Episode 649 – The AFTN Soccer Show (Momentary Blissness with special guest Axel Schuster)

We’re back with another AFTN Soccer Show packed full of Vancouver Whitecaps, Canadian national team, and general Canadian football chat. It's our last show of 2024 - our New Year Special! What a year it's been. For the Whitecaps it was one that promised so much, saw some relative highs amongst disappointment, and then ended in turbulent fashion with the sacking of head coach Vanni Sartini and the announcement that the club was up for sale. Never has the phrase "out with the old, in with the new" been more applicable to the team. We sit down with Whitecaps CEO and Sporting Director Axel Schuster in our 40 minute annual "State of the Whitecaps" interview to chat about it all, to look ahead to 2025, and more. What's happening with the coaching search? What's the sale interest been like? What players could we see coming in? There's a lot to talk about. We also bring you our Canadian national teams end of year review, in what was a wild 2024 both on and off the pitch, plus we chat with Cindy Tye about her year with the U20s and senior women's team. All of this plus we look at the other Whitecaps news of the week as two players get set to depart, the breaking news that Vancouver FC's Rob Friend has taken up a CEO job in Malaysia, we hand out our final end of the year awards (heroes and villains edition), and music-wise we wrap up our 2024 Festive 15 with the songs that came in at the top three positions. Who will take the coveted number one spot?! And we finish 2024 with an absolute quality Wavelength song from Armchair Loyal. Here’s the rundown for the main segments from the episode: 01.41: Intro- Christmas, New Year, and 2024 musings 26.17: A 2024 Football In Memoriam 29.00: Whitecaps News of the Week 36.00: Vancouver FC's Rob Friend become CEO of Malaysian FA 43.11: AFTN's 2024 Festive 15 - #3 Fontaines D.C. - In The Modern World 48.20: Axel Schuster's State of the Whitecaps interview 88.56: AFTN's 2024 Festive 15 - #2 Electric Callboy and Babymetal - Ratatata 94.10: Canadian national teams Year in Review 125.37: AFTN's 2024 Festive 15 - #1 Fontaines D.C. - Starbuster 131.38: More AFTN End of Year awards - heroes and villains edition 162.25: Blankety Blank! 169.20: Wavelength - Armchair Loyal - Shit 'n' Miss