Postecoglou sends warning to Tottenham stars and reveals what he told them after West Ham defeat The Tottenham Hotspur boss has been speaking about the future at the north London club and what will happen in the months ahead
Ange Postecoglou has delivered a warning to his Tottenham Hotspur players after their increased their winless run to five matches
Ange Postecoglou has made it clear to his Tottenham Hotspur players that things will ‘never be smooth’ while he is at the club and revealed what he told them in the dressing room after their defeat to West Ham.
Spurs began the season with a 10-match unbeaten run in the Premier League which swept them to the top of the table. However, they have now gone five matches without a victory, losing four of those games in the process and culminating in a 2-1 derby loss to West Ham at home which left Postecoglou fuming.
The one benefit for the Australian and Tottenham is that the 58-year-old has been here before, with there having always being some kind of adjustment period at his clubs before the players better understand his methods and very different philosophy. He warned his Spurs squad though that they will never be allowed to truly settle under him.
“I have been there and I have the benefit of experience. I’ve been through this many times. So I know, unequivocally, what we need to do,” said Postecoglou ahead of Spurs’ match against Newcastle United. “But for a lot of these guys, it’s the first time and I’m always mindful of that wherever I’ve been. That’s why I know that invariably, sometimes it’s happened at the beginning of my tenure, sometimes it happened in the middle, sometimes at the end of the first season, but always in the first season there are challenges.
“Players need to go through that and come out the other side and see that ‘okay, we’ve survived that. It hasn’t killed us, we’re still going, we’re still alive, we’re still up for it’, right? Then if anything it can make us stronger going forward, but obviously, I have the benefit of that experience. The players don’t and my role in this is to guide them through it. I know how we get through this, and I know what the road ahead looks like.”
He added: “But they’ve got to go through it themselves and find out about it themselves. Do they want to be part of this because it’s not gonna get any easier. That’s the one thing I keep telling them.
“There’s never going to be a time where it’s going to be smooth, not while I’m at the club. Even when things are going well. I’m going to be pushing for us to be better. I’m going to be pushing for us to improve and pushing for us to bring success to this football club. So there’s never going to be a time where they can feel any sort of comfort that things are going to run smoothly.
“So the more they embrace this side of it the better and it’s a great time for me to be somewhere, apart from the beginnings this is where I’m most alert, not just with the players with the staff, everyone at the football club. How is everyone reacting to this? It gives me a good indicator about what we need to do going forward.”
One tag that has followed the north London club over the years is the word ‘Spursy’, used whenever the team lets something slip. It has emerged again in recent days with the defeat to West Ham making Tottenham the first side in Premier League history to fail to win five consecutive matches despite going 1-0 up in each of them. It’s fair to say Postecoglou is not a fan of the term.
“That’s schoolyard stuff. All I need to know is that this club hasn’t won anything for 15 years. That’s all I need to know. Why that is, and why others may think that is, and whatever tag, that’s the reality. There’s no getting away from that,” he said.
“There’s no point in me trying to disguise that, or anybody else at this football club trying to disguise that. If you want to be successful, then like most organisations, you’ve got to learn from the mistakes of the past, you’ve got to come up with a plan, you’ve got to stick to it.
“Whatever tags other people want to put on it, that can’t be your motivation, that can’t be what drives you. If you want to bring success, you’ve got to have a clear idea of how you’
