i'm show business i'll see you then. eight years in the making and the twenty eighteen feet for world cup in russia is here the biggest event in international football kicks off in just two hours wherever there's a match. backed stadiums and fans dogs all eyes are on the pitch and the players from across the biggest country on the planet and our special studios from the face of a warm welcome to all of you for world cup twenty eight in russia. fans from across the globe have been out in force in the russian capital reveling in the festive atmosphere. to.

see we have unique insight and analysis from one of the best minds in the game manchester united manager joe samaria. hello from new center in moscow this thursday june fourteenth you can get up to speed on global developments in our call now though the wait for millions of football fans around the world is nearly over as the start of the twenty eight hundred fifty four world cup is now less than two hours away over the coming weeks we'll bring you the best of the atmosphere from all of the how cities across the biggest country in the world so now let's join our teams top team in the heart of the capital. yes it's another big hello here from the heart of moscow is the focal point of

international football right now but it will cut sixty four games. over the course of the next four weeks and we have one of the biggest names in the sport to help guide us through it joining us here on top of the four seasons hotel is paid off michael one of the greatest goalkeepers of all time to have you back in. so you were only two hours before. already but it's a must win game isn't it for this. again. i mean you know two years of not playing competitive football eight years of waiting i think a lot of players a lot of russian players they've been dreaming about this they cannot be one of the trying to three names in the squad can i be one of the eleven players actually playing in luzhniki in the opening match this is a big day not only for russia but for football we've had you know the fifa congress we've had the concerts so many official things going on in this week you know

teasing the world cup today i have to say the sixty four games they cannot come quick enough so i'm really looking forward to. tonight's game you mean if you look at the rankings and i much into them but there's not a lot of difference between these things would you expect to see that tonight on the pitch. so russia when one down just seventieth and the fifa ranking and saudi arabia's sixty seventh i believe in the latest. you can argue that russia's because it's not played competitive matches so we don't really know how good russia are at this moment in time because you know the play is. when you play a game. you try to do your best but when it's competitive you play for three points there's always something extra when you haven't done it for two years it can be difficult to pick it up in one go saudi arabia where they they they are there because that's where they are russia have an obviously scored a lot of future points because they haven't played for four points so put saudi

arabia there because if they are that's a level they're at and you know. if it's any sensical mind the knows about football will say russia has to say with the world cup history the number of players they have the quality of the players but you know it's an opening game and the roll call of the whole world is watching you know eight years there isn't all these fans everybody expects russia to win i think that the fans today. will play a really big part i think you know if i can give the russian fans a little bit of advice is to be patient and understand this is difficult for the players make sure that you support the team for the ninety minutes because the game is really ninety minutes and i know it's a cliche to say that but it is ninety minutes and it might take ninety minutes to break a team like saudi arabia down and i wonder when it's three points it's exactly the same as winning seven you know you don't get much more points for that so be patient support the team as long as they feel the love they can do that best. let's

talk about sacking fiat's in goal for russia today over one hundred caps he's played so many games i think he first started playing for us he was saying when he was eighteen i don't know how many minutes of football how many russian president so i think he's just processing fifty thousand minutes of football for russian and you know he was one of those young goalkeepers that that when i left i left my position on one thousand nine hundred ninety was on that short list of potential replacements we will actually meet the guy that replaced me he's going to come on this program and. i'm not going to say who it is but you will find out if you just say it i just said it. ok never mind on television obviously there you go but the thing is and i find this a little bit unfair and sometimes i protect the gokey was a little bit too much people criticize me for doing that but the thing is you cannot even know you're the best goalkeeper in the world you cannot keep clean

sheets if you're not protected by a defense and the obvious problem that russia has had in the last six seven eight months is crucial injuries to defend us so you know the defense has come in very very late into the preparations and the results are there you can see i think it's two point four five goals or something like that per game in the last year they've conceded that's a lot of goals that's not his fault he you know he's a big character he can do a lot for the team but he cannot do everything he can save everybody can see ten chances you know the likelihood is that one of them will go in the back of the net so everyone has to take part in defending and i think that today is as crucial and ski slowly i can let's listen to. the mansion ninety manager said about this he was with us in the studio a couple of hours ago and he's predicting a russian win despite the negativity here in the russian press. if i was.

checkers off i hope by chanting his name not so not so wrong i'll be happy because. no expectations no positivity no optimism everybody expects the war's end it can be in this moment in in his alltel we display years preparing everybody for that for their country pride for let's for that let's do it for the country let's do it for ourselves let's do it against the ones that don't believe in don't believe in us so i think can be can be a good. i think for them you want my personal opinion i give my personal opinion i think there is a little bit. of an identity crisis in the russian team. at least i think my generation used to have. the russian teams with a certain identity i think they lost

a little bit of that identity there in the search of that talent is not commands. but they have enough they have enough to win tonight they have enough to go through the group phase and of course later you will get the teams more talented with probably the best the best teams in europe the best teams in south america and then becomes a huge huge challenge but i would say that russia has has enough has enough to get . i would say probably the five points that you need to qualify. speaking to me a little while ago now is not just say up in the studio bring you coverage we've got a whole team lined up for you today so let's see who's on board you've got. the stadium there which is hoping i was thing to night's opening ceremony and then the crucial match between russia and saudi arabia and we've also got on the right. time in

sochi foresting and you can see the fish stadium behind action there tomorrow portugal spain a crucial match later in the day we'll be joined by several other correspondents take. on all the action let's first go to the stadium here in moscow to you. became cakes are a little over two hours for a little less than two hours from now it is actually one of the sea atmosphere. well dieter it's definitely much louder here than when you and me came here a few weeks back just filmed for the peter schmeichel show it's buzzing with excitement thousands of. fans and we were here something four hours before the kickoff now it's obviously less than that and it was already crammed with people i took a train to the luzhniki area and the cot i was writing and it felt like like a global party i've heard german spanish arabic a english old all the languages you could think of it in just one caught in that it

was a full train of people so it is very exciting here clearly a lot of bands are going about because it's not only russia and saudi arabia fans it's also argentina it's also peru and even the countries which are not taking part in this world cup like china for instance a lot of chinese fans wearing their national team colors here even though their head again and not in the world cup and that has been the theme of what you have seen in the capital over the last several days you go everywhere in the city and you see the hordes of fans from across the world singing their songs that is something that is happening here as well and actually i took a little stroll down central moscow along red square and surrounding areas and try to learn a few things from the fans on the ground let's listen to that in my high energy report. and i have.

talked. to. you. you know breaking news moscow has been taken over by friendly forces meeting fans from all over the world and i'm here on a mission chanting as part of football culture and i want to learn chance from different parts of the world. i don't know exactly what these guys are chanting usually but i know the chant which will make them happy guys. plus our last book that i didn't get i'm going to michigan you teach many of the egyptian chance it was. i.

don't know i mean you know like i thought they did not know that a ahmed was in the circle proper stop drop a fan stop good god god. god i'm sure. i wonder what they will be chanting tonight. was. caribbean fans in moscow one of the largest representations. of. simplest one and.

only. legs i seems like you i looks like you had a really good time let me check you a little bit about the russian team here because the way i'm reading it there is a certain amount of doubt about how russia going to line up today and then i asked couple of games he's changed the system so he placed three at the back. but they still conceded goals do you know or have you got any ideas like you heard from anyone how they're going to line up today. well that's part of the mystery surrounding the russian national team because the last friendly that russian team had. last week we expected something close to the strongest eleven the russian mayfield but chess of continued to experiment the line up was told it different to that three at the back as well so tonight is a big mystery of course i would say that it's a one hundred percent certainty that the likes of feel the smell of alexandre. and

probably even if will start in the first line up the biggest mystery is the defense of course whether that would be a spot that moscow screwed up of whether that would be further could show off or the veteran shavit who came back out of retirement of international football to play for russia during the world cup that is of course yet to be determined i would say probably reasonable to play the brazilian model fernandez who actually got brazilian passed but you ought to play for the russian national team and got a russian citizenship he was one of the strongest last season of the season before that where the church asked if we trust him enough to put him in the back for the old back three for that matter that's of course a big question but you were mentioning how like last of the defense has been for the russian national team i agree with that just such an extent but there was also a problem very much visible in the charity game where there was very little creativity coming from the midfield and this is something successive will hopefully address tonight and that is probably the biggest mystery at least to me how exactly

is going to shape the engine the heart of the midfield for the russian national team but that is something we will know in less than an hour from now ok thank you very much actually it's forty five minutes till till the managers they have to give their team line up so we'll be keeping an eye on that and this is of course the world cup it's a showcase for every football in the world let's take a look at who the key players to watch ah. really.

ok well let's talk more about their star players because the rest so much talent on the spy isn't at this welcome i mean more than usual in terms of every same probably ten same's you will have a major star player i think that's correct. we will all talk about messi we will talk about name we all talk about an out of. the big names coming in here but this is not because i'm from denmark but there's a guy there christian eriksen which at this moment in time there's a big story that he he will go to barcelona after the world cup. and put a chain is just signed a five year contract with the person because the next place is person i said the first player i want to nail down after hurricane who's just timing is christian eriksen he's very much in demand and denmark is very depending on him performing

well and if he does it you know it really is an opportunity then might for to take it along but you know it is it's it's this is the interesting thing because we have play is that are playing for smaller nations and since we're up to thirty two teams now we get some of those smaller nations in here and we get to see them in the world cup and i could give you an example of a player that i've played with. player ryan giggs never played in a world cup never played in a european championship and he was probably one of the best players ever produced in the world and it's such a shame when you don't see these kind of players i mean looking ahead. next we'll have even more teams and then presumably you know that's a good thing isn't it and i some people curious might say will be too many weak teams in that tone and will get to say more and more place but you just just think about the excitement that we feel in the streets of moscow and everywhere we are just feel about the excitement of the world cup everybody wants to feel that i

think when and now it's always three countries it's a whole continent hosting i think it's only right that you can freeze the numbers of the number of teams and give the smaller countries that opportunity it's actually every four country now every four member state has an opportunity to to play in the world cup and we'll get to see more players that will get to see more talent and i think this is what football is all about and eventually everything goes exactly to plan you know presume argentina spain or germany will win it sure and that's a way of raising a lot of the surprise for somebody else other than it was you you see so it's not that you know the bigger countries are losing out they might claim they have to play some week it seems but the end of the day so what yeah sure like i want to talk about see those big things portugal and spain a big scandal but the day before it all kicks off spain siteman manager. how did you see tomorrow's game going between spain and portugal well you know this this

crisis for spain couldn't have come in a worse time they prepared really well they qualified they got twenty eight points out of thirty it was a solid qualification they were in the same group as italy it's really not even in the world cup but they kept them in the second place. that they come into the the tournament a second favorite people really like the way they play has really put used a solid team in the next generation after they won the world cup and now we believe that spain can win the world cup again and this happens and you know financial hero who is who is now the coach for the reminder of the world cup they only have one training session with the with the with the boys. before he's playing the european champions the arch rivals of spain portugal so you know this is this is something that's going to hurt spain and i'm sure it's going to diminish their chances they can still do really well but my god this is a massive crisis and i tell you another thing this is going to drag on it's going

to be a we're going to talk about this literally every day because everybody else would do that and we'll get new angles new stories out of it and we'll hear different things the players will eventually talk about it so this is not going to go away for this world cup and that's going to hurt spain i think i was talking to. a couple of hours ago about this but he was saying that the level of quality in the spanish team is so great that they won't be affected by this development but let's just hear what j.c. i think had to say about it when i did talk from a couple of hours ago. the match tomorrow i think anything can happen we portugal we feel confident enough to play against spain and try to win but i know that spain with the quality and class of the players they have they also feel confident that they can beat anyone and there's a fan i wouldn't be. held if we lose against spain. but i would not also be in haven't we should beat spain i think we both are going

to qualify. because they are two of the strongest teams in the competition it is the pick of the year of the bunch isn't it at the moment what do you make here of the fact that spain sent their manager yesterday just two days before this match and now a sink is a strange situation i don't know if spain second the manager if the manager second self we. there we everything happened between himself and real madrid i feel sorry for the manager of course because the you. when we did team for the last. two years and of course he would deserve to be with the team but i also understand the position of. of the for the ration they just gave him a new contract for the future if you threw out i read that the president of the federation was informed a couple of minutes before the club makes official is

a strange process what i feel is that it is a national team with such such a quality and such a maturity and such an understanding that the majority of the players belong to real madrid's. not so long. some. top class players with the philosophy of play that comes since lose out on as so many years and then. get so many years so i think the fact that he's not from la to take me on the bench and he's for another year on the street i don't think is going to make a huge difference. yeah i agree with a lot of what joe says saying there and of course the quality that spain they have and i just want to stress that they can still go out and win every game here that that is the level of the performance of the players that they have in their squad and they all said this yesterday many times they're all winners they know how to win trophies but it took got to be exciting to see what kind of quality and what

comic kind of game they bring to the game tomorrow and talk about quality. i succeeded this man here he succeeded me back bust that she was i mention i did i actually yes i left i went to. like i'm back well i mean yeah it's all good to see when the season gets here and i hate to see anything coming out now because you're from australia you moved back you've lived after some time now. you're in touch with one eye strain you're doing at the moment yes so we're going to talk about that but i just want your take on this spain situation what was your thought. i was always shocked i was really really shocked especially a day out from the world cup i thought maybe the federation was just trying to sort of you know turn around to show who's boss the lead and maybe apologize and that but nothing surprises me in football anymore it really doesn't. get involved in any situation there's always going to be a top fall and the bottom line is he who has the gold makes the rules and the

federation have decided he's going to govern gaza what the players have said you know what plays a life will be over say for us and say yes we want this we want them a sin is the big boss comes and says yeah how much do you want that you want to lose your place to go ok fair enough so yes i would like ivan now but look i agree of what peter was saying before they can still go on and win this and so i'm interested because you have both players fight any extremely high level this sort of news you're saying wouldn't affect you i think if it effects you in the it won't affect it would think me for ninety minutes of football i could i could easily set up. because it doesn't go away it's something that in a in a tournament like this you know you're speaking to the media every day you have a minimum fifteen minutes the day before game it's an hour but you speak to the media every day and after the game you have to go through the mix oh so you're in contact with the media at all times now because it doesn't go away you know you can say listen we will. and then no one will ever ask you again you have to

really you know you have to be content with that all the time you have to take to take a position you have to comment on it and it jacks it drains you out it will get so tired and i think it's happened so many times with england and this is one of the reason that england the code could never really on that never but i haven't really been making this is always something that is annoying to the squad and they can focus one hundred percent and it only takes one or two percent less to do the football one hundred percent right you know let's talk about denmark and astray ok you can head to head when you really did. a poll jeez man i'd like. recently well my deciding that i. was not going to get that degree because you're going to think we stole that and we saw that mistrial and you. just try supporters were shocked and. he's just being nice to us what's going on look with we had a difficult qualifying campaign we had to get through the playoffs we played syria

in a playoff and basically syria hit the post in the last minute if they had scored that goal they would have went straight then we played on their wrist and beat them quite convincingly then the manager resign and told us all to leave before he resigned just out of the blue. stepped in he had the team maybe for three months in title he had a camp with him in turkey look it's going to be very very difficult i've been against france that we saw in two thousand and six the same got to last sixteen astride his best record ever in two thousand and ten they got knocked out of the first round but they had the same points as two thousand and six any difference being a goal difference i've been in game two thousand and six we won three one i've been in game two thousand and ten against germany last fall neal said this game against france is going to be absolutely everything for us as well as what we keep saying you know you got three games you got them in ten things. and the first game is more important than the second and third because it hasn't been played yet but if you set yourself up like you said in two thousand and six you set yourself up with a win in the first game it changes the approach for the second game and it changes

how you would supply a seed but most certainly also how the manager wants to do it to to put your good team out tactically because. you will. likely hood would be that you go through one for one week and when the first day or the next not sure you're not safe but you more often than not you will go through one second cycle which now and i've tried both i've tried to get four points out to two games and go through and not go through. no sorry you got four points in two seconds if you know i mean so but we won the last game but we didn't win the first one we drew the first one last second so the first game. so important you have to and you play france we play peru and a funny thing about this and this is i have to speak to you also about that tomorrow is. true is eleventh in the world how how is he not looking at them hey i am i'm seriously more scattered through than i am in france and i know what

france and i know the quote is but i say half but i i really do not know what kind of peru team time job and it can be a nasty nasty shock if you're not prepared for for the eleven and they have you say one hundred percent wrong it is also not a fun same suppose they have here talking on the match on well all down i don't see how it is before we come up here we'll talk i was trying to have sides wait for his hands were just going in a mental i actually spots or so this is how many fans have you brought here and he was saying to me fifty five thousand now i don't know if it is fifty five thousand but what he said was what they're aiming for every game against denmark against france and then as a striker they want to make it like a high and toss a first world cup in thirty six years this week's audit and i grabbed one hundred percent roy high on the dock horses of the group but no in what i say on the dogs yeah they're going to be different we want to be in scotland scotland no disrespect they're not a great team but just watch the recently. top score and a captain he's been a tight supply they've got to be a very difficult same to because i get it coming back to the opening games that's

going to be so sorry for he came back and scored to who. he was he was banned he was banned for taking cocaine but it was the his fault it was in a cup of tea and it was proven that at the at the race for the ins he was given a choice of my suspension then schieffer cut it down to six and then go ping body they say has took it to the court of arbitration and they increase it to fourteen months but now pfieffer said listen there's so much doubt about this we suspend the sentence and you can now play for the correct one and the australian captain the danish captain and the french captain it's all related to fever saying this player you should play solos is also what i think so everybody is happy with that one before you can get people to talk about the star listen you straight. yes nineteen years old and iranian refugee correct daniel. i mean what a story absolutely amazing story i mean we do the local football and obviously we did a pretty laid back in australia but when these type of things come up it doesn't matter where it is what around the world they're just an amazing story so from january we had heard of him that warren joyce of peter those very well who used to be at

manchester as the coach of the city introduced him into it in january and we started asking him get away from what's he done because in australia it's very structured now the pathways how you get into playing first team football how you get to play for the national say but it's cost a lot of money and he said well this kid didn't go through any of those traditional paf ways only don't wish to play straight football and we picked him up as soon as we saw him that we sort of thought you know what he's a player that australia has no you know he's a player that could be maybe one day touch wood like a christian eriksen some think a little bit different i can go around one of my eyes i can open the game up and fair play to keep them in the squad of twenty six and then this was a twenty three now last friendly game against hungary it was a pretty poor guy typical friendly game you know but all of a sudden he comes on with twenty minutes to go people are getting out of their chairs he's saudi and he's good he's very good same time i'm going to have to leave it that doing very much and i think you've got a surprise maybe to somebody else but it just to give you an idea how i think these guys i think.