Tottenham Hotspur have sacked manager Ange Postecoglou, the club said on Friday, little more than two weeks after the Australian guided the London club to a first major trophy in 17 years with victory in the Europa League final.
While Postecoglou’s fate has split opinion amongst the fans, the 59-year-old ultimately paid the price for an horrendous Premier League season which saw Tottenham finish 17th.
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“The Board has unanimously concluded that it is in the best interests of the Club for a change to take place,” Tottenham said in a statement.
“Following a positive start in the 2023/24 Premier League (PL) season, we recorded 78 points from the last 66 PL games. This culminated in our worst-ever PL finish last season.”
Postecoglou leaves two years to the day after his appointment and 16 days after his side beat Manchester United 1-0 in Bilbao for the club’s first silverware since 2008, a win that also put them in next season’s Champions League.
The former Celtic manager has had to face questions over his future for several months, yet delivered on his claim early last season that he always wins a trophy in his second season in a job.
He also took Tottenham to the League Cup semi-final but their league campaign was their worst since 1976-77, the last time the club suffered relegation from the top flight.
Several of the club’s first team have voiced their support for Postecoglou since beating United, but chairman Daniel Levy is now searching for his fifth full-time manager in six years since Mauricio Pochettino was sacked in 2019.
“At times there were extenuating circumstances — injuries and then a decision to prioritise our European campaign,” the club said. “Whilst winning the Europa League this season ranks as one of the Club’s greatest moments, we cannot base our decision on emotions aligned to this triumph.”
Several managers have been linked to the Tottenham job, including Brentford’s Thomas Frank and Crystal Palace’s Oliver Glasner.
GOOD START
Postecoglou will walk away with his pride intact and a handsome bonus, but his recent comment to fans at the Europa League victory parade that the third season of a TV series is always better than the second now looks hollow.
It all started so well for Postecoglou. He began the 2023-24 campaign by guiding Tottenham to their best start to a top-flight season since the 1961 title-winning team.
That form soon dipped though and despite finishing fifth in his first campaign the momentum had long since gone.
This season Tottenham earned only 38 points and lost 22 top-flight matches. They managed five points from their last 12 league games and the only win they earned during that run was against a Southampton side who narrowly avoided becoming statistically the worst team ever in the Premier League.
Postecoglou has pointed to a long injury list which denied him the likes of Cristian Romero, Micky van de Ven, Dejan Kulusevski, Destiny Udogie, Dominic Solanke, James Maddison and Son Heung-min for significant periods.
But while it has clearly been one of long-serving chairman Levy’s toughest calls, he has concluded that Postecoglou is not the man to lead the club forward.
“We have made what we believe is the right decision to give us the best chance of success going forward, not the easy decision,” the club statement said.
“We have a talented, young squad and Ange has given us a great platform to build upon. We should like to express our gratitude to him. We wish him well for the future — he will always be welcome back at our home.”
Many fans reacted to the news of Postecoglou’s sacking with surprise, but England manager Thomas Tuchel said that sometimes even winning a trophy is not enough.
“I feel for every manager and I have huge sympathy for every manager in these moments because I was in the same spot,” the German, who was sacked by Chelsea despite taking them to the Champions League title, said on Friday.
“If the trust is not there anymore then sometimes it’s not enough to win a trophy.”
