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Chapter 1: What was the significance of Cape Verde holding Spain to a goalless draw?
This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. Keitetääs kahvit. Mikä ihana lause. Saa hengähtää ja unohtaa hetkeksi huolet ja hommat. Siinä mieli virkistyy ja sydän kevenee. Ja kuulee maukkaimmat jutut. Tai saa vain hetken olla ja nauttia. Arkea ikä kaikki. Ja se on hyvä niin. Eloveena. Täyttä eloa. So we're into match day five of the World Cup.
Me and Lloyd are at our base for the tournament, which is outside of Yeoldy King's Head in Santa Monica. Today... Just wanted to mention that we went and had a lovely lunch with producer Jonathan. And then we went for a little mooch around some shops nearby.
And then when it was time to come home and watch the Iran-New Zealand game, we were obviously looking for some electric bikes, which we call hogs, which is our favoured mode of transport while we're here. And we realized that some of these hogs will actually take two. So you can have one person on the front and one gripping from behind. And I said, well, we need to both hop on here.
And you were absolutely categorically against it. And it was a bit of back and forth. And you were really resistant. And then in the end, you relented. And we rode together all the way back to the apartment. And I'm not exaggerating when I say it's the best thing we've done since we've been there.
So I want you to publicly apologise for moaning and questioning when I was right and it was fantastic. Is anything I've said there unfair?
Well, no. Yes.
Oh, go on.
Well, I was a bit apprehensive because, you know, we're riding on LA roads here. And I've ridden a bike on my own. Absolutely. We've done it the whole time. We've done it the whole time, but I haven't ridden with anyone on the back before. I'll accept. It was snug. It was very snug. Very, very snug. It felt like we were in the Winter Olympics in one of those toboggans.
The thing is, I would have loved maybe five minutes in an empty car park. just to kind of go round, get myself used to... Get on the freeway, see who salutes. And it was... No one saluted. No.
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Chapter 2: What went wrong for Spain in their match against Cape Verde?
So, starting at 9 a.m. It was lovely. Belgium drew 1-1 with Egypt. Saudi Arabia and Uruguay also drew 1-1. Iran, New Zealand finished 2-1. Biggest story of the day, though. I think probably the biggest result of the tournament so far. Cape Verde, who managed to hold pre-tournament favourite Spain to a 0-0 draw. A reminder, all of the goals and highlights are available on the BBC Sport app.
Guillaume Balaguet joins us now. Guillaume, how are you? Yeah, I'm fine. I'm very, very thankful that you invited me to talk about Queberde. I mean, you were there in the stadium. I hope. And it's an incredible result. And it is a result that I think it is fair to say nobody saw coming.
No, nobody saw it coming. And he has got his reasons. You have to start with Kai Berde and their fantastic defending. But Spain have shown a bunch of things that you did not expect, which I'm sure we'll go through in detail to make you able to say that. Isn't it disappointing that one of the favorites for the tournament have turned out to be maybe not so favorite.
But in any case, we went down to the press conference really, really disappointed. The media was in the media area. We were told to come down by the manager. Says, you know, the team has lost in 32. You have to trust us. You know, it was the nerves of the first game. There was no much of self-reflection. There are lessons to be learned, he says.
Went home a little bit happier and then started getting messages from people back home and got annoyed again. It should not happen. It should not be a draw. But you do hope, as Luis de la Fuente said, that there is a lesson or two to be learned from it. From your point of view, what were the lessons? They're like, with...
depth number nine somebody that you're from long distance and uh physicality but apart from a little bit of that but you know it all starts with something that was said briefly by uh by luis de la fuente he says that they weren't sure if capo verde were gonna actually go man to man and pressure high or defend deep but they never expected that they were gonna defend this deep really
I mean, all they had was defend, defend, defend, and one or two transitions. That was their hope. And they wanted more transitions. That was what the manager of Calverde told them at halftime. But in any case, it was mostly about defending. So, okay, you've got a team that defends very deep on the edge of the box with nine men. What do you do? You set it with. You put the wingers.
Oh, by the way, we've got four wingers. Great. Three of them are injured or coming out of injury. Because the idea of the first two games against Cabo Verde and Saudi is basically that we were just going to get them ready for the bigger games, for the next stage. So we did not use one of our wingers that was fit in Jeremy Pino.
And the substitutions came quite late based on the fact that he wanted to have in the last few minutes, 20 minutes or so, Lamin Yamal, who is as much as he can play, Nico Williams for about 15 minutes and Mikel Merino for another 20. So he was just waiting and waiting and waiting, by which time I think the nerves of the side just made playing football even harder and harder.
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Chapter 3: How did Guillem Balague assess Spain's performance in the World Cup?
And the game became very long, very slow, and we didn't find the solutions.
Do you think that was what Cape Verde's plan was from the off, knowing that actually a lot of their wingers are injured and let's just go, let's just dig in deep and see what they do?
Yeah, yeah. It was all about, let's make sure that we don't get many shots on goal. 27, there were plenty. But on target then, seven, not enough. They defended really, really well. Do you know how many fouls they committed in the whole game to stop us? I do know this. It's one. Just one. Wow. One. Do you know how many yellow cards? I don't know that. Just one yellow card. Wow.
There was a lack of, as you said, Rick, it was a lack of energy. And as you said, it was just once they realized what they were doing, they were doing very well. They just kept doing it. I must say, I joined the celebrations of Cabo Verde at the end because it was so nice to see.
Yeah.
And it was so enjoyable to see them just jumping up and down. So I just got in the middle of all the celebrations and I felt Cabo Verdean for a second.
And you were like, yeah, I'm going to switch allegiance here. Why not? Lloyd, you wanted to talk about the Cape Verde. Keeper, who had an absolute worldie.
Well, he had such a great game. I mean, when we saw the line-up, we got up early. And look, I'm not throwing any shade on him. Like, he looks like a... You know, he's 40 years old. He's 40 years old. He looks 40. And he looks 40. He looks like he's had a number of paper rounds. But he had an absolutely fantastic game. 40 years old with a lot, a lot of experience and some absolutely fantastic...
Fantastic saves. Had you heard of him before, Guillaume? Were you expecting that? And were you annoyed with him by the end?
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Chapter 4: What are the standout qualities of Egypt's Abdelkarim as a young talent?
I think not through the amount of followers on Instagram, but with some clever work from his agent, I hope that his family will manage to see the next couple of games. And by the sounds of it, with everybody with one point, they've got a very good chance of going through as well. You will not know this, either of you. Do you know how many teams have we beaten since we won the World Cup in 2010?
And which, if you know them, the amount, give me the names. No, go on. You won't get it. Iran, Australia and Costa Rica only. Really? Yeah. So we get a little bit distracted by us having won the European Championships. But to be honest, since we won the World Cup, we've been a disaster. So all of a sudden you start seeing things and stats in a different light.
Only 24 hours ago I was saying, can I just say very softly, We're not only candidates with the best team in the tournament. And I'm going to have to eat my words. So a little bit of humble pie for everyone at the moment.
Yeah, but you know, we don't need to judge who's the best team in the tournament yet, in fairness. A bit of context I think would be useful for the listeners on Cape Verde. So it's a tiny little nation off the west coast of Africa. Third smallest country ever to qualify for the World Cup based on population.
After Curaçao and Iceland. That's actually good from Lloyd.
Finally, adding some value. They're ranked 67th in the FIFA World Rankings. Spain are ranked second. That is the ninth largest gap ever in a World Cup fixture. And then I quite like this one. So all 26 players in Cape Verde's squad are valued at combined transfer value of about $63 million. And you compare that to Spain...
You just look at Lamine Yamal, who I think current market value is something like $230 million. And that just, that tells you the story of why this is such a fantastic result for the World Cup and why we love the World Cup. Because none of that matters when it's 11 v 11 on a football pitch, Guillaume.
Yeah, you know the last eight will be the usual suspects. But up till that point, you're going to get results like this, and it's going to allow us to understand about the country, for instance, stories, personal stories, which I'm sure you must have told the one of Roberto Lopez, and stop me if you have done it already, from the center back from Sharma Roberts, who will send a LinkedIn note.
Have you heard? No, I haven't heard it, no. It's really good. The diaspora of Cabo Verde means that there is three times more people that have come from Cabo Verde or family over there. outside Cabo Verde than they are in Cabo Verde, which is 600,000 only. So to get the best players around, LinkedIn was used.
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Chapter 5: What was the atmosphere like during the Iran match in Los Angeles?
And basically he's done so well that Barcelona have decided to pay the sum of 1.5 million euros for him to be the number nine of Barcelona B. But depending how he goes, and of course, you know, if he scores in the World Cup or he shows his personality in the World Cup, he may just train with the first team. But yeah, they've got high hopes from him.
He's the kind of striker that you don't get in La Masia. He's got quality, good head of the ball, he's big and he should become bigger. He's only 18. And as I said, he seems not to be fazed by anything. And he did help the under-18s to win the league with five goals this season since he joined in February. So, yeah, he's now a Barcelona player.
And then Romelu Lukaku, who... I'd sort of, I wouldn't have been surprised if he'd retired from international football, to be honest.
Can I just interject? We're at the Old King's Head, Guillaume, in Santa Monica. We got here. I just came from the toilet. There's a lot of English fans just watching the highlights. The Belgium highlights were being played. And some Cockney guy was like, is he still around? And it was Lukaku.
But yeah, and then, you know, 20 seconds after he comes on, he sort of, you know, makes a nuisance of himself. The ball goes in the back of the net and you're like, okay, still effective. But then equally... Right near the end, that header is painful, Guillem, because it's the perfect ball for him.
Yeah, let me start with, I would love to have heard the conversation between Courtois and Lukaku, because Courtois has returned to the national side, hasn't he, after 21 months, because the captaincy was given to Lukaku, and he didn't like that. So he just started messaging all the other players when he realized that he wanted to be in a World Cup.
And eventually he would have had to sit down with Lukaku and either apologize or whatever. But for both of them, especially for Lukaku, as you're suggesting, is the end of his time with the national side, the opportunity to shine. He didn't score the first goal, even though we just tried to convince the FIFA to give it to him just because he's Lukaku. I was very close to that ball.
And then, yes, we know that he doesn't always get it right when he finishes, does he?
The actual highlight of the entire game for me probably was the Belgian coach getting absolutely drenched by the sprinkler before the start of the game and then just having to sit looking like he was doing a sort of wet T-shirt competition.
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Chapter 6: How did the Iranian crowd express their political sentiments at the match?
Do you know which player you're going to chat to tomorrow? Because they're going to be grumpy, aren't they?
Yeah, it's Mikel Merino. I don't know. Mikel Merino, probably, when he heard about it, he's like, me? Why?
I barely played.
Well, you touched the ball, and that's the main thing. They were going through to Mikel's, and they said, we can't put Azabal through this. He's got to get a lot of grief. It's you, Merino. Well, we'll chat to you again soon, Guillaume. Thanks for your time. Appreciate it. Cheers, mate.
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The 2023 Ballon d'Or France footballer is Lionel Messi. Listen first on BBC Sounds. The football day after people
Always good to get an invite to Guillaume's house. Now, I do want to talk about the game that we've just finished watching, which was Iran-New Zealand. And there is a little bit of context to this. Iranians call America the great Satan. Iran is part of what America labels the axis of evil. They are traditionally not the best of friends. Then you've got a war on now. It's coming to an end.
The peace deal between the two countries apparently is going to be signed in a couple of days. There's a lot going on. So what happened when the Iranian football team came to Los Angeles, where, by the way, there is a very large Iranian expat community. Let's bring in our North America correspondent, Shaima Khalil, who's been down at the Los Angeles stadium. Hi, Shaima.
What was the atmosphere like in the stadium and outside the stadium before the game?
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Chapter 7: What were the key highlights from the Belgium vs. Egypt match?
carrying so much political baggage. And at every stage of that match, you could feel that baggage inside and outside the stadium.
What happened when the anthem of the Iranian regime was played? How was that received?
So I was standing next to a woman and she said that when the Iranian anthem, the official Iranian anthem was played, she cried. She got really emotional. And she was very clear she doesn't support the government, she doesn't support the regime. In fact, she said, you know, my mother is still in Iran. I want to go visit her and I'm still scared.
And so it's very clear where she stands politically, where she stands as a football fan and as someone who loves her country. She got really emotional when it was played.
Funny, though, you should mention the anthem because just outside the stadium, again, the soundscape was fascinating because as part of the protest, they played the pre-Iranian Islamic Revolution anthem, the anthem of the Shah time. And so, again, it just felt like there were two Iranian sentiments playing out.
Thanks very much, Shyam. Really good to get your view from inside the stadium. Appreciate it. You were messaging your friend who was in that game tonight, in the stadium tonight.
Yeah.
And his kind of take on it was quite interesting.
Yeah, Humphrey Carr, who is a comedian, writer, based out in LA. He was at the game this evening. He sort of runs Wrexham. Sorry. He also runs Wrexham FC with Ryan and Rob. He was at the game.
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Chapter 8: What memorable celebrations followed Cape Verde's historic draw?
It won't disappoint.
It won't disappoint. It looks like he's just been told off as well. His head's bowed. He's like, come on, Bielsa, look at me. Look at me. And he's just straight down looking at the floor. I will not.
I absolutely will not. Favourite bit of commentary today was during the Egypt game. Egypt got a centre-back called Hamdi Fati. And the commentator said, oh, Fatty wants more. I had a little chuckle and I looked over at you and that was that. That's horrible. And then the celebrations, Cape Verde celebrations. Now, I don't know whether this was in Cape Verde. I assume that it was.
And they're all over Instagram. Just... Type into your search engine. Could I sound any older? Probably not. Type into your search engine.
Type into Ask Jeeves.
Cape Verde goat celebrations. And you will see some Cape Verde guys and girls. celebrating quite literally with goats. I don't know where the goats... They're quite small goats. They appear from a car, I think. Why have you got goats in your car? I have no idea what is happening. But basically, they're sort of holding these goats like they're a trophy. And it's really good fun.
And I think the goats are fine. Don't worry about the goats. The goats are fine. I'm sure they are, Rick. They're quite a funny pose where they've kind of got their legs out like this. It almost looks like the goats are going, oh, not again. Yeah.
Not again.
We've had another good result, have we? Damn it.
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