Is this the most knowledgeable man in world football? | Football Weekly
The Sweeper pod's Paul Watson might have a claim to be the most knowledgeable man in world football, and here he is bringing you stories of Dominica's goalkeeping search, Madagascar's misstep and lesser seen international fixtures. Watch the full podcast episode ► https://youtu.be/xIcBT7d7lIs Subscribe to Guardian Football ► https://www.youtube.com/@guardianfootball?subconfirmation=1 We want your feedback! If you had any thoughts on our coverage of the World Cup, please let us know here ► www.theguardian.com/YTWorldCupSurvey The Guardian publishes independent journalism, made possible by supporters. Contribute to The Guardian today ► https://support.theguardian.com/ Guardian Football Weekly: https://www.tiktok.com/@guardianfootballweekly https://www.instagram.com/guardianfootballweekly/ Website ► https://www.theguardian.com Facebook ► https://www.facebook.com/theguardian Bluesky ► https://bsky.app/profile/sport.theguardian.com Instagram ► https://www.instagram.com/guardiansport/ The Guardian on YouTube: The Guardian ► https://www.youtube.com/@theGuardian Football Weekly podcast ► https://www.youtube.com/@FootballWeeklyPodcast Guardian News ► https://www.youtube.com/@guardiannews Guardian Australia ► https://www.youtube.com/@GuardianAustralia Guardian Sport ► https://www.youtube.com/@guardiansport
Transcript
Oh, you had some world uh stories from the sweeper world to share with us. Um Dominica trying to find a goalkeeper uh via social media. >> Yeah, so it's Dominica um have got four Conquer Calf Nations League fixtures coming up and uh just before the the squad came together, uh one of their scouts, the head scout Justin February put out a post on Twitter saying, "We're looking for a goalkeeper." Uh, and the requirements were you have to have one Dominique and parent and trust in your goalkeeping skills. That was the those were that was it. Um, and it didn't exactly probably make the two goalkeepers they do have feel particularly brilliant. But to be fair, they have two keepers who are very young. They've got Dante Newton and Dwight Eloy who only have one cap between them going into this break. So, I think they basically sort of panicked a bit and thought, I wonder if there is someone out there who has got heritage and and is really decent. Um they actually deleted the post fairly soon after and I hoped it's because they'd found the perfect guy. I hope they found like some brilliant but I think actually they just got a hell of a lot of time wasters. So they deleted it. They actually gave Dwight Eloy uh one of their existing keepers the chance to play against Angilla in a friendly and he kept a clean sheet. So maybe it was a competition for places. Maybe he's thinking I really better be on my game or some guy is going to tweet yes I'll play and he'll be down here in with his gloves and everything. Well, look, and it is a slightly lower level, but I was on channel 10 in Australia uh doing some A- League stuff, and I used the uh uh I abused my position by saying the Melbourne Bohemians needed a keeper and Marky P came in and he's been excellent for a couple of years. He has retired, but you know, it it can work these kind of uh these calls. Um talk to me about Zachary Boucher getting his first call up for Madagascar goalkeeper, always been a decent goalkeeper. played through France's youth system. Um, finally got his international callup uh for Madagascar where he has heritage. Um, but he just got time to sort of start celebrating his callup when an old interview emerged with Leip uh from 2018 when he had turned down a Madagascar callup and his quotes were not the best. His quotes were, "I am French. I have never been Malagasi. The French national team jersey is important to me. I won't ever wear any other jersey than that one." >> [laughter] >> So this article didn't massively endear him to people in Madagascar um to the extent where the fans were lobbying for him to be dropped from the squad entirely. It was actually reported widely that he had been rescinded his call up that they had said no don't don't come but that wasn't actually true. He is he's been spotted training with the team they're playing against Nigeria. Apparently he's training alongside his fellow goalkeepers. Um but he might be the first Can I shock you? Has he tried that? Has he [laughter] >> He's probably tried everything by now. Yeah, but I I he could be the first player ever to come on for his debut and get that kind of booing, you know, like as if he's sort of playing playing for for another team. It's a bizarre thing to have done to have basically I think what it was is when he was younger, he must have thought I'm going to play for France, you know, I don't have to mess around with playing and then he must have got to this age of 34 and thought you know what I don't think I am going to get that call for France. I'm going to take it and then you will just get called out these days. >> Cook Islands playing their first home international in 28 years. That's where I wanted us to be based for the World Cup, but producer Joel was worried about the Wi-Fi in the Cook Island. [laughter] But um just use for them. >> Just the Wi-Fi, right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I was like, it looks on the time zone. I could do that. Palm tree palm trees. I I Google image the Cook Islands. Looks pretty pleasant. >> It's all right, isn't it? Yeah. And and this is true. Like a lot of people, we we moan a lot about, you know, all sorts like Nations League pileup of fixtures, but imagine being a national team that hasn't had a home game for 28 years. That is a that is a tough situation. They're they're playing Tahiti twice. They're playing on September 26th and 30th. So, uh they've got these two fixtures. And before that, the last time they played a home game was 1998 when they played against Tahiti. It's quite normal relatively in Oania to just not have any games. So, it's now 750 days since the Cook Islands played their last game. Um and there that that game was in World Cup qualification in 2026 World Cup qualifiers. And the Oceanania tournament is brutal for the underdogs. They have this like um first tournament, this preliminary tournament. They just got 90 minutes. That was their entire qualification campaign. They got one game where they lost to Tonga and that is it. You are out. And then they have to wait 750 days for this for this friendly. So um however much we complain about, isn't it? It you know [laughter] it is >> it is it is it's really brutal. I mean Tahiti also haven't played since March 2025. The the worst one is Kiraabas who are associate members of Oani Football Federation. So they don't get uh invited to all the main OFC tournaments. They haven't actually played a match since 2011. It's 15 years since Kiraas had a national fixture and um it doesn't look like he's becoming anytime soon. They actually put out a call on the eve of the World Cup saying please can someone come and play us? We'll take on anyone even Argentina. [laughter] >> Thank you Paul. Uh more from the sweeper pod if you want that sort of stuff.