Former Tottenham Hotspur manager Ange Postecoglou admits he is sad but not surprised to see the club thick in the relegation quagmire, having handed Igor Tudor some words of advice over how to save the club, but stopped short of answering if he would step in to replace the under-fire Croatian.
Tudor’s four-game reign at Tottenham Hotspur is already under serious threat, and calls for his removal as interim boss are growing louder by the day. A 5-2 thumping by Atletico Madrid in the first leg of their Champions League last-16 tie saw him beaten for the fourth straight game, pitching the club as a whole on the worst losing run in their history.
But while TEAMtalk revealed on Wednesday that high-level talks were being held by the Spurs board to discuss a way forward and a potential removal of a second manager in a matter of weeks, it later emerged that Tudor looks likely to battle on for now.
But quite how long he has left in the role remains to be seen, though sources have played down speculation that Sean Dyche is on the cusp of stepping in despite sources revealing the 54-year-old would be keen to take on the role.
However, desperate fans have suggested 16 different options more favourable than the struggling Croatian, who surely now must take at least a point from Sunday’s trip to champions Liverpool to have any hope of continuing in the role.
In light of all that, former Spurs boss Postecoglou has offered Tudor some sound advice, having admitted he was pained to see them battling relegation.
“No, I wouldn’t say that,” Postecoglou responded to TNT Sports when asked if he was shocked by their struggles.
“I am still invested in the club because I have an attachment to those players, I worked with them for two years, the last time I had an interaction with the fans was 200,000 of them in the streets of London.
“It pains me to see it, it definitely looks like the players are fairly lost at the moment. There’s obvious pressure there, and it’s a really difficult time.
“It all kind of manifested in what happened [Tuesday] night, it was almost a worst-case scenario, you’re playing a side away from home, Atletico Madrid, who never drop to a performance level [below], they’re always at a really strong level, and it was just a horror start for them.”
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Big Ange on what Tudor needs to do to save Tottenham
Asked what Tudor needs to instil into Spurs to help them survive, Postecoglou was hesitant to answer but quickly gave a detailed response.
“It’s hard for me to say, and me speaking about it tends to skew the argument. I think what’s really important right now is there is no way anybody objectively would say these players are performing at the levels they are capable of. They’ve just got to try to ease the pressure on them somehow.
“I thought [Tuesday] night was a tremendous opportunity for them, they’ve done really well in the Champions League, they’re on a good side of the draw, Atletico away is tough but you’ve still got to take them back to Tottenham, it just felt like the pressure was there.
“I’m sure they trained on the pitch the night before, but the number of times they were slipping over, I think that’s still pressure, there’s just a real desperation in everything you do, mentally you’re desperate. Then that physically manifests itself, you’re lunging for things, you’re rushing things.
“It’s hard for me to comment from the outside but, but for me, it’s about instilling some belief, showing them the kind of players they are, not that they can be, that they are, what they’ve already shown.”
Asked about supporters’ expectations versus what is being delivered, Postecoglou added: “That’s a broader argument, but the reality of it is they’ve got to deal with it now, that’s the most important thing.
“The football club, I said it a couple of weeks ago, wasn’t behaving to me like a big football club in terms of the kind of players it was attracting.
“But it is a big football club, we saw that last year, there was a couple of hundred thousand people in London going nuts there, and I felt it, how big a club it is.”
Would Postecoglou return to Tottenham?
Knowing how tough and competitive the Premier League is, the 60-year-old commented: “In the Premier League, it’s a slippery slope once you take your eye off the ball with certain things.
“But all that is not important right now. What’s important now is where they are in the league; they need to maintain their Premier League status, which is obviously paramount to what they want to build.
“Those kinds of questions, you kind of go, ‘okay, we want some real direction here’. I think it’s pretty clear what Tottenham fans want – they want the team to play a certain way, they want success, every team wants success.”
And when asked if he would consider a return to the club should he be asked, Postecoglou dropped a two-word response that perhaps, importantly, did not rule out such a possibility.
Dropping a two-word response to the question about answering an SOS to the club, he added: “No comment.”
Latest Tottenham news: Pochettino blow; Romero’s next club named
With regards to a long-term successor to Tudor as Tottenham manager, the club’s number one choice for the role, Mauricio Pochettino, is now in danger of being whisked away to an elite European side after he emerged as the top pick for an ambitious president.
In a further blow, another option for Spurs in the permanent manager’s role has now also made his ambitions to take charge at Manchester United instead.
On the transfer front, Cristian Romero finds himself at the centre of intense speculation as the summer transfer window approaches, with multiple top European clubs circling the Argentina international.
And amid a growing belief from TEAMtalk sources that Spurs are increasingly open to letting the Argentina star depart, the club most likely to sign him this summer, as well as the club’s asking price, has now come to light.
Another player strongly tipped to leave this summer is his jet-heeled defensive partner Micky van de Ven.
Strongly linked with both Liverpool and Real Madrid, it is now claimed the reigning Premier League champions have now reached a firm decision on a summer move – and Spurs might be able to breathe a little more easily.