The debate over whether Tottenham should stick by Ange Postecoglou in the wake of Europa League glory is a polarising one. Here, we look at both sides of the argument.
Tottenham Hotspur have just played out one of the most baffling seasons you’re ever likely to see.
They finished the league campaign in 17th, just one place clear of the relegation zone. It was their worst ever finish in the Premier League era and their worst in any top-flight season since 1976-77, when they were last relegated.
But they also won their first trophy in 17 years on a glorious night in Bilbao with a resilient defensive display in the Europa League final, the type of which was almost entirely absent from their whole Premier League campaign.
The thinking before that victory over Manchester United was that the domestic campaign had been so dismal that even silverware would not be enough to save manager Ange Postecoglou. Widespread reports suggested the decision to sack him had already been made.
But the jubilant scenes at the final whistle in Spain and the trophy parade in London have changed the narrative. Many who were convinced Postecoglou was the wrong man for the job now believe he has earned the right to keep it.
Chairman Daniel Levy has been left with a difficult decision to make: sack the man who has just ended Spurs’ trophy drought, or stick with someone who oversaw a historically bad Premier League campaign?
So, what should he do? Here, we make the case for and against a change in the dugout.
The Case for Sacking Postecoglou
The reasons to get rid of Postecoglou are based around the pretty simple assertion that the team has moved backwards under him. There has been little evidence he is capable of building a Tottenham side who can compete – as they did consistently under Mauricio Pochettino – at the top end of the Premier League.
His football succeeded in Australia, Japan and Scotland, but flaws have been exposed in the harsh world of top-flight football in England. Tottenham scored a hell of a lot of goals under him – 64 in the Premier League this season to be precise, which was as many as fourth-placed Chelsea and more than 12 teams – but they shipped goals and chances far too easily.
Only the three relegated teams and Wolves conceded more goals in the Premier League this season than Spurs (63), while only the bottom three allowed their opponents a higher expected goals total than them (64.4 xG). Based on their defensive displays, they fully deserved to finish 17th.
Much of what Postecoglou has espoused throughout his time at Tottenham has centred around the idea that football should be enjoyable to watch. “Are you not entertained?” he asked Sky Sports following his side’s 4-3 League Cup quarter-final win over United in December, a game in which Spurs had led 3-0 but very nearly threw away.
Approaching matches that way was fine while Spurs were winning, and during his 10-match unbeaten start to life in England at the beginning of 2023-24, he was seen as a breath of fresh air. He won himself a lot of admirers among a fanbase who had grown tired of watching the football of José Mourinho and Antonio Conte.
But when opponents figured Postecoglou’s Spurs out and the gung-ho tactics led to results nosediving, he still stuck to his guns, refusing to change the way his side played, whatever the circumstances. His doing so and then saying things like “it’s just who we are” became a stick to beat him with. And rightly so.
Spurs remained entertaining through his two seasons in the Premier League, but in 2024-25 they were fun to watch for the wrong reasons. They continued to score reliably but were just as consistently outscored, and the damning numbers speak for themselves.
They suffered more defeats (22) than any other team that avoided relegation from the Premier League ever has. Their total of 38 points was Tottenham’s lowest in the Premier League era, and would have been low enough to see them relegated in four other seasons, while in three more they would have been saved only on goal difference.
They were very, very fortunate that the three promoted sides proved to be the worst trio of relegated teams, in points terms, the Premier League has ever seen. That meant relegation was never really a genuine possibility and Postecoglou was able to focus fully on the Europa League, something he has admitted he did since the season ended.
But make no mistake, what everyone saw was a team not cut out for the level they were playing at. Spurs were outplayed and beaten by plenty of teams they have much greater resources than and were expected to beat. They alone were responsible for two of the six (33.3%) away wins that relegated trio Leicester, Ipswich and Southampton recorded, for example.
Postecoglou complained for much of the season about the injuries his side suffered, and there’s no doubt the many absences had a big impact on results. Through the middle part of the season, they were consistently without a full team of players.
But there is also the question of whether Postecoglou’s insistence on playing his relentlessly high-intensity brand of football was in some way to blame for their injuries. His players were asked to put in more physical effort than most of the rest of the top flight, with Tottenham ranking either second or third in the Premier League this season for distance covered (111.5 km per 90), sprints (167.5 per 90), off-ball runs (159.0 per 90) and pressures in the final third (55.2 per 90). This is a topic we covered in more depth during the height of their injury crisis earlier this year.
Questions over whether Postecoglou’s football is suited to the demands of the Premier League alongside a European schedule have therefore persisted throughout the season. If – as evidence suggests – he is not willing to budge on his tactics in league games (he did adapt in the Europa League but has spoken openly about his view that cup competitions deserve to be approached differently), then there is little to suggest he can take this Spurs team back to the upper part of the Premier League. They are just too easy to beat.
The case for sacking him, in its simplest terms, is that Tottenham Hotspur simply cannot continue with a manager who has just overseen such a terrible season, because if 2025-26 is even half as bad, it will still be a long way off acceptable.
The Case Against Sacking Postecoglou
Sure, the numbers don’t look good, but that Europa League trophy certainly does, doesn’t it?
That is the crux of the argument for keeping Postecoglou in charge: he delivered Tottenham’s first trophy in 17 years and their first in Europe for 41. Against all odds, he proved that this club, for so long underachievers and nearly men, can, after all, win silverware.
And what a way to do it, too, after his promise all the way back in September that “I always win things in my second year.” How about that for a way to convince the players and fans to believe in him?
It could have been the perfect “mic drop” moment, as their goalscoring hero in the Europa League final, Brennan Johnson, said after the game in Bilbao.
But it could also be the start of something else; further reason to get behind him in the stands at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium and, more importantly, in the boardroom, too.
If Postecoglou is backed with budget for transfers and wages to match the teams against whom Spurs want to be competing – something that Pochettino was not given – it is worth giving him the chance to try and bridge the gap to the upper echelons of the Premier League.
There has arguably been enough proof that Postecoglou’s Tottenham aren’t a million miles off doing so. There were some performances last season – in the 4-0 win at Manchester City and the 1-0 home League Cup semi-final win over Liverpool in particular – that showed the ceiling of this team is very high indeed. With a few additions to the squad, they should be able to produce that level of performance more often.
There is also no ignoring how Postecoglou adapted to difficult circumstances in the later part of the season to guide Spurs to Europa League glory. If the criticism of him had been that he was too steadfastly wedded to his principles, then surely he deserves credit for doing precisely the opposite and winning a trophy doing it.
In the final four games of their Europa League run, Spurs conceded only one goal, a deflected effort late on in the first leg of the semi-final against Bodø/Glimt when they were already three goals up. They had no more than 41.7% possession in any of those games and won every one. It was nothing like ‘Angeball‘ as we had come to know it.
They weren’t carved open time and again, and their opponents didn’t find it easy to create chances. In the final, United only really threatened from balls into the box from deep or from set-pieces.
That successful run might just hint at Postecoglou changing his ways. Perhaps he has learned that sticking religiously to his idea of playing isn’t the way to get results in this job, even if it was at previous clubs, and that he may need to ask less physically of his players to keep them fit.
He might have said in so many words that he would never change or negotiate on his principles on more than one occasion since joining Spurs, but the last few months suggest that may no longer be the case. Perhaps he can be adaptable and, dare we say it, pragmatic, after all.
The final thing to say in Postecoglou’s favour is an intangible that cannot be underestimated, and that is the positive feeling around the club; the belief in what he is doing.
With 90 painstakingly poor quality minutes in Bilbao, the entire narrative around Tottenham was flipped on its head. Despair at the constant defeats this season and years of failure previously made way for the euphoria of finally winning a trophy, and with it, Postecoglou earned legendary status among the fans. He proved Spurs don’t have to be brittle and beatable. They don’t have to be ‘Spursy‘.
The players clearly love him, and a few have openly stated their hope that he stays, so why disrupt that feeling in the hope – and that’s all it would be – that there is something better out there?
For all the data that suggests Spurs weren’t up to scratch this season, for those defending him, there is only one stat for 2024-25 that matters. Trophies won: one.
Essentially, the debate can be boiled down to data versus vibes. Stark numbers that paint a picture of a truly dreadful league season against the sheer, unbridled joy of winning a major European trophy for the first time in a generation.
It’s a difficult decision that Levy has been left with, and the above arguments show there is no definitively correct answer.
Still, it’s one the fans hope their chairman can get right.