I am focused like at the games afterwards.
Speaker 5
37:13 - 37:14
And I, you know, there's people up
Speaker 1
37:14 - 37:14
in
Speaker 5
37:14 - 37:39
arms about referee decisions and that, but I never actually speak about the ref. I'm like, oh, odd decision, da-da-da, but move on. It's a, you know, 50-50, 6-1 after the other. If anyone who didn't watch the match, he was, honestly, it's the worst referee performance I have seen for Sutton, for any game. Not the worst I've seen overall, because I've seen a few hours in the prem, but that is, without VAR, the worst performance I've ever seen.
Speaker 7
37:39 - 38:13
But it's not as in the worst performance, because normally, as Andy said earlier, normally when there's an awful performance referee, he's awful for everyone. And you can both point to different things going on. That's not right. I think Barnett thought they should have had another penalty. But you mentioned Dean Brennan. I love him by the way, but he came into the bar afterwards and someone did mention how much did you bribe the referee and he just blessed himself going, oh my god, I can't believe we got that. Fair enough, all right, there's nothing more we can say on that.
Speaker 7
38:13 - 38:14
He's a really
Speaker 5
38:14 - 38:15
honest, nice manager.
Speaker 7
38:17 - 38:34
Yeah, I'm surprised he didn't question where all the 1300 fans came from because they weren't there at Barnet at the start of the season. But we did score, Suji got his pen. Were you in doubt, Joe? Yes. You're in doubt?
Speaker 5
38:36 - 39:11
I'm half expecting the referee to blow as he was taking it. Just saying, no, I've had enough. I back it. He's had a tough season as Sige. He was very much in the side at the start of the year. He struggled throughout the year. He's had a few very rocky performances. uncertainty of Simpa, Barbrook, Woody not massively making the impacts. He'll be gone. He's looking like he's going to be here next season with the contract extension. Good for him to get a goal, play in the last three games, play in the Cup Final, get a bit of confidence going into the summer break.
Speaker 5
39:12 - 39:18
You know, we haven't seen the 16 goals that he got for Avery last season by no means. Most of them were 10s. But, you know,
Speaker 3
39:21 - 39:21
been
Speaker 5
39:22 - 39:52
there on the pitch to take the pens, it's been Will, it's been other people. So, I just, I was very, you know, I was in doubt because I just, I don't know, I was feeling just odd after the whole, I was thinking I was just seeing red. But no, the Yeah, I'm happy for him, because he has got a bit of stick, shall we say, I think, over the last few months, just for how he's been playing. And, you know, fair enough, he hasn't been great, but I was happy to see him to get there.
Speaker 5
39:52 - 39:58
He's starting to, you know, cement his place a little bit more, because he is a powerhouse in midfield when he gets going.
Speaker 7
39:59 - 40:02
Andy, were you in doubt? Well, you had your phone out, same as me. You knew it was going.
Speaker 2
40:03 - 40:43
Yeah, yeah. No, I thought it was, I thought it was, um, yeah, I thought it was gonna be fine. Um, yeah, I mean, good point you made there, Joe, about, because I think we've all got different opinions on our current squad, whether they're good enough or not. And I don't think people necessarily going to agree completely on who is probably good enough to carry on for us next season, apart from, you know, some real obvious contenders. Um, But yeah, I mean, Sid really hasn't had that much of a chance. He's been, even times where we've really struggled to name enough substitutes.
Speaker 2
40:44 - 41:21
he's still on the subs bench. And now he's actually starting to get his chance. And I think this is a really, OK, we've got three games left, two games left. Put the cup final at one side. Two games left. This is really an opportunity for Morrison to take a really good look at who we've got available and what they could do for us. The results don't really matter anymore. I mean, yeah, we might end up losing both games. Eh, we lose both games, we lose both games, doesn't matter. Yeah, we're not going to miss out on prize money or anything like that.
Speaker 2
41:22 - 42:04
But yeah, it's a real opportunity for him to see actually, well, you know, as you rightly said, Joe, mix things up a bit, have different players in different positions and using various players. Harry Ransom's another one. He's hardly featured. But in the last month or so, he's kind of, you know, appeared a bit more. Same with Hayden Muller. It's really seeing who can step up to the plate. This is why Ebbsfleet was a bit disappointing, although it never happened, obviously. The Ebbsfleet players on that day were playing, knowing they were relegated, playing without fear, and a lot of them were playing to put themselves in the shot window to get another National League contract next season.
Speaker 2
42:05 - 42:39
from another side. Um and actually I'm thinking a lot of our players should actually be in quite a similar thing. We're not going down. We're not going up. We're going to be mid table. Now is the opportunity for you to kind of say to Morrison or to another manager who knows actually I'm really good. Yeah, sign me up again or sign me out of this club sort of thing. So, The last two games might be what is classed as dead rubbers, but actually for our squad next season, I think they're vitally important.
Speaker 7
42:40 - 42:51
Yeah. It could be classed as dead rubbers, but I don't think Steve works like that. No. Yeah.
Speaker 3
42:51 - 42:51
Which
Speaker 5
42:52 - 43:20
is really good. Yeah. It's really good. Because, you know, they're not easy games. Joville have had a really weird season with all their ownership stuff, and it's their last home game of the season, and everyone that's been banned for basically saying, oh, your chairman's slightly dodgy is going to be back and having a great time. And Woking have been I saw a stat earlier today. Woking, since Ardley took over, would be sat fourth in the table, which is amazing. And Harry Buteman, a hidden O'Brien, you know...
Speaker 7
43:20 - 43:21
Harry's injured
Speaker 5
43:21 - 43:22
now, I think. Who?
Speaker 7
43:23 - 43:26
Harry. I think I saw he got injured.
Speaker 5
43:26 - 43:29
No, no, he might have been injured. O'Brien scored the other day.
Speaker 7
43:29 - 43:31
He's checking. Andy's checking.
Speaker 5
43:31 - 43:52
Put it next to the Will Davies. But no, I mean, in terms of the wider effort this season, he's been excellent. He's scored, like, say, a goal. But they're both good games and it makes me excited but also slightly nervous because it's going to be a weird summer for us. Because, you know, last season it was all just bye, bye, bye and then everyone was starting
Speaker 4
43:52 - 43:52
to leave.
Speaker 5
43:52 - 44:23
Obviously Smith, Patrick, Kizzy, goodness show me as Andy said. And then the season before that it was like, right, firm from National League season leave. Season before that, it was like, just stay where we are. We had a ridiculously good season, keep everything going. And it was a bit of a weird window. I remember, I did like a Twitter thread, which was like, worst players that have played for us since we went up. And the amount of players I can name, Matt Ridley, Toby Ogundaye against Kwame Thomas, like players I can name from that season, it was like, Yeah, you didn't do anything.
Speaker 5
44:23 - 44:29
Aaron Pierre, Luke Gambin, Charlie Kendall. I mean, just the name Damani Mellor. I could just name it and that's just a weird transformation.
Speaker 3
44:29 - 44:31
Damani Mellor's doing a podcast now.
Speaker 4
44:31 - 44:38
I know he is. Luke Gambin's playing in this new Ballers League thing.
Speaker 3
44:38 - 44:39
Aaron
Speaker 4
44:39 - 44:41
Pierre's got League One football consistently.
Speaker 3
44:41 - 44:42
Yes, yeah.
Speaker 5
44:42 - 44:46
It's so strange. But it just shows that some people
Speaker 7
44:47 - 44:56
see different things and for different reasons. So a player that we might go, oh my god, he's awful. Who's that bloke who went on to have a really good career? Is it Solomon?
Speaker 2
44:56 - 45:13
Yeah, Solomon Taiwo. Yeah, he was absolutely shocking for us. And we let him go. It was in our relegation season, to be fair. And yeah, he ended up playing for Cardiff within weeks in the championship. What? How? You've got the
Speaker 7
45:13 - 45:20
wrong person there. But anyway, yeah, right. So Steve's high standards. So we were raving about
Speaker 1
45:20 - 45:21
Lewis.
Speaker 7
45:22 - 46:07
And Steve has kind of went, yeah, yeah, it's great going forward, but I need more from him defensively. And he's done that to Jack Taylor. He's done that to Will earlier in the season, going, OK, great, you got to 10 goals, but you've got to get to 20. So these are the standards he's setting. And I think slowly a lot of us coming around to going okay we're getting him now a little bit more his personality's coming out a bit more he's not he's he is grumpy there's not a lot he can do about it he says it himself he's grumpy um well he said miserable i'll choose grumpy um but he is he's got very high standards and um after a match if we've lost he is not somebody who wants to sit around and talk to you about it he wants to just punch something yeah and
Speaker 5
46:07 - 46:44
also There are people who are saying, oh, Samara don't care about me. And I will say this, I think he absolutely does. I think he takes everything that happens on that pitch to heart, like, massively. From my interactions with him, from watching him speak, watching him on the sidelines, he is someone, you know, it's like, people are saying, oh, he's just teeing himself up for a mere award, for a bigger job. You know, that's why he went down to Hornchurch in London. I think, you know, the way he's setting us up on the programme, all 1-25, you know, there is a certain level of, let's build this club into a really long-term, sustainable place.
Speaker 5
46:44 - 47:05
The things you're doing are off the pitch as well. I think he really, really does care. And, you know, there have been times this season where I'm like, oh, this is miserable. This is really horrible. But I want to back him. Now, even though we're having a bit of a rough end to the season, you know, a bit hit and miss, I've never been more confident. I'm going to put my neck on the line here.
Speaker 4
47:06 - 47:06
I've
Speaker 5
47:06 - 47:38
never been more confident that he's the right person to try and get us pushing at the top end next season. Because I think he really does care about making the club in that situation. And he's had his time now. I mean, it's so difficult when you've had two managers in God knows how many years. What was it? Like 15 years. And to come in and change so many things. He doesn't care. You know, you might think his tactics are wrong. You might think he's gruff. You might think he's miserable. I think the one thing you can't say is he doesn't care because I actually think he takes
Speaker 4
47:38 - 47:39
all of it
Speaker 5
47:39 - 48:01
on the chin and all of the flack and all this. He'll morrow out. He's taken that. It's not the wider group. It's not the players. It's, you know, him and Tyler French to an extent as well. That's my one thing I would say going into the end of the season. I don't think the statement he doesn't care can apply to him anymore because I think it's pretty evident that he really does.
Speaker 7
48:03 - 48:13
Yeah, I mean, if you look at, just a silly analogy, if you look at building sites, there's fuck all happening, fuck all happening. It's miserable, it's dirty, it's manky, it's
Speaker 1
48:13 - 48:14
wet,
Speaker 7
48:14 - 48:30
it's horrible, and then suddenly you go away for two weeks and come back and go, Jesus, where'd that building suddenly come from? Because the foundation work is horrible and dirty and all the rest of it, and then all the pretty stuff gets added on afterwards. I like that, I should have worked on that a bit harder. But I will use that somehow, again. um
Speaker 3
48:31 - 48:31
yeah
Speaker 7
48:32 - 49:31
absolutely yeah i'll put morrison building something um so he obviously went a little bit upset with ref um which again he doesn't do he's for all the all the faults he doesn't really do that so um that just shows and obviously there's one reason why you don't do that, you're going to get fined and all the rest of it, but when you just go, no, it's fine, you can't fine me for that and we'll get another apology, was a nice little throwaway comment as well. But we will move on. There were a couple of other little things, so one conversation I had with someone else, was one of the things that I think we might be trying next season is to maybe change the ethos a little bit of the fans, because obviously we all like to be in the bar as long as possible and that bell goes and everyone starts going out or thinking, oh, I'll just finish my drink.
Speaker 7
49:32 - 50:13
Let's try and get people out there in that stand before the players come out. So Joe, you might have something to do with this. So we might then have to start thinking of maybe getting some songs to just play everywhere that people know, right, drink up now, get out there and then something to get everyone going a little bit. So, because I think sometimes when the players come out and we're all still filtering out, it can have an effect on you to think, oh, they're not really that bothered about starting, but when the guys behind the goal did all the displays and they were there and everyone was up for it, and they've been fantastic all season, as much as I want to try and moan at them, apart from the odd flare or two incident, they've been fantastic all season behind that goal.
Speaker 1
50:14 - 50:14
But yeah,
Speaker 7
50:14 - 50:30
something to think about if people's got ideas. I didn't gently mention it to Jack and he said, oh yeah, something we might need to look at as well. So yeah, keep badgering everyone. But over the two games, Andy, What was good for you? Could be any one thing over the two
Speaker 2
50:30 - 50:57
games. The entire squad in the Barnet game. Perfect. Without a doubt. Every single player to a man was really, it was actually really good, including those coming on as subs. Yeah, like I said, couldn't fault that, couldn't fault that performance. really couldn't and we've played a lot worse and drawn like against Aldershot. Yeah, it's the way it goes.
Speaker 7
50:58 - 51:00
Great to see Josh back. I know it's
Speaker 2
51:00 - 51:01
only
Speaker 7
51:01 - 51:05
early in the season but great to see him back on the pitch again. Joe, what was good for you? At
Speaker 5
51:08 - 51:23
Aldershot in particular, I thought we were very good. Really, really good bank holiday attendance and cheering on the boys, which in, you know, quite an outnumbered stadium. But yeah, really good, really good from them.
Speaker 7
51:25 - 51:58
And the away fans have been mentioned specifically as being a great example of what we would like at home as well. But I know, Andy, all of us have had conversations over the years of going, it doesn't work because we all stand in different places. But There's a brand new stand, there's a brand new generation, so who knows? Who knows? And some of them can drink now, Joe, eh? Joe, what was bad? I can't actually believe he's thinking about this. We've
Speaker 3
51:58 - 51:58
just
Speaker 7
51:59 - 52:01
been half an hour discussing the fucking referee and
Speaker 4
52:01 - 52:04
he's thinking about what was bad. You didn't see my brilliant drama skills there, where I was, you know,
Speaker 5
52:04 - 52:39
looking up to the ceiling, pretending like nothing at all went wrong. Um, no. Um, you know what, I should leave it to Andy to say the obvious one, just because I feel I'm gonna find something really cool. Um, do you know what was bad? The quality of card at all the shops. I watched the game back, and I looked at the quality of the rest cards, and I was bitterly disappointed. They look grainy, and I don't know why. I don't know if they're standard issue, and I don't know if they're its own cards, but they just didn't look good.
Speaker 7
52:42 - 52:43
Are you quite well?
Speaker 4
52:48 - 52:52
Can you say the ref if that would help? Yeah, no, no, no. It's just an
Speaker 7
52:52 - 52:57
odd thing. I mean, I did think you were going for some food tangent again, but OK. Andy, what was bad?
Speaker 2
52:58 - 53:07
Oh, it's obviously at Barnet, it was the weather. It was the rain coming into the stand, you know, in the halfway through the first half. No, it was the fucking ref.
Speaker 7
53:10 - 53:23
It was the weather, because I was told it was going to be 15, 16 degrees and rain. So I wore my T-shirt with a little raincoat. It was fucking cold. Oh, Joe likes the weather ones as well. Yeah. I was led astray. Andy, what was funny? The
Speaker 3
53:23 - 53:25
referee. The referee. Yep.
Speaker 2
53:41 - 53:48
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Right. It was just so preposterous. Yeah, she almost had to laugh. Yeah.
Speaker 3
53:48 - 53:49
Well, yeah, if
Speaker 7
53:49 - 53:54
you don't. Joe, anything else funny for you? Apart from me being cold.
Speaker 3
53:58 - 53:59
Not
Speaker 5
53:59 - 54:00
massively.
Speaker 4
54:01 - 54:01
I mean,
Speaker 5
54:01 - 54:12
yeah. Oh, after Good Friday, I went out for a Friday tea. I distinctly remember talking to some poor girl
Speaker 4
54:13 - 54:24
in a field. I think I was talking about 433. No, because she asked what football... No, no, no, right? This is one of my mates, right?
Speaker 5
54:25 - 54:35
This wasn't just like chat, right? But she was like, what football team do you support? And I was like, you won't know it. And she was like, try me. I bet I will. And I said, Sutton United. And she said,
Speaker 4
54:36 - 54:36
oh, in
Speaker 5
54:36 - 54:55
Birmingham. I was like, no. I was like, how do you know that at Sutton? But I was like, OK, that's not the point. And then I distinctly remember saying the words, Alex Woodyard, he's a scrapper, but he doesn't have a pass on him. So, you know. Paul, um, yeah, I don't actually remember your name, but if
Speaker 4
54:55 - 54:56
you're out there listening,
Speaker 5
54:57 - 55:00
you've got a detailed explanation about how Sigurd Aluzzi doesn't fit into our system.
Speaker 7
55:02 - 55:20
And Joe's going to be single for the whole of his life. Looking forward to a very mid-table game on Saturday. French is suspended. We're going to have to do a little jiggle around. But how do you see it going, Joe? Do you care? Do you want experiments?
Speaker 4
55:22 - 55:22
Yes.
Speaker 3
55:22 - 55:23
I think we
Speaker 7
55:23 - 55:25
should
Speaker 3
55:26 - 55:27
play. I want to see
Speaker 5
55:27 - 56:00
it on the fence. Because I was just thinking about this. You play a five-back, because you play our wing-backs really high, play Vaz and Bez high, and they basically play as a three-back, but then you kind of have two central defenders, depending on who they are, Ransom and Muller. If you then have Sidge in the middle, which basically plays as a sitting DM, who's scrapping but can kind of distribute passes out there, then when you come forward, you become like a 3-4-2-1, which is basically kind of what we've been playing all season. But it just gives us a sense of stability.
Speaker 5
56:00 - 56:03
I need to stop talking about the system. I've really thought about this way too much.
Speaker 4
56:03 - 56:03
But I'd
Speaker 5
56:03 - 56:28
like to see Steve try something, to be honest, just because, you know, again, I know the lads are going in fancy dress. I was going to come, but I'm trying to convince my parents when I've got A-levels in like three weeks that, yeah, can I go down to Somerset in fancy dress, have a drink and watch my team, you probably, if not, get battered in the cold. And then I don't really think I'm going to sell this if I'm going to the cup final, the awards dinner and Woking. So,
Speaker 1
56:29 - 56:29
you know,
Speaker 5
56:29 - 57:02
it'll be a good game. They're not bad side. Nice, nice ish away day. I mean, it's better than Braintree. So, yeah, it will. It'll be a good game, but again, nothing for either team to play for. Hopefully they make it fun. You know, end of season games in previous years have been quite interesting. MK, Rochdale, as Andy mentioned earlier. Brett House deciding to go on some sort of shopping trip midway through the first half. So, you know, it could be a 4-4 draw, but it could very easily be a 0-0 with no shots on target and nothing to speak of.
Speaker 5
57:02 - 57:02
So, we'll see.
Speaker 7
57:04 - 57:11
Andy, do you feel like we should play Soji in the Lothar Matthäus role? We might not have
Speaker 2
57:11 - 57:43
a choice, to be honest, looking at the players we've got available to us. Yeah, I think it's interesting because somebody, Dave Fairbrother posted on the forum today that it was 39 years ago today that we played Jovo in the Isthmian League. And it was, for those who don't know, it was basically us and Jovo, it was a two-horse race. Jovo beat us 2-0. And everyone thought, oh, Jovo won the title. And then they kind of petered off, and then we won the title to get us into what was then the GM Voxel Conference for the first time.
Speaker 2
57:43 - 58:19
So I was just thinking, hmm, how have our teams done since then? It's like, yeah, we've gone down, and we went up, went down. Jovo went really up, stayed up for ages and then plummeted down. And so it's funny that, you know, kind of everything changes, but everything stays the same. We're back to playing Jovo at that level. So again, it's funny because both Jovo and Woking now are probably the teams closest to us in the league. So we're really playing statistically equal. Um, so it's going to be quite a good measure of where we are or how we're going to win the season and how it goes.
Speaker 2
58:20 - 58:48
Joe, you're absolutely right. We have been playing a lot better away from home. Although weirdly enough this weekend, it was, I think it was kind of swapped. Um, and, uh, Yeah, I think, yeah, the players go out there, they should go out and just enjoy themselves. You know, if you're playing that game on full manager, it's like, relax, enjoy yourselves, you know, half-time team talk, don't see them, you know, that sort of thing. Yeah, I just say to the players, you know, well, just try and finish it off, finish off the season the best you can.
Speaker 2
58:49 - 59:07
Although, of course, I'm sure there's going to be a number of players who will be thinking, yeah, we've got a cup final on Tuesday as well. So, I'm not hopeful that we'll get a result. at the weekend because of that. But let's see what happens. Who knows? Who knows what turns up this year?
Speaker 7
59:08 - 59:17
One of the first games I ever went to was Yovo at our place and we won 5-2. uh
Speaker 2
59:17 - 59:19
yes late 88 it was yeah
Speaker 7
59:19 - 59:19
yeah
Speaker 2
59:19 - 59:20
it would have
Speaker 7
59:20 - 59:26
been over november to december time yeah and then he scored a hat-trick and um bastard made me fall in love
Speaker 2
59:26 - 59:35
and i missed i missed two goals because i was queuing up at rose's tea hut for a pie but rose deserved it yeah yeah
Speaker 7
59:36 - 59:45
never moan about the queue of that I'm still so delighted that one of the first inductees in the Hall of Fame was Rose the Tea Lady. She
Speaker 3
59:46 - 59:47
was a legend.
Speaker 7
59:47 - 1:00:02
That's amazing for a football club to go, yeah, hang on, this is happening. Right. We'll talk about the Prediction League. I know, well, Joe played once. He's bottom of the league. Pessimistic
Speaker 5
1:00:02 - 1:00:06
PC. That entry, you know. I refuse to enter again based on that.
Speaker 7
1:00:07 - 1:00:40
So Paul Chalmers nearly got full maximum points because he had Tsuji first and he had a 2-1 loss, so he was cursing that third goal even more than most other people, but he didn't get the full points and he is seven points ahead with 16 to play for and Stuart is waiting for a slip up. So, two more games left in that. It's not going to count the National League Cup because I haven't counted it all season. So, if you want to enter now, you can do. You'll probably beat Joe because he's entered once. So, you'll probably get ahead of Joe.
Speaker 7
1:00:40 - 1:00:40
I
Speaker 4
1:00:41 - 1:00:45
entered with my zeal at Tamworth on the way up on the trade and then I just gave
Speaker 7
1:00:45 - 1:00:53
up. You got one point and that's just for entering. So, yeah, but you'll go on the list for next season. But do you have...
Speaker 4
1:00:54 - 1:00:56
I didn't even get a point for getting anything right. It was just an entry point.
Speaker 7
1:00:56 - 1:00:59
No, you just got a point for entering, that's it. It was just for putting your email in.
Speaker 4
1:01:01 - 1:01:05
I thought I did something good, but I just got a participation point. Yeah,
Speaker 7
1:01:05 - 1:01:13
basically, yeah, you could have put a 9-9 draw, but whatever. But what is your prediction, Joe, for Saturday?
Speaker 5
1:01:17 - 1:01:22
It will be a 3-3 draw and a hat-trick will be scored by Jack Wardham.
Speaker 7
1:01:24 - 1:01:29
Okay. I think I've asked this before. Are you quite alright?
Speaker 5
1:01:29 - 1:01:33
That was quite well last time. Andy,
Speaker 7
1:01:33 - 1:01:34
what
Speaker 2
1:01:34 - 1:01:34
about
Speaker 7
1:01:34 - 1:01:36
yourself? You don't have to go quite so detailed.
Speaker 2
1:01:37 - 1:02:00
You know about me and my predictions but I'm going to go for a 2-1 defeat at Yeovil but I'm going to resurrect a prediction that I made back in July, I think it was, where I said that we will win something this season with Morrison. And I think that's going to come true on Tuesday. Excellent.
Speaker 7
1:02:01 - 1:02:14
I agree. Yep. Because today's Tuesday. I'm going to go with a wonder win. We're going to keep it tight. We're going to be solid. We're going to win 1-0. We're going to break their hearts in the last few minutes. They deserve it.
Speaker 5
1:02:14 - 1:02:21
Notification at 15.02, the overall score 1-0. Can everyone retweet
Speaker 7
1:02:21 - 1:02:35
Mike, please? No one puts any stock in my things. You saw how I celebrated when everyone was like, oh, Davis has got a two-year contract. Yeah, I was right. Oh, has Harry won out? Andy,
Speaker 2
1:02:36 - 1:02:44
did you see was Harry injured? Yes. He hasn't played since the 8th. Two for two. He
Speaker 3
1:02:45 - 1:02:46
came off
Speaker 2
1:02:46 - 1:02:54
way older on the 8th of... on the 8th of April. I came off on the 80th minute and hasn't played since.
Speaker 7
1:02:55 - 1:02:56
Two for two. Obviously,
Speaker 2
1:02:56 - 1:02:58
I'm not happy that Harry's injured. Don't
Speaker 7
1:02:58 - 1:03:01
think like that. I'm happy I got it
Speaker 4
1:03:01 - 1:03:05
right, but I'm not happy really.
Speaker 7
1:03:05 - 1:03:17
No, Harry. I still love you. Right, we're going to wrap up this episode. We've spoken a lot. As always, thank you for your... Come on, Joe. Come on, Joe. Do it. Do it.
Speaker 5
1:03:17 - 1:03:18
I'm not saying it.
Speaker 3
1:03:19 - 1:03:20
No. Come on,
Speaker 7
1:03:20 - 1:03:49
Joe. Thank you for your attention and your feedback. Get involved and let us know what you think. Follow, like, share, give us the thumbs up and everything on YouTube. You can't hide. Don't forget to like and subscribe and we will be back. not after the Oval. I'll put something out, hopefully, if people pull their fingers out about the Dundoe, the second part to the Dundoe interview. But definitely we're going to be back after the Woking match because I've got two people lined up for that already. As always, thank you to our sponsors, Lucky Star Gin.
Speaker 7
1:03:50 - 1:03:57
A big thank you to the panel today of Andy and Joe. Thanks to everyone for listening. Hope you enjoyed this podcast and we take care and see you soon. Bye bye.
Stay Connected with Sutton United & Sutton Podcast
Join our community on social media for the latest updates, exclusive content, and engaging conversations. Don't miss out on the Sutton Podcast for in-depth match analysis, player interviews, and more!
Bookmark our one stop page for all updates
Follow Us:
Listen to the Sutton Podcast: Catch our latest episodes on Spotify, Apple Podcasts and all other platforms.
Contact: If you have any questions, feedback or comments please reach out on any of the socials with @suttonpodcast
Share this post