Hiya folks, episode 18 is finally on the cards. In it, in light of his recent appointment to the gilded ~Premier League~, Martín and Will share an insightful discussion with De Zerbi aficionado Jack from the archives. The lads talk all things Sassuolo, Shakhtar, and more.

What makes this fella so interesting? What better than to let one of his disciples get you up to speed.

Do tune in :)

Find us on Twitter @touchlinetheory.

Find our shrewd guest Jack @JackM_77!

Find Martin @MG_theory2, and Will @WA_theory!

Subscribe, share, and send us your feedback! Exclusively destructive criticism is our personal preference.

Oh Baby! Episode 17! Touchline Theory returns after another lengthy hiatus, fueled by the emotional impetus delivered by our newest number one fan. Hailing from Brisbane, Australia--Jonathan, we welcome you to the family! Today, our dynamic duo waste little time recapping the months they've been out of commission, and instead leap headfirst into a classic question: what is tempo? .. and maybe why should we care?

As they soon find out, the term is hard to define. It carries musical analogues that can help us begin to grasp the concept, but a range of discussions surrounding units of measure leaves Martin and Will with a full appreciation for the difficulty at hand. Do touches slow the play down? What about passes? What about time on the ball? What happens when everyone sprints but the ball stays still? Vice versa? Does territory matter? Should this be split into x and y terms? If CBs ping the ball back and forth, can that clog our devised metrics? Is this a collective or individual thing? What do other smart folks in the field think? Are any of them right? Are any of them wrong?

The gang proceeds to investigate how tempo might impact scouting and the transfer of skills from one environment to the next. They chat about about the distinctions between attacking and defending tempos--who sets them, who responds, and the importance of changes or stable game pace. Is dT/dT the *real* term of value in all of this? Perhaps.

Are there some players that have the special ability to manipulate tempo on the fly? How does this compare to other sports like basketball? Doing some players accelerate or decelerate the play? How do individuals impact resistance to fluidity, or add some verve to the ongoing play? Is there anything empirically better about high tempo? Can we do less without knowing what more is?

Join us to hear our thoughts on all these items, and more--including a consistent misuse of Dan Burn as a quintessential Peter-Crouch-esque tall striker when he's actually a centerback (we'll apologize for this next week), Marcus' podcast debut, 120 bpm (unitless), Florian Wirtz the conductor, moral relativism, a dose of dashpot molasses, and a redacted skebop! for good measure.

Find us on Twitter @touchlinetheory.

Find Martin @MG_theory2, and Will @WA_theory!

Subscribe, share, and send us your feedback! Stamps and cursive are both preferred.

Episode 16! Another guest! Today, Austin Reynolds of The Philadelphia Union II, Soccer Detail, and the widely-referenced Spielverlagerung joins the TT Pod to talk all things substitutions. It's jam packed, as the kid--only 24--is a fountain of knowledge (currently taking his USSF A license course) and brings more than his fair share of insights to the table. Let's hop in.

The show begins with a discussion on fatigue. One of the main reasons players get subbed, at all, is because their tired--but how exactly does exhaustion impact performance? Switching gears, Martin & Austin chat about some of the cognitive challenges that can come with replacing anyone at all--perhaps suggesting that the original conviction was erroneous. Many coaches feel reluctant to make changes since it inherently proposes that they may have made a mistake in the starting xi. Things continue to wind towards the art of timing subs optimally. How late is too late? When should you bring players on? Are time-wasting extra-time subs actually wasteful? Does that strategy even work?

From here, the convo goes psychological, as the duo aim to pick apart the mental side of things. Coming on in the 92nd minute--even if your interruption of the game's intensity does, in fact, help earn the team a win--sucks. It's plain and simple. So when you have a full bench of players who might get thrown on in the 60th, or the 92nd, how do you keep them motivated? The two run through a few examples of social dilemmas that may be encountered in situations of this ilk.

There's more to all of this, too. are there better ways to engage the bench in problem solving during the match? What kids of questions should we ask the bench to keep their minds active? Are there subtle ways to reframe the role of a sub so as to make it clear how important they are to potentially disinterested people? Does the route of altering nomenclature to solutions or finishers make an effectvie sugar coat, or is it all nonsense?

Before ducking into the lockerroom, Martin peppers Austin with a few final curiosities. Should you ever sub first? Should you ever sub more than one player at once? How long do you wait until it's safe to make your final sub? What happens when you, or they, go down to 10 men?

Emerging from the dugout, the conversation springs right back into things after the whistle. It all starts with youth players, and how there's an emerging idea that prodigious talents must learn, at the pinnacle of their young successes, how to play a role (substitute) that they'll likely never played before. When you ascend through the academy, it's likely because you're dominating every minute--yet, when you take the field for the first time, you probably won't be a starter. How does that work> How can you teach players to earn their full, first team chances from the bench? Does the need to prove oneself cause some to deviate from their optical actions?

Next up is the idea of a subs coach, pioneered by Wimbledon in recent times, and as reported by The Athletic and Tifo's YouTube Channel. Sammy Lander, the man of the hour, is fully in charge of those player who'll eventually come in. He warms them up for 15 minutes, on the field, while the rest go in for a halftime talk. This seems really compelling--but the question may be asked: does this further fracture the social divide between starters and subs? If not, then it sounds like a solid idea.

Measuring the impact of subs can be difficult, too, if they have a certain runway necessary to get fully engaged with a game. Stats collection might be swayed by this and need correcting.

Lastly, the discourse leads to 5 subs. If the world does this, permanently, what changes? Tactically, what might unfold? How does this disproportionately benefit larger teams--or perhaps even smaller ones? Will talent hoarding become more egregious? Where might this all end up?

Join us to hear our thoughts on all these...