Sao Paulo GP 2025: Verstappen Charges, City Rout Liverpool

Podcasting from Studio 2520, this is Tackling the Chicane bringing you all the latest in motorsport and soccer.

Our new, uh, opening jam. Not too shabby. It's not bad. Well, we only have a limited budget for the live band. You can only take so many freaking copyright emails.

Exactly. So that what we did is we got a studio band of just a few guys to come in and play Uh, for the opening. And yes, so that's where we will carry this. We shall have no more commercial music on this podcast, at least, uh, for now. Yeah, just not minutes worth.

I think it was our issue. Well, it's hard. You can't do an You can't do an intro in 30 seconds. Every TV show ever has done that. Hmm.

I have to look that up. 30 seconds to a minute, maybe. All right. Well, uh, we took a week off last week. Uh, so we've got a lot to discuss.

The Premier League has kept turning since then. So we're going to have to get caught up on all of that action. Um, of course we're gonna kick it off with the weekend that was in Formula 1 in Brazil. São Paulo, Brazil's most populous metro area and home to, well, the country at least. Gabriel Bortoletto, who did not have a good weekend.

We Sure, we'll touch on that a little bit. And, um, traditionally Lewis Hamilton does very well there. Surprise, surprise, that also didn't happen. But I think we got more clarity on the 2025 World Drivers Championship and where it is potentially headed. I am personally ready to say that Max is out.

Um, obviously things did not go as well as they needed to go for him this weekend. Yeah, he didn't have a really good weekend for sure. Uh, what do you want to talk about that first and then go to the race? Uh, yeah, I figured, I figured we could start with the championship implications and then take a more microscopic look at the weekend. But things have turned kind of on with the drop of a hat.

Well, in this battle, not, not a great, uh, performance for the entire weekend for him. And, you know, well, kind of. Kind of and kind of not. Okay, so put himself in the pit lane for the start. Okay, um, they took a penalty for that because they wanted to do a suspension change of some kind, but to be honest, his qualifying runs weren't super hot anyhow.

Okay, but with that being said, to come from the pit lane to lead the race at one point and then to end the race in 3rd place is still— that's classic Verstappen. Yeah, it was a very heroic, uh, actual race from him, starting in the pit lane and then finishing on the podium. That's virtually unheard of. But Max continues to do impressive things, things that kind of have no precedence in Formula 1.

I think it's clear he's not gonna win the Drivers' Championship for the 5th year in a row, but certainly still does impressive things pretty much every weekend. Yeah, and you know, I mean, this thing's in it. It could potentially bounce back and forth between Piastri and Norris.

Um, or maybe not. I mean, I don't think he's got enough. We don't have enough races unless something goes horribly wrong, um, for the 2, the top, the 2 top guys, Norris and Piastri, for him to supersede them. I don't think that's going to happen. Um, but I mean, with that being said, the guy continues to impress.

You start in pit lane, you come up, you lead the race, you end up 3rd. He's pretty good. I mean, and then Russell, Russell seems to be like the bridesmaid or the bridesmaid who's never a bride. He's always like 3-4, 4-5.

And then Kimi Antonelli in this particular race, you know, came in second. So second in both the sprint and the— he's, he's only going to get better. So Russell's going to feel a lot of pressure from the Antonelli camp to perform.

Is it done? Let's be real. Is this, is this championship over with? I mean, Piastri again, bad weekend. Uh, there's collision and doesn't finish the sprint.

Meanwhile, Norris wins the sprint and then Norris wins the race. I— you— in motorsport, you can't ever say definite, like definitely this is finished. Uh, it seems like we're headed towards a Norris Uh, championship win for driver, but stranger things have happened. I mean, we still have 3 races— Vegas, uh, and the other 2, uh, Saudi Arabia, maybe Saudi Arabia, and, uh, the last one is, uh, UAE. Yeah.

So 3 races left. Anything can happen. 24 points is your gap. But should I— should— well, I know, but I mean, we've had some weird stuff happen over the years. If everything comes to fruition like I think it is, it's going to be Norris, Piastri.

The way this race finishes is I think how you see your driver's championship.

Um, well, Verstappen finished ahead of Piastri. So do you think he's going to finish ahead of Piastri in the championship battle? No, no, I had, I had a separate window open. Sorry. Um, no, I think it's going to be Norris in the driver's championship.

Piastri is going to come in second. Unless something horrible happens to Verstappen, you know, we're looking at it right here, I think. But you, it's too hard.

You can't, you can't predict the future of races and you don't know. I mean, one of these guys could get taken out and have no points. You know, it's possible. I think L— uh, not LA, Las Vegas is the, uh, most likely race to have any real sort of chaos, as it is a street race. I think if Norris does well in that one, kiss it goodbye.

It's done. Yeah, it's done. It— nothing— Lando Norris is miles and miles and miles and miles better than— yeah, Piastri. In the past 4 or 5 races, it seems like Piastri's pretty much completely fallen off a cliff. Feels like a head game.

Yeah, I think that's 100% what it is. I mean, we're talking about a guy who— he led the championship for 15 races. Yeah, 15 races. Yeah, that is over half the races, you know.

What we have to look forward to, and I'm sorry, these, I got new cans and they're, it's completely different. It just is. The, my other ones had NC, like noise canceling. So it just, just felt different. Doesn't matter.

Um, I think we also have to keep an eye on these rookie drivers who continue to perform. And we've got, uh, in this last, uh, race, you know, we've got a bunch of guys up there in the top, top positions that we're gonna see next year. Hadjars are gonna be there. The Lawsons are gonna be there. The Biermanns are gonna be there.

Um, it only makes sense, right? Yeah, I mean, I, I think Bearman is certainly someone to keep an eye out on. I, you know, he has that Ferrari connection from, uh, his junior career. He'll stay at Haas for next season, but I actually look to see him probably move up, uh, in years coming to a better team. Uh, just very mature performances, went toe-to-toe with Verstappen the race before.

Hadjar is almost undoubtedly going to be in the Red Bull seat next year alongside Verstappen. I think he has as good a shot as anyone that's been in that seat to, to do well. So let's just call Yuki Tsunoda a failure. I guess. I mean, I mean, not— it's a poison challenge.

I'm not saying it's a failure as a driver or a person. It's a failure to connect with this 2-person team. He's just always been way, way down. Yeah, I— that's an institutional failure more as much as it is Tsunoda hasn't been that good. No one in that 2nd seat has really ever sniffed Verstappen.

And obviously, you know, Max Verstappen is who he is, but that— there's not really an excuse from Red Bull to continue to just have a lame duck in the 2nd seat over and over and over again. Um, and we'll see. It'll be interesting if they do change drivers, which they probably will. Yeah, Tsunoda's done. And we used to see a better performance out of another driver who drove for Red Bull who used to keep in pace with Max Verstappen.

And who might that have been? Sergio Perez. Thank you.

So I, you know, as far as where we're at with everything, it's, it's probably going to stand the way it is. We might see a little differentiation down in the lower ranks.

Got a couple of guys tied 9 and 10, Hadjar and Hulkenberg in the driver standings at 43. And a couple guys right behind them, uh, Bearman and Alonso in, uh, with 40 points. So, you know, you got to battle for points down in that part of the, um, table, I guess.

But I don't know, I'm pretty happy with the way the, the campaign has played out this year. Um, I think we've had mostly competitive racing. We've had some, some races that weren't really that great to watch, but I wish there was a way to go back. I wish what F1 would do is do like a retrospectum.

Spectrum. Perspective. Perspective. Sorry, I would get there eventually. Like a retrospective of the season and which races were the ones that created the most change in what happened.

Um, that would be really cool if they could do that. Uh, but yeah, I mean, Constructor-wise, we're— it's— that's done and dusted. That's not even worth really looking at except for maybe down— Ferrari falls to 4th with this weekend's results. It— however, people, it depends how much you want to actually put into how important the constructor standings is. It is— it's worth millions of dollars, but for those top teams It's important for Ferrari.

I can guarantee you that. Well, for them it's win or failure. Yeah. Even though they, they're like the Yankees, it's win or failure, but they haven't actually won in, right. You know, 15 years.

Yeah. 17 years in the case of Ferrari. So they would probably like to finish above, um, Red Bull though. Yeah, that would be a failure if they finished below Red Bull, who is a one-horse team. Uh, that car is just— it's just slow.

The Ferrari is just slow. And I'm sure all of their development and efforts are on to 2026 at this point. There's really, you know, 3 races left. Who cares? Yeah, for them.

So that's a team that I would continue to monitor in the offseason. They need to come out of the gate swinging in '26. Where things could go very wrong there. Let's talk about the actual race here. Uh, the big, I think, kind of story of this one is the penalty scenario in which Oscar Piastri, as race control would deem it, the stewards, uh, caused a collision with Kimi Antonelli, uh, right off the rip.

And, uh, he was docked with a 10-second time penalty, which essentially took him out of contention of this one and out of contention to even, um, you know, finish on a podium. Trying to hearken back to the contact that happened, 10 seconds is It's egregious. It's not a penalty. It's an egregious penalty to put 10 seconds on him. And sometimes I wonder if these guys are sitting around a table going, how do we make this more interesting?

I don't know. That's conspiracy theory. Yeah. But I just think there's just never been real consistency about how F1 officiates races. Which we talked about last time, I think there's no conceivable way that Oscar Piastri intentionally caused a collision in that scenario.

He, he was on the racing line, even squeezed off of it a little bit, and Kimi Antonelli comes into him the way I deem it. I just think it was a racing incident. You know, that's— those lap 1 melees are so part of the sport. You rarely get enough looks at the contact in F1, um, vis-à-vis NASCAR or IndyCar. There seems to be 6 or 7 very definitive Okay, 8 or 9 very definitive looks at an incident on track.

We don't get to see that typically in F1. We see certain camera angles, but I would agree that this was not anything but a racing incident. And to get a 10-second penalty for that is— I, you know, where do you go from there? And I'm sure Piastri felt the same way, but it— you live and die by the rules of this series. Yeah.

And somebody's gonna get the sword eventually, right? It seems like Piastri's been on the short end of a couple of those decisions and just kind of the short end of luck recently. I think Lando's kind of been riding— not— he hasn't been riding luck, but Piastri certainly hasn't been on Lady Luck's side in recent weeks. Um, you know, 3 races to turn it around, not impossible, but doesn't help when the stewards are dishing out 10-second time penalties like they're candy. Yeah, and I, I just, I just don't like that.

I don't like that for the sport. I, you know, Not everything is an egregious breaking of the law. You know, racing happens. Shit happens in racing. Not everything is intentional.

You know, I think very, very, very— especially in F1, almost never is a driver trying to cause contact. I just think that's ridiculous. Yeah. Just stupid, stupid officiating. And it makes it incredibly hard to watch these races sometimes when you just know that a race-changing penalty is about to come down.

Yeah, I agree. Um, I do have to answer this work-related text, so Looking ahead, 3 races left. Las Vegas next. Firstly, I don't really know what, what that'll bring in terms of weather. Probably cold as shit again.

Uh, it could be. I mean, that's— well, the first year it was cold. It was literally in the 40s, I think, which made for, uh, interesting racing, if anything. Both years have— like, the actual race has been solid. I just, you know, it is what it is in terms of kind of being a circus.

But well, I mean, listen, they're all circuses when you look at it. We're just not privy to what it's like to be in Azerbaijan or, you know, some of the São Paulo or, you know, these other places. I would love to, you know, I, what would be really cool is to pick 3 races for the season and go to 3 in different continents. That would be awesome. You got, you got like 50 G's to cough up for that?

Not right now, I don't, but someday. Yeah. I think what Vegas brings to the table is a chance. It feels like it's a very racy track.

And like you said, I think the last 2 have been great. And I don't, I don't, I don't think that we're going to see anything different this year. I think it's going to be an awesome race. Um, of course I'm biased because it's— we have Texas, you know, we have Florida. Miami just feels cheesy to me.

Well, it's in a parking lot. I mean, certainly this street course in Las Vegas is a thing, you know. You're shutting down one of the capitalistic towns in the world to do this. So it must pay dividends to do that. But well, they signed a big-ass extension last year, so it must work.

I don't know. And F1 would not be the type of entity that would admit failure. So well, those contracts— that being said, I mean, we've seen tracks come and go. Too. I can't name a specific one now, but GPs will run for a stint and then, you know, we may not see them again for a bit.

Yeah, I, I don't know with Vegas. I really— even though they signed a big-ass extension, I don't know, it seems like it could like, you year to year. It could just— I guarantee you one year it could just be off the calendar. Yeah, I don't know. I mean, in a town like that that lives 24/7, is a month really a big deal in terms of— I mean, they have that shit shut down for about a month.

They— okay, this is anecdotally speaking. But my friend Cam was there in September and he made— he's not an F1 fan— he made note that they were already setting up for the race. Yeah, I guess that makes sense. September, maybe it's more like 90 days. And really, I, I mean, again, anecdotally, people have complained a little bit about its sort of encroachment, but it's also Vegas, like Encroachment of what?

You're fucking gambling and— right. And you can't stumble down the sidewalk. Yeah. Like, it's not like you're missing out on— there's no cultural, uh, monuments and shit that's being impacted, guys. Yeah.

Casinos. I feel— I think you're exactly right about that. I mean, this is the town that never sleeps. And if you I suppose people are probably inconvenienced by certain things that happen during this, but the overarching money that comes into the town, obviously whoever's in charge is like, uh, we'll take that. It would be interesting to see just how much money actually comes in.

We'll never know. But I do know, you know, last year, you know what, they slashed prices for that race because they came in here and, you know, this is audio only, my hand is near the ceiling, came in super high, realized, okay, we can't completely fucking rake people over the coals, you know. And they can't— they're not going to continue to get away with that, especially know, just the way things are headed, you know, like people are not going to continue to just be raked over. Oh yeah, I can, uh, 6 G's for the weekend, no problem. Okay, and again, this is maybe a rabbit hole, but like the rabid fans of F1 are not the millionaires, okay?

So like You can't price out your fan base, although F1 tries their best.

I would agree with that. I think a lot of the folks who get to the spoils of F1, um, are there not just— they're not there for the race, they're there for clout. Yeah, but which, alas, Yeah, I mean, it is what it is. And, and I, that's a goal of mine is if that race continues, you know, maybe we can go see it. I want to see one somewhere.

And I think probably Texas is our best shot. I would say Miami is, but we've kicked the can. We've kicked the can. Down the line. That's true.

Well, let's, uh, we'll work on that as an entity here. The sticker shock is just something you're gonna have to swallow. And this is just— I'm just speaking generally. Like, if you want to see F1, you're just gonna have to know that you're gonna spend a couple G's. And that's just life, I guess.

Yeah, it shouldn't be that way, but that's the way it is.

True. True. Anyways, so off to Vegas we go, right? Yeah. Not this weekend, but the weekend after.

And so we will leave that on the table for now.

Um, yeah, this, uh, São Paulo race was entertaining to watch. Um, you know, we'll see where these guys finish at the end of the year and then we'll have much to talk about offseason because new car. Yeah. New teams. I was watching a video the other day about the new car and they're concerned about its power generation.

It's 50-50 hybrid and, well, okay, 50-50 electric and internal combustion engine. To generate power as opposed to 80/20 in this car. Uh, many in simulations have shown that it is a very underpowered car, so they're gonna have to figure that out. Well, that could, uh, bring us some competitive racing possibly. Yeah, it's, uh, that's the point.

Uh, anyways, let's Well, and the point too is they're trying to be more environmentally sustainable. You know, the whole series. I saw an interview with— crap.

Who's the guy that jetted out 2 years ago? The German dude.

Peter Steiner? No, no, the driver. Oh, Sebastian Vettel. Yes, yes, sorry. He had like a— he is apparently undertaking a huge like environmental impact.

Yeah, he's been doing that for a while. That's why he said he left. He said, I can't justify the environmental impact of this series. So okay, we'll head that way, which is okay. Um, but if they're gonna go that route with the 50/50 powertrain, then we're gonna see a very different style of racing, I think.

Yeah, it's— there's actually a couple big changes regulations-wise. The front wing nose is a lot different, it's smaller.

Additionally, DRS is not— is no more next season. It'll be almost like a push-to-pass in IndyCar, except it's not using fuel. It's a battery thing, but it's a button that'll be pressed as opposed to the back wing going down. And they've had us— they've had sort of that same kind of battery. They don't talk about it a lot during the race, which I, I find interesting because it— well, and they don't really talk about it because they've had it for for 12 years.

Yeah, KERS. KERS has been around, you know, since I was like 12 years old in F1. They talk about it in IndyCar because that technology is fucking riveting to them because it's relatively new. It's relatively new, and they, they, um, amplify it on the dashboard. They want you to see— yeah, well, at least at the beginning with the hybrid thing.

Now they don't. Even in IndyCar, they don't. Not so much about it. Yeah. But that's, that's where we're headed.

Um, yeah. Motorsport needs to sustain some kind of, uh, internal combustion. It just needs to. We can't go the full— well, it's never going to go full electric, but, um, yeah. I mean, I think I'm going to have to do a little bit of reconnaissance on the off season.

We're going to talk a lot about that 20— 2026 car as we go through the winter here. Um, but yeah, it's— we could see a very different F1 in 2026 than we, than we're seeing right now, depending on who, which teams embrace that and figure it out. And I think we're going to have some newcomers you know, coming into the series, which is interesting. And that's what it's all about. We can't stay stale and stable.

Stagnant. Stagnant. Yes. Yeah. Well, F1's always been good about being kind of on the cutting edge of tech.

So that is going to continue, but, uh, let's, let's table F1 for now. We've got quite a bit of soccer to discuss. Um, I want to touch on Scotland for a sec here. Uh, we do head into the international break now, and, um, this is in theory supposed to be when Celtic make their managerial appointment, their permanent managerial appointment, during this break. So whether or not that'll actually happen, uh, remains to be seen as we record.

Uh, but the front runner, uh, at least in the rumor mill for the new job, is a very interesting name because, uh, take a wild guess where this person manages now.

No idea. Give you a hint. They are a local club.

Columbus Crew. Yes. Wilfred Nancy is the current manager of the Columbus Crew. Their season just ended, sadly, in the first round of the playoffs. But he is the bookies' favorite to become the next manager of Celtic.

And what is his? Tenure in the league, shall we say. Well, this would be his first European managerial position if, if it were to happen, but, uh, he has generally a very good track record in MLS. He won the 2023 MLS Cup with the Crew, you may remember. Uh, he's won Leagues Cup with Crew, he's won Campeonato Cup.

He's so he's won three trophies with the crew. Before that, he was with Montreal and was fairly good there. Had a weird falling out with the ownership there, but his track record is good in MLS, which to Scottish football fans means absolutely nothing. In fact, people don't seem to be thrilled that that's the rumored next. Rumored next manager.

I don't really know. I mean, I— so are they going to go through the end of this campaign with the manager they have? I don't think so. Martin O'Neill? I, I don't think so.

I mean, there hasn't been a whole lot of news coming out about like who would be the next manager, but I really just— I don't think the idea is to have 73-year-old Martin O'Neill manage 3/4 of a season. Yeah. Um, but I don't know, it's Celtic and currently they're kind of a mess. Um, but that is sort of the kind of a mess in second place. Well, in Scotland it's all relative.

Yeah, I mean, I always look at the table, so maybe I'm— well, I'm— the table just— there's there's just not a lot of context in a league table. Yes, second in theory is, is fine, but that's not fine for Celtic in Scotland who have ran the show for the past decade plus. Sure. Um, you have Hearts, you know, in, in second or in first. Uh, they stumbled over the weekend against Dundee United, so I still think, you know, I think I— it's gonna take an absolute, like, a literal miracle for Hearts to win the league.

Um, so I think that end of things will probably start to stabilize for Celtic. But, you know, European-wise, you could probably kiss the Europa League goodbye. Their next games are against Roma and Feyenoord, who thousands of times better than this current Celtic team. Yeah, so that's gonna be— that could be potentially hard to watch. But, um, meanwhile Rangers seem like under their new manager Danny Roll that things have stabilized a little bit for them.

Uh, they won at the weekend as well. So right now it's— I think it's a 3-horse race for this title. Um, even though Rangers still are kind of lurking in the background still, but I don't expect their, their form to be worse than it's been at the beginning of the season. Anything to come from Hibs? Um, probably not.

Uh, they did win pretty convincingly against St. Mirren, but no, I don't expect them to be higher than probably 3rd if things really go nuts for them, but 4th. Um, Falkirk have kind of been the surprise package of the league. I think you'll find them in, in 5th place, I believe. Uh, correct, the newly promoted team. So that's pretty rare, uh, at least, you know, amongst teams that have not been in the top flight for almost a decade, like, uh, Paul Kirk, or even over a decade.

So punching well above their weight. So it'll be interesting to see if they can continue to do that. Upcoming matches, anything? Um, so obviously it's the international break this weekend, which means, uh, the final United States men's national team camp of 2025. So we'll keep at least a loose eye on that.

Uh, but as for upcoming matches in Scotland of note, um, Celtic take on St. Mirren. This is Saturday the 22nd. That'll be away at St. Mirren. That's always tough. Hearts will play Aberdeen away.

Aberdeen, quite frankly, suck, but you know, still a tough place to play. All to play for in Scotland. Um, it would be interesting to see how things fare there. But, uh, if you have no other questions, I'd like to turn our attention south of the border into England. Sure.

So pretty, pretty, uh, What's the word, I, I just a very consequential weekend in the Premier League. Um, we— I was watching, you were sort of double duty with F1 qualifying, but Arsenal and Sunderland. Arsenal of course are— have been, uh, just absolutely fantastic to start the year. They had not conceded a goal in 5 matches headed into this match at the Stadium of Light against Sunderland. And, um, Sunderland pretty much gave them as much as they could handle.

They started— they actually took the lead 1-0 and were leading for a while there, um, with the Dan Ballard header in the 36th minute. Uh, big center-back there. Uh, Bukayo Saka gets things rolling for Arsenal on the 54th, and then Leandro Trossard made it 2-1. I thought that was, you know, Sunderland were dead and buried. And then in the 94th minute, uh, let me make sure I'm getting the name right— Brian Brobbey.

Brobbey, sorry. Uh, sort of like an acrobatic almost bicycle kick, not quite, but you know, both feet off the ground, swung his leg into a ball, and 2-2. Crowd went nuts. That's, that's— I— it's— if it's not the best Premier League atmosphere, it's certainly top 3. Stadium of Light, Sunderland.

So that one finished 2-2. That was probably my favorite match of the weekend, but the one that we're gonna cover in depth, I think, you know, is probably the, the box office one, the, the one that deserved the most attention, and that is Man City versus Liverpool. So obviously Arsenal dropped points, which meant the winner of this one would, uh, be able to make up some ground. It was a— what'd you think? A fine match, um, to watch.

Uh, 10th minute, Doku draws the penalty for Man City. Haaland to kick. Haaland has made many, many conversions, so I don't know if you heard, um, but he up until that point— spoiler alert, he does miss— but he had never missed a penalty. In the Premier League. I think he was like 18 for 18 or something like that.

Yeah. I want to say that maybe he was, there were 2 that he didn't make, but I'm not 100% sure about that. Doesn't matter.

A fair kick from Haaland and just a great save by the keeper who gave away the penalty, mind you. Yeah. Uh, you're— that's a nightmare pronunciation for, for my co-host. I'm gonna give it a try.

Uh, Georgi Mamardashvili. Mamardashvili. He's Georgian and not, uh, and he's big. He's a big keeper. A lot of presence in the box.

Um, 6'6. Yeah. And Harlan was not happy. So interestingly enough, Mamadarashvili, probably still getting that wrong, uh, is only starting because Alisson, the legendary Liverpool keeper, is hurt. So this young lad, at least by goalkeeping standards, gives away the penalty on Jeremy Doku, who by the way Liverpool had virtually no answers for, uh, defensively speaking, for Mr. Doku, uh, and then goes from zero to hero with the PK save.

Um, that was pretty much the last good thing that Liverpool did in this match. Agreed. And so with Harlan denied on the PK in the 29th minute, Muniz to Harlan, and Harlan has apparently the skull of a great Viking or something. He is Norwegian. Is that Viking or no?

Yeah. Yeah. Just. Beautiful header in the rain.

Makes the goal 1-0. Yeah, at that point, maybe a little bit against the run of play just because Liverpool had actually threatened. I'm trying to figure out, and you'll have to forgive me. I should have, I didn't take notes for this one. I was being lazy, but, uh, I was trying to figure out when exactly in the run of play, uh, Liverpool's goal was chalked off.

Did you make note of that?

Um, apparently it wasn't that impressive. Well, it was not. I think it was an offside. Yeah, clearly. Which was bullshit.

No, it was not. Clearly, uh, so I don't know when the fuck it actually happened. Sorry, it had to be between the 10th and the 29th.

No, whatever. I don't— this thing has fucking every goddamn thing that happened except the fucking thing. So I have a note here that in the 38th, the Liverpool goal goal was called offside. It was Virgil van Dijk. I was asking for it.

Yes, Virgil van Dijk, who heads in a ball. Andy Robertson is, uh, allegedly deemed— well, he's in an offside position, but that doesn't matter because he didn't touch the ball. What he actually was— the goal was chalked off for was that he was in the line of sight of the Man City goalkeeper, uh, Donnarumma, and therefore interfered with Donnarumma's ability to save the ball, which is bullshit because Virgil van Dijk put it in a position that no one would ever save. And Robertson, was he really in the line of sight of Donnarumma? I, I don't think he really was ever going to save that.

So yeah, I'm calling bullshit on that VAR decision from the Premier League. But regardless, it really didn't matter at all in the run of play. Maybe it would have changed things just because they would have equalized. Well, and but yeah, I don't know. They looked— you can't— so you can't— if they had scored then you, you don't know what the shift of momentum is.

The timeline changes, right? Exactly, 100%. So that was in the 38th. It was Virgil Van Dyke, and I, I didn't realize that it came to be that technical. I— someone, if I remember correctly, was talking about like where his foot was on the line I don't know if that has something to do with it.

Yeah, he was offside, but I, I think the reason they actually chalked it off was because of interference, which I've seen a million times and sometimes it's valid. That's one of those soccer rules that I don't really think is, uh, very, very rarely does it play out the way that I think the rule is intended, where the rule is there so a defender or I Well, not a defender, someone on the goal-scoring team can't just stand in front of the goalkeeper and prevent him from actually seeing where the hell the ball is going. But more often it plays out to where a guy is in front of the play and is in the general vicinity of the goalkeeper but really has no impact on whether or not the goalkeeper can actually save it, uh, but is deemed to be in the path of the goalkeeper or where the ball is headed and it gets chalked off. And that's what I think this goal ended up being with Andy Robertson. He has no impact on the play.

Donnarumma's never ever saving the header from Van Dijk, but interference, and he's in an offside position to boot. So see you later, chalk it off. Weak, uh, Commentary agreed. Not that that really means anything, but just weak. And I honestly, I think the first penalty was kind of weak too, that Haaland scores.

Goalkeeper going for the ball, happens to make a little contact with Doku and penalty given. Yeah, very little contact. Yeah, but VAR howlers all over the place with the Premier League this week. Everton This is side note. I was watching the Everton match, which they ended up winning two nil against Fulham.

In the first half, they had four balls go into the back of the net, of which one counted. And some of it, you know, was all of them. I think were offside. But the fuck please for the love of God. FIFA, IFAB, change the rule that says that the ref keeps his flag down until the play happens.

It used to be when someone was offside, the second he's offside, the flag goes up, right? Why do we wait a fucking minute? That's because they're, they're depending on— cover their ass. They're depending on the VAR, which is why they do it, but it's Jesus Christ. In this particular league is also terrible.

Okay. So apparently these leagues have not garnered the same technology that we have here. Well, yeah. Yeah. Not, I don't, I feel like we go down the tech rabbit hole a lot and I'll just say that soccer doesn't work well with video review.

Well, it just does not. Maybe it shouldn't. It doesn't. The rules are entirely too— like, what is and isn't a foul is so unbelievably subjective, right? Offside's a little more cut and dry, but no one gave a fuck before VAR if a, if an attacking player's toenail was offside.

Yeah, no one cared. Yeah, it— no one asked for this change. No one asked this change. So my issue is quit allowing play to go on when you know it's offside. Whistle.

That's stupid because how many— I've literally seen it. And when this first started, VAR in the Premier League in 2019, they were saying, well, what happens when the play goes on and someone gets hurt and then the flag goes up, that player got hurt for no reason. I was like, okay, well, whatever, you're just being stupid. Like, that— the odds of that happening are slim. And then I actually witnessed it happen, and, you know, it's like, so that's stupid.

Why the fuck are you— you're just letting play that you know will not count go on for God knows how long. 3 times that happened in the Everton match. 3 times in one half. What are we like? That's just— it's like the F1 10-second penalty on Piastri.

It's like, just quit micromanaging the game. Yeah. Anyways, well, there's my VAR. Obviously they, they need to figure that out.

Who knows? Plus 7 stoppage. That's another thing with the Premier League. They love their stoppage time. And I mean, 7 minutes.

You're giving everyone a huge chance. Didn't happen here. We saw that in the Sunderland Arsenal game. They gave 9 minutes in the first half and then I think like 7 which turned into basically 9 in the second half. I don't know, like, I swear those numbers just come out of a fucking hat because even when there's been games like that I'll watch that'll have a huge VAR review and then it'll be like 2 minutes added on first half.

And then there was— I, I think there were 2 VAR reviews in this first half, but I think a lot of the stoppage comes from Um, players being assisted, or like when, when the trainers come out. Is that— well, and they've gotten more strict about that. You— I've— I don't know, and maybe you can help me with this. So if a— if the training team comes out onto the pitch, is that where we officially start running the clock on stoppage? If a guy's— the referee, you know, they bring the ref.

The referee is supposed to be keeping track of how much time has been wasted with the ball, but that's up to him. Yes. So it's, it's entirely up to his interpretation of— I think the 4th official does now as well. Okay, because you have the VAR guys in the booth that are probably telling them. Well, it's kind of hard to figure out.

It used to be the ref was just responsible for keeping— which is also stupid, yeah, to be fair. But the reality of the situation is, and I've, I've read articles about this, if soccer actually did like real added time, it would be like 15 minutes a half. So that's just not practical. Um, but the Premier League, I'll say it, they fucking manufacture fake— not fake, they manufacture late drama just because they add on so much time to every second half, whether or not it's actually like— I swear it's so— it— I think it's embellished how much time they add on more often than not. You'll watch, and I watch other leagues.

I don't just watch the Premier League. Watch a game in Italy, watch a game in Germany. It's half the added time. Half the added time. You might see a +1 or +2 in the first half.

I mean, they'll throw, usually you'll get 5, 4 or 5 at the end of a second half, no matter what, unless it's a blowout. But the Premier League, 7, 8 minutes, and then it goes on and on and on and on. How many games do we see that someone scores after the 90th minute, deep into stoppage time in the Premier League? Brentford-Newcastle this weekend, 90+5. Um, 90+1 in Nottingham Forest match.

Um, Sunderland 90+4. I mean, this, this isn't egregious, but all of this comes in stoppage time. 90+1 in the Tottenham one, 90+6 in that match as well between Tottenham and Man United. You don't see that type of shit happen at nearly the rate in, in most other leagues. And I, you know, maybe I I don't have like hard data.

I'm not looking at hard data here, but I just, it's a pattern that I can't help but notice. Yeah. Well, the second goal in this match came in stoppage in the 48th minute, I believe. Gonzalez scores for Man City 2-0. And then, I mean, we'll just bring it down to the end here.

Doku finally got, Doku finally got a goal. 3-0, Man City made the final in the 63rd and well deserved. I mean, the guy's, he's played his ass off in this game. He was, Liverpool had absolutely no answer for him. No.

Connor Bradley for Liverpool. I'm sorry, man, but He put you in his— on fucking skates a number of times. Like, and they basically shut down Mo Salah. Mo Salah has— he's been terri— not terrible, but he's been pretty shit this season. And I know that because he's on my fantasy team.

But, uh, by his standards, which are admittedly quite lofty, 4 goals in 11 matches, 2 assists. That's, um, and the goals that he is scoring oftentimes are not of, um, amazing value, let's say. Liverpool, I mean, they've— their form has pretty much fallen off a cliff since their great start to the season. They've lost 4 of their last 5. They sit in 8th place.

Now granted, you know, there's 2 points separating 3rd from 9th right now, so it's tight, but Harlan rules the world. Yeah, he's back for sure. He's back. He kind of a slower season last year, but I mean, he's, he's killing it right now. He has 14 goals in 11 matches.

Yeah. So he's, he's just killing it. Yeah.

And, uh, whether you, you think that it's, um, that it brings anything to these matches. I, I honestly think that, um, it's, it's there, it's a bit of an Achilles heel. It's more often an annoyance than it is something that I think actually is of value. I would not be sad if they scrapped it. Some countries, I Norway is the best example of this, have implemented VAR and then gotten rid of it because they hated it so much.

Well, it's just there, it's not consistent. Yeah, and I like watching, uh, the championship a lot too, uh, because there is no VAR and, uh, can be refreshing. I mean, you get your shitty, uh, and I, I will admit and say I'm two-faced in this But you get your shitty calls and you just kind of deal with it. Now, like in baseball, that pisses me off to no end, but a strike zone should be more objective than what is a foul in soccer. Not to go down another rabbit hole, but soccer just does not lend itself well to video replay.

If you slow down any tackle in soccer, you can make yourself think that it's a foul. So I'm tired of that, quite frankly. Let's talk Liverpool for a second here. This is the— this might go down as the biggest bust of a summer transfer window of all time, and I'm not even being serious. Or I am being serious.

Um, if Liverpool continue to play this way and if they don't win a title, that's an abject complete abject failure on their end. It's like if the Dodgers didn't win the World Series this year. Total failure. Florian Wirtz. Liverpool spent, I, $140-odd million on Florian Wirtz over the summer.

He has 0 goals and 0 assists in 11 matches.

Um, another guy they spent a shitload of money on, Alexander Isak, has 0 goals and 1 assist. He's dealing with some injury issues, but he doesn't play 4 matches. That's— you're talking over $250 million splurged on those 2 players. They have scored you no goals in their Both attackers. So that— I, I'm really interested to see if they can turn that around.

But Arne Slot basically played a squad of all the guys that were already there from last year besides Florian Wirtz, who gets subbed off, uh, in the 83rd and did nothing. So I don't know about this Liverpool team. I, I was At the beginning of the year, I was, you know, thinking, wow, they might just walk the league. And to be fair, they looked like they might. But now they look, uh, for lack of a better term, they look quite shitty.

Um, and sitting in 4th— 8th. They are in 8th place. Yeah, they're in 8th with 18 points. Arsenal sit top, 26 points. Now again, it's fairly early in the season, but at this point we've seen enough football to know that Um, things are gonna have to improve for Liverpool to, uh, win back-to-back titles.

And, uh, now we go into the international break. Teams can regroup and things will really go into high gear after this international break, and we'll learn a lot about these teams over the holiday period. So there you have it. Yeah. We have a lot of teams above Liverpool right now who, you know, we've seen Spurs play well.

We've seen, I mean, Sunderland in 4th, Chelsea. It's going to go anywhere at this point. Yeah. I'll be interested to see if Arsenal can not fold under the pressure again. Being the leaders.

Let's see, uh, let's remember 2023-24, they led the— I think they led that championship for some— somewhere around 90% of the season, I think was the statistic, and then they lost it to Man City. And then obviously weren't really, you know, in it last year, but it'll be interesting to see if they finally kind of turn the corner on that. Um, clearly Man City are here to play, but they have a loss in them every now and then that is kind of inexplicable. So I think they'll need to get that out of their system if they want to be super serious title contenders. And then who knows with Liverpool.

Um, but I think those are still the 3 clubs that you would bet any real money on to win the title, but Who knows? We'll see. All right, well, that concludes the agenda for this episode. Uh, next time, uh, I don't know, it might move to the beat of jazz a little bit next time. We'll probably see a little bit of the men's national team before next time.

Um, There is some IndyCar offseason stuff that I, I will probably bring up as well, but, um, yeah. All right, let's, uh, get going if you're ready. Yeah.

From Studio 2520, this is Tackling the Chicane. Executive producer Richard Tanaka. Copyright 2025. We'll see you next time.