Ange Postecoglou welcomes scrutiny but calls some pundit comments ‘offensive’
Jamie Carragher has repeatedly insisted that Ange Postecoglou should not play the same way for 90 minutes.
Ange Postecoglou has no issue with Jamie Carragher’s analysis of his Tottenham team but does feel certain discourse around himself from unnamed pundits has been offensive.
Injury-hit Spurs took a big step towards a first trophy since 2008 on Thursday night with a rip-roaring 4-3 victory over Manchester United in the quarter-finals of the Carabao Cup.
Two mistakes by Fraser Forster put Tottenham on the brink of throwing away a three-goal lead and, while they held on for a precious win, the critique of Sky Sports pundit Carragher post-match centred on how Postecoglou’s side never change their approach but should do – a view echoed by Jamie Redknapp.
Ahead of Sunday’s visit of Liverpool, Postecoglou found an ally on Friday morning in opposite number Arne Slot, who declared himself a big fan of the Spurs boss’ style and insisted he wants to see them win the Europa League.
Postecoglou discussed in detail the analysis of Carragher and others when asked if he would listen more to someone like Slot than the ex-Reds defender.
“Jamie Carragher, mate. You can name him. He’ll enjoy that,” Postecoglou laughed.
“People tell me he likes me so that’s a good thing. They say, ‘did you hear what he said? But he likes you as a person’. So, that’s important to me.
“Look, it’s all valid, it’s all valid but I don’t need validation from anybody to do what I do. Whether you agree with my approach or not, there is validity in both and I don’t have an issue with that.
“I love the fact people are talking about our games and analysing our games. I think that is important as well for this football club and I’d rather that than us be anonymous and no one talk about us, or we’re just grinding out an existence.
“As I’ve always said, you have to be prepared for scrutiny, you have to be prepared for criticism and it’s how you react to that that is more important.
“What I am saying is I don’t need validity and it won’t change what I believe because what I believe is borne from a lifetime of experiences and values that I won’t let anyone tamper with from the outside.
“Whether it is Jamie or anyone else scrutinising or criticising our approach, that’s healthy because to me how you react to that is much more important than that itself because if you’re going to jump every time, it tells me you don’t really have a lot of belief in this building about what we’re doing if we’re always going to worry about what he is saying, or we need someone to say a good thing, or someone already said a bad thing.
“I think it is healthy if it’s coming from the right sort of place. Someone like Jamie, he is there to give his opinion and will not stand there and say, ‘I’ve got nothing to say,’ he’ll give an opinion.
“Some of the other stuff I kind of don’t understand because I think it’s just about getting headlines but again if you react to that it kind of says more about yourself than anything else.”
Invited to expand on what had been said to create headlines, Postecoglou replied: “There is some stuff out there and I find – and at the appropriate time I’ll call it out – just offensive towards me.
“I just think you know what, I don’t know. I’m up here with a silly accent and maybe I don’t take things as seriously as people want me to and I’m fairly dismissive of them, but that’s alright. I love my life and I’ll keep doing what I’m doing.”
Spurs should have Destiny Udogie (fatigue) and Timo Werner (illness) back for Liverpool, but remain without eight players.
