Manager Watch: Ange Postecoglou

SirHarryHotspur said:

Let's see how Ange & Co operate in the coming summer window, he has clearly stated in interviews that he only gets in players that he wants. So far he has chosen Johnson, Maddison, VDV, Dragusin & Vic, free transfer & loan so no risk, Solomon & Werner, for the future Veliz, Phillips, Bergvall and Vuskovic.
Compared to previous years a lot going on and he still wants more from some of the players that were not his choice , like Sarr & Udogie, let's see how this all pans out.

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I may be wrong but I'm not sure the final decision on any of these were Ange's. I'm sure he had input and was certainly involved in the discussions regarding Veliz, but I'm pretty certain Phillips and Vuskovic were decisions from Paratici and the development team.

muppetman said:

The stuff about Ange managing in lesser leagues being an issue is a bit of an odd one to me. Most leagues are competitive, so if you are winning at that level you are doing well. The PL is tougher than the Aussie league (I assume as I don't watch the Aussie one!), but we have better players to counteract that.

As far as I know, he's never gone to a dominant team or had better players than everyone else - but has managed to win wherever he's been.

It's always seemed like a good fit for Spurs and a few shitty results in what was expected to be a turbulent season isn't changing that.

I'm also really, really bored of the churn of managers - we need to find someone and stick with them for once, even when it gets bumpy and have a bit of faith.

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Celtic were a dominant team with superior buying power in their league, but I think he took that job with both eyes on getting noticed by a PL team, it worked, and the timing was right.

funkycoldmedina said:

So it was a Levy bashing you wanted?

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Being a BSODL used to be a bad thing on this forum.

Now I'm so old I think 90% of the members on here don't even know what that is

The manager establishes the gaps/requirements.
The club identify the talent based on data.
The manager reviews the identified players’ character/personality.
Both agree to the player.
The club try to complete the signing.

This is how I see it working.

Yantino said:

The manager establishes the gaps/requirements.
The club identify the talent based on data.
The manager reviews the identified players’ character/personality.
Both agree to the player.
The club try to complete the signing.

This is how I see it working.

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It's the only way it will work. The players contract length, or selling clubs financial plight has to be a by-product and not the driving factor as it has been historically.

Trix said:

I may be wrong but I'm not sure the final decision on any of these were Ange's. I'm sure he had input and was certainly involved in the discussions regarding Veliz, but I'm pretty certain Phillips and Vuskovic were decisions from Paratici and the development team.

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Maybe so with the youngsters but for others he says final desicion is this, 6:30 in on this interview with lovable Gary.

SirHarryHotspur said:

Maybe so with the youngsters but for others he says final desicion is his, 6:30 in on this interview with lovable Gary.

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I know, that's why I bolded the part I did.

Trix said:

I know, that's why I bolded the part I did.

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Hadn't noticed the bold bits , anyway good interview think he says it's going to be scary the way he wants to play.

Trix said:

Indeed and I have no doubt he won't act the same way Conte did even if it gets to that point. The two of them are very different in that regard. Like I said everyone is focussing on the differences and ignoring the similarities. Those similarities will be the reason he fails here, if of course he does.

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Isn't this why Scott Munn was brought in to bridge this disconnect.

Trix said:

You are getting a lot of stick for this but I think I get your point, and agree that others are ignoring/missing it.

When Conte was here a fair few of us kept hammering down on the fact that Conte needed specific player types to get the best out of him as a coach, and that it was Levy's fault for not getting them as he knew exactly what he was getting when he hired AC. This was met by a number of posters on here that a highly paid Premier league coach needed to adjust and work with the players he had. Ironic isn't it that many of those same posters are now saying that Ange needs more specific players suited to his way of playing in order to bring success to his philosophy. Fact is I agree on both counts, and every manager with an outlined philosophy will require a large number of specific players to play that particular way.

Levy failed last time round, lets hope he plays this one differently because irrespective of style of play a coach with a set in stone way of playing needs substantial help from board level to achieve that. Thus there are more similarities between Conte and Ange than there are differences at a similar stage in Conte's tenure. And no I'm not talking about principles of play, I'm talking about everything else. Ange needs backing and far more than Conte got regarding the players he wanted to bring in.

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Constantly said it about Conte at the time, most coaches need specific players.

Honestly the whole 'he needs to adapt to the players he has' approach is not a long-term road to success and I can't understand why people can't realise that.

So Ange adopts a more defensive approach or plays 2 pivot players or stops inverting the FBs, we get a few results on the board, great.

Then what?

He will still revert back to his principles, which will take even longer to ingrain cause he has now got the players used to a different set-up/tactical approach.

Pep's City were continously exposed in his first season cause the likes of Kolorov couldn't play a high line and others couldn't adapt to Pep's way of playing (defensive players inverting etc).

This was one of his selections;



Pep never diverted from that and kept plugging away at it until he was allowed to bring in a GK, FBs and a CB that COULD play that system and give him the flexibility.

You are absolutely right.

Ange needs his own players to fill these roles and we have probably got so far into the season and Ange may have started to realise some of their limitations.

For example;

Udogie - as great as he is, and he will be superb, far too often he is lax in his defensive reactions, slow to pick up players and not qucik to close down. He also keeps making the same mistake of taking a loose touch inside which immediately puts us under pressure.

Porro - Generally think he is fine, however there are occasions he is a bit lax with the ball and plays a stupid inside pass. He isn't the quickest to recover either.

Bissouma/Bentacur - Neither are quick/defensively intelligent enough to cover those gaps when we lose possession, they just don't have that instinct of where danger is and to get across to stop it before we are really on the back foot. Sarr fits that description too.

Some of these players juts need more coaching (Udogie and Sarr) due to their age, we should expect them to make mistakes but some may need a rethink and what we once felt was a key player, may no longer be so.

Hopefully, Levy, Munn and co are prepared to fully let Ange see it through and rip it up and start again if he requires it.

The other factor is that by not compromising and changing things short-term, you realise player's shortcomings faster.

If we were to change system to suit Bissouma and then next seaosn go back to Ange's preferred style, Bissouma would likely get found out and we would not have moved further.

You have to put players to the test and the only way to do that is try them in your system, you then get the answer which is best in the long-term

Jamturk said:

Isn't this why Scott Munn was brought in to bridge this disconnect.

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I don't think it's a disconnect that can be bridged by an intermediary. Levy because he signs the cheques, and Ange because he coaches the team need to be on the same page, and that page has to be for Levy to do all he can within the clubs means to get Ange what he needs. No Manager worth sticking with will expect more than that, but it is also the minimum of what they should expect.

Dunno if this has been raised but I would imagine an ideal Ange-type signing would be less money and potentially more resale value than an ideal Conte signing. But I might be being unfair there.

RuskyM said:

Dunno if this has been raised but I would imagine an ideal Ange-type signing would be less money and potentially more resale value than an ideal Conte signing. But I might be being unfair there.

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It might work out that way due to age profile etc, but I genuinely doubt either give it a second thought about it from a signing them POV.

Trix said:

It might work out that way due to age profile etc, but I genuinely doubt either give it a second thought about it from a signing them POV.

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Yeah, I think Ange will be similar to Poch in that regard, happy with bringing in players that are perhaps not seen as elite-level but once you get closer to winning titles the need for those game-changer types increases.

Like Klopp at Liverpool too, said he wouldn't sign 100m players and then realised he had to.

Trix said:

It might work out that way due to age profile etc, but I genuinely doubt either give it a second thought about it from a signing them POV.

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Which is fair, and I don't doubt Levy's failed managers before, but honestly Conte and Mourinho complained they weren't financially backed at clubs with far more resources than we had. I kind of get the reluctance, although it's worth asking why then hire them in the first place.

RuskyM said:

Which is fair, and I don't doubt Levy's failed managers before, but honestly Conte and Mourinho complained they weren't financially backed at clubs with far more resources than we had. I kind of get the reluctance, although it's worth asking why then hire them in the first place.

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Again spending money does not mean the manager was backed. So it's no wonder they wanted more. That £13mil we spent on Spence could have gone towards getting a better option than we got in another position, it could have been the difference in Richalisson and a truly elite forward player. Could we have tempted Inter to sell Lautauro for circa 75mil???

Bringing Lenglet in on loan was another waste of wages that could have been spent elsewhere. The insistence from Daniel every season to try and integrate players that they knew weren't going to cut it only to be stuck with them and have to try and shift them at the death of the window for no financial gain. We should have tried to shift NDombele on a permanent for a cut down price the season he went on loan to Napoli after stinking the place out for 2 pre seasons, but Daniel wanted to see a redemption where he could then get most of his money back. All this has to stop, and hopefully a combination of Munn and Fabio can get it through to Levy(hopefully already have), because Ange won't put up with that sort of micromanaging for long.

alfie103 said:

So that means we can rival the likes of Arsenal, Liverpool and others when buying players? Because other people say we will never get to that level.

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We've been through this recently in another, more suitable thread.
I'm pretty sure that the questions you're asking here have already been addressed there.

dontcallme said:

Spence was a bad one off. We did spend on huge wages for Perisic. We also brought in Romero, Richarlison and Bissouma during Conte's short time here.

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Romero arrived under Nuno in August 2021 on loan with option to buy - the deal was made permanent while Conte was in charge.

Trix said:

That's not what's happening. Not from my part anyway. I think/hope things are different under Ange and Levy does seem like he's learnt from Conte. You have to admit though it's quite clear Ange is not the coach many thought he was. What I mean by that is he does need certain player types and can't just work with what he has in the same way Conte couldn't. Too many are looking at the differences between Ange and Conte and are completely ignoring the similarities. It is imo in those similarities why Conte failed here. Levy needs to do better, which tbf he looks like he is, otherwise it'll be the same outcome.

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There’s certain members here that will take their opinions on Ange to the grave rather than admit that he’s not the coach they thought he was.

There’s different levels of backing.

Have Brighton backed De Zerbi? They have sold some of their best players, after all.

Has Klopp been backed by Liverpool? Arguably they would have won more titles if he had been backed the way Pep has been at City.

There’s backing and there’s backing and there’s backing.

Ange needs to be backed but he’s never going to be backed the way Pep has been, or the way some previous Chelsea coaches were. So he needs to live with that and be adaptable and we need to be smart about the deals we do. So far the signs are good.