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Learn English Through Football Podcast: 2022 Women’s Euro Final

On this football language podcast for learners of English we look at some of the language from the 2022 Women’s Euros final match beween hosts England and Germany: ‘clip the ball over‘; ‘turn in‘ and ‘ping‘. You can read the transcript for this podcast below, while you can also check out our glossary of footballing phrases here and visit our site to access all our previous posts and podcasts. If you have any suggestions or questions then you can contact us at admin@languagecaster.com.

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Learn English Through Football Podcast: 2022 Women’s Euro Final

DF: Hello again everyone and welcome to Languagecaster.com – the football-language podcast for learners of English who love the beautiful game of football. I’m Damian and I’m in a very sunny Sweden – I’ve been travelling around the north of Europe for a few days and that’s one of the reasons why the podcast has been slightly delayed this week. Now, it’s [been] a week since the final of the Women’s 2022 European Championship game [final] between England and Germany which the hosts England won 2-1 after extra time and this of course has led to huge celebrations in England.

Now, I’m one half of the languagecaster team, the other member of course is Damon who’s based in Tokyo, in Japan and for those regular listeners who listened in to the preview to the Women’s 2022 Euros final in our podcast from last weekend, you may have noticed that one of us went for a Germany win on penalties after a 1-1 draw (that was close), while the other one (yep, that would be me!) went for a 2-1 England win. Congratulations to England – the Lionesses – on winning their first ever major international tournament. So, in today’s podcast we will look at some of the phrases to describe the three goals from the final and to do this we will use a report from The Guardian newspaper. The three phrases are: ‘clip the ball over‘; ‘turn in‘ and ‘ping‘.

Stinger: You are listening to languagecaster.com (in German)

Clipped the ball over/Line-splitting pass

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A long-range line-splitting pass from Keira Walsh fed Toone and the Manchester United forward clipped the ball over Frohms. (Guardian.co.uk)
The opening goal was scored by England player Ella Toone who had come off the bench only six minutes earlier. She lifted the ball over the goalkeeper to score – some might call this a chip or a dink as these are both words to describe a raised shot that is hit over the goalkeeper – but in this report, the word clip is used; she clipped the ball over the keeper. To clip the ball is a type of chip as it describes when a player lifts the ball in a very accurate manner – either as a pass or a shot. So sometimes we can hear the phrase ‘a clipped ball‘ or a ‘clipped pass‘ which would be an accurate pass in the air between team mates. So, in this example, Toone is running towards the German goal and lifts the ball over the keeper, she has clipped it over the keeper.

There is also an interesting phrase used in the report to describe the pass that allowed Toone to score: ‘a long-range line-splitting pass‘. So, let’s break this down a little to help with understanding. The first part to describe the pass is that it is a long-range pass and this means that Walsh hit the ball a long way or over distance; it was a long ball or long pass. The second part of this phrase is ‘line-splitting‘ which means that the pass split the lines or cut through a line of opposition players. If a pass breaks through the lines it means that it has got past the line of opposition players. Players that can do this kind of pass are very valuable in football as they can break the press and move their own team forward much more quickly. The suggestion is that this pass from Walsh is extremely accurate as it has got through the opposition’s defence and set up a chance for her team mate Toone.

Ping in a cross

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Neat play from the substitutes Sydney Lohmann and Wassmuth allowed the latter to ping in a cross that was turned in by Magull from close range. (Guardian.co.uk)
The German side equalised with ten minutes remaining in the game when their best player Lina Magull scored from near the goal – from close range. The report says that she turned the ball in which means that she guided the ball into the net. The German striker scored after an assist from Wassmuth (she is ‘the latter’ in this example) and this assist was a cross or centre which of course is a pass that comes from the wing and this was pinged in. So, to ping a ball in football means to hit the ball hard and fast – there is a suggestion of accuracy here too though not always.

Turn in

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…with 10 minutes remaining a Hemp corner was swung in, the ball bounced down off Bronze and Kelly turned in her first international goal.(Guardian.co.uk)
We have already seen in the previous example that the German equaliser was turned in by Lina Magull and this verb, ‘turn in‘ is also used here to describe the winning England goal from Chloe Kelly. To turn in a cross or a pass means that she changed the direction of the ball with her foot so that the ball would go into the net. Sometimes we might hear that a player has turned home a ball or a cross – and here ‘home‘ of course means the goal. So to turn home or to turn in is to score from a pass or a cross.

Stinger: You are listening to languagecaster.com (Dulwich Hamlet fan)

So, let’s take a look at the original sentences again:

  1. A long-range line-splitting pass from Keira Walsh fed Toone and the Manchester United forward clipped the ball over Frohms.
  2. Neat play from the substitutes Sydney Lohmann and Wassmuth allowed the latter to ping in a cross that was turned in by Magull from close range.
  3. …with 10 minutes remaining a Hemp corner was swung in, the ball bounced down off Bronze and Kelly turned in her first international goal.

Stinger: You are listening to languagecaster.com (In French)

Contact

Now, if you want to ask any football-language questions or simply say hello then you can do so by adding a comment on our site here or by using our forum. Now, we’ve just had a few question and recently a about the phrase ‘a good run‘ which you can check out there. You can also send us an email at admin@languagecaster.com and you can also look out for us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

Draw Level

Now, we’ve also had a great question from one of our listeners, Alberto, about the verbs used to describe a draw. He asks, ‘in Italian to draw/tie a match is translated a€œpareggiarea€ (a€œparia€ being a€œlevela€) (apologies for my poor Italian, Alberto). And he asked how would you say [this] in English when the game is still going? The sides are drawing level? The sides are level?

Well, thanks a lot for the question Alberto. I think a TV commentator during the game might say one of the follwoing to describe the game being a draw:

  • The teams are (still) drawing
  • So, West Ham are still drawing…
  • They are drawing 1-1
  • The game is still level (at 1-1)
  • The game is still tied (at 1-1)

While at the end of the game we might hear:

  • The game was drawn (1-1)
  • The game was tied (1-1). I think tie might be more common in the US but it is still used in other places.
  • The game finished in a (1-1) draw

Now, looking back at previous matches (i.e. the games have finished) we might hear something like these:

  • Tottenham drew 1-1 with Southampton
  • The teams drew when (they last met)

So, to draw level would be used during the game to describe the action of one team equalising – they have drawn level with the other side (we can also use the phrase ‘to peg back‘). So, they were losing 0-1 but then scored to make it 1-1 and so we can say that they have drawn level with their opponents. Sometime we might also hear ‘draw level‘ when describing the league table (referring to a points total). So for example, Manchester City’s win saw them draw level with Tottenham at the top of the table (I am dreaming here of course!).

I hope that helps a little Alberto and thanks for the question again – it’s really interesting to see how other languages describe their football!

Stinger: You are listening to languagecaster.com (in Greek).

Goodbye

DB: Yes, you are listening to languagecaster and that message was in Greek and we’d love to hear from anyone else who might like to share this message, ‘you are listening to Languagecaster.com‘. Don’t forget that there’s a transcript to this podcast and lots of vocabulary support which you can access by coming along to our site. We thinkA  it’s a great resource for those learning and teaching the language.

OK, that’s it for this short football-language podcast in which we looked at some of the language from the final of the recent 2022 Women’s Euro and in particular we looked at the phrases, ‘clip the ball over‘; ‘turn in‘ and ‘ping‘. Hopefully my favourite team Tottenhm manage to turn in a few goals in their first game of the new season this weekend.

We’ll be back soon with more football language and until then enjoy all the football. Bye bye.

Related Vocabulary

Learn English Through Football Podcast
Learn English Through Football Podcast
Damian Fitzpatrick

Learn English Through Football Podcast: A show for football fans to improve their English language skills

Welcome to the website that helps students interested in football improve their English language skills. Soccer fans can enhance these skills with lots of free language resources: a weekly podcast, football phrases, explanations of football vocabulary, football cliches, worksheets, quizzes and much more at languagecaster.com.

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