There are not many football clubs at which the ‘t-word’ triggers such an avalanche of emotion, opinion and debate, but Ange Postecoglou is happy to set trophies as the bar by which he and others will judge his work at Tottenham.
No wonder Daniel Levy told the Cambridge Union last year that winning trophies is “easier said than done”, given Tottenham have lifted only the 2008 League Cup during his 23 years as chairman.
Previous managers have run a mile from talk of silverware at Tottenham, instead using European qualification and a cup run as the barometer for success.
Postecoglou briefly worried that this reporter’s question about “the t-word” was in reference to a swear word. It may as well have been, given the panic that talking openly about Tottenham’s need to win a trophy can prompt in some.
“It’s why I came here,” Postecoglou said. “I came here to try to win things for the club. That should be our measure and, if we fall short of that, then we need to improve. That’s up to me to try to achieve that. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with embracing that.”
Manager: I believed I failed last season
The Australian was mystified why a television interview, in which he underlined his record of winning a trophy in his second season in previous jobs, caused such a fuss after the derby defeat by Arsenal.
He tackled the subject again head-on ahead of Wednesday night’s Carabao Cup trip to Coventry City. When it was put to Postecoglou that it was a high bar to set for himself, he replied: “Yeah it is, but that’s all I’ve got.” Asked if, in his mind, he would have failed if he does not win a trophy this season, the 59-year-old added: “Yes. I failed last year in my head because that’s how I’m geared. I’ve made it pretty clear what my expectations are.
“But that doesn’t mean that I stop. That just fuels the fire of ‘why didn’t I do it?’ ‘Why didn’t we achieve last year, why didn’t we win something?’ That gets me going for this year and this year it’s about progress. That’s been my whole career, that’s my foundation.”
He accepts, then, that it is also fair for others to measure his performance as head coach against whether Tottenham win a trophy.
“I’ve never tried to steer it another way,” Postecoglou said. “Have I downplayed anything since I’ve been here? So I’m willing to be measured against that – that means that I’m fair game.
“Now, how you come to your summary at the end, that’s as much on you as it is me. You can make your assessment on just one thing or many things. But I’m happy to be judged against that standard because that’s my standard.
“That’s what I’ve done in the past and I don’t want to dilute that because then I miss the opportunity to continue on the road I’ve been on. I have no problems with people using that as a yardstick.
“If I said, ‘This is going to take three or four years, then yeah, it would relieve pressure. But I don’t want to wait three or four years. This year’s an opportunity and then, if we do well this year, next year’s an opportunity. That’s the way I think about it.”
Timing is everything in football and Postecoglou’s willingness to talk about trophies will be particularly arresting to some, given Tottenham’s start to the season, taking four points from their first four Premier League games.
But it is not just his second-season record that gives Postecoglou encouragement. He recalls facing even earlier difficulties at the start of his first season in charge of Celtic, which ended with a title and League Cup double.
“We’re four games into a new season, it’s pretty early,” he said. “I realised in Scotland, they’d rule me out after two games. They said it was all over in the year we won the double. I’m just going to say these things the way I always have and I’m not going to change.”