670: Double Trouble

[00:00:00] Hello, foodies, and welcome back with another episode of FUT IN REVIEW. This is episode 670, and we are still heading towards number 750 in a couple of weeks. Well, months probably. We're still chasing dream towards that number 1000. And talk about chasing dream. It's time for Dream Chases promotion.

[00:00:26] My name is Julian. I'll be a host today and joining me is, of course, the King of the North, the Norwegian legend. If I would name all his nicknames today, this show would take an hour longer. But he's here. It's Ingber. Hello, hello. Hello, Ingber. And we are not alone. We are joined by a Scottish legend. And it's not actually Chris. Chris is still moving.

[00:00:54] He's actually building his own separate podcast studio. To be fair, he's building a nice little secret place in his garden, which is going to be a football Walhalla, actually, with all kinds of memorial. But because his wife can't know it, it's his podcast studio. So hopefully she doesn't listen to this show.

[00:01:18] But we are not joined by Chris. We are joined by the man formerly known as Talking Foot. It's John Kirkham. Hey, John. Hey, John. Hey, A.B. Thanks again for having me on. Delighted to be here. It's good to have you back on, mate. You are wearing a weird collar though today. Good. I thought you were blue. Never mind. Yeah, normally I'm team blue. Absolutely.

[00:01:43] But it's good to have you on. And as always, it is a Friday. But before we start with our week in review, it's time for some housekeeping. Of course, the Creed event is almost done and we are almost signing off on the final list. It is from May the 12th to May the 16th. You can still join, but you can only join until next week because then we're closing everything off and we're making sure we get all the reservations in.

[00:02:10] Talking about housekeeping, next Tuesday we'll have Nathan back with Shaq, of course. That means they are recording the Tuesday Club and that will be the last Tuesday Club for a while because, of course, happy news. Nate is going to be at that really soon. Hopefully not before next Tuesday, but it could also happen, but very likely often next Tuesday. So we'll be switching the podcast schedule to once a week. Maybe we'll do a bigger show. We'll see what happens.

[00:02:39] But no more Tuesday shows until everything or Aldo does settles, I suppose. That out of the way, Yngwie, it is very important to ask you, how has this week in food been rated from 1 to 10 and why was it that number? This week in football ultimate team. Four. Whoa. A four during food birthday. You need to explain that, my friend.

[00:03:09] And maybe next time we should start with John, by the way. I thought I was going to be bad, but... Yeah, I haven't been too happy about the evolutions. There have been some gameplay things that's been off. The weekly completion thing that we're supposed to get a guaranteed first birthday pack has still not been fixed. Yeah, the pack width has been awful.

[00:03:41] Not any cool SBCs. So, yeah. It's not been that exciting this week for me, to be honest. That's unfortunate here. I think this was one of the best promos so far. But I can see where you're coming from. John, it sounds like you weren't too positive either. I probably got a six and a half, if I am. I'm honest.

[00:04:08] Similar to EV, I think the EVOs, the coin ones, I didn't think were worth the coins personally for my team. And the free ones just weren't really good. I've actually not done some of the free ones because I'm thinking I'm not playing 12 games to put a trickster on a player. I don't use trickster. So, I wasn't enamoured with that. We've already spoken off record. There's still no goalkeeper evolutions. Probably won't be this cycle. So, that's not great. The positives.

[00:04:37] I got my 35 points very quickly last week. Well done. Well done. So, that was fine. Obviously, the previous week it collapsed. I was eight minutes away from Div 1. I ended up in Div 3 when the season finished. Don't ask me what went wrong. The wheels came off the bus. The flames came. Everything just crashed. And therefore, I started the season in Div 3. Got my 35 points. That was nice and easy. But yeah, again, no pink players in my team apart from Trent.

[00:05:07] And I think everybody's got Trent. So, I just felt a wee bit flat. That was all. What about you, John? I've had a week where I wasn't able to play much. Did, of course, do some SPCs. I didn't pack any pink ones either this week. Well, last week, I, of course, I think I packed Bonmati. I bought the Nusa card, which Ingrid recommended last week. Really fun card. Haven't been too much playing with him.

[00:05:36] But when he did, he was really fun to use. Petit packed last week. Not this week. But also had a couple of good experiences with him so far. And, of course, I did buy Marco von Muster from the market right after last week's podcast. So, if you don't buy into the hype, but just one week later, he's actually really affordable. Bought him for $110,000, something like that. I think he actually went up in price after that. Really, really fun card.

[00:06:05] But all these cards are fun. But, yeah, generally speaking, I think it was all right. Good 6 and a half. 6.5 for me, something like that. I think that's a decent. I wish I had to play some more. Maybe that would change my experience for the better or worse. But, yeah, sometimes business goes first. All right. Oh, yes. We need to play it on the table. Exactly. Else we can't do this either. So, there's that. No, generally speaking, I quite like it.

[00:06:33] And if you're listening to the show, of course, leave us your rating of your week in food in the show's description. Because we like seeing them and we always appreciate that. And I want to see a more general feeling about what people think so far. Yngwie, what does this week bring us? Dream Chasers. Kind of confusing name when we saw it.

[00:07:01] It's a promo dedicated to highlighting players who have excelled in UEFA club competition this season. Dream Chaser items will showcase their incredible performance and achievement with upgrades worth of those moments. Dream Chaser ones are not live cards like the road to the finals. But they look very similar to make it more easy to see. Yeah, there are some similarities. So, yeah.

[00:07:29] Dream Chaser also will have a rich history of the four prestigious UEFA competition. Champions League, Europa League, Europa Conference League and Women's Champions League. There's going to be icons and heroes in packs and SPCs and objectives. So, there's a little bit of this and that, different stuff. And we also got a new icon added to the game as well.

[00:08:00] Legend. Mr. Beckenbauer. He's here. I would show a picture, but not all sides have his picture already up. He's a little bit shy, it seems. Well, he's also shy on the market. So, that goes for that saying. I do have an op now. So, I'll put him on screen. So, if you're looking at the YouTube version, Spotify version, you can, of course, also check that out. But, yeah. 92 rated center defender, Franz Beckenbauer. Yeah.

[00:08:29] And he can play center mid and CDM as well. So, he's a nice looking card. But, I think, as you already know, there's a special coming next week, I think, or the week after. So, let's just get him in now. But, if you pulled him, I would use him. I think it's a nice looking card. What are you thinking, Yvi? Yeah, it's a well-rounded card. Of course, it's not top notch.

[00:08:59] But, really good passing. He's got good defending stats. Quite okay physicals. Dribbling is, well, it's not what he was well-known for either. So, that's fair enough. Trista Skimmer, Trista Weakfoot. I could have wanted maybe Forza Weakfoot at least. That's fine for a defender, though. Yeah, CDM. Yeah, but I think he's meant to be a center back because he has a ball-playing defender plus plus.

[00:09:28] CDM is deep-lying playmaker and the same one plus. Same with center mid. But, he's not a tall player. He is 5'11 or 181 centimeters. So, I think he would suit best in maybe a back three. I think he would be good there. I quite like the fact that he has a long ball plus and his passing sets are amazing. You don't see many defenders having these tens on passing. And incisive pass as well, which is nice.

[00:09:58] If you're going to use him as a ball-playing defender. Long ball meta is here. Interceptions, 96. Defensive awareness, 95. Just beautiful. So, generally speaking, N'Ve. When I look at comments about this card, isn't he too slow? If in a three-back, I don't think he's going to be too slow. But in a two-back system, unless you have one with more pace, I think you could struggle. Unless you're a really good manual defender.

[00:10:29] Because if you miss a tackle, he will struggle to catch up with the fast attackers. But if you have a fast one next to him, I think he should be really good. Because if someone gets close and he gets a tackle in, I think he would be able to win the ball quite a lot. I see people being really negative. But then again, 90% upvotes on him as well. He's not extremely tall or something like that. No. But he's a little bit expensive. It's extinct at 1.9 million.

[00:10:59] But I think the price will go down. He's got it all, though. Except the pace. If you look at LeGiond said, sliding tackle 90. Standing tackle 91. Defensive awareness, 95. Interception 96? Yeah. 95 jumping as well. Yeah. Yeah, you just give him the ball and he plays and don't let him be outpaced, I guess. He's not one for a high line. Yeah.

[00:11:28] Back three, he would be really good, I think. Yeah. How many back threes do you actually see, right? Not many. But the ones that used it, I think they could have this card and be really happy about it. If they can get him at a good price. Yeah. That's the other thing. Try to get him. But John, you said next week we get a promotion card from him? I think that was the rumor. Yeah. Yeah. He's going to get a special card. Promo card next week. Next Friday.

[00:11:57] Yeah, he said it themselves in their information pitch note thing, I think it was. Got to release the base first and then have the special. Pretty cool though. Although, who can you imagine? Well, the other side is that because he's a base icon, that could make some of these SPCs later on more interesting as well to do. So. Mm-hmm. But you won't get him out on icon pick at the minute because there are no base icons and icon picks.

[00:12:27] No, no. True. True. But it will be soon. I promise you that. Yeah. But hey, he's there in V2 a couple of weeks. But is he what you hope for? It was kind of expected stats, yeah. So I think they're well-rounded. Many won't say he's meta enough, so they won't even try him.

[00:12:49] But if I pack him, I will absolutely try him because I'm a huge fan of the way he played when he was an active football player. So a huge legend of the game. So I would definitely try him and see if I get my hands on him. Yeah. Let us know if someone packs him, what he does. I'm curious, but I'm not so curious that I want to snipe him. Or if I even have the funds to.

[00:13:18] I was going to see you, John. You have not got the funds to snipe him. No, but I'm pretending I would. Dream chaser for John. Oh, let me open it back now. No, but generally speaking, quite good. What I, I don't really like them releasing base icons at this stage of the game. Because you know he'll get special cards. You know, he will get later on. NSPC perhaps. We've seen it with Pirlo before as well.

[00:13:48] I think that's a little bit risky to invest in one of these players. But then again, it's cool to have more players in the game. And we can't say they're not updating the roster throughout the year. So, yeah. Well, you say that, John. I've had players at St. John's time playing games since October this year. And they're still not in the game. But we'll not go down that road. Yes. That is true. Yeah. Can't really. That is, that is definitely true. I will.

[00:14:17] Who else is in the gaming video? Is there certain someone who could be worth discussing today? From the promo team, you mean? More SPC perhaps. Somewhere. Yeah, we can maybe start with the SPC. We got two player SPCs today. We got the dream chaser Dembele. He's had a great season so far. Both in the league and in the Champions League. Kind of a rejuvenated player. I think he was kind of. You don't want to talk about his Champions League performance, I suppose.

[00:14:47] I said he was great in Champions League. He's been insane the last few months. I think he started quite slowly, but I'm not sure it was October, November. He started performing and he's been scoring and assisting for fun in pretty much all competitions. So that's a 1.9, no, 1.1 million, almost 1.2 million SPC.

[00:15:14] And I have the Blueprint Evolution version of one of his cards. And I think that's maybe better than this one. So I'll be skipping this. A little bit. It's a solid card, not the best stamina. He has the new low-driven playstyle plus, which is nice, of course.

[00:15:41] So I think the card will be good in-game, but it's a little bit expensive, I think, for me. What do you think, Joe? I think it's a very nice card. I certainly won't be doing it myself. I've got Malin, Nico Williams, Maradona. Yeah, I play 4-4-2 and I need two wingers, but I've got Joe Cole. I've got so many wingers that I just couldn't put that money into that player. I would rather use the money or coins or players into the other SPC.

[00:16:13] Yeah, I think, honestly, the price is solid. I think 1.4 million, 1.3 million. Good 5-5 star, all the stats are in all the right places. I'm glad his finishing isn't up too much because then that card would be a must-do. But I definitely think it's perfectly fine and very much it could do. Right? Yes, I think it could do.

[00:16:39] I think, obviously, if you have French, PSG, past and present, etc., definitely. But for me, it's a hood-do, not a would-do. No, exactly. Yeah. Ingrid? Skip for me. A skip? A hard skip? Yeah, okay. I have the blueprint one with three PlayStyle Pluses and everything, and it's a really good card. So, Jesus, there has some upgrades, but not many.

[00:17:09] Compared to what I have. So, I don't think he would be worth it for me, to be honest. But as we say that, I'll probably play a game and he'll destroy me. So, there we go. Oh, yes. He'll destroy me as well. Of course, that's standard. But I think there are more interesting SPCs at the moment, maybe. Do you have someone in mind, perhaps, on that one?

[00:17:33] Yeah, we got both cool and a little bit frustrated. Pretty much everybody knows there's a 90-rated base Gullit SPC out. And three weeks later, now we have a 94-rated Gullit SPC out. That cost 4.5, 4.6 million coins to do.

[00:18:01] And I would be quite sad if I just finished the base SPC, to be honest. I don't mind that he's getting a new promo card, because it's been a while since he got the Thunderstruck one. So, the kind of time that's been between the promo cards are fine. But to release the base as an SPC and then three weeks later come with this one, I would have preferred that EA had dropped the base SPC and then just released this one.

[00:18:28] So, it would be kind of a better way to do it. The card looks, of course, insanely good. But the prize, not many will be able to afford this straight away. But you have until the 21st of May to finish it. And we'll be in, I think, team of the season territory as well.

[00:18:54] So, if you start now, I think you should be able to finish it before it expires. For some, it might be a long grind. But I don't know how. It's probably going to still be good if you get him in May. But it would be nicer to get him now, of course. Yeah, I'm going to ask John for a second, because we also have some technical issues. I think we need to connection with Ingrid.

[00:19:24] But we heard everything there for now. So, John, 4.7 or 4.8 million. Last time we had an SPC like this with Mbappe, further went up in price. And I can see this card turning to be 6 million plus in a bit. Very possibly. I would certainly break the 5. 5.4, 5.5 I thought might go up to John. But it's great. Absolutely. I would love that card. Absolutely love that card. And a 4.42.

[00:19:53] And I'd play him as a CM. However, I've not got the fodder, because I've done far too many icon packs. Or icon picks. And I don't have the coins, because I've ripped some packs as well, which I sort of regret. So, I don't think I'll manage it. I think this is an amazing card. Absolutely. I think this is an amazing price for this SPC. Although, I don't know, 4.something or 5.something sounds awfully high.

[00:20:22] One, this card will be 15 million extinct at the market. So, you can get this. Everyone could get this card for a third of the price you'd buy him off the market, I think. Yes. Putting him 60 days in is absolutely fantastic. And I know people say, yeah, but there's a lot of 91 rated SPCs and 90 rated SPCs. But we're already getting some 90 rated cards in packs and stuff.

[00:20:49] We're in the midst of team of the season when this ends. And that should generate enough fodder, I think, to get it done. If you want to do it today. I agree with that, John. I think the problem is when you're in team of the season, you're probably going to be rolling around in those blues 96, 97s. Whoever is Jude Bellinghams and so on. Then this card is still excellent. Still excellent, but he's maybe not.

[00:21:19] The card's been going to... But yeah, if I could get him done. If I could do him within the next four weeks, absolutely. I just know I couldn't do him in the next four weeks without opening my credit card. I don't want to do that. No, but I get what you're saying. But on the other side, I'm not going to ask Ingrid for his opinion here. But I think this is... Goethe's always been like the best midfielder in games. Stable, big, strong, special, unique body type, special player. He can do everything. He can shoot. He can be a midfielder.

[00:21:47] He can be a center defense midfielder. He can attack like 90 shooting, 97 shot power, 95 long shots. He is very fast, 90. He can also defend. This is just all around... I'm just going to say it. Probably the best player in game, even throughout the team of the season. Ingrid? Yeah, he's been at the CDM position as well with holding... Plus, plus, plus. Yeah, which is really nice.

[00:22:16] And anticipate. Sorry, intercept plus. Yeah, so he's fitting the meta, I guess. He's going to be in the 4-1-3 teams. If you look at his play styles, he's only got one cam role. So even though he's got the cam position, he's not designed for that. He's certainly... Oh, sorry. I apologize, John. You had two. But yeah, I just think, for me, box to box, I had two. Brilliant. Yeah.

[00:22:46] Yeah. I'd love to hear what everyone thinks in chat, though, or in the comments. But I think... When this card came out tonight, there were a lot of people being negative about the price. And you know me. I'm not an SPC grinder. Not in the nearest day. But I think 60 days to get it done. If you don't... This is a card you're actually crying towards. All photo you got, you put it in this, right?

[00:23:15] You slowly go into... Coming towards the phase where you're able to put him into your team. Which I think could be pretty rewarding. If you want to have a bigger advantage, you should try to get him in your team now. But I think that's going to be really hard for most people currently, of course. But I also think that it's fine. Because now that card would be broken to face. Like, overpowered. But in four to six weeks, when there's still two weeks left for him to do.

[00:23:45] I think this card is still very, very good. But there are a couple of alternatives that will get closer to him. And that's also fine. I quite... I dig them doing it. But I do have to agree with Ingrid that putting the base in first for a couple of weeks. And then coming back with another version of the SBC. I hate when they do that, though. Because that other one wasn't cheap either, right? Yeah. Both are active at the same time. So it's like...

[00:24:14] Imagine you have one squad left of the 91. And you see this one pops up. And it's like... Heartbreaking. I wish that there could be a second version of the new SBC where you could chunk in the 90 rated SBC version. To kind of cut down the cost of the new one. That would be more fair. But I don't think EA will do that. But that could have been cool, of course. I think it's hard to implement.

[00:24:43] But I do agree that if you have a basic version of a card and there's a new version coming out as an SBC, it's a really cool idea to allow you to upgrade that card through that means, I guess, I suppose. Yeah. That chunk off a few of the SBCs at least. So the high rate... When it does Mbappe in your team, player of the month, Mbappe, it helps. I think that's pretty cool. Yeah. And when the second player of the month, Mbappe comes... Exactly. Or Salah.

[00:25:12] I mean... Yeah. There are a few cards. Is this... Would you rate this a must-do, Ingvi? Or it could do? Because I don't think it's a skip for anyone. It's not a must-do. Because there are so many good midfielders in the game. It could do. If you have the possibility to grind towards. But I still think with the midfielders I have, I'll be fine.

[00:25:40] And I will get better ones when team off the season. But of course, Hullit would be really cool to have. I haven't seen him that often so far in the game Psycho at all, to be honest. So I don't think he has been before until now. That super meta that he used to be the earlier years. So I'm a little bit interested to see reviews as people have used him in Champs and Rivals, etc.

[00:26:08] To see if this card is as good as what he looks. Because he looks like, as you said, one of the best midfielders in the game. I agree. I agree. And I think the reason we haven't seen him that much is he's also just 1.4 million for the most expensive version currently. But I think that's because there's so many alternatives. And the Freezy down, of course, does not help his value either.

[00:26:37] But man, am I in love with this card, that 94 rated. And I wish I could grind towards him. But as always with these SBCs, I'm so hesitant to start a big SBC and realize I'll run out of time in the end. Also knowing that it finishes the week after we have the Creed event, which is, of course, awesome. And we'll play FIFA, but I definitely don't have any time to grind before that. So it's making me a little bit nervous to get started.

[00:27:04] But I might have to check out the club, see if we can take off a couple of those high rated. Because it has five 91 rated squads needed. Yeah. If I hadn't done the CR7 SBC, I would be able to do with fodder, I think. I think that's the problem, isn't it? Most people have some fodder into something big already. Yeah. If I've started Yaya, no chance. But I didn't do that, at least.

[00:27:31] So I think a few people that started Yaya will have a little bit of regrets now. Because it looks much better. Yeah. I think you are definitely correct there. I'm glad I didn't do either Ronaldo or this one yet. Or Yaya yet. You should have at least some fodder. I will have some fodder. I also just have 20,000 coins left. 23 squads was the fodder, John.

[00:28:00] If I sacrifice a few of the promo players I packed, I don't know. If I can get the 91s away, then we'll see. But I need to just check what I have in my club and see who can be spared and who has to be sacrificed. I'm going to say it, though. Because if you are able to start this SVC, or if you decide to work towards completing this SVC,

[00:28:27] I think this is one of those players that will stay in your memory. I had that Thunderstruck last year. Was it last year or the year before? I can't remember. I think last year. I think there was some. Or do you mean the wild cards one? It could be a 94 rated as well, I think. Anyway, I had one of those big fancy Gullet cards. And that card just carried me throughout the game and was this player.

[00:28:51] And it's so weird coming back from Gullet to a gold player at the start of the year again. And then you already miss him. So I'm very much looking forward to grinding my way towards this. Although, I still have that fear of not being able to complete it. If you can get time to play the foot jumps, because there are a lot of packs there which gives a lot of fodder.

[00:29:20] Might not give that many promo cards, but you'll get lots of fodder. If you get a rank of 9 or 10 wins, you should get lots of fodder from that. But of course, you need to have time to do jumps as well, of course. That is true. And it's just, it's not too many matches here. Maybe, maybe. Although, not this weekend, I think. I'm going to say it's a must-do.

[00:29:52] I'm putting it in there. I think it's a must-do. This is one of those cards where you'll stay in your memories. It's one of those cards where you can be certain values there. And it's one of those cards. Can you, like, imagine they put out a Ronaldo, like an R9 SBC, make it 4.5 million. You would instantly say, you have to do this. I think this is the same story. This is a player that is unobtainable for so many players. Because normally it would be 15 million. Extinct. Extinct, yeah.

[00:30:22] And now everyone could grind towards him and has eight weeks to do so. If you didn't do any of the big ones, it should be really possible to do it. I think it's a really good move from EA, except for the fact that they put out an 18 rated a couple of weeks ago. But, yeah. Just to put something on that, as you were talking about, John, the price has jumped to 150,000. While recording, yeah. Yeah, that's what I said.

[00:30:50] Yeah, I'm pretty sure that will happen. And I remember with Mbappé that I had a couple of canes laying around, which were... Oh, and I think the Haaland card, the gold one, who jumped in price after two days with that SBC being out. So, I'm not an investor. Definitely not. I'm definitely not a trader. But that's... You could also choose your battles here, not do him and sell you fodder.

[00:31:17] If you have tradable fodder, because that's something else entirely, unfortunately. What else do you want to discuss? If you do want to take a look at the team or the... I don't know. Want to discuss the Norwegian weather, maybe? No. It'd be nice, but it's okay. There's an objective player from Chelsea as well. George, I think. His name is... That you can unlock quite easily, I think.

[00:31:47] All right. I haven't found him yet, so just go for it. Yeah. He's been a very popular bronze evolution, I think. So, I've seen many running around with different versions of an evolution of that player, saying that he's been quite good in-game. So, I think he should be quite usable if you choose to unlock him. T-Rick.

[00:32:18] T-Rick. George. Yep. There he is, in all his glory. He doesn't look like he's having fun on the card, though. He doesn't look like... He looks like, really? This is the dynamic image you picked for me? That's how he looks. He's not a fan of the green, I think. But, yeah. It's a solid card for free as well. And he's going to... I don't know how many evolution he fits already, but probably a few. Yeah. And you can toss him into Kulet, especially later on.

[00:32:46] Of course, he fits there as well. But that's just a solid card as well. So, to not try something different, he can play Cam left mid and left winger. So, I don't see any huge holes or weaknesses in the stats of the card either. So, I like... I think that's what we said last week. There are so many good players out now. The only thing is with...

[00:33:15] I would not buy any 4-star, 4-stars. He's a 4-star, 4-star, of course. And I think the last two weeks we had so many and still very cheap 5-star, 5-stars on the market. I think that's a definite downgrade. But that is my biggest issue with per foot, per day maybe, is even that they make 5-star, 5-star so common. That everything that's not 5-star, 5-star is sort of a letdown from the bat.

[00:33:44] Except if it's a defender like Beckenbauer, then I don't care too much. But for everything else, I'm like... I also have a 5-star, 5-star. That's pretty similar in stats. You know what? Hmm. Let's do this. Because if you compare this to your Norwegian friend last week, Invy, I think he's worse. Yeah, that's true. But I like that EA chose someone that hasn't got lots of promo cards already.

[00:34:11] If you look at the team, there are some copy-paste things that annoys me, of course. Which I think is a little bit sad. But I think EA should do a much better job by selecting players that doesn't have a load of promo cards. If they really, really, really, really, really stand out, then fair enough.

[00:34:39] But I think Wirtz has 7, 6-7 promo cards already. Yeah. And I'm not sure if he's been their best players either. He's been good, yes. But I think there are other players in his team that have kind of been living the dream. You see it. John, when you just hovered over the specials, he's had one team of the week. That is true, of course.

[00:35:09] He has 2 players a month. But that's probably because he has 2 players a month. So I suppose, yeah, that would make him more. So he probably is deserving then of that card. Yeah, I was like, maybe you can't put him in a team of the week when you know he's getting a player of the month or when you know he's getting a special card and coming again soon. Yeah. So, no, I can't say that I have watched a lot of women's Champions League.

[00:35:35] But I think Caicedo and Jón Stottir both have a future stars card, if I'm not mistaken. Yes, sir. And Barcelona have 2 players, Barcelona ladies. I don't know why. They are the only team that has to... I know they've been good, but I think they could have selected a player from a different team than 2 from Barcelona ladies. I agree there.

[00:36:02] I think Barcelona ladies gets a little bit too much hype going around on these teams. Maybe too much slow, but yeah. And of course, you were highlighting maybe the kind of hidden gem in the team as well. Yeah, I'm not going to highlight them. I'm actually going to put them on the big screen. Hugo Bueno. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. So, I'm going to remain silent to let Invi talk about Hugo Bueno. He's super cheap though.

[00:36:27] He's like 12, 13,000 coins left back with some really good defensive stats if you don't look at heading. But it's not that important. You don't see that much crossing anyways now. 90s all over and the rest of the defending stats. He's got quite good physicals, good passing. He's fast enough. He's got good dribbling stats as well. Five-star skill moves, four-star weak foot.

[00:36:56] Rapid plus, swift pops plus, normal jockey, intercept, slide tackle, technical and press proven. So, I think he could be a really fun left back. You can also play him left mid, I guess. He has the false back plus plus and wing back plus plus. So, and winger as a left mid plus plus. So, he can play different positions. I think he would be fun in, of course, three at the back. Still fine with four at the back as well. Overlapping wing back.

[00:37:25] Yeah, I'd say left back and just overlap with him. With great crossing as well. 94. Can I ask a question? Are you working on a three back at the minute? You'd almost say so, eh? Me? Yeah. It'd be good. No, no. I'm four. It'd be good on three back. He's good at the full back as well. He's just hoping people will play three back against him. I have a few friends. I have a few friends that's using three at the back now and they like it.

[00:37:52] So, I'm using four at the back, but I use false back a lot now. In the 4-3, 3-3 formation I've been using with two false backs. I was just queering it because you've mentioned that a few times. That was all. I might try it, but now there are players to use. But for that price, it looks so cheap. Just pick one up. He's going to fit in Evolution as well. So, or maybe. Yeah.

[00:38:21] I actually bought him already, of course. I didn't even see it until you said it before the podcast. I bought him for 13,000 coins. He dropped to 12, but I mean. Yeah, that's fine. I think, yeah. But this is what we said like a couple of times already. And of course, I'm biased because it's a final player, right? Yeah. Honestly there. But compare him. I now play the Petit card and left back, the new Petit card. This card's better for 12k.

[00:38:51] Yeah. That is insane. And I think that's, I can't rephrase it. This isn't the normal power curve we're facing now. This is, I wouldn't say out of control, but this is something I don't think. Close to. Yeah. We haven't seen this happen before in FC, I think, or FIFA, where every team that allows usually has great players. This one as well, of course, right?

[00:39:20] We're not actually going to mention the Alpacet in this. Sure. It'd be great if you pack them. But even the bad players or cheap players, I should say, are very, very good. Most of them are. Like the Norwegian players we mentioned last year, for first, they had a whole lot of them. We got Buey now. If you spend 150,000, you can buy a team that's viable. Yeah, that's true. And sure, like Daniel says last week, that striker will score 8 out of 10.

[00:39:49] Well, the Ronaldo will score 9 out of 10. But that is when you would say, you know what? I'm going to put in those 4.5 millions for my Ronaldo or for my Gullet card. But that's fine. We got a Freezy Dun and a Free Maradona to come along with that as well, right? I think you don't really, and this sounds weird coming from me, you know, but you don't really need to spend money on this game to enjoy this game this year and be viable.

[00:40:21] Nope. And how good does team of the season have to be if these cards are still... I don't know. Four playstyle plus, maybe? Yeah, will that make a difference then, though? Maybe not. People default to wanting the shiny cards. And what I mean by this is we want the Gullets, the Villeras, the Mbappes. Yeah, but you can actually get the Zetane. You got the Zetane.

[00:40:50] You can do a Viera SBC. You could do the Villeras SBCs. That's never been the case before. We've got a normal... We would have got one of those SBCs. Would have cost the world an Ensom at the end of the year. Not in February and March. I think it's been... And especially with five stars for Bertha, I think we are... It's hard.

[00:41:16] And we've had this conversation before, but it's also hard. What is an upgrade for your team? Because... It's almost impossible now. Exactly. I think Gullet is. Bueno is a nice swap. But for 12k, you can try players. Yeah. I don't think it matters if I play Van Basten or... All five stars, who cares, right? It's just a matter of preference. But I think with a 100k costing or 150,000k costing Marco van Basten,

[00:41:45] if he's a dream player, he'd be viable until the end of the season. Unless they introduce like six star, six star. I don't know. But else I wouldn't know what would make me choose to use a different striker in this. Or a different setup. And I think that's a weird place to be in. Right? And for... I've seen this with other games. Well, for example, I don't know if you guys play Diablo. I've played it. No, I haven't played it. Okay.

[00:42:14] So Diablo, you play to get gear. And once you get gear, you can play a higher difficulty level, which will drop higher gear, which will make you sure you can go to the highest difficulty level, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. It's a nice grind to keep going. And there's always so much gear dropping. There's so much cards in this game dropping now. That will make you feel like you're still making progress, right? Once you hit the highest level though, details are marginal. You can play five nights in a row and get like 0.3% more damage at the end of the week if you're lucky.

[00:42:44] Or you're rolling and stuff. At that stage of the game, I'm usually like, you know what? I'll wait for the next season because, meh, this isn't really rewarding. It's sort of in the stage we're getting at this game now. Where I'm like, I mean, I really like picking up these players for 12k, 20k. It's also why I don't care about my coin balance at all. And I think that's why a good at SPC was very much needed. It gives you something to play for that is actually an upgrade for your team.

[00:43:12] But the reason I don't put in too much time in Wicked League, except for my schedule, is also because it has to be one of those top three players in a team to make that weekend worth it. It's not that. And all the others are replacements for the cards I already have and won't make any difference. Does that make sense for you? Or I'm just feeling things that I'm doing? No, it doesn't make sense. No, it totally makes sense.

[00:43:38] I think, like we've been saying for weeks, that every player that is now is a good player. They might not improve your team, but they're not bad players. They're not the meta players, but they're not bad players. I can't remember which one it was. There was a couple of FIFAs ago. You used to get Championship Player of the Year and League One Player of the Year.

[00:44:01] I remember those, I think it was an 87 rated player, and he was an upgrade for my team those three, four, five FIFAs ago. And that's not the case now. That was at Team of the Season time. You're talking about an 87 rated. We'd have potentially got into the edges of my squad. But 87 is now, I haven't even touched anywhere near your team. No, 80-80, boy, I was going to get in my team. But that's the thing.

[00:44:28] And I think if you, we can't really say that, it could be me, but I can't really say that this FIFA has been, at least after Christmas anymore, pay to win. Because you either have to pay a whole lot to get that top player, or you just spend nothing and just get a really good team still. Yeah, that's true. I quite like it, but it's also, I'm sort of worried for Team of the Season.

[00:44:56] It has to be, like this promo, this promo is pretty cool, I think. There's some fun players in there. There's some versatility in there. We haven't even talked about the heroes, but then there's a new icon coming. We got the SBCs coming. And except for Gullit, like you said with Dembele, it's like you already have Dembele, which is better. So, eh, it's not worth it. How good does Team of the Season cards have to be to make that the hype promo it's always been?

[00:45:27] That's, they need four playstyle pluses at least. They all need to have it then. And they need to be good. You can't, like, throw an acrobatic trickster and then some kind of long pass and then intercept on a centre-back. That won't do. They need to be, like, really fitting that place where they actually place in the team.

[00:45:52] And on that caveat, I know it's one of the last big promotions. For a lot of people, it's the last big promotion, but you've still got footies after that. So, it's not like these cards at Team of the Season can all be 98 or 99 rated, because that's what your footies cards are. So, they're going to be 96, 97 rated, maybe the odd 98. So, yeah, it's going to have to be four playstyle. But it was, yeah.

[00:46:21] And five star, five star. And five star, five star. And then you get to footies where they're all just 99. And that's fine. Double five star, I guess, as well. You could have five, six playstyle pluses by footies. Just every card in footies has all things on gold. All playstyle. We'll get a striker with long trail. Could be interesting. It's going to break the game, I think. No, I do agree, right?

[00:46:52] Although they keep tuning the game. Because talk about tuning the game. What has your experience been, Yngwie, with the new low-driven shot? You tried it? Yeah, I've tried it. The playstyle. I kind of used it already, though. But not with playstyle plus. But I used it on other players. That type of shot. Because I noticed that it was quite effective. But of course, with the players that has the playstyle, it's even more accurate. And can score from even more crazy angles.

[00:47:23] So, I like it. If you haven't tried the Garrelin Echo card, it's a very clinical striker with that playstyle plus. Super cheap. And if you need a new striker and don't have a budget that big over 80k, then go for him. It's insane, actually. If you're going to think about it. Yeah. No. Yeah. You wouldn't say that a year ago. You really can't join. You have 20k. Stop it. Yeah, because I bought Mark of a Buster.

[00:47:52] And, of course, we know. And that Norwegian's left-wing, which name I keep forgetting. Nusa. Nusa, Nusa. Yeah. Nusa. So. Now, we have the Norwegian Barg as well in the promo team. She needs a link for Nusa. No, Nusa is just on Maxima Camade. But that's not too hard with six icons in my team. Seven. So, yeah. That won't be too difficult to do.

[00:48:20] One Norwegian, the coach will just make it all turn green, I guess. Yeah. Yeah. But, of course, you can do some crazy evolutions now as well with a few 99s like the Brian Giel. You can have 99 pace and 99 shooting on that card and lots of other 99 stats on a 90 rated card.

[00:48:45] I don't know what kind of team of season card is going to kind of be better than him, to be honest, as a left-mid left winger. Nusa will be. No, just kidding. I might have that kill card still somewhere, but I'm definitely not going to toss him into an EVA, though. Are there any players you want to discuss besides the actual team?

[00:49:12] I mean, we got the icons, which are Rivaldo, Raul, Prince, Makalele, and Desai. I honestly think Desai at 380s looks all right-ish, but then again, time of those. They should be solid if you need a CDM, I think. I know that isn't a match. They're just talking about things like he'll be solid. He'll fit in the evolution later. Oh, my gosh. That's all anybody says now. Keep on fun of evolution.

[00:49:40] Yeah, next year is going to be FC Evolution. FC Evolution, yeah. Heroes, we have Lucio. Really expensive, 5 million. Crazy. And we got Lizzo Razoo, who is dirt cheap. Yeah, I'm surprised at that. Yeah, not as good as Bueno, probably, but very good nevertheless. I'm kidding. Where's that five star for 200-something K? Pretty insane K. Good K, yeah. I think it's a little bit smaller than Bueno.

[00:50:10] Yes. Bueno is 178-something. Yeah. And he's 169. I don't know the other measurements on the guy. But four star, five star, both of them, actually. I think both are fast. Bueno, both can cross really well. Lizzo Razoo might be a little bit better in defense. But, you know, I speak in. Pretty similar. Just like two on the other.

[00:50:40] Lizzo Razoo's playstyle plus wasted on slide tackle. Because we really shouldn't be tackling. Yeah. That's the joke. From a coach's perspective, there should be no slide tackle. No. I think he should get penalized for that, though. Having that playstyle. There is this one player I won't hear I'm looking forward to when he gets his promo card, because that's usually crazy fun every year. It's Peter Crouch. Oh, yes. So much fun.

[00:51:07] For me, it was at least hilarious last year. He was so good. And he fit in Evolution as well. And he lost him any longer. To be fair, I faced him in a rivals game, and it was 5-5. And he scored two goals from midfield. He voted into a 90-rated midfielder. Yeah. You are correct, though, because he hasn't had any upgrades yet right this year. Not yet, no. No. So we only have 85 base cards. That's weird. Yeah.

[00:51:35] So I think there's team two of Dream Chasers, so he might pop up next week. We don't know. Hopefully. Soon. Probably, I suppose. Yeah, I'm going to try him. I get on well with the tall strikers. Yeah. I think there's something about that, because I've got team of the year, or team of the season, whatever one it is, Eusebio and Cantona. And I get much more out of that.

[00:52:05] Oh, here it is, Guyon. Team of the year, everyone, yeah. Yeah. And I've got team of the year and Van Dijk as well, but that's by the by. I get more out of Cantona, my play style, than I get out of Eusebio. Yeah. So just some plows that click. Like, that's what I don't like about the meta. Everybody said, this is the most meta. But what is meta for one person definitely is not the meta for another one.

[00:52:34] Well, to be fair, meta is, of course, the most effective tactics available. Yeah, but it might not fit my style. So it can be... True, but that still doesn't mean the other one isn't the meta. It's still the meta. It just doesn't fit you. But generally speaking, it would be the best way to play the game. I think... Although with this year's game, I think there's... 4, 2, 1, 3. Yeah, probably the most... I know, but... It's like tackling all over. And that.

[00:53:03] No, but it's probably the most effective way. But I think the other ways aren't far off. And that's been way different in previous years as well. Yeah. You can pretty much play any formation to a certain degree, for sure. So, yeah. Yeah. And so many players can fit. Yeah, it's... Which is nice. So, yeah. Full of options. I will give them that. For all my criticisms, I will absolutely give them that. Yeah. There's more variety. There's a couple of things to applaud them for.

[00:53:31] I think the free-to-play has been better than ever for a couple of months now. I think high-rate players were given for free. High-rated players, essential players are now in SBCs. And those aren't priced too bad either. I even think Gullit is well-priced. Food Birthday, I guess you didn't pack anything. But still, I think it was a pretty successful promotion.

[00:53:58] It wasn't awful, but it wasn't bad. But the problem I had with... They were in Evolution pretty much every day, but almost all of them were paid. Yeah. And I think that's the difference. I didn't look at the... Normally, I wouldn't skip many Evolutions, but I can't remember. I skipped so many of the paid ones because they could have been fun, but they wouldn't improve my team, so I wouldn't do it.

[00:54:26] But if it was a little bit more balanced, I would probably do more. And I would agree with that, Evie, as well, because there were a couple who would move like a couple of my Saints players to 90 or 91 rated. And I thought, all I'm doing is locking them out of the next Evo till the 90s, 91s can be Evoed. So I'll wait on this, say, to 89 till a better Evo puts them to 91. And that defeats the purpose of Evoing. Yeah. That's fair.

[00:54:53] And when you pay like, let's say, between 50, 200 and 50,000 coins and have to play like between 14 to maybe 20 matches as well, I think that's too much. When you pay for an Evolution, it shouldn't be over 10 matches, in my opinion. Unless the stats are like insanely crazy, but there hasn't been any Evolutions.

[00:55:18] So maybe the Blueprint one, Team of the Air, that's the one that was worth 500,000 coins. Fair enough. But other than that, I think that wasn't that many matches either. So EA need to, I think it would be nice if EA could adjust some of these. The free ones is fair enough. You need to do more matches, but the paid ones shouldn't.

[00:55:43] And then the defence, this has been the first real year of genuine, so many Evos last year. There were, and they've done a good job of stopping the breaking of Evos where people were getting 92 rated months into the game. I had a 99 rated centre-back. Yeah, so I like the way they're keeping that bit in line. I still think some of the frustrations are, again, I had a player, he's got one too many physical.

[00:56:12] So even though he's like 85 or 87 rated, he's got one too many physical and he can't go into an Evo. And you're like, oh, come on. Just put the cap on. He says, right, he can't get his physical past 92, but don't stop him because he's got 87. Yeah, that's. And I think we'll learn and improve that for next year. But right now, talking this one, there are the frustrations. Yeah. Yeah. I will. It is what it is.

[00:56:40] And I think the things they're doing currently is generally speaking much better. And I've seen little mistakes, far less mistakes than ever during the past couple of weeks. Gameplay patches has been there. We've got updates. We've got updated rosters. We've got new players in. Promotions are, I think, pretty good, actually. SBCs are on par. If I'm honest, I think I'm pretty happy at the state of the game, didn't you?

[00:57:08] I'm still waiting, though, for the SuperSub addition thing to... That was the only thing I was wondering. It's still not here, so... Yeah, it was announced with not the patch that was released now, but the patch before that. SBCs are coming soon. Coming in the future. Yeah, but it should come before the next patch, though, in my opinion. Next week, last time you said that, we got it like a day later, so... We'll see. Hopefully next week. Interesting to see how that works out.

[00:57:38] Definitely. Guys, thank you so much for joining me on this Friday evening. And, of course, thank you for listening and watching us, of course. If you like the show, you can always go to patreon.com forward slash foot in review to put in a little money and make sure we are able to keep doing this. And if you're not able to put in any money, that's totally fine. Just give us a sub, a like, a five-star review on either Spotify or Apple Podcasts.

[00:58:08] And, or tell your friends or family about it. Even if everyone just tells someone else and that someone else does play this show, we're helpful. We're very grateful for your help, I'd say. My voice is now totally breaking down, which means it's time for my weekend. Guys, thank you so much. Leave us with one thing left to do. And that is to... Drop it. Drop it.

[00:58:42] T To Give it a You