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You're listening to the Footglitch Podcast.

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Love football, learn English.

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How impressive is it that all five Czech teams won their games in the European Cup?

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What happened in the Baníkostrava Copenhagen penalty shootout?

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Will Sparta and Slavia Prague make it to the Champions League group stage?

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And what does the phrase back on track mean?

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Hello everyone, welcome back to another episode of the Footglitch Podcast.

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The best podcast for football crazy learners of English.

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My name is Denek Lukas and here is another episode for you.

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And today I'm joined by a special guest, a Czech commentator, a football commentator from Kanal plus Sport TV.

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Am I saying it right?

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Yes, you are saying it right.

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Hi, thanks so much for having me.

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Yeah, it's a pleasure.

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So, Štěpán is your name and you were recommended to me by Karel Tvaroh.

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Yeah, yeah.

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As I said, it's a great pleasure and Karel is a huge professional.

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And yeah, we used to play together at Sparta Prague Academy.

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I do not remember so much about him because he's like five years younger than me.

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I see.

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Yes, but yeah, I remember him as a small boy and now we are working together.

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So it's quite a nice story.

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So you have a similar sort of journey in professional football, but let's say you didn't make it to the top.

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But now you are doing that in journalism, sports journalism.

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Yeah, yeah, yeah.

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I agree, I agree.

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I think the experience from the professional football or football in general helped us a lot, you know, because it gives you discipline and you can use it even in the journalism career.

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Absolutely.

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I think it gives you also a unique perspective.

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But mostly we have like the most common way is that you get ex players, like very successful players.

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I don't know, Karol Poborsky.

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They are also great.

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But I think your story is different.

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I think for them, it's kind of almost like lined up for them, right?

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They always get that position because everyone knows them.

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Everyone wants them.

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For you guys, it's maybe a little bit harder, but that's why only the best make it.

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So I think I'm talking to a great maybe up and coming journalist, Sze Pan, because you still seem very young.

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Yeah, well, 30 years old.

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So it depends.

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It depends on the on the view.

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But I consider myself still young in this profession.

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So hopefully a lot of potential and big things coming.

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Well, you're definitely young compared to me.

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So that's for sure.

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But we're not we're not going to talk about our age here today on the Footgris podcast.

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We are here to cover the crazy, I would say, absolutely mad week, a game week, European week of the Czech clubs, which no one expected, I guess.

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Sze Pan, what do you think?

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So we had five teams, right in the European Cups and all of them won their games.

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Yeah, all of them won their games.

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But unfortunately, Ostrava didn't make it through the penalty shootout, which was quite crazy because I think four players missed their penalty and three of them hit it over the crossbar, which is, I would say, unusual for a penalty shootout in an adult game.

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I think I experienced it in the youth level.

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But, you know, it's always hard after 120 minutes of football and football in the European Cup, which is which has like super high intensity.

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But still, at least you have to you have to hit the goal.

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Yeah, I thought it was quite bizarre, actually.

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Like I was watching watching it yesterday.

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I don't know whether I didn't know whether I should laugh or cry.

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It just it was so weird.

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I had seen something similar.

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There was a I think it was a Japanese Cup.

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I don't know if you've seen this video where like nine penalties in a row were missed.

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And it also includes the player Iniesta.

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Iniesta was playing for one of the Japanese clubs and he was the one that scored the last penalty and then his team won the Cup.

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But nine players before him or something like that missed the penalty.

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So that reminds me, actually, this penalty shootout of Vanja Ostrava against Copenhagen reminded me of that.

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Yeah, I didn't see the match, to be honest, but I know he's playing for Viseł Kobe, I think.

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Is he still there?

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I think he's still there or maybe he retired the last season.

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But to be honest, I'm not quite sure.

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But yeah, it happens in football and I think we are going to remember it for a long time.

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Yeah, like it was just incredible.

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Do you think the pitch were also partially to blame for such scuffered penalty shots?

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I think it may be because I saw that the condition of the pitch wasn't the best.

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And sometimes the TV spectators don't see it so clearly like the players on the pitch because sometimes the penalty spot is quite, I would say, not in the best condition.

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So I think it may be when I saw the technique of the kick of the Vanja Ostrava players, something seems a little bit off.

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So I would say that influenced the penalty shootout.

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Even the Copenhagen players missed, I think, two penalties.

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So it just seemed a bit weird.

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Yeah.

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And this is the only thing that marked that fantastic week for the Czech clubs because Balinko Star won their game 1-0.

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But that meant the tie was even and it had to go to penalties and they lost that.

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Yeah. And they were really unlucky because the first game in Copenhagen, they lost 1-0 and the goal was scored, I think, in the stoppage time of the second half.

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They played really well, but unfortunately, maybe some lack of European experience.

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I think in a longer perspective, it can make them even better.

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But right now, they are definitely sad about it.

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And definitely they were playing so well against them.

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They were almost the better team, I would say.

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Definitely in Copenhagen, I thought they were the better team and nobody expected.

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Because Copenhagen, weren't they in the playoffs of Champions League last season or something like that?

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They were. They were in the round of 16.

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They played against Manchester City, which is crazy.

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I think they lost 1-0 in the group stage at Old Trafford against Manchester United.

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Then they beat them at home.

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The team is really strong.

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I think they lost the goalkeeper, Kamel Grabara, who went to Wolfsburg, to Germany.

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But otherwise, the team is, I would say, almost the same, even with the head coach.

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Fortunately, the other teams did much better.

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Let's talk about Mladá Boleslav, for example.

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That was a bit unexpected as well, what happened in that game, right?

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Yeah, definitely. I think they were 2-0 down after the half time in the second match.

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A lot of people criticized Mladá Boleslav because of their previous experiences or previous matches in the European Cups.

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I wouldn't say always, but mostly they lost.

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But this time they made an amazing comeback.

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I think, once again, I will use the phrase, there was a lack of discipline by the Israeli players.

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So that's beer, Beer, Beer, Beer Sheva?

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Maybe four checks, it would be better if it's Beer Sheva, but I think it's Bear Sheva.

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If you look at the spelling, the spelling is like B-E-E-R, so it looks like it's beer, but you're right, it's probably pronounced as Bear.

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But I like the pronunciation, beer, to be honest.

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Yeah, so then they scored four goals and won 4-2, a lot of emotions.

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The match was played, I think it's important to mention in Lovac.

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I know that the city is called Lovac in Czech, but I don't know if it has some special English word for the city.

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It's possible, but basically not in Israel because of the war situation.

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So it was a disadvantage for the Israeli team, let's be honest.

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Definitely, I saw some Israeli flag in the stands, but still if you play the match in Bulgaria, you cannot expect a lot of supporters from Israel to come.

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Yeah, that's true.

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So, Blazeng, it's just another professional performance from them, it seems like these only just keep on coming from them, right?

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Yeah, absolutely. I would say they are a European team in terms of their success in the European Cups, because I have to mention the last season, their European campaign.

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They reached the quarterfinals of the Conference League, which is like a super success.

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When you look at the style, how they operate in the modern football, they, I would say, mostly sell the best players.

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They get a good amount of money, they get the players from the Czech League, some African players, and they just implement them into the team in a brilliant way.

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So I think we have to give huge respect and I have huge admiration for Mr. Kovac, who is the head coach.

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And even though he's, I think, 70 or maybe 70 or 72 or something, the oldest coach in the Czech League, he doesn't give you that impression at all, though.

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Not only by his looks, but just the way he is able to respond to anything tactical happening in the game is just brilliant.

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Only words of admiration, as you said, a lot of respect for him, honestly.

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And it's like for me, Plozen is this robotic European team. They just keep on winning, usually by one goal. It's just what they do, right?

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Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I think a lot of people, I wouldn't say they didn't have so much respect for Krivbaz, for their opponent, but they were underestimating them.

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But there is a really interesting story about their coach, who I don't know the name, I'm really sorry, but he was the head coach of Sherev Pirasol,

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who played two years ago in the Champions League and they won at Santiago Bernabeu against Real Madrid. I think they won like 2-1 or 3-2.

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And then when the Russian invasion to Ukraine started, because he is Ukrainian, he joined the army. Then he had like six months break from coaching.

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And then he joined Krivbaz. And from, I would say, a mediocre team, they were competing for the highest spots in the Ukrainian league.

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They finished third. And I was really eager to see how they're going to compete against Pilsen. And I would say they were quite good.

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But as you said, Pilsen was better and they are just robotic in the European Cups.

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That's right. Okay, well, that's interesting. I think I heard it about this coach that he was in the army, so yeah, on the front line. So yeah, you're right.

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Okay, and then we have the two most well-known Czech clubs. So obviously you have some sort of affiliation with Sparta Prague, right?

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You work for them, there's a podcast called Sparta Unlimited, yeah? Yeah, yeah. And you are involved in that?

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I would say Sparta Unlimited is a paid platform that Sparta launched before this season. And they have like a lot of bonus content like interviews, podcasts, then the studio that we are doing after each league match.

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And it's like super interesting because I've never been a host before. So it's like quite new experience and it's great. Yeah. And of course, I simply cannot hide it because I used to play for Sparta. So yeah, I'm a Sparta fan as well.

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Absolutely. Okay, great. So I guess we can talk about Sparta a little bit here. So are you happy with the way they dealt with the Romanian team FC SB, the former Steaua Bucharest?

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Yes, yes. So happy. So happy about it because the first game was, I would say I would describe it as a so-so because Sparta played, I would say under their level, under their standards, they were underachieving, but still they managed to get a draw, at least a draw.

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Even though they scored a goal to make it 2-1 in the stoppage time, but it was disallowed because there was a clear foul. And then in the second game, 3-0 after the halftime, it was like the stuff made of dreams. I thought I was dreaming, you know, I was so frenetic while cheering for them.

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Even I was only at home in Prague watching it on TV. And then during the second half, I think I started the second half as a 30 year old man. And after the final whistle was blown, I was like 45, maybe 50 because it took a lot of nerves to watch the second half and the end of the game.

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Yeah, no, that was incredible. But obviously what counts is the fact that Sparta knocked them out and that's what matters at the end of the day. There were some problems, you could see some issues there.

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For example, you have Ecuadorian player Angelo Preciado, and he has been one of the revelations in the Czech League, one of the players we haven't really seen on the Czech soil much because of his technical abilities. It's really another level. No wonder he's linked with Everton, the Premier League team. But there are some issues with him as well, right?

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Yeah, it seems like his head isn't like set on a good mindset. I think maybe he's already thinking about joining the Premier League side, which is like a great achievement.

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And I think even though the Czech League gets much, much better in the last five years, you cannot still compare it with the Premier League. So I think maybe after the playoff round of the Champions League, I think he's gonna go.

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Basically, it looks like his weakness could be his nerves, right? Because last season, wasn't he sent off twice, got a red card for reckless challenges. And now again, he had a yellow card and it looked like he might have been sent off at one point.

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And he had to be subbed off because even his own teammates didn't believe that he should be on the pitch at the time, right? So there were some issues.

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Yeah, definitely. I was shouting at the TV during the half time like, take him off, take him off. He cannot finish the match. He's gonna get a red card and we're gonna be down by one man or down to 10 men.

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And yeah, I was quite worried he's not gonna finish the game. So it was a good choice that I think it was like in the 68th minute he was subbed off.

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But obviously there were a lot of positives as well, the performance of your arguably biggest star, Birmanchevic, the Serbian player.

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Sparta is, I would say, quite strong on the wings like Lukas Jaraslin, the Slovakian international. Then of course, as you mentioned, Belko Birmanchevic, the Serbian international.

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Amazing players, amazing players offensively. But even though their biggest strength is in the offensive part of the game, they were also working very hard defensively. And that's the key why Sparta succeeded in the game.

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Do you think Sparta Prague will manage to keep all these stars or because I've heard there is a lot of interest from outside to buy these players, you know, still the transfer window is not over.

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Do you think can they hold on to them? Is it dependent on whether they get to the Champions League group stages because there's still one more round to go, right?

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I think they are definitely going to hold on to Birmanchevic because he's younger than Jaraslin who is 28 years old.

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Even though he said that he's going to stay at least for one season. But I think then when you are 29 years old in football, you are considered as I wouldn't say old, but maybe not the youngest player.

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So it's going to be really interesting to see the transfer speculation and maybe even the done transfer.

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But I would I would say that I hope that they are going to stay in Sparta because they are so important for them.

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Well, in the playoffs, so you will you will hear the Champions League anthem at Letna, right?

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So this is always happens because it doesn't happen in the third round. And now it will. Your opponent is Malmö, which is the Swedish club.

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And I think you you have you have some stuff to deal with because in the past they beat you, I think, 10 years ago or something, right?

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It was 10 years ago. I still I still remember that.

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You need a revenge. You need a revenge.

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Yeah, so definitely, definitely a revenge because I think we won 4-2 the home game and then we lost to Nell at Sweden, I think.

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Yeah. And back then there was still the away goal rule, which means it was 4-4 on aggregate.

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But yeah, they scored two goals at Letna. So we've been knocked out by back then really good side with the great players like Emil Forsberg, who played in Leipzig for, I would say, 10 years maybe.

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And I don't know, the Swedish legend, Markus Rosenberg, the striker, they were really strong back then.

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They are really strong right now. But I think there is a huge chance that Sparta can knock them out.

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Perfect. Yeah. Well, I look forward to that. I think your first game is away from home in Sweden.

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And then, yes. And then you will take it all to Letna.

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So hopefully over those two games, you come out on top.

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And, you know, that's that's what matters ultimately that we see Sparta Prague in the Champions League.

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And there is a chance there could be two Czech teams in the Champions League because we also have Slavia Prague, who managed to overcome their opponent, the Belgian team, Union, Royal Union, something.

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I can't.

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Saint-Gilouard.

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Saint-Gilouard. Perfect.

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Yeah. I tried. I tried my best while pronouncing it because my French is really, really bad.

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It's still better. It's definitely better than mine.

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Yeah, yeah. It was it was like a really strong side or at least the expectations were quite high with the Royal Union Saint-Gilouard.

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But Slavia destroyed them in the home game.

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And I think the game in Brussels was, I think, I wouldn't say easy for Slavia, but they have such a huge experience from the Champions League.

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I think there were twice in the Europa League quarterfinals in last seven, eight years.

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So they just show that they are really, really strong side.

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And even though the Union is one of the best team in Belgium, I think Slavia definitely deserve to go through.

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So great performance.

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Slavia is off to a good start of the season, even though the first game in the Czech League wasn't that impressive.

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They drew nil-nil away from home.

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But right now, I think they are back on track.

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And I think they are going to be a good contender to Los Clil, the French side that they are going to play against.

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And I think it's like 60 percent to 40 percent to Lille in terms of still a French team.

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Yeah, so strong, strong opponent.

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But Slavia Prague is not without a chance, I think.

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I think you sum it up perfectly.

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I don't think they want, if you think of the way they look at it, the French, I don't think they wanted to play Slavia either.

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I think no one wants to play Slavia because they play with such high intensity.

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They are running like crazy.

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They are in amazing form because the coach, Indřich Terpichovsky, is really tough when it comes to the fitness.

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Yeah, yeah, yeah.

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So they ran a lot of kilometers in the preseason.

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And I think they are going to be a really, really strong opponent to any of the European teams.

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So I think they showed it last year when they beat IS Roma or IS Rome in the home game.

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So really, really great team.

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Well, for you, obviously, you want Sparta Prague to be in the Champions League.

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For me, at least one of the two teams, I would be happy, but both would be like a fairy tale, honestly.

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Absolutely.

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I can't remember if there was two Czech teams in the history.

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I think never.

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I think never.

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Speaking of Sparta Prague, I heard you tell me if I'm wrong, but the last time they were there was like 20 years ago.

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And you know what?

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I actually went to that game because at the time I was living in England in London and I went to Arsenal, to the Arsenal Sparta game.

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I remember that I was sitting next to a British guy and I was talking to him about Karol Poborsky that he had just been he had just been fired from Sparta or something went on and he had to go to České Budějovice.

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I remember that moment, you know.

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I remember that as well, but I think it was the playoff round because Sparta lost to Arsenal.

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I think it was 2006 maybe.

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Yeah, yeah, yeah.

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Because I think Tomáš Rosický just joined Arsenal.

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Are you sure?

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I don't think.

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I'm not sure.

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Yeah.

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I'm not sure.

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I know it was at the old Highbury.

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Oh my God, it was in the Highbury.

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Yeah, it was.

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Yeah, yeah, yeah.

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Yeah.

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All right.

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Yeah.

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I think it was in the group stage.

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Yeah, I remember the whole game.

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I think it was in the group stage.

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Thierry Anri scored a goal.

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I think they lost 3-0 and Sparta they just they didn't they showed nothing in that game.

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All right.

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Yeah.

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Unsurprisingly, but I was there as a Sparta Prague supporter back then and then I turned into an Arsenal one.

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Wow.

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Wow.

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Yeah, I remember right now because yeah, Thierry Anri was a monster back there.

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So there was no way of stopping him.

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He was he was amazing.

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My favourite player, my favourite player growing up, Thierry Anri.

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Yeah.

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Well, now I think your player Lukas Haraslim is taking inspiration from him because of the way he scored his goal against Stjoa was also impressive.

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It was that he bent his shot, right?

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Yeah, yeah.

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Into the side netting.

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This typical Anri-esque finish.

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Exactly.

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Exactly. Exactly. That was something Thierry Anri could be teaching in the universities all around the world.

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So, so universities with his with his with his eyes closed and blindfolded and all that.

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Absolutely. Absolutely.

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All right.

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So, Stjepan, so well, we have something to look forward to for more 14 still in the competitions.

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And I mean, three of them are already in the group stages.

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Now we need or yeah, I said it right.

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Yeah. Now we need to see.

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Yeah, because plus and can can if they lose, they can get the conference league at least.

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And then we have Nada Boleslav.

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They need to beat who are they playing?

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Do you know?

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Bacs. Bacs. I think it's a Hungarian team.

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Yeah, yeah.

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I just I just know I just know that it is it is like I'm not even sure about the pronunciation, but I think it's Bacs.

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Excellent. So let's look forward to that.

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Thank you very much, Stjepan, for being on the podcast.

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It was a real pleasure.

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I have to say, just like Karel, you guys have amazing English.

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Like, can you tell us your secret?

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How did you get to this level?

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Because you know what?

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Like, I don't always hear people with excellent English like yours.

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I mean, I'm talking about Czech people specifically here.

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Wow. Well, thank you so much.

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I've never been anywhere outside of outside of Czech Republic to learn English, which is something I'm quite sad about.

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But yeah.

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So how did you pick it up then?

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Like, so what happened?

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So tell us because we have people listening to this that are English learners.

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So you could inspire them in their own English learning journey.

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So what what made the difference for you?

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I think I think mostly playing the video games in English, watching movies in English.

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I loved English commentary because when I was growing up, it was not that common in Czech Republic that you get the matches with English commentary.

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So I was watching it on YouTube and anywhere I could I could get access to the matches.

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So mostly I would say it came from this. And yeah, I studied English since I was nine years old.

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So already already 21 years of experience.

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But yeah, but you know what?

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You have a lot of people who went to school and it's not only about how long you've been learning English.

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You have people who've been doing it for 20 years, 30 years, and they don't speak like you.

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So I think in my opinion of knowing knowing English learners, what probably made the difference for you is what you did in your free time and the fact that you were so exposed to the English language.

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As you said, you played a lot of games. You probably also use the team speaker.

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You communicated with with your with your friends or with people you played with and then watching the commentaries.

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That's a lot of listening input. It's so important.

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And that's what people used to do wrong in this country. And that's the teachers did not stress it enough.

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They probably didn't know. You know, after the fall of communism, we had to learn how to do it.

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And honestly, now you see a huge difference between the between the people sometimes.

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So kudos to you. I absolutely I absolutely agree with you.

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Thank you so much again. And I just wanted to mention that I was I was a language elementary school or like with an advanced language learning.

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So we had we had English English conversation classes with I remember we had a guy from Australia.

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We had a guy from from UK. We had an American American lovely lady.

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So it was it was amazing. And I think it helped a lot even even though even though we had only one during the week.

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But but it was it was amazing to to talk with someone who's native language is English.

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Absolutely. OK, Shepan. Great. Thank you very much.

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Good luck to you in your future endeavors.

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And maybe it's not the last time I talk to you on this podcast. Who knows?

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Thank you so much. It was it was an amazing experience.

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I have to say I really enjoyed it here.

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And I think since I heard like two episodes, it's a it's a great work you are doing.

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So kudos to you as well. And thank you so much for having me.

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All right. Well, take care. Bye bye. Take care. Bye bye.

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Welcome back to the language corner.

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As always in the language corner, I'm going to be going through some language.

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We're going to be picking apart a little excerpt that little excerpt from Shepan's speech.

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Yeah, we're going to look at several phrases and some words.

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And I think it's going to be quite interesting.

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But before I do that, let me remind you that you can actually hire me as an English teacher if you need some regular English speaking practice,

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especially if it's about football.

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And then I am your guy and I will provide some feedback to you.

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And yeah, we can work on getting your English to the next level.

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That's the idea anyway. But back to what Shepan said.

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So I really like this excerpt.

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Slavia is off to a good start in the Czech League, even though the first game in the Czech League wasn't that impressive.

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They drew 1-1. But right now I think they are back on track and I think they're going to be a good contender to Los Clil.

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So this is what Shepan said. And there are a few things to look at.

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First of all, if you are off to a good start, that means that you have begun an activity successfully.

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We often use this when we're describing football matches.

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You would say that this team is off to a good start or you can think about the entire season.

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So as Shepan used it, so if you win your first two games of the season, we can say that you're off to a good start.

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Right. It means you have begun the season successfully.

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Then Shepan said, even though the first game in the Czech League wasn't that impressive,

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if you say that, like it wasn't that impressive, it actually means it was not so good.

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It's kind of an understatement. It could also mean it was quite bad.

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The English language is known for its understatements.

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You say one thing and it's like indirectly saying something else.

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So if you say someone is not that fast, if you say this player is not that fast,

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essentially because of the way the English language works, it kind of means that that player is very slow or quite slow.

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Right. It's just an indirect way of saying that.

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OK. Then Shepan said that now they are back on track, which means Slavia basically drew their first game,

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but then they started winning again. Now they're back on track.

341
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So imagine an athlete running on a track and then they fall.

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They fall. I don't know, they trip over something and they have to stand up.

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And after that fall, they are back on track.

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So in the same way, a team, when they lose a few games or have a bad run,

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we could say that, you know, they are not performing well.

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They have some blips or hiccups.

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And then when they overcome this, we can say they are back on track.

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They're back to the winning ways again. Right.

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And then finally, Shepan also said that I think they're going to be a good contender for Los Clil.

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Very nice word. A contender.

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Basically, if you are, for example, a title contender, it means you're one of the people that we will compete with for the title.

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OK. So it's like it's like competition for someone. Right.

353
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So if you say Slavia Prague are going to be a good contender,

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it means that Slavia Prague will give them a good run for their money. Right.

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So hopefully this was useful. Hopefully you enjoyed it.

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I need to thank you for listening, for making it this far,

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because I know that if English is not your first language, it's not always easy to stay focused.

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Right. To be attentive at all times.

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But congratulations, you made it till the end.

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You made it to the finish line.

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And what else remains to say? Well, don't forget to subscribe to the Footgrish podcast.

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You can do that wherever you get your podcasts, whether it's Apple Podcasts, Spotify.

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You can find it on YouTube as well. I have a channel called TeachersDennec where I publish most of the episodes,

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not all of them, but most of them. So you can subscribe there as well if you fancy it.

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And yeah, that's pretty much it for today. Thank you very much for listening.

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And I will speak to you soon. Bye bye.