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You're listening to the Footglitch Podcast.

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Love football, learn English.

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In the context of war, how significant is it for Ukraine to participate in Euro 2024?

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Why does Oleksandr Zinchenko frustrate Ukrainian fans?

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Was Mikhail Mudryk's deal to Chelsea overpriced?

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And what does the idiom to throw the spanner in the works mean?

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Hi listeners, welcome back to the Footglitch Podcast.

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A football podcast that can help you level up your English.

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We're discussing Euro 2024 here and for me personally, and I believe for most of Europe,

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one of the biggest stories is of course Ukraine.

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I am glad to welcome to the podcast a Ukrainian fan, a Ukrainian himself.

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Marianne, welcome to the Footglitch Podcast.

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Hi everyone.

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I'm glad to be here and thank you for your invitation.

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It's a good opportunity for me to talk to everyone about our team and a little bit about Ukraine.

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It's a real pleasure. Of course we know your story and I want to ask you the first question.

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How important is this for your country? How important is it to be at the Euros?

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Now it's the most important year for us because we can tell about the situation in Ukraine

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and about the war and our players do it everywhere and in each their interview.

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And it creates opportunity for us to remind everyone about other problems.

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So it's not just only about football, it's about more than football.

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Absolutely and I can totally agree and that's the right way to do it.

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And you know your country has incredible spirit and you don't give up.

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And I think this is another way to show it to those people who have been maybe ignorant

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or live in their bubble because there are so many people in the world who live in a bubble.

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They are surrounded by the same friends, they follow the same social media

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and listen to the same politicians and then this can lead to a disaster in this day and age.

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So it's important what you are doing and it's important for your team to be at the Euros.

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That's at least my opinion.

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Yeah and it's important for all people who live in Ukraine and who can't live in Ukraine now

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because it's great emotions and great things about which you can be happy.

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And it's a moral boost.

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I can imagine it's a moral boost even the soldiers who are at the front line.

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I don't know if they have a chance to see the games but at least they hear about it.

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They hear about the results. Now we are going to talk about your second game

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which you managed to win. You beat Slovakia 2-1. We are recording on

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Saturday so a day before that you managed to beat Slovakia.

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And I think it's important that you got those three points don't you think?

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Because after your first unconvincing performance against Romania where you lost

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3-0 you needed this. Would you agree?

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Yeah and this thing which you mentioned before that our soldiers watch our football matches

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and this is true because not all of them but some of them have this opportunity to watch

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and it's also great emotions for them because if you are a fan of football and if you're a fan of

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our team and Ukraine of course you will be happy and you will have some cool emotions and some

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boost as you said because when you are on the battle line it's really horrible. It's like the

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second world war. Horrible things happen there. So maybe people don't understand this and they

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think that it's some small war and far from people in Europe but this is pretty the same as we had

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almost 100 years ago and it's horrible and it's hard for people who are there. So yeah it's great

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boost for them. It's not motivation, it's great. It's just great emotions which they can get from

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this match and of course it's great that our team managed to win because after the first match

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we were disappointed, angry, upset and we said lots of words to our players and not only average

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people, all people who have YouTube channels, football channels I mean. Yeah there was a lot of

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critique from everywhere. And also we have to say that your team did it in an incredible fashion.

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So you were one nil down after half time against Slovakia right? It's about style.

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And it's your style I see. So basically you were staring at the abyss right? You were on the verge

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of being eliminated from the tournament and you kind of did it in the last minute because you

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needed some points from this game. Ideally three points because even one point might not have been

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enough since you lost three nil so your goal difference is still not very good so you needed

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three points. Yeah unfortunately we still need three points and I know it's possible but

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it will be hard to get three points against Belgium but we will try and Slovakia managed to do it and

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our group is the most interesting group because before the last game all four teams can have three

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points. Yeah that's true, that's true. And it will be interesting because Belgium will win today

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Belgium will win today. I think especially Slovakia threw the spanner in the works by beating

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Belgium one nil in their opening game so now you beat Slovakia which means you should be able to

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beat Belgium, you should be able to beat Belgium right? Yeah but if think about this in this way

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Slovakia won Belgium and Belgium is better than Ukraine so why Slovakia lost Ukraine it's a question.

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It makes no sense you can look at it in any way you want but the game you played against Slovakia

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it was kind of a half kind of a game of two halves. I think Slovakia started off really well they

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seemed full of confidence after their amazing win over Belgium and Ukraine didn't exactly look

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at their best but then something changed and since you know from the moment you scored your

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equalizer and remind me who scored the goal was it Sharapenko? Sharapenko right?

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It was a great player but he got injured maybe a year ago or two years ago and he didn't play

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for a year or two and only now he back in football and start playing again great.

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Well an amazing moment for him an amazing moment to such an important goal right and I have to

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mention Oleksandr Zinchenko because he plays for my favorite team Arsenal and he bagged a really

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important assist as well he was a great great assist from him wasn't it? Yeah I recalled about

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Zinchenko yesterday too and I was talking with my brother about this and Zinchenko is a great player

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but it's not great enough to be to play on defense yeah. Yeah that's true that's true because

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actually the goal Slovakia scored was Zinchenko's mistake wasn't it so he kind of redeemed himself

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there with that with that assist I think he redeemed himself and it's the same at Arsenal he's

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capable of moments of brilliance when it comes to the build-up especially the build-up he can hold

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the ball really well he's a good dribbler and he has good eyes he can see a lot of things on the

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pitch but when it comes to defending he doesn't exactly cover himself in much glory he is really

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a bang average defender I would say and that's a problem if you are a defender your job is to

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defend right so another big problem because to play in attack he can he isn't enough great tool

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because in Arsenal there are better players and in even in Ukraine team we have different players

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and we need to use different players to play in our game and it's a completely complicated

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situation because we have a great player but we do not have a place for him but there was a time

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he used to play in the in the midfield right but now now he's yes but because of his

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of his best season in Arsenal now we don't use it in this position he's a left back again right

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yeah yeah yeah okay then well then of course the best moment for you was that Jarem Csuk goal

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Jarem Csuk the Valencia striker I think he was a substitute in this game right he came on late and

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and he managed to win the game for you in the 80th minute I thought it was a lovely first touch

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or did I say something wrong he did similar thing when Dobrik scored the goal on previous Euro if you

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remember this we played against Sweden and it was the last minute of extra time and Dobrik

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scored the goal and something was similar in this match yeah but played only for several minutes and

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score wonderful goal and yeah now these are these are great stories and I thought his first touch

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was exquisite it was just such a lovely delicate first touch and I heard people on an English

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podcast describing it as an Bergkamp-esque first touch yeah and then he put it past Dubravka it was

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barely it barely crossed the line yeah the defender almost almost kicked it out almost cleared it out

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but fortunately for your team it went in and how happy were you at that moment

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yeah and it was a wonderful moment of course it's not was it wasn't a moment like this

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Dobrik but it was a great moment because we hopefully won the match and oh you did you did

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yeah and thankfully thanks thankfully you won it yeah and and one thing which I noticed is that

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in this match were great players who needed to change the team or who wanted to get some

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offer from right European teams because our like stars didn't show the game which they had to show

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our player Jernčok, Šaparenko and even Zinčenko who aren't like stars now they showed

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they showed how our stars have to play yeah no that's always a motivation for players playing

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at the Euros right especially if they think they can do better young players it's their chance to

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show off their skills and hopefully be noticed you know because everybody is watching the Euros

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all eyes are on the Euros so that's why it's it's the best opportunity you can ever have

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if you score a fantastic goal or if you have a great assist or put on a great performance then

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you will be noticed you know by some agents and hopefully offered an interesting job

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yeah and if continue our awards in this Euro our main goal of team and Šahtardonesk is to sell

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Sudakov and Sudakov had to be like a big star in this team but now he isn't because Šahtardonesk

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wants to get about 18 millions and it's you know it's nearly impossible to get

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well they are a big player in the European football Šahtardonesk you know they have been around for a

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while did Mudrik also come from Šahtardonesk yeah Michael Mudrik right so you might remember him

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how expensive he was and I don't I don't even okay don't get me wrong he's a good player but

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I don't think he was worth that kind of money and I think you got an absolute bargain there

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Šahtardonesk you know yeah because I couldn't understand why he cost so many money because it's

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it's impossible that player had one great season one season not two not three one season in Ukraine

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and he was enough it was enough yeah sometimes these stories happen and I'm happy for you I'm

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happy for your country for Mudrik I want I we wanted him at Arsenal now he he's playing at

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Chelsea he has like a 10 year 10 year contract or something as crazy as that I think he's getting

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a little bit better like his start was very slow now I think his his last season was slightly better

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so I'm sure he will only he can only get better so yeah we can't play better but I don't know why

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we can't because our players have a practic in European championships and they play in European

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teams they don't play in Ukraine it's another level you mean your point is that these players

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play well in European teams and they they cannot replicate it in the national team is that your

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point yes because in Ukraine when we were talking about this euro it was mentioned like the best

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Ukrainian team in history and players maybe were a little bit self-confident yeah no no it's true

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because if you look at your your players they they really play for amazing teams you have you have an

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arsenal player you have a Chelsea player you have a Valencia player you have how many players do you

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have at Girona you know so there are two players and in this team we have 15 players from abroad

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because before we have only two one maximum three players now we have 15 players from different

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teams of Europe and but our play is well hopefully this win can kick start your campaign and you will

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only get better it's about a team isn't it well look at England they have superstars and it doesn't

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guarantee anything right it's about how these stars can work together and play as a team

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and sometimes even sort of sacrifice their own ego a little bit you know it's about that as well

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so Marianne it's been wonderful to have you on the podcast thank you very much for talking to me about

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the Ukrainian team and I wish you all the best for the rest of the tournament you are my number three

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team okay thank you too for this opportunity and to tell me about our team and Ukraine

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all right fantastic take care and goodbye goodbye

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and as usual here is the final segment of the Footgris podcast this is the language corner or

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whatchamacallit this is where I explain to you some stuff regarding the English language so today

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I want to look at a few phrases you could say idioms so Slovakia threw the spanner in the works

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with their win over Belgium I said what does it mean well what does a spanner mean first of all

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a spanner is like a metal tool with a sharp end and it's used to turn nuts and bolts

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and imagine you throw this metal spanner into the works in some sort of machine

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it will create a problem right it will create a disruption so that's a that's actually what

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Slovakia did because no one expected them to beat Belgium so they really complicated this group

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complicated in a good way for Slovakia of course they threw the spanner in the works

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then I said Zinchenko bagged sorry then I said Zinchenko bagged an assist

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if you bag an assist it means you sort of get or achieve an assist right so imagine you put it in

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your bag and it's sort of you've got it you've got it so imagine Zinchenko makes an assist in a game

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well then it's his it's in the statistics then it's something he has achieved right okay and

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then I said when it comes to defending he does it in the game he does it in the game he does it in

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comes to defending he doesn't exactly cover himself in much glory again I was talking about

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Oleksandr Zinchenko for some reason I was talking about him a lot in this episode well no wonder he

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is an arsenal player and I support arsenal now there's a phrase not to cover yourself in much

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glory which is used in the English language in a slightly ironic way it's an understatement it's

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a euphemism for saying that you had a really bad game or really poor game you were not impressive

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at all and well we were talking about Oleksandr Zinchenko if you say when it comes to defending

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he doesn't cover himself in much glory it basically means he's a bad defender but you say it in a

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slightly humorous way I suppose it's a it's a funny phrase funny idiom that is used often in

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in Britain okay guys I think that's it that's enough for today let me know if you know any

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of these phrases if you use them let me know in the comments and as always don't forget to subscribe

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to the Footglitch podcast because that is the only way that you can keep getting your feed right keep

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getting your new episodes and in that way you will never miss any future episodes thank you very much

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for listening I have been Zdenek Lukas thank you and take care bye bye