Ange Postecoglou has been hung out to dry by Daniel Levy
Tottenham Hotspur’s dismal season got another chapter on Sunday when they were defeated 2-1 by relegation-threatened Leicester City at home.
Six defeats in last seven Premier League games sees the North Londoners languishing in 15th in the table, just eight points above a dreaded relegation spot. Consequently, Ange Postecoglou has fallen under fire, and the Hotspur Way chiefs have only been able to bring in a young goalkeeper Antonin Kinsky from Slavia Prague.
With less than a week left for the winter transfer window to slam shut, there has been no urgency shown by the higher-ups to back the Greek-Aussie tactician and turn the season around. As results are getting worse and there is no stopping the rut in the Premier League, majority of the fanbase have lost their patience with Ange Postecoglou and are calling the board to sack him—especially after the embarrassing 2-1 defeat to the Foxes.
Postecoglou was appointed as Antonio Conte’s successor in June 2023 following the Italian’s explosive rant at the club’s present hierarchy, but in hindsight, he might have been rightly frustrated to do so. This is the opinion of reputed journalist Henry Winter, who also feels that Daniel Levy has let down Postecoglou in the transfer market amidst Tottenham’s woeful current situation.
“A better manager than Conte’s successor, Ange Postecoglou, could organise the current side better, even with their injury issues. But there are deeper issues at Spurs than Postecoglou’s limitations,” Henry Winter wrote on his Goal Posts blog.
“The culture’s wrong. The club lacks a winning mentality. They’ve not won a trophy since 2008 or a league title, that nine-month test of mental and physical resilience, since 1961.
“Conte’s point was about the ownership, about recruitment, but ultimately he called out the players (and maybe that’s all tied in together if the board doesn’t recruit players with the right mentality). Most damningly, Conte felt it was an institutional failing.
“Spurs are “used to it…they don’t want to play under pressure. I want to see the fire in their eyes, fire in their heart. Not only in the training session but on the pitch. I’m not seeing this.
“Some of the current players have that fire. Dejan Kulusevski, Ben Davies, Lucas Bergvall and Archie Gray obviously care. Some play through pain. But not enough. Conte was right. The culture needs to change more than the manager.”
Conte has been a winner in his career, lifting trophies at leading clubs except at Tottenham. First of all, he was backed well in the transfer windows and given enough time to change the mentality of the club. Being a serial winner, it was difficult for him to experience the things at Spurs which he perhaps didn’t do in his career before.
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The combination of a lot of factors led Conte to call out the ownership, the recruitment strategy, the club’s ambition, players’ weak mentality and lack of desire to win etc. While all of those he had claimed then were right, it was inappropriate on his part to call Levy, the owners and the players out in public.
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That being said, there is no denying the fact that a change in leadership is much needed at this football club. Levy’s penny-pinching, unenterprising attitude has led to the club’s downfall over the years, with Big Ange potentially the next manager to get sacrificed.
With just six days left in the winter transfer window, Spurs must accelerate their transfer plans and bring in at least a couple of players at the club.
