It was always going to end spectacularly, one way or another. The end, it seems, is almost here – and if this really is Ange Postecoglou’s last act at Tottenham, at least he’s stuck to his script.
It speaks to the dark, oppressive cloud of negativity that has settled over Spurs this season that most people seem to have totally discounted any possibility that they could beat Eintracht Frankfurt on Friday morning (AEST), reach the Europa League semi-finals, and maybe even go on to win it to end the club’s 16-year trophy drought.
For some, even that would not be enough.
Indeed, you don’t have to doom scroll for too long on any given social media app to find Tottenham fans who want the team to lose so Postecoglou gets sacked. We have come full circle: it has been barely a year since many of those same fans wanted Spurs to lose to Manchester City to prevent Arsenal from winning the Premier League title, a concept that an enraged Postecoglou couldn’t get his head around, creating a schism between himself and the club’s cynical supporter base. That schism is now a chasm, and it can’t be bridged. Now they’d deny themselves a trophy to be rid of him sooner.
What has changed since the cautious optimism raised by last week’s 1-1 draw with Eintracht Frankfurt in the first leg of their quarter-final, their most encouraging performance in recent memory?
Three days after that came an awful 4-2 defeat away to Wolverhampton Wanderers. Postecoglou was widely ridiculed for pointing out that Spurs had largely controlled the match, and that they were undone by four ghastly and “unusual” individual mistakes which led to the four goals they conceded. There have been losses which could be chalked up to Postecoglou’s methodology; this one really wasn’t on him, but the volume of losses (17 this season in the EPL) and mistakes (they’re sadly not unusual) is such that people are just tired of hearing his voice. His Tottenham is still capable of great things occasionally, but also of repeatedly stepping on rakes in the manner of Sideshow Bob.
Ange Postecoglou appears to be on his last legs at Spurs.Credit: Getty Images
Ange teams aren’t usually like this. Something is broken.
There are a bunch of mitigating factors as to why this season has spiralled so far out of control, but the bottom line is it’s a results-driven business. The results stink, and when they stink this much, only one person pays the price: the manager.
It’s been broadly decided in England that Postecoglou is a bumbling, naive “vibes merchant” who has been “found out” and that Celtic was his ceiling. His acts of defiance – the ear-cupping to the fans, the “it’s just who we are, mate” declaration, the second-season trophy proclamation, all things he’s said and done in response to doubt, disrespect and condescension – are all just memes now.
Football is unforgiving at the highest level, especially in the digital age: it’s a world of hot takes, viral abuse videos, AI-generated image banter and dressing-room rats leaking to monetised aggregator accounts, which get more hits and clicks from speculation and out-of-context press conference grabs, and are therefore incentivised to stoke the neuroticism of a fickle fanbase for their own benefit. In this environment, his quotable nature becomes a weakness, not a strength. He’s at four pressers a week currently, and so the perception is that he’s always blabbering on about something. At Spurs, the outside sentiment always seems to seep into the inner sanctum, and becomes self-fulfilling.
Ange Postecoglou.Credit: AP
His predecessor, Antonio Conte, said on his way out that Tottenham’s culture was a contributing factor to the malaise he oversaw, and that too many managers had taken the fall for problems that went beyond them. “Tottenham’s story is this,” he said. Postecoglou bravely backed himself to douse the flames but ended up getting burnt.
He’s failing. That doesn’t make him a failure. It’s probably not a coincidence that most ex-Spurs coaches go on to enjoy success elsewhere; nobody in this part of the world will be shocked if another club in Europe hires him, backs him, and trophies follow.
This is indeed a mess, but only partly of his making. Luck has generally deserted them. Injuries have gutted their season. The club’s recruitment policies denied him a quick fix. They sold Harry Kane, arguably Tottenham’s best-ever player, five minutes after he took the job. His other senior players have let him down in too many key moments. And his aggressive tactics have further exposed their vulnerabilities – but he hasn’t strayed from them because, in his view, the only way past this situation is through it. The problem is, he has run out of credits to sustain the charge.
Postecoglou vowed last year to accept a “noble death”, should that be the fate that befalls him, in quotes that now read as a prescient prediction of what we might be about to see in his final days or weeks in charge.
“I believe what I believe down to my core,” he said at the time.
“I’ll stand on the highest ground, die a noble death, believing in what I believe. Like anything in life, once you feel like something is working for you, something you believe in brings success – and it does – you take that forward.
“Maybe the Premier League is a step too far, mate. Who knows? Maybe, maybe – but I will still be on that hill, wounded, my dying breath saying ‘I believe, I do believe’. But I do, I really do, mate.”
What could he do in a third season at Spurs, with a few more top-line players and a cleaner run at it? That will probably remain a thought experiment. Even if they win the Europa League, the feeling is that a parting of ways might be the best thing for all concerned.
It’s gut-wrenching. The thought that England is a “step too far” is humbling, and will stick in Postecoglou’s craw.
But this is the hill he’s chosen to die on.
