Tottenham Hotspur are suffering inconsistent form under Ange Postecoglou having been beaten 2-1 by Ipswich Town on Sunday.
Tottenham Hotspur are just so good at building your hopes up to crush them mere days later.
Wins over Manchester City and Aston Villa had sparked enthusiasm following a truly awful defeat at Crystal Palace.
Tottenham managed to fall flat again on Sunday though, losing 2-1 at home to struggling Ipswich Town.
Ange Postecoglou clashed with one Tottenham fan on Sunday as the mood inside the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium turned a little sour.
Postecoglou felt that the 3-2 defeat to Brighton and Hove Albion was the worst of his reign, but this loss to Ipswich will be right up there.
Gary Neville on Ange Postecoglou
Postecoglou doesn’t appear to be under any immediate danger of losing his job but the results certainly have to become more consistent.
Former Australia international Mark Schwarzer is pointing the finger of blame at Spurs players but Gary Neville thinks something deeper is going on.
Pundit Neville has told It’s Called Soccer that he feels Postecoglou ‘looks really down’ when speaking to the media right now.
Neville added that he thinks something may have happened behind the scenes to leave Postecoglou feeling ‘let down’.
The former Manchester United defender suggested that Postecoglou may have been ‘rejected’ internally, presumably over potential signings over the summer, with Neville highlighting the power of Daniel Levy.
Neville added that Postecoglou’s situation ‘needs monitoring’ as it could easily ‘get out of control’ in the coming weeks.
“He looks really down, doesn’t he?” said Neville.
“In the interviews, when you see him come in… I’m not going to say he looks lost but he looks really down on himself, but also he’s getting some pretty poor performances out of the players, but at Old Trafford they were fantastic.
“I look at it at this moment in time… I really like Ange, I really like him at Tottenham, I think his style of play suits the club. I just wonder whether he feels let down with something. You just always know sometimes at Tottenham, there’s a period comes whereby something has happened behind the scenes, he may have been rejected.
“Obviously, he’s got honour, he’s got integrity and obviously, you know what happens there at that club – there’s one guy that runs it and he sort of says ‘no, this is what we’re doing’ and then you’ve almost either got to kick off, and that’s a bad ending, or keep quiet – and that’s probably not the best either.
“He looks like he’s in that type of mode where he feels a little let down by certain things that may have happened. He might be let down by the players, with the level of performances, he might feel let down by people above but he is also taking responsibility himself, which I would expect him to do. That’s what good managers do, they take the responsibility themselves, they take the pressure away from the players and don’t pile it onto the players.
“It’s a difficult situation. There is something happening there at this moment in time that needs monitoring, because it’s the type of situation at a club like Spurs that can go away, but it can easily get out of control quite quickly,” he added.
Ange Postecoglou may be frustrated over transfers
Spurs managers have been frustrated in recent years.
Antonio Conte’s meltdown resulted in his departure whilst Mauricio Pochettino consistently called for improvements after losing in the Champions League final.
Postecoglou may be hitting that same feeling and Tottenham’s summer transfer business may be a source of frustration.
Reliable insider Paul O’Keefe reported in October that Postecoglou wanted to sign Conor Gallagher whilst Eberechi Eze and Pedro Neto were also targeted.
Wages were the problem with Gallagher and Eze whilst Neto ended up at Chelsea with Tottenham refusing to pay a full cash deal for the winger.
Those players are proven Premier League difference-makers and could have made an instant impact at Tottenham.
Postecoglou wasn’t able to sign any of them and missing out on those players may well have left him feeling frustrated heading into this season.
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