The Rondo - AFCON vs EUROS

in afcon that's one of the tournaments where you see african superstars like

mo salah get neutralized by some right back who's playing in botswana yep

so jamie carriker had some interesting comments regarding afcon saying that it's

yeah you really gotta boo these comments for sure jamie carriker said that afcon is not a

major tournament it should not be considered in the same category as the euros or copa america when

when it comes to Ballon d'Or contention. What do you guys think about it? Why? Just why

Just why? For half a second, I'm like, okay, well, maybe what he's trying to get at

is you weight the Euros more in Ballon d'Or. But it doesn't matter because he can't play in the Euros

and it means so much to them to win that competition. It's all of Africa

Why are we just sitting here and being like, yeah, it's not a major tournament. It's done. I'll give it the only leeway I'll give to him

as we were talking about that off camera is that he didn't explicitly say

yeah, AFCON is in a major tournament. But when Micah gives him a chance to say

oh, it's like, oh, remember. Like, oh, remember, like, AFCON is a major tournament

It's like, he doesn't correct himself. He ain't trying to go back

You're being given a golden ticket right now to take it back

to take your stupidity and your ignorance back and correct yourself. There's no doubt that Jamie Carragher knows football well. Cool

He's aware of the landscape of the game and what's going on. But he's also proven that a lot of times he just don't

he doesn't care about, you know, how things may look. He just says whatever he want to say

We've been talking about these narratives, like, for a while now, about, again, the African Cup of Nations and African players overall

just not getting the looks that they're supposed to. And after the last tournament, last year, the Euros was trash

Copa America was trash. AFCON was lit. Was lit, bro. How many other international tournaments had a viral song mid-tournament

How many tournament had the host country fire their coach in the middle of the tournament

and then go on to win it? How many? Carragher how many seasons did Jamie Carragher have where in January one of his best players is tough for a couple of months He knows the importance of this because he seen his Liverpool

team lose important players. So how are you then going to act like it's not a big deal

I never really understood it. Like the fact that he literally has two of Africa's biggest stars to

ever play for Liverpool, Sadio Mane and Mo Salah play for Liverpool. And he literally saw both of

them win editions of the tournament and he's not going to say it yeah it's even more crazy to me

because it's like you literally have representation from your own club at these major tournaments how

much it means to them how much it means to the world and you're going to say that it doesn't it's not on the same level i think what makes it even worse too is like you've literally seen players go

to afton have success there and be it mentioned for these massive awards as well so your your

argument is pretty invalid i know a lot of people are giving jamie carragher the benefit of the doubt

when it comes to this talking about this but it's like you know in afcon that's one of the

tournaments where you see african superstars like mo salah get neutralized by some right back who's

playing in bokswana yep facts it doesn't happen on the on the in the premier league right because

you're used to seeing the absolute elite of football week in week out but like that's it's

a similar thing that's what's fun about the world cup right and i don't want to call afcon not elite

but you know what i mean like you watch the world cup and sometimes there's a lad for new zealand

who's locking down Kylian Mbappe for half an hour. And you're like, this is awesome

This is really cool. I think another thing in AFCON, didn't a ref just blow the final whistle

in like the 86th minute? Yeah, he did it too early. He didn't fancy it anymore

He's like, yeah, I've had a stinker, mate. But that's the thing though, in a world in a year

where there was a lot of questionable, from so many different sports overall

not even just football, a lot of questionable refereeing. AFCON's refereeing, other than like slight moments like that

was stellar. I feel like a lot of times referees get so much criticism

but then when they do a good job, it's like we expect it to just be normal

Like it's silence. Now, like just as much as we criticize them

when they make bad calls, when they do a good job, like we're supposed to be highlighting that too

And that's one of the things we saw in AFGON. Like even the moments of the tournament

we have like Sebastian Haller who was out of football for a year a year and a half with cancer comes back scores in a final And this is an elite player This is not just a bench player in his club for Dortmund

This is an elite footballer coming back. And it's a great story

You know what I'm saying? Some of these narratives, too, are prevalent in AFCON. So you have guys like O.C. Men, you know, Ademora Lukmen

These guys are leaving their clubs to play in AFCON. top level european clubs top class players world class players so it's like to not call it major

the fact of the matter is like i don't think i'm not confused by it because i know the undertones

that are that are coming from it i know the culture that people like jamie carragher are from

and why they're inspired to say things like that the backlash is warranted and it's necessary for

people to start putting some respect on these competitions like afghan is a major tournament

point blank period if you want just elite television and elite like something that's

great to watch that's what afcon is you know it's great content so if like that is your bare minimum

that is your baseline that's what gets millions to give a yeah then checks the box man and what

i love too is that uh michael richards and daniel sturge were so quick to be like hey like bro

actually yeah afcon is a major tournament because a lot of other pundits wouldn't have said a word

they would have just agreed with that bearing in mind that both of them were england internationals

as well neither of those lads ever played in it and that doesn't just that doesn't detract from

their point that's just them being like more i guess tapped into the culture and knowing what

it means to like whether it be like their families whether it be players they played with you know

they they how do i say this other than they know the vibes you know yeah is it a scouse thing is it

like a i don't is it like a i don't know is that region just you know right well because

i remember football only yeah even i'm not gonna so there's been uh was it the napoli president

napoli um who had like uh an issue with that and saying that they weren't gonna sign any african

players anymore because they don't want that that's been prevalent it's happened in french

clubs as well pop also has you know talked about that and again afterwards everybody said oh he was just joking it was taken out of context but how many times are we gonna hear about it you know for us to be like oh no they not joking Like they dead serious and they don want to lose some of their

African players because they don't value AFCON because no one's complaining. And, again, I know we say that the Euros is in the summertime

and the schedule is a bit different. I'm willing to bet that if the Euros is in the middle of the season

no club manager is complaining about losing their European players. Absolutely. Like, it will be a completely different story

Part of the reason this came up was, like, they were talking about Ballon d'Or, right

And Carragher was making the argument around Salah and the Ballon d'Or

And it was kind of all interconnected. If Salah wins the Ballon—wins AFCON, is that Ballon d'Or locked up

With the performance that he's had this season, like, he's—this is a record-breaking season

Like, he's putting up numbers, and this is what exactly they were comparing

They're comparing his season to the Alan Shearers, to Thierry Henry, to some of the greatest players in some of their best seasons in Premier League history

So if he caps that off with a Premier League, if he gets far into the Champions League and possibly wins it, I'm saying Barca-Liverpool, the way it's looking for the Champions League final

If they end up winning that and Egypt, I don't see Egypt winning AFCON right now

At the moment, yeah. I'm seeing Nigeria, Senegal, these teams. But they have a chance

They have a chance. They have a chance. But if he puts up a good performance in AFCON, wins the Premier League, which it's looking like right now, and does well in the Champions League too, it's undeniable

He's going to set the record for Premier League goal comps. End of story. He should win

Sure. Listen, at the end of the day, Mo Salah is one of the greatest players to ever grace the Premier League

Ever. Has everything. Football, period. Before he used to be a player, he'd create four or five chances a game, maybe score one

Now, not only is he creating chances, he's scoring them. He's added so many things to his game

outside of the boot pass if they cut him cut him off from going inside. If he goes

outside, it's cooked. If you cut if he cuts inside, goes on his left foot, it's over

If he goes on the right side, he has that Travella on him. So I think he's really just vastly

improved his game as he got older. And if he wins the Ballon d'Or

because he won AFCON, it makes sense. Like, at the end of the day, if you win a major international tournament with

your country and also win everything at club level, Jamie Carragher or anybody can't

say anything