Plus, we also taste-tested those special World Cup-themed crisps (except you’re not really allowed to call them that because of merchandising rights, and the like). Spanish Chicken Paella may, quite possible, be the most revolting thing I’ve ever put in my mouth.

Second off, as Ebbsfleet United and MyFootballClub.co.uk are one of of the few football issues I mention on here regularly, I thought I’d draw you attention to my post at twofootedtackle on The Five Pound Football Club.

I shouldn’t be surprised that these schemes keep popping up. Somebody, somewhere either thinks they can succeed or make money from it but until the solve the annual renewal issue, it’s just not feasible in my book.

My book also reckons they should start a club from scratch, but that’s a completely different post for a different time.

Finally, a few people have asked what I’ll be doing for the World Cup and the answer is sitting around, drinking beer and watching football. That and a few arbitrarily timed podcasts.

I’m probably not going to write much, if anything at all, about the World Cup, partly because there’ll be so many others fighting for your attention, and partly because I don’t feel international football is enough of a speciality of mine for me to bring anything different to the table. That may change if I get inspired, but I’d rather enjoy the tournament rather than worry about spouting the same lines as everybody else.

Besides, things like the unexplained disappearance of Grays Athletic from the footballing map are far more interesting.

What’s really impressive is the twofootedtackle podcast’s co-nominees. EPL Talk and World Soccer Daily are pretty good, but Football Ramble and especially the Guardian’s Football Weekly are the dons of the football podcasting world. I suspect anybody starting a footballing podcast has Football Weekly in their mind when they do so.

Essentially, Chris and I are two people who host a podcast in our spare time. Said pod is less than a year old and has a relatively modest number of regular listeners. To even be in the same company as those on the list is a real delight and one I think Chris and I are still a tad surprised by.

I know we’ve not won (and I don’t in a million years expect us to do so), but I’d like to say a few words of thanks to a few people as just getting to the list is an achievement. First off, to Chris for being a great co-host and always coming up with fresh ideas, to Porter Novelli for letting us borrow their studio each week, and, most importantly, to every single one of our guests on the podcast.

Seriously, it would be nothing without the variety of opinions we get from you all, and it’s genuinely enjoyable to head into the studio each week not knowing where we’ll be heading on our footballing chat journey.

At this stage you’re probably expecting me to jump up and down and implore you all to vote for us, but I find that all a bit embarrassing (and a tad egocentric. And frankly, I don’t need any extra help to sound like a tosser at the best of times).

What I will say, though, is if you listen to the show and really like it, then please do press the button next to our name. But only if you genuinely think we should win. The rest of the list is populated by great podcasts, so I seriously won’t be offended if you think they’re better (as they probably are).

Voting form is here.

Well, I’ve never been one of pay that much attention to Them, and anyway, They are wrong. Last Thursday I found myself in a recording studio talking all things football with Tim Vickery for the twofootedtackle podcast.

Proving if you don’t ask you don’t get, Chris dropped him an email inviting him to come on the show as he was in London and a couple of week later he was in our studio.

Footballers, I can do. Celebrities, I can do. One of my favourite football writers? Just a tad nervous. It also doesn’t help that Brazil is one of the few leagues I know next to nothing about (I’m a lot more au fait with Argentina).

But it was great fun, Tim Vickery is a great guy and the podcast, sounds, er, great. Great. It’s certainly inspired me to push the pod onto greater things.

Although talking football on a podcast with Tim Vickery wasn’t ever on my list of things to do before I die, I’ve decide to add it on there now. It’s my life and I can change the rules, thank you very much.

In one of those weird quirks of fate, I had my hair cut yesterday by a Brazilian hairdresser. I think he was somewhat suprised by my (newly-cribbed) knowledge of Brazilian football.

Anyway, in the meantime Michael Jackson passed away. He was actually, for a brief period of time, a director of Exeter City FC. Along with Darth Vader. I really wish I was making this up, but I’m not. I’ve told the whole bizarre and somewhat depressing tale over at Soccerlens.

Plus, over at twofootedtackle.com, we also did a slimmed down summer podcast. Listen and laugh at our woeful Confederations Cup predictions and marvel that nothing has happened on the transfer front in a week. That’s so not news it’s almost news.

We will be doing occasional podcasts over the summer but we’re taking a bit of a break for the time being to let us charge our batteries.

Then I’ve also put my two pence forward at Soccerlens on what changes should be made to the FA Cup, Champions League and UEFA Cup.

It’s already got accused of hateration from an Arsenal fan…

Then there’s the twofootedtackle podcast, with myself, Chris Nee and Kate Clarke, where we pick our Premier League team of the year, predict who’ll drop down to the Championship, chat MLS, share tips for poaching eggs, and have a quick chinwag with Bobby Zamora.

And then the longer Pulitzer-winning [2] version of the interview with BZ can be found at Soccerlens.

[1] If this were Argyle it would, naturally, be a slightly different story. Assuming I even bothered to write it.

[2] May be a lie.

First off, Soccerlens, where I have a brief look at the crisis clubs of the summer, namely Southampton, Darlington, and Stockport.

I won’t be including Fisher Athletic in the list as they were wound up today. There’s a quick obituary from me at twofootedtackle.

On a more cheerful note, Guardian scribe Will Dean joined Chris and I in the studio for a very entertaining twofootedtackle podcast. Among the topics discussed were: The most intelligent discussion you’re hear all year concerning Manchester City, the Champions League, UEFA Cup, the Premier League, MLS, Boca Junior ultras and why Whitley Bay has some of the nicest toilets in Britain.

Speaking of pies, the big debate on the pod this week was which football ground serves the best pie. Ollie says Plymouth (surely they just serve pasties there), Chris says Villa and I say Kidderminster (which Thom agrees with). I’ve never been to Wigan though.

(Other pie recommendations include Oldham and Bristol Rovers for pasties).

You can join in the pie debate by becoming a fan of the podcast on Facebook.

And, while I’m at it, this week’s Soccerlens piece is on the rise of AFC Wimbledon. Sadly not accompanied by the fall of Franchise FC.

So, in addition to this week’s Soccerlens column, which is mainly on Burton Albion’s title wobbles and includes references to Wilde and an impotence joke, there’s exciting news on the assorted football stuff I do.

As from next Tuesday (hopefully), my good friend Chris Nee and I will be producing the Two Footed Tackle podcast. Which is essentially chat about football, but hopefully an entertaining chat about football.

It’s not like this was planned. We’d both chatted about various podcasts we liked, he happened to mention he may have access to a radio studio, I mentioned my broadcasting background, and at that point we thought “why the hell not”.

It’ll be fun to get behind a broadcast desk again and even more fun to chat football for 40-odd minutes.

It’s very much a communal effort and we’ll be reviewing the big stories on the blogs as well as the papers, plus we’re hoping to get some guests, bloggers and general football fans, in the studio to counterbalance our witterings. Should be fun.

At some point in time, I should also be contributing (hopefully) to the excellent Soccerlens podcast, which is a couple of episodes old and a very good listen indeed. It’s also different to the one I’ll be doing with Chris, so you don’t get football fatigue.

It also means that all three of you who missed my dulcet tones after left the newsreading business will be able to get, um, aural pleasure from it again.

Or something.