
Tired of the Premier League and big-league European football? Want to discover the hidden stories of the global game? The Sweeper Podcast is your passport to the most extraordinary stories from across the football world. From the World Cup and Champions League to the most obscure and overlooked competitions on earth, expert journalists Lee Wingate and Paul Watson explore the intersection of footba... more
| Publishes | Twice weekly | Episodes | 142 | Founded | 6 years ago |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Number of Listeners | Categories | SoccerNewsSportsSports News | |||

At the start of October, Chengdu Rongcheng had been top of the Chinese Super League all season and were given a 99.9% chance of winning the title: they had a 12-point lead over challengers Dalian Yingbo with four games to go.
What then followed was ... more
The Principality of Sealand is an unrecognised micronation that is located on a fort in the North Sea, approximately 11 kilometres off the coast of Suffolk in the Unted Kingdom.
Despite its tiny size – at 50 metres long, it is not even large enough ... more
The Slovenian Cup is mental: Pizza and a referee almost conspired to deny Rogaška the title in 2023/24, while 2025/26 winners Aluminij come from a village of just 1,000 people.
And with third-tier teams vastly outnumbering top-flight clubs and makin... more
The old European Cup Winners’ Cup made headlines like almost no other continental competition – but was eventually discontinued by UEFA following the 1998/99 campaign.
And yet 22 years later, Europe’s governing body reintroduced a third-tier competi... more
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Really interesting pod. Great hosts with top knowledge
Come on 🏴🇬🇧🇹🇷🇸🇲🇲🇰🇨🇼🇨🇻🇦🇹
Excellent, well researched, fun and a different niche than the norm. A pod for proper football fans who love the travel, the game and don’t take the game quite so seriously. 5 star!
Slowly working my way through the old episodes of the podcast and really enjoying it. Good to hear some different stories rather than just the boring stuff from the bigger leagues.
Would like it if the Europe United episodes would make a comeback, they were very good!
Keep up the good work guys
Updated 5/5/26
The biggest football fairytale is St. Johnstone’s cup double. Nothing comes close
Have listened to this podcast for over a year - every episdoe is expertly put together - thank you all (producers as well as presenters & contributors) for the effort and time.
Key themes from listener reviews, highlighting what works and what could be improved about the show.
How this podcast ranks in the Apple Podcasts, Spotify and YouTube charts.
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Apple Podcasts | #66 | |
Apple Podcasts | #68 |
Recent interactions between the hosts and their guests.
Listeners, social reach, demographics and more for this podcast.
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Journalists Lee Wingate and Paul Watson tell stories from football's less-covered corners, from small leagues and overlooked clubs to international competitions and the politics, history and geography around the game. The format mixes researched feature-length conversations with shorter roundups of several unusual stories, often adding quizzes, travel observations and light humor. Topics range across all continents and levels of football, including club histories, federation rules, fan culture, governance, identity and the practical challenges of playing in remote or unusual places.
The distinctive appeal is its focus on underdogs and places rarely covered by mainstream football media, while still connecting local stories to wider question... more
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These podcasts share a similar audience with The Sweeper:
1. Football Cliches
2. On The Continent - A European Football Podcast
3. Libero
4. It Was What It Was : The Football History Podcast
5. Not The Top 20 Podcast
The Sweeper launched 6 years ago and published 142 episodes to date. You can find more information about this podcast including rankings, audience demographics and engagement in our podcast database.
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Recent guests on The Sweeper include:
1. Amal Kuka
2. John Duerden
3. Ali Howarth
4. Jon Arnold
5. Nathan Joyes
6. Maksims Krivunecs
7. Titas Teiten
8. Ali Howorth
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