#69 - Richard Masters, Financial Fair Play and Palace Preview

Well well well. It's been a wild few weeks to be an Evertonian. We give a state of play on where Everton are at on and off the pitch, decide that Richard Masters is, to quote Ben, a smarmy git, and we also preview the Crystal Palace game. 

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Any time you think are these people stupid or are
they orchestrating some grandconspiracy?
It's always that they're stupid.
Welcome to episode 69 Of theboys brothers.

(00:25):
Ever some podcast.
Adam said he's been waitingweeks for episode 69.
I think that's what he said.
Anyway, we're all here.
Sorry, it's been a little bitof a gap.
Everyone's life's busy.
What can we say?
Everyone's got shit to do.
We have, you have let's.
Let's just move on.
So everyone's here.
Andy's here.
How you doing.

Speaker 2 (00:46):
Hi Austin, I'm good, thank you.
Yeah, it's been a few weekssince we've all managed to get
together, but you're absolutelyright.
You know life is busy.
We've all got food to buy andmortgages to pay, and some of us
have got babies to pay for, andfuck knows aren't they
expensive.
So yes, but I'm good, thank you, looking forward to a tour, to
a tour Chewing the fat overcurrent Everton stuff.

Speaker 1 (01:10):
Adam, how you doing.

Speaker 3 (01:11):
Yeah, very well, thank you.
Yeah, I've just started a weekoff, say week off, week off in
inverted commas.
I spent five hours workingyesterday, such as His life.
But yeah, generally all right,thanks.

Speaker 1 (01:28):
You tell me teachers don't just have three months off
a year.
I don't believe it.
I would say Ben, how you doing?
But I think I've been has justbeen looking after his four
month old son, jude, so it'ssort of I don't know if juice
gonna be able to contribute muchcontribute, more than I do, I
would imagine.

Speaker 4 (01:50):
He might involuntarily contribute at some
point.
But yes, I am, hello everyone,I am you're.
You've got a special littleguess you can't hear who you
might hear at some point In thebackground, as I am, I am
looking after, which is a joy inon in and of itself, but also
other reasons why we haven't hadmuch time to podcast and To

(02:11):
update a conversation that wewere having before the pod,
before the podcast started.
It's now Mansfield nine,harrogate two.
So, okay, that game is gone,thoroughly bonkers, but we'll
we'll keep you updated, asthere's still like 25 minutes to
go and Man's does our hometownfor anyone, which is why we're

(02:31):
following more closely than justthe fact it's nine to.

Speaker 3 (02:33):
Yeah, I mean obviously, if some teams have
scored, you know been.

Speaker 2 (02:38):
A couple of teams have scored eight in the Premier
League this season andobviously Less to beat Sadampton
nine nil a few seasons ago.
I can't recall the last time aPremier League or any football
league team Score double figuresin a regular league.
Fixed, it has happened, butyou've got to go back a while.

Speaker 1 (02:59):
Man United, ipswich, my United put ten past Ipswich
once, I think.
I think that was nine.
Now it was nine.
I don't think there's ever beendouble figures in the Premier
League.

Speaker 4 (03:07):
I think nine is the most important thing.

Speaker 2 (03:12):
No, nine is the highest.
Yeah, ten happened in.
Well, more ten, all greater,happened in the old first
division and it definitely willhave happened in the football
league, but I can't recall thelast time.
So if Mansfield can get doublefigures, that'll be a little bit
of history there, made, as weas we record, by our hometown

(03:32):
club who actually remarked it?

Speaker 1 (03:33):
Now your club still the manager there, isn't he
right?
Yes, yeah, quite well, I thinkyou know I'm looking forward to
the next season of this is rexumfor some Mansfield content.
All right, let's talk aboutEverton.
What we thought we'd do we werejoking about the last episode
title was man City Preview, andwe thought about Honning you,

(03:57):
dear listener, and just actinglike we haven't missed six weeks
and a lot of shenanigans.
But we're not going to do that.
We're not going to go back overall the games that are played.
What we thought we'd do is justdo kind of a you know halfway
through the season plus a littlebit when we at what you know
what, how we feeling, what do wethink's working, what do we
think could happen with the restof the season?
And we're going to split justfor the reasons of everyone's
sanity.

(04:18):
We're gonna.
We're gonna do the on the pitchstuff first.
So we're gonna get to points,deductions of financial fair
play and Nottingham Forest andall that shenanigans, because
there's a lot to talk aboutthere.
But we're gonna, just just tokeep ourselves sane.
We're gonna talk about the,what's going on on the pitch and
how we're playing.
And, adam, I'll come to youfirst.

(04:39):
How are you feeling about?
You know, I guess, results, butalso you know the performances,
the way the teams are playing.
Who's playing well, how Dice isdoing.
Give us your kind of overviewof that and then we'll get into
it.

Speaker 3 (04:51):
I think we've we had that purple patch in, you know,
december, as a December, see,quite a long time ago now,
doesn't it with them, where wewon Four on the bounce following
the United game, which wasobviously the game brought
straight after the pointsdeduction came out, and we, you
know we, we, we overturned the10 point deduction.
You know, very, very quickly,and you know, and, and, and

(05:23):
since then you know we've hadsome really great, we've had
tough games and some resultshave not been, you know, hope
for what you'd hope for, but Ithink the performances have
always been being there and andthe like city at the weekend is
a good example of that whenyou've got, you had a really
clear game plan and for thefirst like 10, 15 minutes, we

(05:45):
weren't sitting back and, youknow, trying to frustrate them,
we were actually on the frontfoot, which is very much
something you've seen a lot ofus doing this season and but
then we had a really clear game,finally gained the city, which
was just trying to try andfrustrate, and then you know to
hit on the counter attack andwhich we managed to do for, you

(06:07):
know, 71 minutes, until, youknow, harlan just swings his big
leg and and break to thedeadlock and, as I'm sure all
the listeners know, I'm a I'm amassive fan of XG because I
think it's such a good barometerfor how teams are actually

(06:30):
doing.
You know, minus points,deductions, minus where you
actually where you actually endup in the way you actually are
in the league and you keep amoment.
And because Everton's XG expecta number of goals sorry is 15
more than their actual number ofnumber of goals, which is
double.

(06:50):
The next, the team with thesecond biggest difference, so
Mars, is 15, and the next team Ithink it's someone in the
bottom three, I can't rememberexactly who it is is seven, and
and obviously that correlates toour points with where we should
have seven more points.
So you're looking at what weare 19 at the minute.

(07:12):
So you know, plus the 10.17 tolook at 36 points.
So obviously that's got to becaveated with the fact that
everyone else has obviously gotXG.
That is different and expectedpoints that is different from
what they actually get.
But you can safely say thatEverton are not playing where

(07:32):
their position in the table isat the minute, regardless of the
10 point deduction, becausethat has been something that has
obviously maintained, has tohappen to maintain that sort of
level and it goes back to theend.
The fact that we are, you know,we're holding teams out, we're

(07:56):
grinding out results, we'regetting good results.
We're getting some good resultswhere they come, like it spurs
at home, a couple of, you know,last week, and so our play is
what I'm trying to say in thisvery, very convoluted way our
play does not sort of reflecthow we are, how we are, how we

(08:18):
are on the table, and I say thisregardless of the 10 point
deduction, because you knowwe're a good team, we've got a
good game plan.
I don't fear, I don't worryabout us at all, and that's, you
know, not even taking intoaccount for us almost certain
points deduction which will helpus out massively.
Yeah, I think we're doing well.

(08:40):
I think Calvert Luhain islooking.
You know, I think once CalvertLuhain hits some form which I
think, which I am convinced hewill, and we start putting away
those chances that we'reobviously creating, I think
things will look a lot better.
So, yeah, you know we've got athin squad, we've got a squad of

(09:00):
players that are suitable tothe way Dish wants us to play
and it generally, it generallyworks, but you know we're not
one of the best teams in theleague, and we are where we are
where we are throughcircumstances that are not
completely in our control, andit will be a matter of time
before we end up, you know,getting the goals and getting

(09:24):
the results that match our play.

Speaker 1 (09:27):
Yeah, and look, there's two conclusions from the
XG stat that I agree with youin terms of its importance.
One is, as you say, we'd befurther up the table, even
separate to the 10 points, andthe other reason we can't shoot
for shit, right, I mean thatbasically, is the conclusion
from that stat is you aregetting yourself into positions
and not scoring them more thananyone else in the league

(09:50):
effectively, which at leastgives you a clear idea what the
problem is.
And I agree, calvert Luhainhopefully does come back into
form, but that's the challengefor us is can we convert the
good play into finishing?
And then what are you thinking?

Speaker 4 (10:04):
Yeah, I agree with Adam broadly.
I think there's a little bit ofan overreaction and then you
know this is partly media drivenas well.
Like you know, after we playedman City it was, you know, we
haven't won a game in seven andyou know, like only three points
from the last week, like thatwas the talk in the media around
the game.
But actually if you look at Awho we've played and B the

(10:28):
results we have got, in thattime, you know, went away to
Fulham, which is not an easyplace to go got a point probably
should have won that game withthe chances we created at the
end.
Got a point at home to AstonVilla, who you know are
relatively high, flying at theminute Ditto with Spurs.
Like this was always going tobe the toughest run of our
season and we've come out of itlike having picked up nowhere

(10:52):
near as many points as you wouldlike, because you would like to
win every game.
But it's not like we've lostall of the games or we haven't
been playing well and we looklike a bad team.
So if you look, if you take theperformances from that run of
games and apply them to the runof games that we now have coming
up, which you know to remindlisteners, includes Palace at
home, burnley at home, sheffieldUnited at home, brentford at

(11:15):
home, luton at home, luton away.
You are more than likely goingto pick up points in those games
if you, if the performances aresimilar to the game, the run of
games that we've, we've justhad.
So I'm not, you know, I'm notworried about relegation because
I think are we one point betterthan Luton over the course of

(11:37):
the season?
Yes, absolutely we are.
Our goal difference is muchbetter than them and and forest.
So it's not.
I just don't foresee a scenario, famous last words, where we're
looking at the last couple ofgames of the season and worrying
because I just think we'll pickup more points than them
because Luton have had a goodrun and fair play to them, like
everyone.

(11:57):
Talk them, talk them up as beingyou know that will they break
the Scabies record for the worstteam ever, etc.
Etc.
And they found a game plan thatworks in a system that works,
but it's very limited and Ithink you're now seeing they've
had their purple pack.
They had that good run of gameswhere it looked like they were
picking up points and then theylose to Sheffield United at home
, which you would say was theeasiest game of anybody's season

(12:20):
.
And you just now wonder, oh,they threw a two goal lead away
against Newcastle.
They then lost to SheffieldUnited.
You sort of wonder, is okay?
Are they now like reverting tothe game of what, what their
team actually is, which is a notvery good Premier League team
who probably will get relegated?
And if they are, you willfinish 10 points ahead of the

(12:44):
bike come end of season, ifthat's, if they are, and to
Adam's point, we start scoringthe goals and getting to Calvary
and converts those chances.
But I mean, I'm happy.
I would like to see us, you know, stick it in the Union bag a
little bit more, because it'svery frustrating watching us get
into good positions and thenand then and then sort of blow

(13:04):
it.
And I think this is partly afinishing thing, but I think
also there's partly an approachplay thing.
I think man City are reallytough to play against, but there
was definitely moments in thatgame where, if our transitions
have been better, if we made theright pass at the right time,
we could have created chances.
So it's not just about like, oh, we're not scoring the goals.

(13:24):
I think there's actually we'replaying.
We're not playing great in theattacking third.
Generally, I think we're workingreally hard, but I don't think
that Neil Harrison are are doingenough in terms of creating
chances of a minute.
But I think that will turnitself around in the games where
you are playing easieropponents and on the flip side,
our defensive record has beensuperb.

(13:45):
We are.
This was true at the start ofthe man City game I don't know
if it's true after we concededat the end of these, one goal
for open play, but we'veconceded the fewest goals from
open play of any Premier Leagueteam this season and which is
quite the stat when you thinkabout it, if it compared to how
we used to be, and I think it'sa testament to the work guys has
done, but also to the work thatyou know the back four have

(14:08):
done and the system that we'vegot in place and how well those
players play.
So, yeah, confident, notworried, I think will.
If you were to ask me betweennow and the end of the season
who gets more points out of usforest, and I'd say it was
fairly confident.

Speaker 1 (14:25):
Yeah, it makes that.
It makes that the losing thinghas been funny because I've
watched a couple of their gamesand They've gotten good at
scoring goals but they've alsogotten really good at conceding
them.
So you know, there's not.
They haven't cracked the code,you know they, they, they
stopped being, they stoppedgetting totally battered and
they obviously won some games.
But I agree, I think they'renot.

(14:47):
They haven't got that muchgoing on.
Andy, what are your thoughts?

Speaker 2 (14:51):
Yeah, I'd agree broadly with everything that Ben
and Adam have just said.
For me, even though we've notmaybe picked up as many Points
as we would have liked, over thelast five or six weeks the
general performance level hasbeen really good.
It's only wolves away right atthe end of last last year where

(15:13):
the performance level reallywasn't there from the word go.
But we had just played man cityat home Three days prior to
that, at the end of a very sortof congested festive Period, so
you could possibly say that theplayers were running on empty a
little bit for that game.
But since then you know youlook at the names of fallen away

(15:34):
possibly could have won thatBiller at home.
You know all the performances.
Even though we've, we've comeout of them with withdrawals,
the general performance levelhas been very good and, as Adam
said a few moments ago, theglaring thing If you had to put
your finger on one thing theglaring thing that we need to
improve is Our finishing.

(15:56):
If we could finish and takesome of our chances, then we
we'd be in so much of a betterposition.
Even again, the Manchester Citygame On the weekend.
They scored in the 71st minutewith their first attempt on
target.
We could have been tuning up inthat game easily if we could
have created, finished off acouple of the chances that we,

(16:17):
we, we created, or if a finalball had been a little bit
better.
So the general performancelevel is Extremely good and it's
good to at least see a teamgoing out onto a pitch with a
plan and a framework and itknows what it's doing.
Every player knows what they'redoing.
I went to a Everton legendsthing of the Empire in Liverpool

(16:40):
in early January and Peter Reedwas one of the Sort of speakers
and he sort of made he made thepoint that he didn't believe
Anybody other than Sean Dice.
Anybody would be doing a betterjob with the current squad than
Sean Dice, which I agree with100%, and the general consensus

(17:02):
in the room was that was the thethe viewpoint of the majority
of of fellow Evertonians inthere.
So it's yet the last last halfdozen games haven't been points.
Total has not been great andit's not really to still be back
in the relegation zone, but forseveral reasons the lead bottom
of the league table is.
It's not meaningless, but it'snot really a question of whether

(17:27):
we're going to be back in theleague or not, we might get
points back from the appeal.
We really might get more takenoff us For us might get some
taken off them.
We'll obviously talk about thisissue shortly.
So yeah, is it great to be inthe relegation zone?
Ostensibly no, but theperformance level is far better
than our league positionsuggests and I share Ben's view

(17:50):
that we'll comfortably Now onthe end of the season,
regardless of what pointsdeductions we might have thrown
at us.

Speaker 1 (17:58):
Yeah, one of the things I agree with that and you
know one of the things beenfrustrating.
I mean there's lots.
Always our job as Evertoniansis to suffer, right, so there's
always things that arefrustrating.
But is you know, there's thegeneral acknowledgement in the
media that the 10 points was,that, was you know, a harsh
penalty.
Let's say that's not translatedinto people appreciating that

(18:20):
our form is Not the form of ateam with 19 points, it's the
form of a team with 29 points.
So, and it's like it just, youknow, does this thing?
Oh, I come with a guy's name,it's that gel gelman Hypothesis,
maybe I'm misnaming.
It was named after a physicistcalled Murray gelman and it

(18:43):
basically said this guy oncegave this speech where he talked
about how you read a newspaperand if you know any, you could.
If you come across a story in anewspaper that you know
anything about, you'll realizethat Newspapers, the way things
are reported, is generallyterrible.
They get basic facts wrong, thereverse causality, like if you
and then you turn the page andread About something you know

(19:05):
nothing about and you go, oh,that's terrible, and you just
accept it on face value.
It's a reminder.
Like I say, we love to likewhat's my friends who work in
the media.
Most people in the media aren'treally that good, like they
don't really have much expertise.
They've done something for along time but it's not very
insightful.
And you see that with this now,because it everyone should be

(19:26):
saying well, you've got a verymind, every center, a mid table
team on form, so their resultsshould follow that, which more
or less they do.
You know, people is shockedwhen we give spurs a game.
You shouldn't be shocked whenyou give we give spurs a game.
You know we can actually have along term.
We shouldn't do that.
So maybe that will change.
I guess it's inevitable.
Sorry, adam, go ahead.

Speaker 3 (19:47):
Sorry I was just to Sort of emphasize your point.
I think it was a, you know, theGuardian Football Weekly, when
they did our, when they didyesterday with the Del Review of
City, they sort of described usas being I'm paraphrasing, but
the sentiment is true.
Basically they said that wewere being plucky and we were
plucky and held our own and allthis sort of like generally

(20:09):
condescending adjective, choiceof like Ever.
You know that we, we werescrappy and we gave them a game
and all this sort of stuff.
It's like we're not the teamthat's 18th in the Premier
League with a team that's whatshould be about 13th, 12th, but
on form of Of, by how manypoints we've actually, you know,
actually picked up and just onthat, on that point I mean.

(20:31):
But you can go on the BBC, go onthe BBC sport website.
Now they still have not got anasterix caveat to to show that
ever since got a 10 pointsdeduction, which is just
completely bizarre for me.
They've got it on match of theday and Sky Sports zap has it,
but but BBC sports still don'thave it.
And it's just like, it's juststrange that and inevitably you

(20:54):
would end up, you will end uptalking like Everton, like they
are the relegation candidatesthat they appear to be.

Speaker 1 (21:00):
I agree, the Guardian .
I'm not either.
I have you know.
I listen to the GuardianFootball Weekend.
I generally enjoy it and I readthe Guardian every day.
But you got a very moment withthe Guardian.
Let me get my tinfoil hat out,but I'll evidence it.
It is a pro Liverpool FCnewspaper.
Right, and the guys was Davewas the name.
He was the secret footballerthey're kitchen.

(21:22):
Yeah, in one of his books hetalks about when he first
started writing, because thesecret footballer is it.
You know this column that ranin the Guardian for a long time
and he was told this isn't thatlong ago, there's only 10 years
ago.
He was told when he stoppedright for the Guardian.
Right whenever you want, butjust never annoy Liverpool fans,
because when the afterHillsborough, when people in

(21:45):
Liverpool stopped buying the Sun, the Guardian very smartly went
in there and sucked it up.
A lot of that.
You know circulation for thefootball coverage and they were
the they came to go to.
So there is like an editorialpolicy at the Guardian football
desk to be pro Liverpool.
So it's that that you're gonnabear that in mind.
I'll tell you what's in forhalf now and we'll get on with

(22:07):
it.

Speaker 3 (22:07):
So I'll put mine on.
I mean Barry Glendening, hehates everything.
I mean he hates everything.
I mean he could go.

Speaker 1 (22:17):
He's a funny guy but like you, listen to him and all
the ever see just describes whathappened.
I said this, I said this, thenthey, then they got one back,
but in the end they lost to youone.
Thanks, barry, how much yougetting paid for that gobshite?

Speaker 3 (22:33):
Yeah, I said I said that time, to think I said that
a few weeks ago and Andrew said,and like, when I was speaking
to him a few weeks later andsaid like Ever since you said
that, it's all I can hear,because it might be part of his
job is to is to like, summarizethe game for people who didn't
see it, but he doesn't actuallyoffer anything else after that.
The thing you have to rememberabout Barry Glendening is that

(22:53):
he's a comedian, that's his like, that's his background.

Speaker 4 (23:01):
Like he's there, he's on that panel because he knows
a bit about football and he'sthere to be funny.
He's not there like a PhilipPochlear or Archie Rintel who
are football, or Jonathan Wilson, who are there to like be
experts of football.
He's there to talk aboutfootball kind of and be funny.
And so when you, when you sortof listen to the podcast,
knowing that that's his role, itstarts to make most.

(23:23):
He's not there to offertactical analysis or break down
systems or talk about structureor like he's there to describe
what happened and then addquality value.

Speaker 3 (23:33):
I would take my tin foil hat off and put it in the
cupboard.

Speaker 4 (23:35):
Then no, that's not to say, it's not.
That's not to say because hedoes hate Everton and he, but he
hates everybody.
But you've got to remember thathe's not doing that because
he's a tactical expert.
He's doing that because it'ssort of his persona, because his
persona is, you know, aslightly grumpy old man,
comedian, who watches football.

Speaker 1 (23:54):
For other things they probably shouldn't game
summarize on that because Iagree with you, like it makes
sense, but they sort of do yougo in the back of a bar.
You watched Everton, spurs tellus what you think.
Well, everson played in blue,max and Spurs I think they were
in white and there was.
It was a draw, fuckingbrilliant right anyway.

(24:16):
And I'm wondering about the, the, the points stuff and financial
fair play and that sort ofstuff.
So bunch of stuffs happen sincewe play the state of play is
this now Richard Masters, theCEO of the Premier League,
embarrassed himself and hisfamily and his forefathers in
front of the, in front of theblack committee.
I mean I felt a bit sorry forhim actually, because he was a

(24:38):
bit I don't.
He obviously wasn't wellprepared for the kind of
environment and where he gotcaught sort of talking about
small clubs and stuff.
He fell into a beautifully laidtrap via politician who led him
to say that but you should knowbetter than that but became
clear that you know they are allover the place on this stuff.

Speaker 2 (25:00):
I mean just just just on the point of how we came
across in that, in that, on thatinfluence of that select
committee in as well as isnon-sensible comments about, you
know, small clubs.
I thought how we just and youguys will know a bit more about
this than me because you've donemore public speaking than I

(25:21):
have he just came across reallybadly because his sentences were
a bit well staccato and well abit like this Now I'm talking,
probably talk a bit like that onthe podcast all the time, but
I'm a fan in this environment.
It's not acceptable for thehead you know, a man in his

(25:41):
position or person in hisposition, to be in that
environment and speak in such afashion.
He just, regardless of what,what questions are thrown at him
, he should be able to answerthem in a clear and concise
manner and he just didn't dothat.
He just came across as badlyprepared and, frankly, didn't

(26:02):
didn't understand the issues anddidn't know what he was talking
about.
A few years ago there was,there was a big security issue
around group four where I thinkthey accidentally released some
prisoners and you know.
It was like three or four timesthat people just three or four
times and I was remember thattheir chief executive was a guy
called Nick Buckles I think thatwas his name and he was whole

(26:23):
before MPs and he was asked tosort of explain why his company
was sort of, you know, takingprisoners out on teddy bears and
he was just trying to get thetechniques and then letting them
, you know, go scot-free acrossfields.
And he came across in the sameway and you know, he just
basically just just just didn'tcame across as weak and
uninformed and just didn't havea grasp of what his organization

(26:44):
and masters came across thesame way and I just thought it
was not really commented onbecause the small clubs comment
got all the attention but hisgeneral demeanor I thought was
really, really poor and it justdemonstrated the premise the
thing is, andrew, he comesacross as a smarmy git because

(27:07):
he's a smarmy git.

Speaker 4 (27:11):
That's the thing.
And the problem is and this isall coming home to Roost now
they've never had to face theaccountability that they're now
facing.
They've never had to.
That was a contribution by Jute.
I quite agree, jute.
He's never had to face thatsort of questioning before
because he's been run like aprivate members club where he's

(27:31):
got to do what he wants and he'snot had to be accountable to
anybody apart from his ownmembers.
So he's never had to explainhimself in public before.
And that comes to like and theums and ars thing.
I get that.
But having trained enoughpublic speakers and dealt with
enough politicians who have umsand ars and as somebody who,
having listened to this podcast,ums and ars were the best of
them I think that stuff is likeI don't think it's necessarily

(27:54):
like the biggest deal in theworld.
I think what's more of aproblem is that and you know
Austin and I talked about thisafter the, after the um, the
hearing he's in an environmentwhere he needed to go into that
and try and win friends and showwilling to cooperate and show
willing to.
You know, play ball and, youknow, operate in a way where he

(28:17):
he recognized that he was theman under pressure and not be a
smarmy git, and he walked awayfrom that with a little bit of
committee hating him and puttingout a press release basically
saying that they hated him andthat he was terrible and that
they had lots of questions thatthey didn't felt were very
answered very well.
So, like from a from a purelypolitical point of view, it was
a disaster because it didn'tconvince anybody that he was the

(28:39):
right man to solve all theproblems that they were raising.
So yeah, he's just, but becausehe never had to do that before.
So that's like that was the itwas.
It was a disaster for lots ofreasons, but that, politically,
the biggest problem they nowcreate, he now has, is that he's
demonstrated that he's not ableto solve all the problems that
they've, the politicians, haveidentified and, as I think you

(29:00):
said, austin, he's about to findout what it's like to have no
friends in Westminster in a timewhere you're about to be
regulated right up the jackseed.

Speaker 1 (29:08):
One of the things, one of the jobs I work me and
Ben do do similar things and I Ione of the things I've done in
my soul, the last bit of mycareer is advise companies on
you know how to like navigatepolitical environments, let's.
Let's say, and one of the firstpieces of work I got years ago

(29:29):
was with the, basically theEuropean like soft drink
manufacturers association.
I can't remember what they call, but and this was remember,
this was early on in the sort ofthe coalition government back
in Britain, so 2000,.
Actually, it would have beenjust after that, after the
Conservatives went in 2015,.
They passed the thing wascalled the sugar tax, right,

(29:49):
basically a tax on sugary drinks.
And I went from England,brussels, with these people
three or four weeks after thishad happened and they couldn't
believe.
They were like, literally, thisindustry was like a Gog, like
how the hell has this happened?
Because you know it doesn'tmake any sense and they had all
this evidence that it wasn'tgoing to help.

(30:09):
And I said, well, it waspopular.
And they looked at me like that, well, people like it, it pulls
.
Well, so politicians did it.
And they looked at me like Iwas stupid, because that is how
you know, and I think the ideaof the Premier made themselves
the bad guy they have, and thatis like that's insurmountable.

(30:32):
That's the whole game, like itdoesn't matter what else is
going on or what facts you'vegot, what you do in a particular
context.
If you're, you're either thepopular, you're on the side of
the popular thing, or theunpopular thing, and they've
made themselves the unpopularthing.
So the regulator now is a slamdunk.
I mean it'll definitely happen.
Anyway, back to Emma.

Speaker 3 (30:51):
Sorry, go ahead, sorry, yeah, a few days ago it
became, it was released thatRichard Bassers refused
Parliament's request to releasethe minutes of Everton's hearing
.
I'm just wondering, like Iimagine the Premier League's
comms people have, you know, hada you know, all have had an

(31:15):
influence in that.
So just Austin and Andrew,austin and Ben, sorry, like was
that is that?
Is that surprising in the senseof like that that's something
they should do because it's forthem, or is it not surprising in
the sense of that actuallythey're doing the right thing by
not releasing it?

Speaker 4 (31:36):
It's not.
I wasn't surprised when theydid that.
Because what they?
Because and you can get alittle bit conspiracy theorist
about this, because people gothey must be hiding something.
And the answer is they'reprobably not, because if the
minutes were that explosive, oneof the clubs would have leaked
them anyway.
Like, plenty of people haveaccess to those minutes.
They're not like locked in asafe in Richard Masters office,

(31:56):
right, they're circulated todozens of people at all the
clubs, what they?
What in those situations?
The they're a private company,so we're not releasing those.
It creates an expectation thatanyone can ask for them at any
time.
So they ask for those minutes.
And then they might go back andsay oh well, you've given us
those minutes, so now we wantthese minutes.
And it becomes really difficultto say no the second time if

(32:19):
you said yes the first time.
So actually it's probably if Iwas at the Premier League, I
would have said hey, don'trelease the minutes, because the
damage of not releasing theminutes is less significant than
us releasing the minutes.
And then if they ask for theminutes of this meeting or that
meeting, which is actually farfucking worse than the one we've
released, then that's a bigproblem.
So like yeah it's one of thosethings where you just have to

(32:40):
you just have to have tostonewall.
It's like you know I worked for.
You know I've talked about thisbefore.
I've worked.
I worked for TikTok.
I do comments for TikTok.
One of the questions I getasked all the time is how many
users does?
Does TikTok have how many?
What's the average age of theusers?
And we just don't release thatinformation because every time
we, if we answer that question,we have to then answer it every
single time and it just gives arunning commentary of where you

(33:02):
are in terms of user base, solike, and that's not information
we want to release for lots ofreasons, many of which are
commercial.
But that's like, it's the sameprinciple.
You say no because you don'twant to deal with it in the long
term, not necessarily because,oh God, we can't let them see
this one line in these minuteswhich is actually exposed that
it's a big plot, because I don'tactually think it is a big part

(33:25):
.
I just think they've beencompensated.

Speaker 3 (33:27):
Yeah, that was my thought process behind it as
well.
I'm sorry, austin, like Ithought it was, because they
would, they would open up a canof worms for you know other
instances where they can releaseminutes and and they want to
keep that sort of stuff, youknow, confidential or in control
as much as it can be.

Speaker 1 (33:45):
Yeah, I'm sure that's right.
I mean there is a generalwithout, because Ben's right If
you spend any time we all knowthis right the employers we work
for, ben and I have had themisfortune to be in the middle
of like government stuff atdifferent times than our lives
Any time.
You think are these peoplestupid or are they orchestrating

(34:07):
some grand conspiracy?
It's always that they're stupid, always, always, always, always
, without finding them stupid.
So there is no grand conspiracyhere, they are just a farce now
.
But I think there's just anuance.
For addition to what Ben wassaying is I think they know that
the more scrutiny there isaround the process, the worse

(34:29):
they look.
So they do want to sort ofdiscourage that Because they
don't mentally, they haven't gota leg to stand on.
The only I mean I just want totake the conversation is the
only the only sort of legalground the Premier League has is
that they're a properorganization and are able,

(34:50):
therefore, to sort of dowhatever they want as a proper
organization, like broadly goingto see them through quite a lot
of stuff.
But the way that they have goneabout this is like absurd.
Did any of you guys readthere's a thing by church court
chambers law firm.
Lawyer there wrote this law,legal and access of, like the

(35:13):
date of everything and like it'swhat.
It's a pain in the balls toread, because lawyers are paid
by the minute and you can telllike it's impenetrable.
But the headline is I mean, ifI did a TLDR on it for you, it
basically says the process thePremier League went through was
like ludicrously, embarrassinglyamateurish, doesn't stand up to

(35:35):
any scrutiny as a, as any kindof quasi-visual process.
And actually it does concludewith a suggestion that Everton
could have a claim under theEuropean Convention on Human
Rights because, because it neverhad to effect trial.
Now, they can't sue a delvedinto this and spoke to some
people who are friends of mineor lawyers.

(35:56):
You can't, they can't sue thePremier League under the ECHR.
The ECHR doesn't buy to privateorganizations.
Everton could sue thegovernment for creating an
environment where their rightshave been breached.
Because this, this, thisinclusion is basically that the,
the, the, the Premier League'sprocess is so laughably
egregious, Like they've got anindependent, which is just one

(36:18):
point in May.
I think it sort of sums it up.
They've got an independentcommission where one of the
members worked for West Ham foryears and had an opponent of
Everton, and another one iscurrently a Premier League
employee, so is in no wayremotely independent.
So it's a.
The whole thing is.
So they've got.
I think they've got themselvesinto a real mess with the

(36:39):
process.

Speaker 4 (36:41):
The other amazing process thing that we sort of
came out in which was in theRichard Masters letter actually,
which was sort of unremarkedupon because it was, you know,
it was sort of buried by thenews that they weren't going to
share the minutes was that therewas a.
There was a in his explanationabout why, like the process had
been fair, he said he basicallysays what the Premier League on

(37:03):
one side of this case, everton,are the other.
Both sides have a right tosubmit, you know, their
proposals and their and theirview of what the, what the
sanction should be, and maketheir case.
And what he revealed was thatEverton, that the Premier League
had made clear two monthsbefore the hearing that they

(37:24):
were recommending a 12 pointdeduction.
But they made that clear toEverton and the independent
commission.
So, like the independent quote,unquote independent commission,
two months ahead of themactually hearing any evidence
from anybody, had already had asubmission from the Premier
League saying, hey, we think youshould deduct them 12 points.
So how can you possibly have afair trial where one of the one

(37:48):
of the sort of sides haspre-briefed you what they want
the outcome to be like?
The Premier League have everyright to say we think there
should be a 12 point deduction,but they get to do that at the
hearing, not two monthsbeforehand.
That's like if you imaginebeing on trial for murder, right
, that's like turning up a trialand discovering that the
prosecution have already toldthe judge of the jury what they

(38:10):
think the verdict should be.
You don't get to do that likewe do the process and you do
that as part of that, but youcan't do that two months before.
That's just not howinvestigations work.

Speaker 3 (38:22):
And it's such a non-precedented thing as well.
So you've got that, whereyou've got a bunch of people who
are, you know, inverted commasindependent, trying to make a
judgment, and they're obviouslyinevitably biased by that.
The fact that one side, who areobjectively the more powerful
side in this circumstance thePremier League making that

(38:49):
recommendation, so they'realready predisposed to make that
judgment against Everton, andso the idea that it was a fair
is nonsense.

Speaker 1 (39:05):
Well, it applies, absolutely.
It applies.
There's a psychological trickcalled anchoring.
If you're ever doing any sortof training on negotiation,
you'll be taught which is likeand if I was buying your car,
basically, anchoring is Iactually want to name the first
number, because then we'renegotiating around my number and

(39:29):
people have a natural, we have.
It creates a sort of anacceptable range.
So once the Premier League, youknow, I say I think they're
stupid, I don't think they'reenough to do this deliberately.
So I think this was accidental.
But in in saying to the mission12 points, you're immediately
in the minds of those peoplehaving them operate around above

(39:53):
or below 12 points, whereas ifthey'd have come to their own
conclusion, they, because andthis is the heart of the problem
for the Premier League, and itis a problem like whether it's a
problem it comes to home, toroost through Everton or forest
or man city or Chelsea orsomeone else the fundamental
sort of problem they have isthere is no agreed framework for
how you get punished underthese rules.

(40:14):
There are rules, fine.
There's a process fordetermining whether you're
guilty, fine, there is a well,whatever you think.
And then you're going to end upacting inconsistently.
And once you're actinginconsistently.
One of the other things that hasbeen discussed by you know
lawyers looking at this isthere's a provision under

(40:34):
company law in the UK which isvery clear on this that says you
can't treat a member of acompany which is equivalent to a
shareholder in this context.
You can't treat one member of acompany differently to how you
treat other members of a company.
You can't say to oneshareholder share people who are
meant to be equal.

(40:55):
Oh, I'm not counting your votesat the age at the annual
general meeting, I'm just goingto count his right.
You can't say I'm just paying adividend to you and not to you,
right?
You have to treat everyoneequally.
Everton can't claim that yetbecause they're the only one
who've been, but the momentanyone else is punished
immediately Everton will have aclaim to say well, we're both
shareholders in this thing underthe same rules.

(41:16):
You're treating us differentlyand the Premier League are bound
to treat everyone differentlybecause there's no guidelines.
So every independent commissionis going to cook up.
I mean, forest could getdeducted, no point.
So they could get deducted 30.
You know, it's completelyrandom, sorry, ania, could you
also?

Speaker 2 (41:35):
yeah, that's right, no problem.
Well, I want.
The point I wanted to raise isrelated to the sanction.
Am I right in saying that theframework for Everton's first
sanction ie you start off withsix points and then go up a
further point for every fivemillion pounds you were found in
breach wasn't in place whenEverton were charged?

Speaker 4 (42:03):
So this one is sort of cocked up and I get why it
has.
But if you read the full report, what happened was that's the
EFL framework.
That's the framework they usein the EFL, the Football League,
and what the Premier Leaguesaid was in their submission,
when they were saying like howthey thought we should be

(42:26):
punished or what they made asubmission that they thought
that that framework should applyto this case the Independent
Commission said no, that's notthe framework we're going to use
because we're independent, sowe're not using that.
That is not a framework thathas been agreed with the other
Premier League clubs either.
So that framework doesn't.

(42:46):
It's not in place now, it wasnever in place.
It's not a framework.
What it was was the submissionbased on another framework,
where the Premier League says,hey, you should do this, and the
Independent Commission said no,and then conveniently ended up
with a point deduction whichbroadly mirrors it anyway, which
is a question that I'm sure oursuper lawyer has asked in the
appeal.

(43:06):
But that sort of framework is abit like the quote unquote, no
sporting advantage, with peoplekeep fairing around.
It's just not a part of whatthe decision was like.
It wasn't ever.
It's not the framework.
Now, it was never the framework.
The Premier League asked for itto be the framework and the
Commission said no.

Speaker 1 (43:26):
But it does speak to that organisation though,
because they said that we shoulduse this framework, but only in
this case.
Now, that should have triggeredsomething in someone's mind to
say it doesn't make sensebecause you know you take
exactly what happened.
They've reached a certain pointand gone.

(43:47):
Oh shit, we actually have noway of determining a punishment
here.

Speaker 2 (43:53):
Well, that's exactly the point I was going to make,
because I've read enough casesin the news over the years where
somebody's being convicted of amurder dating back to 1993 and
they've been convicted in 2018,but they've been sentenced
according to the sentencingregime that was in place when
they committed to crime, becausethat's a basic legal principle.

(44:16):
So if you apply that principleto this case, as far as I can
tell, the Premier League of theBroad Profit and Sustainability
rules in now.
I know the clubs vote for them,so it's the clubs that
ultimately vote for them.
Everton themselves might nothave voted for them, but the
clubs themselves voted the rulesin and they've agreed to be
banned by them.

(44:36):
But at no stage until very,very late in the process,
whichever way round it wascaught, it was arrived at.
Has the sanctions regimeactually been put in place?
It's not written down, as faras I can tell, and it's not been
discussed, as far as I can telland I stand corrected on this,
but it's not written downanywhere or communicated

(44:58):
anywhere.
If Club A does this, it will.
If Club A breaches it by thismuch, it will attract this sort
of sanction.

Speaker 1 (45:10):
No, it's not right.

Speaker 4 (45:16):
And the reason why that's happened is and this
again evidence from the PremierLeague were a bunch of clowns is
they never thought they wouldhave to enforce this stuff.
So they had a set of rules butnever did the underlying work
necessary to build a framework,get agreement with all the clubs

(45:36):
, because they just neverthought they'd have to enforce
it.
And it's like having a law onyour books that you just are
never going to prosecute andthen all of a sudden everyone
starts doing it.
So you're like shit, we've gotto prosecute this now If we got
any censor guidelines on this.
They're like no, no, we neverbothered with any censor
guidelines because we neverthought we were going to have to
prosecute this.
So you just end up making themup.

(45:56):
But it is exactly the problem,and it shows exactly through the
incompetence of the PremierLeague, that the idea that they
had a set of rules but never seta framework for how they would
be enforced and fell back onthis bizarre like you know.
Oh well, it's an independentcommission, so they get to

(46:17):
decide what the what the rulesare.
Well, okay, but like Parliamentsets laws and then has
sentencing guidelines right,exactly so, like the idea that
like oh well, everton breachedit by 20 million and they might
get a one million pound, fine,or we might put the, we might
shut down the club and, you know, ban it from ever playing
football again.
They're both.

(46:38):
They're both within the rangeof expectations.
That's because the independentcommission will decide.
That's just bollocks Like.
No sentencing anywhere in theworld operates sort of like on
that sort of wide scale of a.
Well, you know, we'll justthrow a fucking thing at the
dartboard and see what yourpunishment is.
Guys like who knows, you couldget away with it.
You could be totally fuckedLike you pass.

(46:58):
You have a.
You have independentcommissions, just like you have
independent judges.
You give them a framework towork within.
That goes hey, if someonebreaks this rule, this is the
punishment framework that youare allowed to operate in.
This gives you the latitude touse your judgment to make a
decision.
It might be a fine, it might bea transfer ban, it might be a
point seduction, but here's theframework.

(47:20):
You operate in the idea thatyou just could car blanched at
three people who, to us thispoint earlier, have inherent
biases because of their previousemployers to give out any
punishment they like and they do.
And then Richard Masters sitsin front of Parliament and goes
oh well, you know, independentcommission, no guidelines.
What can I do?
It's like, well, you can bemore fucking competent at your
job.
Is what you can actually do anddo the legwork to set up the

(47:41):
system properly in the firstplace.
But again, they didn't do thatbecause they never thought
they'd have to enforce this.

Speaker 3 (47:50):
And to your point about the anchoring effect of
you read the simp, you read itfrom the same book that I've
read it maybe you got for me,but that's absolutely what's
happened.
It's sort of interesting likelistening to what you've said,
because what they've probablydone is they've obviously
realized that they don't haveany guidelines and their 12

(48:11):
point suggestion has becometheir sort of way of, I think,
almost like accelerating thatprocess of providing them with
some sort of guidelines but alsomixing up, mixing that with a
sort of a bit of chest beatingof the fact that Everton have

(48:32):
been used as a pawn to show thatthey don't need regulating and
to go like this is what's goingto happen if you breach the
profit and sustainability rules.
And the anchoring thing isactually spot on because they
did.
I mean, in that section of thebook he does like some work on

(48:55):
judges and he gets them to rolllike a dice of nine or three and
he finds that the judges thatrolled a dice of nine gave a
higher sentence to a bunch ofcriminals and the criminals that
he then the same bunch ofcriminals were then given a
lighter sentence if the judgerolled a three.
So you've got something asarbitrary, as like a dice being

(49:17):
rolled influencing people'sdecisions.
So the idea that theindependent commission wasn't
influenced by that thing liketwo weeks before, however many
weeks before, two months before,whatever it was, is nonsense,
because they absolutely wereinfluenced by it.

Speaker 4 (49:36):
Yeah, that sort of.
And there's two things that I'dsay about that as well.
I don't think I'll ever forgivethe Premier League for one of
these things.
One, everton aren't allowed tocomment on the process, right,
we're literally not allowed tosay anything about it, which is
why you don't see anything fromEverton about this.
But the Premier League hasleaked and briefed and you know

(49:57):
every stage of the way.
You know, you've seen thefucking puff pieces about
Richard Masters in the lastcouple of days.
You've seen the 12 point thing.
You know.
You've seen the forest.
The fact that us and forestwere going to be charged was
leaked to the athletic, you know, 24 hours before it was
formally notified to anybodyelse, right?
And the second thing and thisis what I won't ever forgive the
Premier League club, thePremier League, for is that they

(50:18):
leaked that story aboutrecommending 12 points the day
after Bill Kenright died.
And I just like I just willnever forgive whoever the
organization for thinking thatwas.
It's not appropriate to do thatfrom a process point of view,
from a fairness point of view,to look at that week where that

(50:41):
happened and go, oh, do you knowwhat?
Yeah, we're still going to leakthat story, we're still going
to put it out there.
When their chairmen just died,like I just think it was a
disgraceful way of acting and Ithink it sort of sums up how
disgracefully they've acted atevery stage of this process.
And that's why I have a, youknow, degree of confidence that
we're going to get some pointsback, if not all of them,

(51:03):
because I just think they'vecreated a scenario where they
have to save face.
Now and this is what makes themockery of the independent
process is because theindependent quote, unquote
independent process is going togive us some points back because
the Premier League, whodefinitely don't have any say on
the independent process, needto save face.
So it's like, okay, so it's notindependent at all, is it

(51:27):
Because you're going to give ussome points back?
Because Richard Masters needsto look less like a dickhead,
like, and it's just.
The whole thing is.
So.
I've gone quite quickly frombeing in a position of like oh
you know it is like incompetenceto a position of like.

(51:48):
Yes, it's incompetence, butinherently it's actually
incompetence built around thesystem that's quite corrupt and
a system that does look afterthe bigger teams and a system
that does look after, you know,the big, the big six.
Because it because the FFPproposal that they're putting
forward as the alternate youknow the updated PSR rules is a
turnover to wages, like playerspending to turnover ratio.

(52:11):
Right, so you would have tolimit your spending on players,
so transfer fees, wages, agentsfees, etc.
To.
I think it's their proposal isgreat.
Like is gradated to come in.
It's starting at 90% and theneventually going to 70%.
So you're saying that like oh,okay, your solution is to say if
you're a massive club who has amassive turnover, you can spend

(52:34):
loads of money on your playingstaff.
If you're lute or Burnley,tough, tough titties like you,
just can't you.
You, you're a small, you're asmall fish in a big pond and you
have to get.
You're fucked by that and likenot just the fact that their
solution is to embed unfairnessinto the system.

Speaker 2 (52:58):
It's like it's a show .
It's just based into theprocess.
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (53:02):
And this is why, like you know, I, don't want to
become one of these people who,like you know, evangelizes
American sport because, god,I've watched enough three and a
half hour baseball games to knowthat there's plenty wrong with
how Americans do sports.
But the one thing Americansports have really nailed is the
meritocracy of it in terms of,like, salary caps and, you know,

(53:23):
limits in terms of the numberof overseas players you can have
.
In terms of, if you look at theMLS and the NFL draft, which the
worst team picks first, rightgets the best player.
Like American sports, theyactually do a really good job of
trying to create a level, alevel playing field in the way
that they write their rules, ina way that football is just

(53:44):
increasingly going totally theother way and becomes less and
less interesting because of it.
Because, like, if you'reEverton or like Aston Villa are
having a spectacular season,amazing season, and the pinnacle
of that will be like they'llwin a trip, they might win the
conference league and they mightget in, might sneak into fourth
place in the league, like, andthat for them, will be like,

(54:05):
probably the pinnacle of theirachievements.
You know that they will be ableto achieve in this world until
they get bought by apetrochemical state, but
football is dying on its assbecause these people are just
transforming the game intosomething which is, quite
literally, the haves and thehave nots.
Yeah stand off my soapbox now.

Speaker 2 (54:25):
Oh no, I completely, oh sorry, go ahead.
Yeah, I completely agree withthat.
I mean, I thought increasinglyover the last few months that
top level football is acrossEurope is very much in danger of
eating itself.
You've only got to look at theexpansion of the Champions
League where there's going to besix extra group games, I think
from next season.

(54:46):
Now I don't watch the groupstage now.
I occasionally tune into thesome of the knockout stages, but
if you're a casual football fan, you're not going to watch six
more games of a group stageChampions League where it's the
same teams playing each otherseason after season.
It's the same teams playingeach other season after season

(55:07):
now and the competition at alower level is completely bought
, is boring.
And if you have, you know, andBen's absolutely right the new
profit sustainability rules willbake in inherent bias favoring
the current, the current bigclubs and you know people who

(55:30):
are more casual fans and theyhaven't got as much of an
interest in the game will startto turn off.
And it's very, you know it'svery.
You know the game, football asin general.
I'm just talking about thePremier League, talking about
UEFA, and you know how FIFA areexpanding the World Cup and
having a you know, 32 team clubWorld Cup and where that's going
to fit into the calendar.

(55:51):
Whoever knows the people who runthe game at a domestic and a
European and a world level inthe next few years have got to
be very, very careful.
Because, in my opinion becausethey could easily, you know, be
the goose that kills the goldenegg, because more one of the
issues around sort of gettingpeople involved in football at

(56:12):
the moment, as I understand itis, is people who are sort of in
the teens and twenties aren'tsitting down to watch full 90
minute football matches.
They're watching more clips ontheir phones.
So the solution to that is tohave more 90 minute football
matches.
That makes absolutely no sense.
So, yeah, they football is got.

(56:36):
I mean that this is possibly adiscussion for another time
because you could go really indepth on it.
But football in general has gotto be very, very careful the
next few years.
How it, how it sort of movesitself forward, it's going to be
very careful it doesn't yetjust just financially eat itself
.

Speaker 1 (56:54):
Yeah, and destroy the essence of the competition.
All right, so let's move thison a little bit to Adam.
I'll come to you first on this.
What do we think is going tohappen?
There are two things at playthat are really relevant for
Everton now.
When is our appeal?
The appeal concluded last week,Apparently.
We'll know any day what theanswer is.
Anything could happen, asdiscussed as no framework.

(57:15):
They could decide to take morepoints off us.
They could decide to give usall the more back.
God knows.
Forest have also been chargedas of week Separate question
about.
I don't want to get into allthe complexity of that because
it's conversation for anotherday.
So, on, forest situationobviously affects us profoundly

(57:37):
because you know we, they, youknow they're down near the
bottom and haven't had 10 pointsdeducted yet.
So if they lose 10 points, Imean that'll make a big, big,
big difference there, whichobviously affects us in terms of
relegation.
If you were betting, Adam,which will be a terrible idea on
this, but if you were, whatwould your?
sense of what is going to happennow.
What would your sense of it be?

Speaker 3 (58:01):
I think it's it's almost predicated on the
discussion that we've sort ofhad already, because the the as
we've discussed, it's reallydifficult to say, because the
process has been such a farce,it's really difficult to sort of

(58:23):
make what I would consider arational sort of judgment,
because the rationality behindit is difficult to sort of nail
to the wall.
I think if I could take a sortof a stab at what I think is
going to happen, I think we'regoing to get something like
anything between a 30 and 50%reduction in our current

(58:45):
reduction, our current deduction, and then we will get another
deduction of broadly the samevalue, which will take us to our
current state, and then forestwill probably get something, you
know, a 50% of what we gotoriginally.

(59:08):
So I think Everton will end upat the end with like a 10 point,
you know, a 10 point deductionover the course of the two
charges, including the appealsprocess, and then forest will
get something like, you know,anything between like four and
six, because I think the PremierLeague are still going to try

(59:31):
and show themselves as beingcapable of self-regulation but
also, as you know, the lack ofspending in the January transfer
window has been testament to isthat they also want to be clear
on what will happen if you userules, and clubs have quite

(59:53):
obviously reacted to that.
You know what was it?
I think there was.
I think the spending in theJanuary 2024 window was
something like only you know 20%of what it was the year before.
Yeah, I think if I was a forestfan, I'd be much more worried
than being Everton fan because,like you know, forest are where

(01:00:14):
they are through.
You know the fact that they'vewon that number of games and
drawn that number of games, butEverton are.
You know where we are where weare because of those 10 points
deduction.
So I think it would be good,it's good for us, but you know,
I mean, who knows, who knowswhat's going to happen?
That's what I think.
That's what I think anyway.

Speaker 1 (01:00:35):
Yeah, let me offer you, Andy, I'll come to you with
this.
Let me offer you a logicalthought I guess you can react to
.
And as Adam I say, the primelogic to this is probably a
fool's error.
But forest, we hear.
I don't think we know this tobe the case because we haven't
got the details of you knowthey're hearing it.

(01:00:55):
But it has been reported thatthe breach, their breach, is
somewhere between 20 and 13million, which, for context,
everton's, in the PremierLeague's view, was 19.5.
In Everton's view was 7.5.
So let's take the PremierLeague number.
So if that reporting isaccurate which to Ben's point of

(01:01:17):
view it probably is, becausethe Premier League are briefing
all over the place on this stuffand that numbers come from
somewhere Forest have breachedeither half a million more than
Everton or 10 million more.
Let's take the lower of thoseand say, essentially the
breaches are the same, right,there is no way, logically, they

(01:01:40):
can end up net with a smallerpoints deduction than we do from
the second breach, if thatmakes sense.
So there's a scenario where wedon't get any points back.
Let's take our worst casescenario.
Let's say we don't get anypoints back in our appeal they
say you know, fuck you, there'sthe rules you're on.
And then they dock us another10, right, for the second breach

(01:02:03):
, which we see because it coverssome of the same period of time
.
Anyway, forest then logicallywould get deducted at least 10
points, right.
It would be like, and obviouslywe're in bizarre land here, but
Forest would then.
So we would end up in the sameposition relative to Forest that
we are now.

(01:02:24):
Almost every other scenarioworks for us, though, where if
we get, say, five points backand then get deducted under the
five points which I considerroughly it will be a good shout.
They'll take some points, we'llget some points back on appeal
and then get docked some morefor the second breach Forest
then get that same amount ofpoints.
So we end up, you know, net upon them, or at least in the same

(01:02:45):
place.
What's your sense of that?
And can you see a situationwhere I mean I guess maybe a
silly question to ask but canyou see a situation where, like
Forest, end up in a betterposition for us, or do you think
that you know they're going tolike?
Logic is going to apply and youknow we'll end up seeing some
you know effective, but getpunished the same.
So we'll end up relativelyeither better off or where we

(01:03:07):
are now compared to them.

Speaker 2 (01:03:10):
Yeah, I think that that scenario that you've just
outlined there and the one thatAdam said as well is broadly has
got the greatest chance ofplaying out, For reasons that
we've discussed over the last 30or 40 minutes.
The Premier League do need tosave face and they do need to
try and get some some coherenceinto this shit show that they've

(01:03:30):
created.
So I completely agree, I caneasily see a situation where we
get some points back on theappeal for the first breach, get
Doc some more for the secondbreach, end up with an overall
points total of you know,somewhere between eight and 10,
but then Forest, assuming thatthey are found guilty and I

(01:03:53):
think they pretty let's assumethey are they would get then get
, if their breaches, around 20million pounds.
They will end up with the samepoints deduction for the for
that breach that we end up withfor our first breach.
That is probably a situationthat would suit everybody
because Everton will feel a bitof a win that they got the 10

(01:04:16):
points reduced.
The Premier League will havesaved a bit of face because they
will have not hammered one oftheir founder member clubs be
seen to be hammering them undulyharshly, Because just on that
point.
I've had conversations with withfans of lots of clubs,
including some Liverpool fans,and the general narrative has

(01:04:39):
been 10 points is nonsense.
There's been some people who'vesaid Everton have cheated.
You know, they broke the rules,they should be punished.
That's far too simplistic aview of things, as we've
discussed.
But the general narrative is is10 points is utter nonsense.
And that feeds into what?
Again, what we discussed aboutthe Premier League being on the
wrong side of you know, in termsof a good side of the line and

(01:05:01):
the bad side of the line, thePremier League have managed to
find themselves on the, on the,on the bad side of the line.
So, yeah, I can easily see asituation where we we, we get
some, get some points back andForrest ended up being docked
the same number of points Cause,I mean, I also did have to do

(01:05:23):
that, of course, because if theyweren't to do that and Forrest
breach was equal to all, greaterthan Everton's Everton would
turn around and say well, hangon a minute.
What's going on here?
That's, that's patently unfair.
And again, in terms of you know, punishment for the same
offenses.
Again, we, we spoke about thatalready.
Yeah, one way or another, Iwill be amazed if Everton do not

(01:05:44):
get at least four points back,if not five or six, in this
appeal.

Speaker 1 (01:05:52):
Ben thoughts on that.

Speaker 4 (01:05:55):
Yeah, I think, and without sort of I'm sorry I'm
going to be slightly clandestinehere, without wanting to reveal
too much about like you knowwhere I got this.
I know for a fact that theapproach Everton's lawyers are
sort of the landing zone, shallwe put it for where they think

(01:06:18):
they could not, where they'reaiming for, because you always
aim for a better position thanyou are, than you end up in.
Well, I think the realisticwhere they can see it landing is
this 10 points gets knockeddown to six points, and then we
get an additional six points forthe second, for the second
breach.
So it becomes six and six.

(01:06:38):
So we end up with minus 12.
So we're two worse off than weare now, but to the point we've
discussed Forrest then bydefinition have to get six for
their breach.
So they end up six works offthan we are now, than they are
now.
So next we, we gain on Forrestby four points over the two

(01:07:00):
breaches, and that's where Isort of see it.
I know there's been some talkabout, like you know, in the
Twitter, twitter sphere, about,like you know, it might be a
fine or they might give us allof our points back.
I just can't see that, and Ican't see that for a really big
reason and I don't think it's agood situation they've created
with, like the January transferwindow to Adam's point earlier

(01:07:23):
but credit to them if their goalwas to limit people spending
money they don't have.

Speaker 1 (01:07:29):
They've really done that, like no one wants to spend
fucking anything Right andthey've gone too far the other
way.

Speaker 4 (01:07:36):
But if you, if they, if they said, okay, the, the
punishment for a breach of PSRis a fine, every couple will
just go, all right, then we'lljust pay the fine.
Like, well, okay, great, likejobs are good and we'll pay the
fine Like this happens at, likethat we're revealing too much
about like work life.

(01:07:57):
This is the approach that a lotof companies end up taking when
they find they might bebreaching sorts of laws and
things.
If they go, oh well, we'll just, oh, we'll get fined if we do
that, how much is the fine?
Oh, it's five million pounds.
Okay, we'll pay the fivemillion pound fine, like,
because the thing we're going todo is going to net us more than

(01:08:17):
the five million pounds we'regoing to have to pay out.
So like, yeah, okay, we'll livewith the bad PR of paying a
fine and we'll just pay the fineLike, speaking about no
specific companies that you knowthat may or may not have taken
that break, but if you go to thecorporate world, that's
something that definitely 100%happens.
They go well, we'll live withthe punishment because it's no
bad thing.
So to the Premier League's pointis like you have to.

(01:08:42):
There has to be somesignificant punishment in order
to actually make the sanctioningworthwhile, which is why I
don't think we're going to get10 points back.
I think what we'll end up withis we get, we get four back and
then we get the second sixknocked off for the second
charge.
And just on forest charge, bythe way, like ours is contested

(01:09:03):
in quite a strong way in termsof the level of the breach
because there was there's lotsof different factors that go
into whether we should, whatshould be counted.
You know the discussion aboutplayer X and how.
You know stuff around stadiuminterest should be counted and
how the war on Ukraine and thesponsorship deals we lost

(01:09:24):
because that should be counted.
Ours is a relatively complexcase.
Forest is like is a dead simple, open and shut, because for
those of you who aren't sort ofaware what forest are alleged to
have done or basically sort ofit's well known what they did.
They did do.
Yeah, yeah, they did do.
So one of the things that wedid, if people remember, is that

(01:09:48):
we had a very hard deadline tosell Richardlison because we
wanted that sale to be on ourbooks by the end of the
accounting period, right?
So we had to sell him by Ithink it was like the 30th of
June.
We knew we had to sell him bythat date because if you sell
him on the first of July he'sthen in next year's accounting

(01:10:09):
so you don't get to count him asa, you don't get to book the
profit, basically against theaccounts that you want to book
them against.
So we and we put this asmitigation in our case we took,
quote unquote, a cut price dealfor Richardlison because we
probably could have got 15, 20million pounds more if we'd

(01:10:29):
waited out and negotiated more.
But we took it cut price dealbecause we knew we had to sell
by the 30th of June.
Forest sold Brennan Johnson andthey admit that they did this.
Forest sold Brennan Johnson twoweeks after that same
accounting deadline, or threeweeks after the accounting
deadline, and their mitigationis oh well, we that money should
still be counted because ifwe'd sold him before the

(01:10:51):
deadline we would have got lessmoney for him.
So, in order to balance up, inorder to get the value and
operating a quote unquotesustainable way, we sold him
after the deadline, but you'dstill count that money, which is
like oh well, I know myhomework's late, but you know, I
wanted to make sure that I didit properly.
So that's why it's like no,your homework's late, fuck off.

(01:11:16):
Like there's a very concrete enddate for the accounts.
That money came in after thatend date.
You don't get to count that.
Whatever your reason for thatis, it doesn't matter.
Like you don't get to countthat money because their
argument is well, if you countthat money in the previous
accounting period, then we'd bein compliance.
It's like well, if my auntiehad balls, she'd be my uncle,

(01:11:37):
but she doesn't, so she's notright.
Like it's just so.
There's such an open and shutcase that I just can't foresee a
way that you give them less ofa punishment than us because
they're basically admitting yes,we breached, but please don't
count it against us.
Because we did this account, wewant you to take it into it.
It's just nonsense.
It's a nonsense argument and Iadmire any lawyer who's gonna.

(01:12:01):
You know, and there will besome lawyer.
Because you compare a lawyer toargue anything.
You know, as Donald Trump isfinding out as he cycles through
them like used underwear the.
You compare a lawyer to sayanything, but it credits hats
off to the lawyer who's going tostand in front of that
commission and argue that moneyprocess after the deadline

(01:12:22):
should still be counted, becauseit would be inconvenient if it
wasn't.
Like it's just a nonsenseargument.

Speaker 3 (01:12:29):
Another thing that's going to be worth considering is
obviously that you know,whatever they get, forests will
have a right to an appeal, aswill Everton for this second,
but Everton the second breachand Forests first breach
respectively.
So so the there can be asituation where I think Andrew

(01:12:51):
and I were discussing this a fewweeks ago like the window for
the window for taking in theappeal for the for each breach
Everton second and Forests onlybreach is after the Premier,
after the league finishes.
So you can be in the situationand again it goes back to that

(01:13:12):
sort of bias where the peoplemaking that decision about the,
about the, about the, put any,any points, deductions after
appeals process and will knowthe effect that they're going to
have.
I mean, currently, withEverton's, everton's, you know,
premier League survival is stillregardless of the outcome is in

(01:13:34):
our own hands, but that will betaken away.
So you've got that element toit as well.

Speaker 1 (01:13:41):
Yeah, it's going to be a set.
And then you've got we'vetalked about this a little bit
as well You've got potential.
If there's a sense, that, whichI think is inevitable Everton
and Forrest are going toprobably I almost can't see a
situation where they don't endup suing each other unless
neither of us go down, in whichmaybe Luton would sue someone,

(01:14:01):
like because how do you nowavoid a situation where either
Everton or Forrest go down andthe one who got relegated isn't
able to claim well, we weretreated differently to the
others?
You just can't see it how thatis avoidable.

(01:14:22):
I can't.
And if Luton get relegated andEverton got some points back,
let's say, which mean we wouldhave gotten relegated if we
hadn't got those points back, ifyou're Luton, you're going to
say well, that's, you've cost methis much because of that
decision and that's where they.
I don't see how this doesn'tend up in a.
We think this is a mess now.
I think the mess it's going tobe over the summer is going to

(01:14:44):
be our next level worse.

Speaker 2 (01:14:47):
Yeah, I'd agree with that, and it's entirely.
And you can lay all of thatblame firmly at the door of the
Premier League.
Through having a process whichis discussed already, we're
basically repeating ourselves,having processes in place
without a proper sanction and asanctions regime.
That's just basic, that's justyou know.

(01:15:09):
I mean, we've all got contractsof employment.
That's all got T's and C's inthere where it says if you do
this, you will face theseconsequences, ranging from, you
know, written warning through toinstant dismissal.
And it appears that the PremierLeague just did the first bit
and didn't bother with thesecond.
What's the rest?

Speaker 1 (01:15:32):
Can we prove you a football match before we wrap up
?

Speaker 2 (01:15:36):
Probably be moved up to.

Speaker 1 (01:15:38):
Yeah, we should.
Let's talk about Palace acouple of days.
Well, actually it's nearly aweek, but we're not going to.
Took us six weeks to have thisconversation, so that's fine,
and you know you'll go into thisgame, I think right, so I'll
start with Adam.
I'll start with you.
How do you think we're going todo against Palace who are just
reading, actually, before westart at the pod that like the

(01:15:58):
stories come out to do with thatand trying to hire it, which is
manager, and I was like, did Imiss Roy Hodgson being sacked?
I was like nope, they haven'tjust sacked him yet, so that's
going to be great for morale,isn't it?
So I think we're going to doagainst Adam.
How do you think we're going todo against Palace?

Speaker 3 (01:16:14):
Well, I think if Roy Hodgson stays in charge, we've
got a hell of a chance, a hellof a bit of a chance, of winning
.
I think if they get sackedthey'll have that, you know,
resurgence that we often seewith teams, where they set
managers where you can put achimp in charge and they'll put
out a decent performance in thefirst game.
I don't think they're going tosack him because I think they

(01:16:40):
would have done it today.
So I can't see how they'regoing to sack him now, between
the last, between now and Monday, and Steve Parris is
traditionally quite a patientsort of bloke.
So I think if with Hodgson, withHodgson in place, I think we're

(01:17:00):
going to comfortably win,because Alistair are a poor side
.
They generally don't do a lotwithout any of Eze, either of
Eze or Elise, and they haven'tgot either of those.
They're also missing Mark Geheeas well, centre back.
So I watched them get toChelsea last night.

(01:17:24):
I mean they basically didnothing apart from Jessam and
Lermas spanking one in from 25yards, which you obviously can't
rely on on a game-to-game basis.
So yeah, I think it'd becomfortable, comfortable win for
Everton, 3-0.

Speaker 2 (01:17:40):
Andy, yeah, I broadly agree with that.
I think Palace are a shadow ofthe team.
Once you take Eze and Elise out, and also the whole sort of
noise around Palace as well,just looks really negative.
You've got the fans unveilingbanners against the owner at

(01:18:01):
various games.
Hodgson is unpopular with thefan base.
The management of bringingElise off the bench when he'd
injured his hamstring less thana week before then he pulls up
within 10 minutes and is now outfor a longer period of time the
whole management around thatinjury is just very, very

(01:18:22):
strange.
So it's just a club that is notin a happy place at the moment,
whereas, as we've discussed atthe start, the Port Everton's
performances broadly are verygood.
So I've got every confidencethat we can go into this game
finally create some chances andor score some chances that we

(01:18:43):
create.
I'm not going to be quite asoptimistic as Adam.
I'm going to say we're going towin 2-0.

Speaker 1 (01:18:53):
All right.

Speaker 4 (01:18:54):
Ben.
Yeah, I mean, palace are shit.
I watched the game againstChelsea yesterday, but they just
have nothing.
There's nothing going forward,there's no creativity without
Elise and Eze.
They had one good shot fromLerner, which was one of those

(01:19:15):
shots that goes in once every 50times.
You try it.
The other thing as well, though,is that and you know, you talk
to I've got a couple of Palacefans and you talk to them, and
what their view is is it's notabout necessarily just the
quality of the players.
The thing they talk about isthere's no fight, and we've all
watched Everton teams who haveno fight, who have no like.

(01:19:37):
You know, and that's the thingthat you kind of ever accuse
Dyshaw or Dysha's Everstop isthat we're always fight and
always work hard, and whenyou're a team who isn't like up
for it and they really look likea team who aren't up for it
that's really dangerous, andthat's why the new manager
bounce thing happens, becauseteams that aren't up for it
don't, you know, don't performwell.
Then a new manager comes in,and all the players have to,

(01:19:58):
like you know, they feelre-energised because it's fresh,
it's new, and therefore theytry harder.
So that's why managers go onthese tailspins, and I think
that I think Crystal Palace arein one.
I have a I think we'll get.
I think we'll get some pointsback on appeal this week.
I think we'll get four pointsback which we'll put as one
point behind Palace and then Ithink we'll beat Palace to one

(01:20:19):
and we'll go above Palace in thetable after Monday Because yeah
, I think they're a bad team andI think we're playing well and
yeah, I think it's.
And then I think everyone willsort of then panic again when we
get six points taken off us forthe second one.
But as we will rack up pointsthroughout the course of the

(01:20:40):
season, I think we'll beabsolutely fine.
But, yeah, two, one, two, onewin.

Speaker 1 (01:20:44):
Awesome.
I think we'll win two now.
I agree with Andy, all right.
That was an epic episode 69 ofthe podcast.
Thanks for joining.
Stay well, we'll be back nextweek, we promise.
And yeah, come on, you blue.
Subscribe wherever you get yourpodcasts on Spotify, apple
podcasts, overcasts, amazonmusic, everywhere tell an

(01:21:06):
Everton supporting friend andwe'll see you next time.
Stay well, we'll see you nexttime.