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The podcast hosts discuss an exclusive interview with Nicky Kavamba, a player from Barnet. They talk about his humility and his goal-scoring abilities. They then discuss the defensive issues that Barnet is facing, including a lack of communication and basic defensive principles. They mention that the team's form has been poor and that the manager, Dean Brennan, may be under pressure. However, they also express trust in the manager and believe that promotion is still possible. Hello everyone and welcome to the UCSB podcast with me, Matteo, and I'm joined by Kyle, Liam and Najib. First things first, I want to talk to Kyle just briefly about our exclusive interview you did with Nicky Kavamba a couple of weeks back, which is on our website, which is UCSB.wordpress.com. How was he? He was a nice guy. He comes across like a nice guy. Obviously I got into contact with the media guy at Barnet and managed to secure an interview with Nicky. He was a good guy to be fair and got some good info out of him about the season so far and his career in general. One thing that stuck out was his humility. Although he scored 19 goals this year, he's already looking for more. He knows that he's up against Paul McCallum, who's a great striker as well, in the race for the Golden Boot. The title of the article is, we'll get promoted and I'll win the Golden Boot, so it's looking like he's on track for that. He's a good guy as well. When I saw him for the first time actually play in real life on Saturday, he's just all about the goals, isn't he? He just manages to score from wherever. Anyway, moving on to the other two. Barnet, let's talk about their defence and how dire it is. Well, well, well. I don't know about anyone else, but I saw the performance here from Newport a couple of days ago. There was a lot to say. It looks a bit disjointed at the moment, I can't lie. I know Newport are a higher league side, but regardless, there were some basic key principles of defending missing there. You see, lack of communication between the keeper and the centre-backs, which was happening a couple of times actually. Especially the first minute of the game, and then considering Aaron Joel, because Colleen didn't actually end up listening to Walker. I think that's going to be a big issue, how they want to get promoted this season. Do you think the lack of communication is because he's changing up the defence pretty much every game? Possibly, but I feel like as a team you need to be able to drop and change easily. You need to be able to communicate with all your teammates effectively to be able to enable your manager to switch. Especially in the National League, where you're playing many games a season. Because you've got the FA Trophy, FA Cup, you've even got the National League itself, which is quite full of pitches. So you need to be able to drop and change your teammates and be able to communicate effectively. I mean, personally I think they're lost to Chesterfield. Mess with them psychologically. I think it started down the spiral, didn't it? I feel like they've not been back to their best since. I mean, I thought after Saturday they wouldn't be, but I was wrong. Yeah, I feel like Saturday, I think... Is it OK Saturday again? Maystone, yeah. OK, Maystone, yeah. I knew it was a high-scoring game, I mean it sounds like it meant that much. I do remember seeing it, Kibamba bagged a few and it goes on what Kyle said. And what he said in his interview, he thinks he can get the Golden Boot, he just wants to bring it down the league. Yeah, but I think with the game against Maystone, it's a game they should be winning and they won. Exactly. In the last, I think, seven games, they've only won one game and they've also conceded 18. So, yes, you could blame the players, but no matter who's playing, that is a mistake. So, I think you've got to look at the manager and Dean Brennan also, because you could change the defence, you could change the shape, you could change the players, but if the same mistakes are keeping on happening no matter who's playing, then there's only one man to look at and that is the manager. For example, against Newport, you would see them, as in you see them drew in the first game, because I feel like he was more reserved in the first game, especially away from home, he wanted to keep it tight. That obviously ended in a 1-1, but you're at home in front of your fans. And I said he conceded three goals in transition and that's been... I've seen that happen in the last few games and there's a saying that if you win, it creates a good habit, but also if you lose, it creates a bad habit as well and I feel like that's what's happening right now with not only the manager, but the players and also the fans. But Najeeb, what did you actually think of their defence? I know you went to go and see their harrow versus the Barna game a couple of weeks ago. The Wolves' turn, yeah. The Wolves' turn, yeah. A game like that, especially because it's a derby, I would understand why the players... and sometimes conceding goals in a derby, obviously don't get me wrong, I feel like in a derby it's more about the passion and who wants to win it more. And what I saw from the Wolves' own players was, every 50-50 they were jumping in, every tackle the fans were cheering. Obviously they were at home, so they're going to have the fans on their side, but sometimes it's the psychological intention, not only what's being played on the match. They don't have the mental habit that they had earlier on in the season. And obviously, as I said before, losing is a habit, and obviously they've lost their last few games, so it is looking a bit bleak, especially the fans. They were on a high, especially early on in the season, now it's dropped all of a sudden. So I don't know what you boys have got to say about their form. I just want to allude to something I've mentioned before, which is the fact that he's talked about in his post-match a lot about how his philosophy is man-to-man, like defending, like he said, sitting back against Newport helped him a lot. But after the Newport replay, he's saying that we need to go back to a direct style of winning football, as he calls it, because the goals they've conceded are so poor, and they all come as a result of counter-attacks. See in the Oldham game, which I went to, they lost 4-1 as well at home, and all of the goals were on the transition, just one ball, and the whole defence is split open. Like I think Mateo alluded to, he keeps changing the defence, and on Tuesday he put a Findlay Potter at centre-back. Findlay Potter's a 19-year-old who's just come from Sheffield United, and he's barely played central centre-back this season. So to put him up against Omar Bogle, who's one of the best strikers in League 2, a strong physical specimen, he's obviously going to struggle. So I think, like he talked about in his post-match, he needs to just start playing direct football, winning football, and switch away from his philosophy to stop the rot. Just speaking about Dean Brennan, he hasn't been able to cope with his defence recently, but we've heard in the last few weeks that he's favourite for the Burton job, so is there now more pressure on him, and are the fans putting him under more pressure, and do you think he'll leave? I think it's the opposite, actually. He's worried that he could leave, because when he took over, Barnett was at the lower end of the National League last season, and he's took them to a good position, third, they're in the play-offs, so for him to leave, it would just remove all that progress they've made in the last year or so, and they'd have to find a new replacement and maybe a new style of football that could affect them. Yeah, but I think that before Dean came in, there were so many manager changes before that, and there was no stability at the club, and Dean's brought that stability back, so I think that the way to go for Barnett at the moment and in the near future is stabilising. Yeah, I completely agree. Obviously you did say about a new manager bounce, but that's not 100%. If the current manager and the players have a very good connection, which from my perspective it feels like they do, if you stack that manager who they trust and who they put their faith into, questions are going to be asked about other people, about the manager of the board, and the players are going to feel disconnected to the club. Right now, obviously, it is a tough form, and it is tough, especially in the National League when you're playing every few days and you don't have a big, bloated squad. It's very hard for you to keep your players fit and keep them fighting, but in the National League, anything can happen. You could win, as in three or four games, and you could climb up six or seven places. It's just about form, and right now it does seem a bit bleak for them, but you have to trust the manager, especially if he's getting linked to jobs which are obviously League Two and higher. I truly do believe that he's a top manager and he does deserve the time and the respect from not only the fans but also from the media. I think I can back up what these two boys have said as well, to be honest. When you're getting considered next to Gary Rowett, who's also a contender for that Burton job, who's had the high praise of nearly getting the meal into the Premier League last season, and then missed out on the playoffs, unfortunately. It's a credit to Dean Brennan because he has lifted up this Barnett side, and as they've said, it'll be a big hit if he goes because I don't think they'll be able to find someone that's good enough to keep Barnett in the playoff positions as it stands. As he's doing, he can just find a way to get Barnett back on the ways, I think. Last thing about Dean and Burton is he's got two years left on his contract, so even if Burton won him, they'll have to pay compensation. I think he'll stay and sort of see how the project... You think he'll see how his contract? He'll definitely see how his contract, but he has notoriously left clubs before, like Hemel Hempstead and Wildstone, to go on to bigger things. We all know that you can't win every game in football, so Barnett are just going through a bad period at the moment, but do we all think promotion's on the table, or has that lost to Chesterfield a few weeks back? They could have finished first, they could have finished above them, but it doesn't look like that's going to happen anymore. Well, I was going to say, I feel like if they can get back to winning ways, then anything can happen, but if you're looking at this current moment in time, where they've only managed to get one win out of their last seven, it's not good enough to get into the playoffs, let alone get promoted. So you'd have to have a look at that, to be honest. I think they're third at the moment? They're currently third, and they're five points from fourth, so they have a five-point cushion. They've still got a cushion between them and them playoff places, but they're going to make it hard for themselves if they keep losing games like they have been losing in the last couple of weeks. I think the problem is the teams that are below them, Gateshead and Aldershot, not really Sally Hall-Morris who are fourth, but Gateshead and Aldershot are in great form at the moment. Aldershot beat Stockport yesterday, who are around the top of League 2, so they're in form and Barnett are sort of on the downward, even though they won against Maidstone. They've lost four out of five. Yeah, they haven't played a league game for a week or so, so we're waiting to see how they bounce back against Ebbsfleet on Saturday. I still do think that promotion is still on the cards. Maybe not coming first and getting that automatic promotion, but obviously through the playoffs they have a chance. They do have a very strong squad, and they have a game in hand against Bromley, and if they win they go to the same points. Right now the biggest problem, as we said before, is them conceding goals. Now the question that you have to ask is how do you stop them conceding goals, and whether that's changing the tactical system, changing the suite. We ain't managers, so we can't really point it. I think he needs to go back to how he played against Newport away. But that's not his philosophy, though, that's the problem. They're going to find their way down the table then, if he doesn't do that. I think sometimes when you're in a tough form you need to go back to basics. Right now he needs to go back to basics, and once you're doing the basics right then you can move on to the more complicated stuff in order to find your form again. Why was it working a month ago and two months ago to now? Because that's how he's been playing and it's been working. It was working because he had players that were in form first and foremost, and they were firing. For instance, Nicky scored all of his goals in the first period of the season, and now he's only scored in the league one in seven. That was against Wilson, the loss. I think he's quite isolated. The one thing I've talked about on Twitter and other socials is that Barnett doesn't really have a right side at all. When you watch them, all the play goes down the left to Idris Kani, and I think that's something that needs to be rectified in the January transfer window. Speaking about the transfers, the money they would have got to get through to the next one would have massively helped them, but now they can't do that. They had a favourable tie in Eastwood at home if they'd got through, but that was a key. They've still got the FA trophy, though, to be fair. There's chances to play at Wembley. If you were to ask a Barnett fan going into the game against Newport, I think they most likely would have thought it would have been a loss anyway, so I just think they'll look at it in terms of money point of view. I think mainly the fans will be looking at it and worried about how they play, because Newport, especially the reputation of the last few seasons, they're a hard side to beat. The players are tough, you know what they're going to do, they're going to sit back, they're not going to try and hit you on the break. We saw that in the first game, but the worrying thing to fans, to the manager, and to the media alone would be how they bounce back, which for me is the biggest question. I've got a question. I feel like from what we've seen, that Barnett have been trying to get a cup front on, so I feel like they've lifted the mood really, especially in the FA trophy now, because that's one of the only trophies they can go for this season. Do you think that the cup allowed Barnett to get a hard reset on their league? As Kyle said earlier, they've not had a league game in a week, which is quite a long time in the National League, but do you think that may allow them to regroup and hopefully come back stronger? Yeah. I think that if they would have got a result against Newport, then I think it would have been fine. But now they've lost another game by a big margin, so the confidence has been knocked again. And Ebb Street away is a tough game, even though they're in the relegation zone at the moment. So they need to get a result in that sort of kick-on, and now is the Christmas period, they've got a lot of games coming up. They've got Southend twice, they've got Boreham Wood, and these are all games that are... One of them's a derby, and they're going to be tough. So I think that they need to, like I said, go back to basics, play balls up to Nicky so he can hold it up, stop conceding goals on the transition. And, yeah, I think they just need to sort of stabilise. These games are all must-wins at the moment for Barnett, because just checking here on the table, between eighth and third place, there's only nine points in it. So all you have to do is lose a few, and the people behind you win a few, and then you're down. And they can't afford to do that at the moment. But just to finish up, boys, what's your predictions for Barnett for the end of the season? Do you think they're going to get promoted or not? I think they need... Well, they will finish second or third and get a home tie in the semi-finals of the play-offs. I think they have to, because they need to show progress from last season, and that would be a step further than they got last season. So I think they'll get into the play-offs. For me, I think it's the same thing. I'm just glad I shouldn't repeat what Kyle said, basically. But I think they will get second or third, and I think they will get a home tie. I really do think that they can get promoted. All it takes is a few games to turn your form around, and I do want to be positive for Barnett, so I do think the manager and players can turn it around, and I think the match-winning fans can help them and support them too. See, I'm going to be the tank of my own body here. I'm going to say that I don't think they'll get promoted, especially if they continue the way they're going at the moment. Obviously, I do hope that Barnett get promoted, but I'm looking realistically, and I don't think they will get promoted, just off of some of the signs you've seen in the last few games. What about the play-offs? They might get play-offs, don't get me wrong. It might be a big drop-off. It might be a very big drop-off for them to drop out of the play-offs, but I don't think they'll get promoted in the play-offs. Personally, I think they'll get to the play-offs, but I agree with Liam, I'm not sure. Right now, they have what it takes to be promoted this season. But that's all the time we've got today, so thanks for tuning in. Thank you, Mathieu. See you again next time.