The Hand of Pod

Football? It doesn’t have to be complicated. As a wise manager once said, “The ball is round, the game lasts 90 minutes.” Finance? That does tend to be complicated, or at least impenetrable to outsiders.

Attempting to make football finance penetrable to the average fan is The Price of Football podcast (tPoF). “Liverpool University’s” Kieran Maguire and Comedy’s Kevin Day spend an agreeable amount of time each week talking to each other, splitting their podcast schedule between answering listener questions (Mondays) and discussing the money angle of football news (Thursdays). With regular interviews thrown in for good measure.

tPoF is both about football and not about football. You don’t have to understand tactics, or even follow a team, to be interested in how money flows through the beautiful game. If footy is your sport, then learning more about how amortisation affects your club’s ability to sign a new striker opens new perspectives.

Maguire and Day know their roles well. Day is the ‘everyman’, starting each week with amnesia so he can ask the audience’s questions without cynism. Maguire is the ‘expert’, dispensing analysis and insights you can’t get from regular football pundits.

That’s the nuts and bolts of the podcast. What makes it work, like all the best audio, is how you enjoy spending time in the company of the hosts. This is two people who share a deep love for football, its traditions, and, its foundational role in so many communities and social groups. They are filled with righteous anger when ‘rong ‘uns harm a club and take great delight when fans put things right.

With Day’s comedy nous, and Maguire’s clear desire to impress him through humour, the Price of Football quickly developed shared jokes. Listen to more than a few episodes and you’re brought into its ‘sitcom world’ with dodgy uncles, secret club insiders, lawyers unwilling to give a straight answer, and punchlines you can see crystallising into shape before the words are spoken.

The Price of Football. It’s for those who like football, those who like finance, or just those who like listening to two pasionate people talking about something they love with good humour. Thankfully I like all three.