Tottenham Hotspur’s 2024/25 season was eventful, to say the least.
Spurs were awful in the Premier League all campaign. They lost 22 games and finished 17th in the table, which is simply not good enough.
Tottenham saved their season by winning the Europa League final against Manchester United. They will now be in the Champions League next season.
Ange Postecoglou has been earning a lot of praise for that, but the real plaudits should go to some of the players for making their manager change his ways.
What happened in a private meeting between some Tottenham players and Ange Postecoglou
Postecoglou has often been accused of being stubborn since he was appointed as the Tottenham boss.
The Australian was always adamant that he only had one style of playing, and that put him on the receiving end of a ton of criticism.
But, in the latter stages of the Europa League, Tottenham weren’t as open as before, and they were a lot more sensible in their approach.
ESPN’s James Olley revealed that the change came following a private meeting between some Spurs stars and Postecoglou, where the players demanded a change.
The journalist said in a video on ESPN FC: “My understanding is that the players were not entirely supportive of Ange Postecoglou’s approach in the second half of the season.
“I believe a group of them went to see him and sort of said: ‘Look, we need to do more work on the opposition, we need to be more versatile.’
“That’s one of the reasons why you saw a more pragmatic approach in Europe, where there was a competition where they actually could win something.
“I think there was a compromise there between what Ange Postecoglou wanted to do, how he wanted to play – ‘We are who we are, mate. We go and play how we want to play wherever we are’ – and the players sort of saying: ‘Well, that’s all well and good, but we’ve got five, six, seven, eight players out injured, we’re not actually the best team in the league like you’ve had at Celtic, in Japan in your career. We need to be more balanced in our approach.'”
Senior Tottenham figures think Ange Postecoglou has done something unacceptable
The expectation before the Europa League final was that Postecoglou would face the sack irrespective of what happened in Bilbao.
But, after ending the trophy drought, many fans have changed their mind and are now open to keeping the Australian at the club.
That may well be the reason why Daniel Levy has not pulled the plug yet, but senior figures at the club are not happy at all with what Postecoglou achieved in the Premier League last season.
Olley said: “The conversations I’ve had with some of the senior figures at the club can’t get past 22 league defeats, even though they have won their first trophy in 17 years.
“They just cannot get past that number and how badly that has affected the squad.”