Episode 10: World Cup Playoffs, France Deep Dive, and the AFC Wimbledon Origin Story

00:00:06
Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to the Away And I'm John Green, I'm Danielle Alercon, and today we're gonna be talking about the World Cup playoff matches that start tomorrow. As this is being uploaded, Daniel, tomorrow, the joy of international football is back with us.

00:00:24
Speaker 2: I had a question about that before we get to the individual games. I was really thinking about this on the way I was walking my dog this morning, that it must be kind of a trip for the players to go from games that matter to games it don't matter, or vice versa. Right, So if you're in a club team and now you've got to go and your club team is like mid table, you're not going up, you're not going down, everything's you know whatever, And then you've got to go to a playoff like the ones that we're about to talk about. Psychologically, it must be a real trip. And then and there's you know, players who are locked in a title race who are going to play like a friendly against you know whoever. And and I feel like that that that just must really be jolting emotionally, don't.

00:01:13
Speaker 1: You think I would think playing in a playoff has got to be so intense, especially these one game playoffs where it's literally winner, go home. Your chances of playing in a World Cup, which is something you've dreamed of since you were a little kid, rest on ninety minutes of football. But it can't be that much less pressure than being in a title race in England or France or Germany or whatever. I mean those that's got to be a tremendous amount of pressure. I you, and then you go play a friendly against like Slovenia, you know, and you're like, here, we are playing football for no stakes. Absolutely.

00:01:55
Speaker 2: I mean, do you remember the guy who uh or the winning penalty kick in the World Cup last time?

00:02:03
Speaker 1: Isn't his name Mundial? No? Mundial means global in world means wait, wait, wait his name is close to give me close. I'm getting there. You're very close. What is his name? Oh? I mean, I feel like I just mispronounced it, Daniel, you.

00:02:21
Speaker 2: Did, Okay, I'm gonna give it to you. Its Gonzalo Montille. And the reason I mentioned him is because I said, you said moundieal. But okay, whatever I said it, I said it perfectly, all right. So once again I am pilloried for my pronunciation when it's not my fault that I was raised in America.

00:02:38
Speaker 1: You're You're fine. That was terrific. So Gonzalo Montiel scores the winning world penalty in the World Cup final, then like languidly takes off his shirt and strolls to the to the corner flag. Uh.

00:02:49
Speaker 2: And then uh, you know, pandemonium ensues like a whole country celebrates. And then he went back to England a couple of weeks later to play for.

00:02:56
Speaker 1: Nottingham Forest and I just remembering, like, what must that be like? You know, yeah, you're celebrating in a bus tour where sixty million people have come out to see you so much that the bus cannot move, and then enjoy being fourteenth, right. I mean Forest fans are intense. I'm not saying they're not. They don't love their football, for sure, they love their club and they they's place to play.

00:03:29
Speaker 2: But it's very different. It's very different. I remember seeing him sort of like taking a corner kick and I was like, man, this must be such a letdown. This must be like you know, like like like playing at the like at the at the YMCA, you know, like, are you know, compared to playing in the hothouse of a World Cup final and then having the cohonas to hit that penalty kick. I mean, anyway, he's now back in Argentstina.

00:03:57
Speaker 1: Playing for River Play.

00:03:57
Speaker 2: In case you were wondering, all right, the game's don there's a lot of exciting playoff action coming up. Should we start with Wales versus Bosnia?

00:04:08
Speaker 1: How do you want to do this? Yeah, let's go with Wales versus Bosnia. Wales is a favorite in that game, but not a huge favorite. I like Wales to go through. I don't know much about the Welsh national team, but except for what Ryan Reynolds has taught me through his Wrexham program. But I feel like they've got better players. They've got a lot of players in the Premier League. There's no reason they can't. They can't. They can't make it through that game. Whether they can make it past Italy is another question entirely.

00:04:37
Speaker 2: Okay, well, I'm going with Bosnia because one of my favorite writers is Alexander Haimon.

00:04:42
Speaker 1: Not just a writer you like, also a writer who's your friend.

00:04:45
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I mean I would say we're friendly. I wouldn't say he's like my closest friend, although there was a time when I dreamed of being his close friend because his first book, The Question of Bruno and his novel nowhere Man were really for me, and when I met him, I remember being completely starstruck. He's a wonderful guy, super super nice. Anyway, he's Bosnian. And when I don't have much writing on this on these games, like I have no personal collection to either country, I really.

00:05:16
Speaker 1: Just go with the literature. That's fair. So yeah, I'm all in on BOSMBI. That's fair. Well. This brings us to a difficult situation for you, then, Italy versus Northern Ireland, two nations with I would say it's pretty strong literary heritage, but I don't know if you have any writer friends there. I have to go with Northern Ireland because there is a small chance, believe it or not, Daniel, that a player from AFC Wimbledon, the third tier English soccer team I support and who will be learning more about later in this very podcast, a player from AFC Wimbledon might play for Northern Ireland in that game. Hmm, that's the reason enough. I would go. Like der.

00:05:56
Speaker 2: No, I was gonna say, uh, I really liked Dairy Girls man.

00:06:01
Speaker 1: Dairry Girls was great, so.

00:06:02
Speaker 2: I'm gonna yeah, it was a good show with Northern Island.

00:06:05
Speaker 1: Yeah, really well written. I kind of will to sleep at the end. You know, it was very moving, very moving. Yeah, I think Italy is like a fifteen to one favorite, but we're both going Northern Ireland out of respect for dairy girls. Great.

00:06:21
Speaker 2: Okay, so that leaves us with Italy versus probably Wales.

00:06:26
Speaker 1: What do you think? I mean, it's hard not to see Italy going through from this group because they're overwhelmingly the most talented team, but Italy has found a way to fall apart in previous World Cup qualifying groups. The pressure of this, the whole the pressure of these two games of this like semi final final bracket, the semifinals we played on March twenty sixth, the finals on March thirty first. I can't even imagine the pressure of going into that knowing you have to win and you're Italy. And that's why I think it's possible that that Italy doesn't go through because of the pressure.

00:07:03
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I remember Italy losing to North Macedonia last time.

00:07:07
Speaker 1: Oh and remember their goalkeeper just In tears.

00:07:11
Speaker 2: The goalkeeper's Donna Rumo or the goalkeeper from North Macedonia.

00:07:15
Speaker 1: No no boffo.

00:07:19
Speaker 2: Man, what a keeper he was h Yeah that was because he was he was like forty seven years old and he knew.

00:07:24
Speaker 1: That would be he was going to do it again. Yeah.

00:07:30
Speaker 2: Great flag, North Macedonia, great flag, great flag. Yeah yeah, Okay, so you're going with Italy, I'm gonna go with.

00:07:41
Speaker 1: Northern Ireland, just to shock the world. Northern Ireland versus Wales Island goes through. Yeah, I'm very pro Irish. I just find him to be charming Irish and Northern Irish. All right, Well, we've got more Ireland down the road to talk about. But first let's talk about Ukraine versus Sweden, which we played in Spain because of the war. This is probably the most toss up e of the semi final games, partly because there is no home field advantage, but partly because Ukraine and Sweden are both really good. I both have really good football teams. Sweden no longer have forty seven year old s a lot in Ibrahimovich, but still have some good players. I'm going to go Ukraine in that one because I like the Ukrainian national team. I would love to see them go to the World Cup. I know how much it would mean to that country.

00:08:35
Speaker 2: Okay, I'm very torn here because I agree with you kind of from a deal political point of view, and so and what would mean to a country in the midst of the war. At the same time, Sweden has Victor Yokurez, a Arsenal striker, and I'm I'm kind of selfishly want him to do well. I mean, he is a player who has the first touch of a croquet mallet, and sometimes watching him dribbles like watching a horse try to do a step over. But he's been quietly effective since the new year, and you know, scoring some important goals, including some game winners.

00:09:13
Speaker 3: Uh.

00:09:13
Speaker 2: And I think we would do Arsenal a world of good if he were to if he were to do well here. So I'm really torn about this. But so so it's like I'm balancing sort of like my selfish sort of Arsenal, you know, fandom versus kind of this moral stance against imperialism. And I think I have to go with Ukraine. Then I have to support Ukraine, Okay, So we're both for Ukraine.

00:09:39
Speaker 1: Okay. Then we've got Poland versus Albania, which we played in Poland. Poland is favored there. But you never count out the Albanians in international football. Really, oh yeah, you never count him out. Has Albebia ever qualified for the World Cup?

00:09:56
Speaker 2: Uh No, they haven't that I can think of, because I mean they did as Yugoslavis shure they had, you know, Zugoslavia, they were. They've never called up, they've never qualified. Okay, man, So I guess actually, now that I think about it, you can count out the Albanians. So here I have to. I have to go back to literature. And there's only one Albanian writer I know is Meel Kadare. It's pretty good, but man, many good Polish writers and streating. I'm thinking of Bruno Schultz, Street of Crocodiles, I'm thinking of uh Tedis Borowski. This way for the guys, ladies and gentlemen.

00:10:35
Speaker 1: What about Joseph Conrad.

00:10:37
Speaker 2: Joseph Conrad a little dense for me? But yeah, oh, come on.

00:10:43
Speaker 1: You don't mean that. You don't mean, man, I know you don't. You liked First off, you like dense literature. Second off, he's not that dense. I don't believe you.

00:10:51
Speaker 2: Okay, all right, don't believe me. I liked his book about the guy with the bomb, the secret Agent. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:11:01
Speaker 1: I didn't love Heart of Darkness. It's a little dense.

00:11:06
Speaker 3: I know.

00:11:08
Speaker 2: It's fair, but you know, yeah, but Poland takes this one just because I can only name one Albanian writer that I enjoyed, but I didn't, you know, Flip out over Man who wrote that book A Minor Apocalypse. Do you know this writer? Oh god, so good. It's called a Minor Apocalypse by Taito's con wiki.

00:11:31
Speaker 1: I'm trying to pronouncing that wrong.

00:11:33
Speaker 2: And essentially the premises, it's like, uh, the these uh, you know, communist anti communist dissidents go to this like aging writer and they're like, dude, you're basically done. You're useless. The Russian premieres in town. Here's a gallon of gasoline and some matches. You know, go light yourself on fire in front of the of the building tonight, because you know, you've got nothing really else to offer the anti commun this movement, and you're not writing anything. And so the novel follows in the whole day as he thinks about it, he's like and he goes around saying goodbye to his friends and like his old lovers and sort of like and everyone is like yeah, I mean this seems like a good ending for you. You know, it's so funny and dark, truly brilliant book. Okay, so Poland in a landslide.

00:12:20
Speaker 1: Yeah. Can I tell you real quick that one time when I was in New York City, I was hospitalized for an infection behind my eye. And I had this roommate because this was a crowded New York City hospital where everybody had a roommate, and so I had this roommate named Al, and Al was convinced that he was dying like that day. He had a heart problem. He was eighty six years old, and so all night long he called up his war buddies. He would call up his war buddies and he would be like, yeah, it's Al, gotta say goodbye. Unfortunately, you know, I got this heart valve issue and it's not going to be long for me. But then I was in the hospital without long enough that he got the successful surgery and then he was completely fine. And then he had to call back all of his war buddies and be like, Okay, it's all false alarm still here. I love that. Good for Al. Yeah, No, I mean good, it's great. It's great to say, it's great to be able to say goodbye, and it's even better to be able to say hello again. Yeah.

00:13:24
Speaker 2: I met a Chilean guy once who in Chile. He'd been living in Sweden for many years and he'd worked for the Swedish news agency. Like many Chilean exiles, he'd gone to Sweden, and he told me that he'd been He and another reporter were going to be sent to Bosnia for the war to cover the war, and they had to do all kinds of medical tech ups. So he and this other guy both did their medical tech ups and then the doctor called him and was like, okay, you have we didn't You have terminal cancer. You can't go to the war. You're going to die in a matter of weeks. So he did exactly what Al did, called everybody and said goodbye, and you know, told people that he hated that he hated them and that he they'd always been the worst to him, and they they were like, just did all this stuff, and then they turned out that they'd switched the files and they didn't realize this until the other guy just killed over and died and then they were like whoops and U And he was basically on the trip I met him. He was he you know, this guy in his like, you know, late fifties. He was coming back to Chile to make peace with all the people that he'd pissed off when he thought he.

00:14:28
Speaker 1: Was gonna die, had weeks to exactly exactly think. The lesson from that is, maybe when you have weeks to live, don't go on like a revenge tour and like tell everyone you hate that you hate them.

00:14:41
Speaker 2: Yeah, or maybe you know, double check to the diagnosis, you know, get a second appurance.

00:14:47
Speaker 1: Get a second opinion, get a second opinion. What else should have done too? Okay, A right, So Ukraine is going to play Poland in the final. Who's gonna win? Daniel Ukraine versus Poland. I'm going with Ukraine. I know that Poland is probably gonna win, but I'd like Ukraine to win. I'm gonna go with Ukraine too. It would be really fun to see Ukraine in Northern Ireland in the World Cup. It's not gonna happen, but it wouldn't be fun. It would be great. It would be great.

00:15:13
Speaker 2: Sponsored by random betting site. Okay, Next is Slovakia and versus Kosovo.

00:15:22
Speaker 1: This is a tough one for me. I don't know a lot of Slovakian or coas of R writers. I'm gonna I think Slovakia is probably gonna win. They're playing at home, They've got that, They've got that beautiful stadium in Brody Slava. I'm gonna go with Slovakia.

00:15:34
Speaker 2: Okay, they're playing at home, so I'm gonna go to Slovakia as well. Okay, Turkey versus Romania playing in Istanbul, this is tough. First see all I see is the welcome to Hell sign.

00:15:48
Speaker 1: Oh my god. Yeah, playing so hard. When Liverpool played in Turkey last week, I was watching on television in Indianapolis and I was intimidated.

00:15:59
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I I there's three. The Basicus is the black and white team.

00:16:05
Speaker 1: Yeuh yeah. And so I was the orange and yellow one.

00:16:10
Speaker 2: And the blue the blue, the blue and and uh and yellow is uh it's Fenerbache. They are very intense, man. I actually happened upon a Bisicas game uh in Istanbul once. I didn't get to go into the game, although in my memory I've revised it that I was there. But I just remember the fans storm, you know, sort of streaming in and just the noise and I would not want to play in Turkey. And also, oh Paul pretty great writer. Yeah, I saw him once from a distance. He was very quiet. Yeah, yeah, he seemed very should you like.

00:16:52
Speaker 1: See him speak or like, was he like at a conference that you were No, he was.

00:16:55
Speaker 2: Browsing books at the Frankfurt book Fair.

00:16:57
Speaker 1: Yeah, oh wow. You didn't go up to him.

00:17:00
Speaker 2: I didn't know, because what are you gonna say, like, yeah, you know what. My son, my older son, Leone, had a box of things that he was scared of when he was a kid, and he would ask his mom to keep it, and every once in a while she would pull the shoe box out from the closet and show it to him. And the box had a lot of random things, but the one thing I remember that it had was a paperback of my Name Is Read By or I'm Pomoke, And the cover freaked him out, and it was just a close up of a of a kind of like a kind of very old Turkish painting of a war scene.

00:17:33
Speaker 1: And he would just look at it and then he'd be like, no, that's enough and put it away. And like we had to hide or on Pomoke from our kid whole life is so metaphorically resonant, Daniel. It's incredible. It's incredible how metaphors just bump into you. Yeah, it might be something to do with my brain, Like the box of things I'm afraid of that I look at occasionally in order to remind myself of fear is the best metaphor I've ever heard of, other than the other metaphors that you've told me from your own life. Look that one.

00:18:08
Speaker 2: I did not come up with my child that, so that's all on him. I think that there's only one that Turkey gets out of this group. But you know, whether they play the Black Air Coasovo, you gotta go with Turkey.

00:18:23
Speaker 1: Yep. All right. So so far we have Turkey, Ukraine and Northern Ireland going to the World Cup. Our last European matchup is Chechia versus Ireland and Prague. Chechi is favored by just on the quality of literature. I know, I know, we're talking about some great check writers over the years, but I still think that we've got to go with Ireland there also. I mean, there's nothing like Irish fans of the World Cup. It's special. So I'm going with Ireland there and then we've got Denmark versus North Macedonia. Never bet against North Macedonia, but I'm still going to go Denmark. And then in the final, I'm going to go Ireland, stunning the world and making it out of that group.

00:19:03
Speaker 2: On literature alone. I'm torn, you know, Uh, you're torn.

00:19:07
Speaker 1: I mean, don't get me wrong, like Aclaholic and kunder is a great writer and everything.

00:19:12
Speaker 2: But you've got you got James Joyce, Yeah, Samuel Beckett, Samuel Beckett, Brendan Behan, whose last words were bless you, sister. He said this to a nun as she was giving him an injection. He said, bless you, sister. May all your sons be bishops.

00:19:31
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, okay, all right, call him toy Bin Oh great writer, Yeah, great bank. Sally Rooney, Sally Rooney. Yeah, all right, okay, convinced me. Okay, So so I'm going Ireland all the way.

00:19:45
Speaker 2: Here, Ireland all the way. So to recap, we have we have Northern Ireland going all the way, pull, Ukraine going all the way, uh, Turkey and now Ireland's great.

00:19:57
Speaker 1: Well here we get one of these.

00:19:59
Speaker 2: Yeah, seriously, okay, we have Bolivia versus Surinam. This is the intercontinental playoff Bolivia versus Surnam playing in Mexico, uh, and the winner plays Iraq. Maybe maybe I think Bolivia is favored there. Yeah, I think Belivia is probably gonna win that game. Olivia versus I Rock is a really interesting matchup, but I don't know if it's going to happen because it's not clear that a Rock is going to make it to that game. I wonder what happens in that case. I don't think there's a precedent for this kind of situation, Yeah, except like back in the like thirties when teams would pull out of the World Cup because like their boat wasn't big enough, you know, to get you know, like the very early World Cup. But this is quite a different situation. Yeah, I would like Bolivia to win. The entire Surnam national team is just like Dutch B teamers essentially, right, which is a fascinating, uh sort of post colonial reality. I would like to believe you to win because Belivisa hasn't been the World Up in a long time, and more Latin America is better for me.

00:21:07
Speaker 1: Okay, North Caledonia, where is that exactly? It's actually New Caledonia did I say North Caledonia? You did? I was testing you, John. That is super embarrassing, super embarrassing. Well, it's fine though, because New Caledonia is a nation of two hundred ninety thousand people. And I would have bet my life that it was somewhere in the Atlantic Ocean, but in fact it is somewhere in the Pacific Ocean, just off the coast of Australia. And it was named New Caledonia because a fella, a European fella, saw it and thought it looked like Scotland. And yet they speak French there. They speak In fact, they are part of France. There is an independence movement and it's currently being negotiated with France whether they will be fully independent, but currently they are French citizens.

00:21:56
Speaker 2: Interesting, Okay, Well I support the Newonian independence movement, but want Jamaica to win.

00:22:05
Speaker 1: Yeah, I want Jamaica. I just Jamaican's at the World Cup. It's so special, like it's such a especially a World Cup in the United States. It's such a it would be so it would be so awesome, it would make me so happy. That said, I think Dr Congo is probably gonna win that that so New Caldaria plays Jamaica and then the winner plays Dr Congo and it's hard not to see Dr Congo winning that game.

00:22:27
Speaker 2: Yeah, Derek Congo is a strong team for sure, just in terms of spectacle, for the the for the the joy that the World Cup would bring for all the fans around the game.

00:22:39
Speaker 1: I think Jamaica in being playing the United States would be wonderful. But we'll see, we'll see.

00:22:46
Speaker 2: I'm gonna go with Jamaica there, even though that I know that's a that's not the most likely thing to happen.

00:22:51
Speaker 1: So we have out of this World Cup. I'm going Bolivia and Jamaica out of these intercontinental playoffs. Yeah, and I'm going to go Iraq and Jamaica and we'll see, we'll see. I mean, the joy of the intercontinental playoffs for me is that it's so unpredictable. Like New Caledonia and Jamaica have never ever faced each other. This is a completely unprecedented situation in human history, and who the hell knows, but we'll find out. That's what makes it so fun.

00:23:26
Speaker 2: I love it, Okay, So and we'll check back in and see who did better, although I guess or how well we did because we kind of like serve agreed on everything or almost everything. All right, let's take a quick break and we'll be right back with a deep dive on the national team of France. We're back on the way, and John, I want to tell you something about the national team of friends. But I want to start with something that I learned when I'm married into a Colombian family, which is that here in Latin America, we are all taught the following that our national anthem was judged to be the second most beautiful national anthem in the world.

00:24:14
Speaker 1: After Le Marseilles La Marseilles, the.

00:24:17
Speaker 2: French national anthem.

00:24:19
Speaker 1: And I always just.

00:24:19
Speaker 2: Took this to be gospel truth because I was taught this when I was a kid at the proven national anthem was the second most beautiful national anthem in the world. And then in my thirties, when I married into a Columbian family, I've discovered that the Columbians are also taught this. And then I think, like most Latin Americans are taught that their national anthem is the second most beautiful national anthem in the world. And it was funny because until I realized this, I never even thought to consider like when was this tournament of national anthems held?

00:24:54
Speaker 1: And who are the judges? Was just like like Eurovision but for national anthems exactly.

00:25:00
Speaker 2: And also you know, how would you judge that, like what would be the fair way? Was it a bracket system or like a you know, friendly like you know, why would that even exist? Who would you know? The whole thing is just so perposteous. But it was just one of those things that I just never questioned.

00:25:14
Speaker 1: I was like, oh, we have the second most beautiful national anthem in the world.

00:25:18
Speaker 2: So but what's funny is that everyone agreed that the French national anthem was like the top the best, right, right. And I mentioned this because it's not just national anthems in which France is a global powerhouse. I have vivid memories of watching the French national team over the years, beautiful memories, and I think I've mentioned this before on this podcast, but I'm not sure. One of the first places that I learned the lessons of kind of narrative and drama was watching the nineteen eighty six quarterfinal match between France and Brazil, and I mentioned it was because the main lesson of drama, like if you want to create drama. It's you you you know, as a writer, you make indelible characters that people love, and so that you're invested in their mistakes, the readers invested in their mistakes, right, so that you're you're you know, kind of this a more sophisticated version of like, don't go in there, you know.

00:26:19
Speaker 1: And and.

00:26:22
Speaker 2: I learned this because I was watching this game, and and I loved two players on the team on each team the number tens for both Brazil and France. The Brazilian number ten is to talk at this, uh, just such a character, uh and a and a and a beautiful player. And the French number ten was Michelle Platini. Both were these kind of very technical midfield generals with tremendous vision the other kind of players that make the other players around them better, which I think is kind of a a requirement for anyone who wants to be in the discussion of being great, truly great. The game I remember was breathless.

00:26:56
Speaker 3: Uh.

00:26:56
Speaker 2: There was a point at which Brazil had a penalty, and the French veendor who gave away the penalty later revealed that platin had come up to him and said before the pen was taken and he said, you better pray this guy misses or I'm going to kick your ass, which which kind of flies in the face of mine. Makes everyone better thing, but you know, it does sort of speak to the intensity that Platini had. The Brazilian player did, in fact miss. The game was one one at full time, went to extra time, went to penalties, and both Socrates and Platini missed. And I loved both of these teams. I was watching through my like a horror movie. I couldn't decide what I wanted. It really was like it put me through the ringer. France eventually won in penalty kicks despite Platini's miss, and went on to lose to Germany in the Semis. So In nineteen ninety eight, I was studying abroad in France and at the end of the semester I flew to Abijean and then eventually to Morocco. I traveled around a bit and went to Spain to visit a cousin of mine who lived in Barcelona. This was a summer of nineteen ninety eight and I almost almost John took a train to Paris, but I thought to myself, I really have no more money and I need to go back to New York to work, and I'm sure that would be amazing, But you know what, France never wins anyway, so it's not like I'm gonna miss anything, And of course they wont. I spent some of the money I made that summer on a Zidon jersey, a player that I had another sort of like midfield general number ten, leader of a team, player I love, despite the fact that he played for Madrid and well, I loved a lot of French players over the years, not the least of which is Terryan Ree, arguably the greatest striker in French history arsenal legend, whose jersey I'm currently wearing. So I guess France when they found out that I doubted them that year, they just really stepped it up. And in response to those doubts, they've become one of those handful of teams that's always always in the mix, that really could win it all. They're in the conversation for every tournament. They've been in the finals for three of the last five tournaments, an incredible feat. They won in twenty eighteen, of course. But I just wanted you to understand the depth of talent that France has because you know, when you present the US men's national team, you were like, oh my god, they have like twenty players in the Premier League or whatever. Paris and her suburbs const do what must be like the greatest concentration of soccer talent in the world. And just to underline this, I wanted to tell you a crazy fact. There were more players born in Paris and surrounding areas playing in the African Cup of Nations this past year than in any other country in the tournament.

00:29:34
Speaker 1: Wow yeah, wow, astonishing, right, And that's obviously has to do with the you know, intense footballing culture, with the training, with you know, the mass migration which is transformed France.

00:29:50
Speaker 2: It has to do with the passion. It's just, you know, this is a footballing nation that has so much talent that they're able to export it to other countries. So players you've obviously heard of Killian Mbappe, and by you, I mean the listeners I know you John have. He was the super young in twenty eighteen. He won the Best Young Player of the Year. He scored four goals in seven games, including one against Peru, which I'm sure was like the most special goal to him, that's the one he remembers. That's probably the one he remembers most things about all night. He has blossomed since then, obviously to become one of the greatest players.

00:30:28
Speaker 1: In the world.

00:30:29
Speaker 2: Just the forty goals in all comps for Madrid this season. Just the forty Yeah. So, but you know he's not the only player John, you know, and Madrid fans still complain about him.

00:30:42
Speaker 1: They're very spoiled, They're very spoiled, They're so lucky. Yeah.

00:30:49
Speaker 2: Dde de Champ's France manager, who looks like one of those senior execs from that show mad Men. Just an absolute embarrassment of talents. And I'm just gonna name a couple or a few. Usman Deanble reigning bellond'or winner, his teammate at PSD, Bradley Barcola, Arsenal's Williams Saliba, Byron's Michael o'lisse incredible player, Barcelona's Jules kunde ugo Ekitik, who you know from Liverpool, and the list goes on and on.

00:31:16
Speaker 1: So much talent.

00:31:17
Speaker 2: The logical conclusion here is to say that France might not win the World Cup, but they're definitely going to be in the mix. I wouldn't be surprised they made it to the Semis. And like we said, with these playoffs, like you know, once we get into the knockout rounds of the tournament, anything can happen. But they're definitely one of the teams to watch, you know. And I just want to end by saying it wasn't just that nineteen eighty six quarter final that sort of taught me the lessons that I think have helped make me a novelist or storyteller. There was another iconic French moment, which I'm sure you remember, that also kind of reinforced that lesson of narrative and the creation of drama, and that was the two thousand and six zinjin Zi don headbutt against one of.

00:31:55
Speaker 1: The most dramatic failures of of keeping a cool head in all of human history.

00:32:05
Speaker 2: Incredible, incredible actually, to name check Alexander Himon once more, he described it as watching a man commit suicide in public.

00:32:13
Speaker 1: It was so dramatic.

00:32:15
Speaker 2: It was, you know, ten minutes for a full time and the deflation of the national team of players around him once.

00:32:22
Speaker 1: He was gone. It was just it was there was like there could only be one winner after that. It was incredible. So we should tell the story real quick of what happened. I was watching from Chicago with a bunch of my friends. I'm sure you were. You were watching wherever you were. Billions of people literally were watching the World Cup final. It was an extra time and the greatest player, you know, one of the greatest players ever, the greatest player on the pitch, but by a country mile, was Zennidine Zadan, This French player and one of the opposing players apparently called his sister a name, and then Zenidine Zidan headbutted, the guy, got a red card, was sent off off and France lost the World Cup.

00:33:02
Speaker 2: Yes, that's exactly what happened. The Italian player was Mattrazzi.

00:33:08
Speaker 1: Yeh. And it wasn't even you know. I mean, let's put it this way. If you headbutted an opponent every time your sister got called a name, you'd get a lot of red cards.

00:33:21
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, it's true, but I think that in some way I should mentioned this also, he is he done when they won in ninety eight, scored two goals in the final, and he'd already scored a goal in Italy against Italy in that game, and moments before he had nearly scored a bullet header from from a distance where it was unthinkable that you could even get off a powerful shot. He headed the ball from almost the eighteen yard line of the box, and the Italian keeper Buffon had been incredible saved, and so he was like, you know, a fingertip away from being like the first person to score two goals in two World Cup finals, you know, and then like literally three minutes later, he gets a red card and no one at the time knew why because there wasn't when we saw it, and I was wearing Miisi Don jersey that I'd bought in ninety eight. There were the same number of like replays, you know, like like we didn't see it for a long time in the stadium, no one knew why unless they'd seen it happen.

00:34:26
Speaker 1: Yeah, because it was off the ball. It wasn't it was It was just a nothing moment where he completely lost his cool. And you have to say, who knows how the game goes? I mean, obviously it's an extra time, it's probably going to go to penalties. That's a lottery. Who knows how the game goes? If he doesn't get a red card. But with him getting a red card, it felt inevitable that France was going to lose.

00:34:49
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely absolutely, So we'll we'll see what happens with France here. But I want to thank the Nation of France for their everything they've taught about narrative, specifically the national team of France for teaching me to be a writer.

00:35:04
Speaker 1: I also want to dedicate.

00:35:05
Speaker 2: This description of the France national team and their chances to my son's friend Camillo, who's French, half French and.

00:35:16
Speaker 1: Really special kid in our family.

00:35:18
Speaker 2: So yeah, let's take.

00:35:21
Speaker 1: A quick break and we'll be robt. All right, Welcome back to the away and it's my turn to tell a story, and Daniel, I'm going to tell you the story of the football team I love so much AFC Wimbledon, because I don't think I've ever told you this story, and I know I haven't told a lot of the listeners this story. So in eighteen eighty nine a club was formed in southwest London called Wimbledon FC. They spend most of their time as an amateur team, but then eventually they rose up to the professional ranks through promotion and in nineteen eighty eight, they reached the pinnacle of English football at the time by winning the FA Cup. They beat Liverpool in the FA Cup final. They won this big cup. Princess Diana handed it to them. It was a big deal. And then almost immediately the club started to fall apart because of poor ownership and rich people, as they often do, treating football clubs as assets rather than as community based organizations. And so eventually the club was basically bankrupted and the only proposed solution from the ownership team was to move the club away. Now we know this happens a lot in American sports, the Baltimore Colts become the Indianapolis Colts, etc. It had never happened in English football because fundamentally, it's not the Arsenal Gunners or the Liverpool Reds. It's Arsenal and Liverpool. And it was Wimbledon, which was a club the community of Wimbledon in southwest London, where the tennis tournament happens. But even so, in the year two thousand and one, the club was moved against the will of all the fans, to Milton Keynes, this new city that had been created sort of from scratch, about seventy miles away and the community of Wimbledon was left without a football club. The one young woman described this to me. She said, it was like my dad. You know, my dad had been going to every game for forty years and it was like they'd taken away my dad's church, you know. I mean, it's such a big part of your identity when you're a supporter of a football club and to have that suddenly just completely rested away from you and told that it's you know, not in the best interests of the sport as a whole for your club to exist is absolutely devastating. And what Wimbledon fans did is they started over. So the club that was Wimbledon FC took the lead place and became known as MK Dons Milton Keynes Dons. The Wimbledon fans refused to acknowledge the Dons part of Milton Keynes Dons, but at any rate that's the official name of that team. And they were by then in the third division of English football, which is still a professional league. And this new club, or this Phoenix club, the rebirth of Wimbledon FC, was called AFC Wimbledon and they started down in the ninth tier of English soccer. I mean at away games, they were literally sitting on hay bales paying fifty cents to watch their team play, when just five years earlier they'd been in the Premier League and thousands of people became owners of this new AFC Wimbledon because it wasn't going to be owned by any rich person. It was going to be owned by the fans, by all of them together, so that this could never happen again. And even if they had to spend eternity in the amateur ranks of English football, at least they would have a club of their own. But they worked their way up. After two years they got promoted to the eighth Division. Then they got promoted to the seventh division. Then they were stuck there for a few years and slowly worked their way up until by twenty eleven they were just one promotion away from being back to being a full time professional team. They had a game, a playoff final to get there. It was nil nil against Lutontown. You know Lutontown They were in the Premier League not long ago, but back then they were in the fifth Division along with AFC Wimbledon. And it was nil nil at the end of full time and at the end of extra time and it went to penalties, and Wimbledon's goalkeeper at the time was this nineteen year old kid working part time at a rental car place named Seb Brown who'd actually been in the pub where AFC. He was like six years old, and he was in the pub where AFC Wimbledon was originally formed back when all of this went down, and Seb Brown saved two penalties against Lutontown to send AFC Wimbledon back to the Football League, back being a full time professional team, which they've been ever since twenty eleven. Our community has been sponsoring them. They wear our logo on the liminal space between left thigh and buttock on the back of their shorts. It says DFTBA, which stands for Don't Forget to be Awesome. We've been sponsoring them since twenty fourteen. But these days AFC Wimbledon is up in the third Division. And what's really incredible is that Milton Keynes, the team that used to be US, is in the fourth division. And so after all that, after all that trauma and hurt and stealing away a football club, they don't even get to play US every season because they're not good enough. But when we do play. I've been to a few games where where AFC Wimbledon played against Milton Keynes and it is the most ferocious. I mean, look, I've never been to Turkey. I've never seen galatass or I play. I'm sure that's more ferocious. But it is the most ferocious thing I've ever seen in English soccer. It is incredibly dramatic. There are many songs. My favorite of the songs that Wimbledon fans sing is where were you? Where were you? Where were you when you were us? Wow? That's also like a metaphor. I would put that in my scary box they sing. They also sing you franchise bastard, you know what you are? Wow? It's pretty For the Milton Keynes players, no, they know what they's. No, they don't have to sign a professional contract with that club. We've got one. There's only one player ever who's signed as far as I can remember, who used to play for AFC Wimbledon, who signed for Milton Keynes. And that guy gets a lot of abuse. I bet Connor Lemon high Evans He's not well liked around Southwest London. I hate that guy. Yeah, I've always disliked him. So that's the story, the very abbreviated story of the football club I love so much, and that I've devot did so much of my time and treasure two over the years. I just it makes how many games do you get to?

00:42:06
Speaker 2: How many games do you get to go to a year?

00:42:09
Speaker 1: Season? I probably go to five or six games a year, so I go to a fair number. Yeah. Yeah, I probably go to one Liverpool game a year. If I'm lucky in five or six Wimbledon games. That's great. Well, I'd like to hitch a ride next time or one of these. Oh, man, you would have so much fun. Yeah, I'll let you know. It's a quick flight from Colombia. Yeah. I think there's direct flights actually from the Wimbledon. Yeah. Yeah, it's not far if you can, if you can get to if you can, if you can get to Heathrow, it's not that far away.

00:42:43
Speaker 2: Yeah, all right, all right, we'll do it. We'll do it, man. I love that story, and I'm a fan. Now, I'm a fan. Now I'll be I'll be checking them out. What are their chances of a promotion this season? Very exceptionally low. I mean, we have the second lowest budget in the third division, so just not getting relegated is a huge win. Okay, all right, well that'll take that's great, you'll take it exactly wonderful. I have a new team to support then in the third Division. I've been looking for a team for the third Division to support.

00:43:12
Speaker 1: John. We got some mail, yeah, awandpod at gmail dot com. Everybody, Yeah, we got a lot of mail. We get a surprising amount of male and I enjoy it very much. So this one says, Hey, Daniel, Sean, and John, I love the new pod. What a great intro to global football. Thanks for making it and sharing it. I've long thought John would find one of my parenting choices funny slash interesting. Growing up, my lullabies were family versions of Irish drinking songs, including show Me the Way to Go Home. When my daughter was born almost three years ago, I decided the logical next step was football. Chance she gets You'll never walk alone and show me the way to plow Lane. Every night tonight she decided to sing along. I grabbed a voice memo of it to share. Thanks and DFTBA Emily. So let's take a listen.

00:43:59
Speaker 3: Show me the.

00:44:00
Speaker 4: Way to Ploway.

00:44:03
Speaker 3: For by I want to go home well ahead a Foper crown twenty years ago and.

00:44:13
Speaker 4: Want one of my whenever I may roam to sell Hurst Parker again, you can always hear me sing in this song show Me the Way to Plowing.

00:44:36
Speaker 1: Oh my god, that's so stinking cute. So that's the song that we sang for twenty five years, Daniel, as we were trying to get back home to Wimbledon, trying to build a stadium to replace plow Lane, the stadium where Wimbledon played from the early nineteen hundreds. And uh, and we finally did. We finally built a stadium across the street from that old stadium, and it's called the New plow Lane. And we still sing that song to remind us of the long journey that we've been on. And I have to confess that hearing that makes me tear up a little.

00:45:13
Speaker 2: It's beautiful, Emily, thank you so much for sharing that.

00:45:16
Speaker 1: I really loved it. Wow.

00:45:20
Speaker 2: Okay, emotional clarity here, let's move on. This one's a little bit of a critique. John, Yeah, we need that sometimes, it says dear John and Daniel. I am writing with an observation the smugness with which you and John Green congratulate yourselves on your powerful hair has not gone unnoticed in the chrome domosphere. Won't someone think of the balls as that renowned poet my mother once said, grass does not grow on a busy street.

00:45:50
Speaker 1: Yours, Luke, Luke Sean isn't this today, But if you were, I would just bring him on right now to talk about his luxurious head of hair. I mean, there's something about our high school that just made for beautiful, strong heads of hair.

00:46:14
Speaker 2: Spend the water. Yeah, I want to say that. This comes from my friend Luke, And I was like, you know, Luke, do you want me to you know, can I say you're you know? I was going to share this anonymous, because actually came I'll be honest in the form of a text, and he said, say my full name. So this is one of my friend Luke Dempsey. Luke is such a good friend and such a wonderful writer. He wrote this book called Club Soccer one oh one, which is one hundred and one stories of club soccer teams from around the world. It's a great book, a really fun book. And Luke and I used to go see Red Bulls games together.

00:46:53
Speaker 1: No nice. Yeah.

00:46:54
Speaker 2: Yeah, he lives in La now and I can't remember now if he's which side of the l traffic Go divide he is now.

00:47:01
Speaker 1: But he's also a big United fan anyway.

00:47:05
Speaker 2: So Luke, I have nothing to apologize for. I just want to say, yeah, neither do I. It's just jeans man. I didn't do anything.

00:47:13
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's just this is this is what I was given. So it's true that you were given a good head of hair, Daniel, but you also do extraordinary things with it. Like even when we were in high school, I would always be like, my god, that guy has great hair. And it's not entirely just because of the thickness of it. It's also because of the way you style it. So I think you deserve a little bit of credit. You're again, your memory of me in high school is just completely bizarrely exaggeratedly, you know, nice to me. I just feel like mostly my style was just not washing my hair enough. And you, I mean, you can say that all you want, but I think we both know which one of us ended up with our mutual high school crush. Let's move on. Let's move on. Yes, very lastly, a correction, and this is key This is from Daniel's son, Alisio. We have a very important correction. Alisio rights. The camaraderie on the chess team is quite strong. When one of us loses, we are sad. When we do well, we are all happy. I disagree with the statement made on the podcast yours, Elisio. That's so great. Corre slight correction to your correction. It's Eliseo. But that's okay. Once again, once again I am pillaried for completely correct pronunciation. I look, we'll leave that aside.

00:48:39
Speaker 2: And I just want to apologize to Elise for this mischaracterization of the spirit of the chess team at his local school here in Bota.

00:48:49
Speaker 1: And you know, I want.

00:48:52
Speaker 2: To wish the chess team of at Anglo all the best in their upcoming tournament and also you know his his chests club at Kaipa as well.

00:49:00
Speaker 1: I'm sure you'll do great. Yeah, And let's a on my front. I just want to say it was my bad. I thought about disagreeing with your dad the moment he said that, because I knew he was wrong. But then sometimes just with the vibe of the pod, you want to just keep flowing. You want to yes and somebody and that was my mistake. I should have interrupted him the moment he said that instead of the chess teams as camaraderie, and it's not Daniel's fault or my fault that we've never been inside of one of those chess locker rooms and seen that camaraderie up close chess locker rooms.

00:49:31
Speaker 2: I'm sorry, Okay, I'm making it worse.

00:49:34
Speaker 1: I'm sorry.

00:49:35
Speaker 2: So, I'm sorry to so, John, you didn't need to throw him ntoer the bus just to get to on my son's good set. Anyway, We're gonna end there before I offend any of my children anymore. John, Thanks, as always, thanks to our producer Kurt Sean will be back next week.

00:49:50
Speaker 1: We're gonna have to quiz him on something for you seams always then, and we'll do it against her. Can't wait.

00:50:00
Speaker 2: Yes,