Ange Postecoglou has launched into an impassioned rebuke over the type of criticism he has received this season as Tottenham head coach.
The 59-year-old became the first boss in half a decade to last a full season at the club when he took them to fifth place in the Premier League last time out. This season has brought a rockier road as while he has led Tottenham to the Europa League quarter-finals and Carabao Cup semi-finals, the performances in the Premier League have been woefully inconsistent from a squad ravaged by injuries.
Despite being the second highest scorers in the competition, team sit 13th in the table with 14 defeats from their 28 games this season. There is no escaping the scrutiny in the world's most popular league and Postecoglou refuses to let it seep into his daily life.
"The scrutiny is more because there’s more noise but that doesn’t mean it needs to affect you. I’ve said many times it doesn’t concern me because I’m not really sure how people perceive this role and particularly me as a person, that they would think I would worry about tomorrow if there’s a negative outcome," he said.
"I just don’t live my life that way. I don’t speak that way, I don’t think that way. My whole career, I love what I do, I get up every day, take on the challenge, see what the possibilities are and keep moving. There’s a lot of noise and I think there’s always two sides to that: one is people doing critical analysis of what I do, others just like the story of a manager being under pressure.
"People get excited about that. Some people really enjoy that process for some bizarre reason. The more they try to push individuals, whether it’s me or anyone else, to that position it generates for them whatever satisfaction they get out of it. It doesn’t infiltrate my world, mate. Irrespective of what happened last night I still would have gone home and asked my kids how their [school] concert went. My life goes on mate. It’s not that overwhelming that I feel the need to block it all out or to react to it. It doesn’t bother me."
However, when Postecoglou was asked whether he thinks the scrutiny focused on him is more intense because of his background in coaching across the world in Australia and Japan, before arriving in Scotland at Celtic, rather than coming through the European game, it opened the floodgates to an impassioned and lengthy monologue to the small band of reporters in the room.
"If I say that then people will just say I’m playing the victim card and I don’t want to do that, but... 100 per cent there’s an element of that. There’s no doubt about it," he said. "Let me give you an example. It’s only a small crew here today so I can share it amongst us. Whatever profession you're in - you're a journalist, a plumber, a policeman, a lawyer, a doctor, you’ve been doing that job 26, 27 years. Irrespective of whatever you did, do you reckon that person has a pretty good idea of that job?
"Would you ever question their knowledge of that job? Would you ever question whether every decision he makes, he’s thought about it or experienced it before? You might say ok, if you survive 26, 27 years you haven’t stuffed up too many times. Whatever you do.
"If you’re a plumber, if there’s leaks you’re not going to get another job. If you’re a doctor and people are dying, you’re unlikely to kick on. If you’re doing it for 26, 27 years he’s got a fair idea of what he’s doing. Then you might say ‘yeah, but maybe he’s just a grinder’. But if that person started pretty much on the factory floor of that industry, whatever industry it was, maybe you’re a CEO or whatever and he ends up in the position where the top 1 per cent of where his profession gets to, you’re gonna say, ‘ok this guy must have something’.
"You don’t get from factory floor to the top 1 per cent in your field, and I’m talking about the level, not expertise. Then you might say, ‘he’s out of his depth now’ and well ok, but if you’ve taken a club that finished eighth to fifth in your first full year… when you put all that together and you hear, ‘he’s out of his depth, he doesn’t know what he’s doing, he’s got no idea, his methods don’t work, his philosophy doesn’t work’ - in any other industry you wouldn’t do that.
"You might be critical of his performance but you wouldn’t do that. Google my name and get some headlines. Just plaster them on a wall and you’d say 'I don’t think that fits somehow', but it does, because that’s where we’re at."
Surely though the higher the level of the game, the greater the scrutiny and that's the pay-off for success and progress?
"That’s right but there’s a difference," said Postecoglou. "There’s critical analysis of performance at every level and as you get higher there’s bigger things at stake, for sure. Forget a football manager, forget me. Would you say ‘he’s got no idea what he’s doing? He’s got no plan B, he’s stubborn, his methods don’t work, he’s out of his depth'.
"Where does that come from? From people, some of whom weren’t even born when I started managing. I started in 1996/97. You've just got accept that’s part of the world I’m in. I accept it but I don’t have to react to it. I can just laugh it off because I just think it’s ridiculous. It doesn’t change me as a person. It doesn’t change what I do, what I believe or how I continue to go on - because my career will go on. Everyone realises that. Whatever happens my career will go on. So, yeah that’s a long answer isn’t it?"
But does the Australian still enjoy the job, having previously said that his favourite times as a manager are when things are at their most challenging and his methods are being questioned?
"I love it. I’m not saying that facetiously. I love the fact there’s a massive challenge there, people are doubting me. I do love it," said the Tottenham boss. "I also think some of it is just ridiculous beyond its nature of being anything other than cheap and very shallow. I’m not talking about critical analysis.
"Jeez, I’m going on now. I’ve got one more story then I’ll let you go. You know who the greatest nemesis for any manager is in today’s world? He’s only come to the surface in the last five, six years, maybe 10 years? Mr Hindsight.
"He’s the guy who when the outcomes are there and the result is already done, he has all the answers with the greatest of certainty and he’s never wrong. Mr Hindsight will go out there every time and profess to be the oracle of all oracles because he just deals with what’s happened after the event. Never before.
"There is such a massive Mr Hindsight. The Killers should do a song about him, I’d definitely buy it. You want to be critical and have really strong opinions about things? State them before the event. Make them really clear and stand by them when they’re wrong. I guarantee you they’ll be just as wrong as any manager is wrong and probably more often.
"There aren’t many of those. There are some who if they don’t do it before the event, after the event they will always put a perspective on their analysis, but I see them mate and I hear them. After the event - ‘oh, so obvious!’ ‘oh, how did he get that team selection wrong!’"
He added: "That’s what I’m saying, anyone can deal with an outcome. You don’t need to even understand football. 'That team won, that team lost. That coach is better, those players, that system, those selections, they were always going to be better. I could have told you before the game, everything is obvious.’
"What’s the point? If it’s just results, what’s the point of having analysis? Whoever won, you put a column there and everyone writes the same piece there. Whoever lost, a column there, everyone the same piece - these managers are under pressure, these managers are the best. Then flip it the following week because results always go the other way.
"Anyway mate, we should have had this offline. I’ve said too many things I’m going to regret tomorrow!"
With that, Postecoglou's monologue was over and despite his protestations, it felt as cathartic for him to get it off his chest as it was meant for the outside world. Ultimately the Australian knows that history will only judge his time at Tottenham by the results and trophies he ends it with, rather than challenges he's faced along the way, but he's just asking for a bit of respect in the mean time.
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