00:00 The weather is measurable, there are some absolutely bizarre transfer rumours floating
00:09 around and Love Island has finished. That could mean only one thing. The football season
00:15 is back. This is everything but the prem, the show that ignores the top flight hype
00:19 to concentrate on what are obviously the best leagues in the country. This week we have
00:23 a bumper pre-kick-off special looking into the championship with leagues 1 and 2 with
00:29 our experts Joe Cran from the Star in Sheffield, Jordan Jones from Bristol World and Steve
00:34 Jones from Doncaster Free Press. The stage is almost set, it's time for everything but
00:39 the prem. We'll start with the teams looking ahead to the season. We'll start with the
00:45 teams who have come down from the Premier League. As you said there, leagues aren't,
00:50 you couldn't describe them as a Premier League club, given that they've only been there a
00:58 couple of years and they're back down again. But certainly Leicester and Southampton have
01:04 probably nailed themselves down as having that kind of status. What do you make of those
01:10 three teams coming down, Leicester, Leeds and Southampton? How do you think they're
01:14 going to cope?
01:15 Yeah, I mean, Leeds are signed, Ethan Ampadu is the only one they've got in so far, I think.
01:23 Then you've obviously got Connor Coday, Harry Winks, they've come in for Leicester, they're
01:29 tremendous, tremendous championship signers. But I think the problem that they've got,
01:34 I mean Leeds have lost a load of players, haven't they? There's a lot of guys that have
01:37 left either on loan or on a permanent basis since the transfer window opened. And I think
01:45 you look at Southampton, they've still got Laverie there, they've still got Ward-Prowse
01:49 there. I mean, if they keep hold, if they happen to keep hold of those players, which
01:53 you can't really see happening, but I mean, Ward-Prowse in the Championship is a bit of
01:56 a joke, isn't it? I mean, there's no way he should be there. I think it's very difficult
02:03 to judge them based on the current situation. As it is, I would say, you know, Leicester
02:09 and Southampton top two, that would kind of make sense. With Leeds, you've got to wait
02:15 and see what happens. But going back to Leicester and Southampton, they could be an entirely
02:20 different team by the time the window closes, both ins and outs. So they could get better,
02:25 they could get weaker.
02:26 And so we move on from the Championship to League One, where we have Jordan Jones with
02:32 us from Bristol Worlds. Jordan, how are you doing?
02:34 I'm doing well, thank you. How about yourself?
02:36 I'm good, thanks. It looks as though certainly teams like Portsmouth seem to have had a decent
02:41 transfer window. There's probably some teams there who have maybe not done as well. Charlton
02:50 is probably in this list as well. There's probably a few teams in there who have not
02:54 done as well as people perhaps expected them to, that look like they may have got their
03:00 house in order this summer and could well make a big push this year.
03:05 Yeah, yeah, definitely. I'm mad that I left Portsmouth out of that, actually, when I was
03:09 speaking about the teams, because I think Portsmouth will definitely want to be up there.
03:13 They've recruited some players from the Championship and some good players in League One and League
03:18 Two as well. So it shows that they're really going to try and make a push for it this year.
03:24 Portsmouth, if you go back about 15 years, won the FA Cup final, winning the FA Cup final
03:29 and being in Europe. So they don't want to be in League One anymore. They want to be
03:32 in the Championship and then at least push for the Premier League as a team that's got
03:36 lofty ambitions as well. So, yeah, a lot of the teams that perhaps haven't been as well
03:41 run in recent years seem to have got their house in order, but there's only three promotion
03:45 spots. So for one of these teams or a few of these teams, it's going to become a bit
03:50 unstuck for them and they might have to chop and change their manager, despite arguably
03:54 all of those big teams. I'm going to go try and soar in dough.
03:57 Are we expecting the team that were in the playoffs last season, who narrowly missed
04:04 out Peterborough, Barnsley, are we expecting those teams to make another challenge? Obviously,
04:11 there's been a bit of a change at Barnsley. They unfortunately lost Michael Duff as their
04:17 manager of the Broadneath Collins in this summer. Do we think that might be another
04:22 work in progress for them or are they likely to be a team that could push for it?
04:26 It would be interesting to see if Duff did stay, but I just think you can't turn down
04:30 the opportunity of managing in the championship. It seems like they've lost a few of their
04:34 players to championship clubs and obviously to League One clubs as well. Luke Thomas has
04:39 gone to Bristol Rovers as well. So it shows that I think maybe Barnsley will be there
04:44 or thereabouts. As for Peterborough United, they were transfer enlisted a lot of their
04:50 players and they were trying to bring the wage bill down, be a bit more self-sustainable
04:54 and things like that as well. So I'm not sure. Maybe Peterborough United will be in the mix
04:57 this season. They've still got Clark Harris at the moment, but obviously a championship
05:02 team or an ambitious League One team might try and go all out for Clark Harris because
05:08 obviously he won the Golden Boot last year or shared the Golden Boot with Conor Chaplin
05:11 last year. So, Barnsley, there or thereabouts, maybe Peterborough get a top-half finish as
05:16 well. But yes, for the teams that didn't quite make it last year as well, obviously their
05:22 ambition will be to do it this year.
05:25 And so last but not least, we move on to League Two, where a little bit of Hollywood stardust
05:31 has been added to the division. In case you weren't aware, there's not been an awful lot
05:37 said about it. Joining me is Steve Jones from Doncaster Free Press. First of all, we'll
05:44 talk about the elephant in the room of Wrexham. If nothing else, we can't be sniffy about
05:57 this. They're going to bring something to the league because of the circus that goes
06:03 with them. They're going to bring something to the league that hasn't been seen before.
06:07 We should really welcome that. We shouldn't be sniffy about it, should we?
06:14 One thing, it was my first season covering Doncaster last year. It had been a while since
06:19 I'd seen football at that level. It's not a glamorous division. The football played
06:23 at times is, I think the term uses, agricultural. Some of the stadiums are less than impressive.
06:30 Some of the teams are even less impressive. I think you are right, it's going to bring
06:33 a bit of glamour, a bit of attention, a bit of stardust potentially at times to a few
06:40 stadiums up and down the country. I think it's a good thing in a way. I knew this question
06:47 would come up when I was thinking about Wrexham. To be fair to the owners, they're not antagonistic
06:51 with how they're doing things. They seem to be trying to do things the right way. They're
06:55 very Wrexham-centric, to be honest. They're not here to have a go or a pop at anyone else.
06:59 They're just doing their own thing and generating a hell of a lot of attention in the process.
07:03 It's going to be quite strange, I think, because they'll be internationalised on League Two
07:06 for the first time in its history, I'd have thought.
07:11 So that's us all wrapped up for this week. Join us again next time where we'll reflect
07:15 on week one of the EFL season, where we're sure there'll be once again plenty to talk
07:21 about. Thanks to all three of our guests for joining us and to you for watching and listening.
07:26 This show was produced for National World by Chris Hedges with music by Gentleman Jackals.
07:31 See you again soon.
07:32 [Music]
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