This Week: Football Phrasal Verbs 6

This Week: Football Phrasal Verbs 6

Rich: Hello my name’s Rich and welcome to our weekly round-up section called ‘This Week’ on Premier Skills English. 

Jack: Hi there. I’m Jack. We’ve got lots of interesting words and phrases to help you talk about football in English.

Rich: If you want to listen and read at the same time we have a transcript of this podcast on the Premier Skills English website.

Jack: This week we focus on Chelsea reaching the Women’s Champions League Final for the first-ever time, how football is fighting against racism and Manchester City being made to wait for the Premier League title 

Rich: We’re going to look at three headlines from the weekend’s action and look at six phrasal verbs awe use in those headlines.

Jack: This episode is called football phrasal verbs six and is the last in our series of episodes on phrasal verbs. 

Rich: We’ve looked at 36 phrasal verbs in total and if you want to go back and look at them all - the first five episodes are all on the Premier Skills English website.

Jack: In fact, you can always find all our latest content on the Premier Skills English website - it’s always freely available for you to enjoy and access to practise your English. 

Rich: The phrasal verbs we are looking at this week are: to get through, to let down, to put up with, to stamp out, to leave out and to call off.

Jack: Remember that we’ll also have a language challenge for you to have a go at later in the show so you need to be ready for that.

Headline 1

Jack: Chelsea reach first-ever Champions League Final.

Rich: Chelsea women got through their semi-final against  Bayern Munich - winning 4-1 and 5-3 on aggregate to set up a meeting with Barcelona in what will be a first European final for the London team. Fran Kirby scored twice but Chelsea’s defence didn’t let the team down with some fantastic last-ditch defending towards the end of the game.

Jack: What a result for Chelsea! The result was never in doubt!

Rich: Haha! I’m not sure about that - if Bayern had scored in the final minute they would have gone through on the away goal rule. Bayern were really on top in the last few minutes - even the Bayern goalkeeper was in the Chelsea penalty area.

Jack: Yes, there was some great defending and a brilliant goal line clearance to save the day for Chelsea. 

Rich: OK, our two phrasal verbs from our first headline are: to get through and to let down. 

Jack: To get through has a number of meanings but the one we are using here is to be successful in something that’s really difficult and in football it’s often used to say that a team has been successful in a stage of a competition and reached the next stage.

Rich: Chelsea got through their semi-final against Bayern Munich. They got through to the next round, which is the final, which will be played in Sweden in a couple of weeks.

Jack: The next phrasal verb is to let down. To let down someone means not to support or help somebody else in the way they expected - in the way they thought you would.

Rich: If a friend says they will take you in their car to a job interview and will collect you at 8.00 in the morning, you expect them to be there and not let you down.

Jack: In the Chelsea match the defence was fantastic against Bayern Munich and they didn’t let the team down. They supported and helped the team to an important victory.

Rich: There was also a bonus phrasal verb in our first headline. Did you hear it?

Jack: I did. It was to set up. We’ve used this one before. It means to arrange something. I might set up a meeting with staff on Friday.

Rich: Chelsea have set up a meeting with Barcelona. This meeting is the Champions League Final. Let’s move on to our second headline.

Headline 2 

Rich: No room for racism in the Premier League.

Jack: The Premier League joined the wider football community in boycotting social media last weekend in response to the continued racist abuse towards players and others connected to the game on social media platforms. No one should have to put up with racist abuse and racism on social media and it needs to be stamped out. 

Rich: It’s great that the wider football community have come together on this to take action and we hope that this will force a change in how disgusting racism is allowed to be used and spread on social media.

Jack: We looked at two phrasal verbs in this headline that were connected to this topic. We said that nobody should have to put up with racist abuse.

Rich: If you put up with something - you accept or tolerate something that is unpleasant or worse than unpleasant.

Jack: Nobody should have to put up with racist abuse.

Rich: The other phrasal verb we used is to stamp out.

Jack: To stamp out means to stop something that is bad. I think it comes from fire. If you see a small fire on the ground, you can put it out by stamping on it. 

Rich: Racist abuse on social media should be stamped out.

Jack: Let’s move on to our final headline.

Headline 3

Jack: City made to wait for the Premier League title.

Rich: Manchester City are one step closer to the Premier League title after a 2-0 win at Crystal Palace. City left out a few key players with one eye on the second leg of their Champions League tie against PSG but won comfortably with goals from Sergio Aguero and Ferran Torres. City were made to wait for the Premier League title however after Manchester United’s match against Liverpool was called off on Sunday.

Jack: City can now win the Premier League title on Saturday when they play Chelsea. To be honest, I think that’s better. It’s nicer to win the title at your own stadium after you’ve won a match rather than because another team hasn’t won somewhere else.

Rich: OK, let’s look at our two phrasal verbs from the headline. The first is to leave out. This is a very common football phrasal verb. In football, it usually means not to include someone in the starting eleven.

Jack: Manchester City left out Kevin De Bruyne and Ilkay Gundogan at Crystal Palace.

Rich: They were probably left out because Pep Guardiola wants them to be fresh for the match against PSG on Tuesday.

Jack: A player might also be left out because they are not playing well. When international squads are chosen for World Cups there is often lots of talk about which players will be chosen and which players will be left out.

Rich: The other phrasal verb we used in this headline was to call off. We said that the match between Manchester United and Liverpool was called off.

Jack: To call something off means to cancel something but in football, it usually means to postpone as matches are usually played again at a later time and they’re not cancelled permanently.

Rich: Matches are often called off in the winter because of bad weather.

Jack: OK, we’ve looked at three stories and six phrasal verbs in our headlines. The phrasal verbs we’ve looked at were:  to get through, to let down, to put up with, to stamp out, to leave out and to call off.

Rich: Listen to the headlines again to hear these words and phrases in context and don’t forget to look at the website for the transcript if you want to check your understanding of this vocabulary.

Headlines - Repeat
Prediction

Rich: It’s time for our football prediction. Last week neither of us got the correct prediction because the Manchester United - Liverpool match was called off. Do you want to choose a match this week, Jack?

Jack: Sure. Well, it’s a chance for City to clinch the Premier League title ... but it’s a tricky one because they are playing another team in top form - Chelsea. Both teams have big European matches this week and City will have had a day’s extra rest which I think will give them an advantage even though Chelsea still need the points for a top-four finish. I think this could be a really good game with lots of flowing football and lots of goals so I’m going to go for a 3-2 City win which will see them win the Premier League title.

Rich: Mmm … I’m not so sure I think City will have to wait a few more days because Chelsea will win 2-1.

Jack: Do you think Manchester City will be crowned Premier League Champions this weekend? Do you agree with me or Rich?

Rich: We want you to talk about all this week’s football on the Premier Skills English website.

Language Challenge

Jack: To finish up the show we’ve got a quick language challenge connected to this week’s vocabulary.

Rich: We’ve looked at six phrasal verbs in this week’s headlines and your language challenge is to use those phrasal verbs now.

Jack: We’re going to give you three sentences and you’ve got to decide which phrasal verb to use. You need to use one of the six we looked at earlier.  Can you guess the missing phrasal verb?

Rich: No, don’t worry about the own goal. You haven’t ________  it could have happened to anyone.

Jack: We shouldn’t have to ________ racism in football or anywhere and we should report it whenever we see or hear it.

Rich: If it carries on raining like this the match might be __________.

Jack: We want you to write the answers on the Premier Skills English website where we have some more questions and activities connected to this week’s show.

Rich: Or write your answers on Apple Podcasts or on Youtube if that’s where you listen to us. Just write the answers in the comments and say hi.

Jack: Before we finish we just wanted to say that we hope you found this lesson useful and we hope all of you stay fit and healthy.

Rich: Bye for now and enjoy your football