Manager Watch: Ange Postecoglou

[For the love of Spurs]

It's not just as simple as whether a team sits off or presses us either, it's seems to be about how the formations match up and how and who they press. I'm not saying Ange needs to consider plan B and C etc every time things get a little difficult, perhaps plan A might need a little evolving though to cope with opposition adaption.

it works with City as they have players who can operate up top in tight space. We can’t, we don’t have players who hold and dribble well enough and thus lose the ball and get hit by counters.

The system is the system, no point trying to half arse it, you wouldnt tell Pep to change his ways. We either buy forwards who are more suited to this high press, tight space way or we might as well get a new manager.

This really goes to the heart of our failings as a club. You can blame the set pieces on Ange but not being able to support a managers system sits directly with Levy and the board. If you want to cheapo in the market and look for deals get a flexible manager who works with whatever he has, Ange isn’t that he is as set as Conte in that he needs a squad built for his ideas. In the summer we either buy 2 elite forwards to remedy this or we just accept 5th is our ceiling and this is all we are and stop blaming the manager for not being Jesus Christ.

 

[Led's Zeppelin]

Agreed, but if there are glaring problems now, why wait until next season to change it? What good is that doing? It’s like driving a car and saying ‘today, I’m not gonna use the breaks, I’ll wait until my next journey.’

I don’t think it is like that.

I think he is determined to build a squad that plays the way he believes will get the best results. And that takes time and courage and persistence. We may disagree with his vision and methods but only time will prove who is right and who’s wrong. Not this season’s finishing position.

I think expect there’ll be some significant changes in the summer.

I hope so and believe so, because only half this team is good enough at the moment. But that’s not the manager’s fault.

 

[For the love of Spurs]

I do think his very well intentioned attitude towards officials is costing us.

Since that Liverpool game we haven't got a thing and it feels to me (admittedly a passionate, slightly thick fan) that froms a refs point of view they don't mind not giving us difficult decisions as we don't put any pressure on them whatsoever.

The lack of penalties despite all our attacking football, the fouling of Vicario that is now allowed, can you name another player sent off for diving? The other tackles ignored just like Romero's against Chelsea.

It's not a conspiracy and I'm not saying everyone is against us but if you make it clear you won't have a go at a ref when others do everything they can to make their lives as hard as possible then to a referee it must subconsciously feel like they can make calls against us far easier than an arsenal for example who go for them over everything.

I get what you mean, refs need to be as afraid to call a decision against us as Liverpool or Arsenal. Sad but probably where it is at.

 

[Styopa]

Agreed, but if there are glaring problems now, why wait until next season to change it? What good is that doing? It’s like driving a car and saying ‘today, I’m not gonna use the breaks, I’ll wait until my next journey.’

Because it takes time to coach these things, it takes time to get in the right players, it takes time to change a playing mentality. That’s a lot to do in one season.

If we were in danger of being relegated, or Ange was in danger of losing the dressing room, or similar, then I would agree with you. Drastic times call for drastic measures.

But we’re not really driving with no brakes when it looks like we’ll cruise into 5th or maybe worst case 6th.

 

[GutBucket]

I think most agree he should be given next season, the tough questions will be if we finish 5th/6th again next season whether people will think he should be given a 3rd.

If he gives some minutes to youngsters then yes. Donley will be 20 in January so either needs a proper loan (like Skipp, Walker, Rose had) or minutes in the first team. Guys like Moore need to believe that we will give academy prospects a chance. And if we still can't defend set pieces then most will want him gone probably. To me it's more about seeing progress than results, but we have to start thinking about our academy as well. Getting Tosin or similar when we have Phillips and Dorrington would be a wrong move IMO.

 

[THOWIG]

This

1

Familiar lesson beckons for Levy​

Ange Postecoglou found enough blue sky in the Spurs squad he inherited to make a pair of sailor’s trousers out of the opening 10 games of the season. The rest of the season since then feels like a return to the mean. Spurs would currently be eighth in the Premier League if their form outside of that supercharged start was rolled out across an entre season. Fifth place is probably above par for this miscellaneous group of players and the manager’s own first look at the league. And while defeat in the north London derby will sting, as will the high likelihood now that Spurs will finish outside the Champions League spots, it is also important to remember that fast start was also real, a taster of how Postecoglou can make this team hum with the right ingredients. Spurs are well-placed financially. The lesson here is that Daniel Levy needs to back his man in the summer – does this sound at all familiar? – and build on the good times of Ange Year Zero before any judgment can begin to be passed on the ultimate ceiling of this Spurs iteration. Barney Ronay

 

[leray]

I think his post game comments about set pieces a bit embarrasing to be honest.

With such a low scoring game as football, you just can't allow losing so many cheap goals. Teams throughout the league employ a set piece specialist coach (we've had one last season!) and it will quickly become a standard everywhere. Right now it's not about finding some marginal gains, just about cutting significant losses.

No amount of focusing on build up play and isolating wingers will help if we keep conceding goals from corners and free kicks.

 

[rabbikeane]

Pretty sure first half of the season we had the best defensive record when it came to set pieces then all of a sudden it switched since Everton or City? I could be wrong but I swear we rarely conceded from corners prior to that.

That's when it became known that refs now allow players to attack goalies, and they found out Vicario especially is weak against it.

 

[fishhhandaricecake]

You know what, mate, on reflection, you're probably right. We have had some really poor patches and a few really bad games but it's not as much as my original post, I think Newcastle at home and Villa away we're really good performances.

As always I love how positive you are and i really do want it to work for Ange. I really hope he gets the players he needs in the summer and addresses the things he needs to change to give us the best shot at making it work. I have my worries but Ange definitely deserves the chance to get it right.

Thanks mate and I hope so. Give Ange more players and time and I think we will improve. Whether he can get us to be title challengers without changing his ways a tad I’m not sure but certainly enough positives for me that I’ve seen to give him plenty of time. We do need a fair amount of new players again this summer to really kick on though.

 

[Albertbarich]

I think his post game comments about set pieces a bit embarrasing to be honest.

With such a low scoring game as football, you just can't allow losing so many cheap goals. Teams throughout the league employ a set piece specialist coach (we've had one last season!) and it will quickly become a standard everywhere. Right now it's not about finding some marginal gains, just about cutting significant losses.

No amount of focusing on build up play and isolating wingers will help if we keep conceding goals from corners and free kicks.

We didn't have a defensive one it was Stellini who I'm sure nobody wants back.

As others have said, he is backing his coaches to the media as opposed to throwing them under the bus, we don't know what he is saying /doing behind closed doors though. Theyre clearly not going to just ignore it

 

[gavspur]

We didn't have a defensive one it was Stellini who I'm sure nobody wants back.

As others have said, he is backing his coaches to the media as opposed to throwing them under the bus, we don't know what he is saying /doing behind closed doors though. Theyre clearly not going to just ignore it

We did, didn’t we? It was well talked about, our set piece coach. We scored quite a few from corners and hardly conceded. I can’t remember his name, but it wasn’t Stellini.

 

[Albertbarich]

We did, didn’t we? It was well talked about, our set piece coach. We scored quite a few from corners and hardly conceded. I can’t remember his name, but it wasn’t Stellini.

Ali gold keeps saying that Vio was an attacking set piece coach. Stellini was in charge of defensive set plays.

 

[GutBucket]

That's when it became known that refs now allow players to attack goalies, and they found out Vicario especially is weak against it.

All it takes is one game. Brighton showed to others how to overload midfield against Conte and everyone started using it. Someone realized that Mourinho gave Aurier licence to bombard forward (but not Davies), teams adapted to our asymetrical formation and we started dropping points. Hopefully we adapt faster next season, but if we sign better players then teams will have more things to worry about it.

 

[E17yid]

If he gives some minutes to youngsters then yes. Donley will be 20 in January so either needs a proper loan (like Skipp, Walker, Rose had) or minutes in the first team. Guys like Moore need to believe that we will give academy prospects a chance. And if we still can't defend set pieces then most will want him gone probably. To me it's more about seeing progress than results, but we have to start thinking about our academy as well. Getting Tosin or similar when we have Phillips and Dorrington would be a wrong move IMO.

I think the reality is that if we finish outside the top 4 next season most will want him gone, even if he sorts out the set pieces.

Winning a trophy will buy him another season for sure but you wouldn’t put any money on that and generally speaking, for the amount spurs fans bang on about paying the right way, most don’t give a shit and just want to win games.

I’d like to see him take some ownership and hold his hands up for the last month or 2 to be honest. He talks a good game about backing the players as long as they do what he says and he goes on about fans feelings being very important but I’m not hearing a lot from him in this regard. I may have missed some comments though.

 

[gavspur]

Ali gold keeps saying that Vio was an attacking set piece coach. Stellini was in charge of defensive set plays.

Fair do’s. It’s probably a good idea to have an Italian organising the defence, in all honesty.

 

[robotsonic]

We did, didn’t we? It was well talked about, our set piece coach. We scored quite a few from corners and hardly conceded. I can’t remember his name, but it wasn’t Stellini.

He was for attacking set piece routines only.

 

[Oh Teddy Teddy]

This

1

Familiar lesson beckons for Levy​

Ange Postecoglou found enough blue sky in the Spurs squad he inherited to make a pair of sailor’s trousers out of the opening 10 games of the season. The rest of the season since then feels like a return to the mean. Spurs would currently be eighth in the Premier League if their form outside of that supercharged start was rolled out across an entre season. Fifth place is probably above par for this miscellaneous group of players and the manager’s own first look at the league. And while defeat in the north London derby will sting, as will the high likelihood now that Spurs will finish outside the Champions League spots, it is also important to remember that fast start was also real, a taster of how Postecoglou can make this team hum with the right ingredients. Spurs are well-placed financially. The lesson here is that Daniel Levy needs to back his man in the summer – does this sound at all familiar? – and build on the good times of Ange Year Zero before any judgment can begin to be passed on the ultimate ceiling of this Spurs iteration. Barney Ronay

Find this stance a bit weird; those 10 games are as much a part of the season as every other game since, I see no value of removing them just for narrative’s sake.

If we remove all our losses, we’re unbeaten – is Ange a genius?

 

[mil1lion]

Find this stance a bit weird; those 10 games are as much a part of the season as every other game since, I see no value of removing them just for narrative’s sake.

If we remove all our losses, we’re unbeaten – is Ange a genius?

If we remove the last 10 games and go based off that I wonder what the table would look like

 

[TOLBINY]

I don't recall us at any point this season sat in our box with 11 players defending against relentless attacking play from the opposition, which happened far too often last season.

Last season we lost 0-2 at home to Woolwich, we had more shots (17-14) more shots on target (7-5) and edged possesion (51%-49%). Were poor in the first half and good in the second under a coach deemed negative and boring!

 

[djhotspur]

Just hope he changes his system a bit next year. People have said he tends to move to move of a back 3, 1 inverted fullback system next season which would make us a lot stronger defensively.
He absolutely needs a specialist set piece coach and I do hope he goes out and gets one.
It does take time to build, arteta is reaping the rewards of time but also getting very lucky with an academy player in Saka and 2 buys in ode and saliba who know knew would be this good.
If we get a proper 6, a striker, a LW, a LB back up and a free English fast lcb like Kelly and think we are in good shape and should look very good next season.
If we have a good summer then well see what ange is made of next season.