Losing football matches has been quite commonplace for Ange Postecoglou’s Tottenham Hotspur this season.
With Sunday’s 2-1 defeat to Aston Villa in the fourth round of the A Cup, Tottenham have now lost in 16 matches this season across all competitions.
That is quite a lot for a team that has sacked people like Mauricio Pochettino, Jose Mourinho and Antonio Conte in pursuit of excellence on the pitch.
However, since their departure, Postecoglou’s tenure at the club has been unflattering to say the least.
FA Cup Loss Virtually Ended the Chances of Silverware for Ange Postecoglou
Spurs are now in 14th position in the league table, which is quite disappointing.
They got thrashed by Liverpool in the second leg of the EFL Cup semifinal recently, ending their chances of acquiring a trophy.
Winning the Europa League will be extremely tough for them, given the kind of form they are in at the moment.
In the name of professing entertaining and adventurous football, Postecoglou has often made his team take too many risks without bothering to look at the practicality of the situation.
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Lack of Quality
The Australian manager should be wise enough to know that in order to play a very attractive and aggressive brand of football, one has to first have a team bristling with world-class talents.
With Son Heung-min now clearly past his prime and Micky van de Ven plagued by injuries, Tottenham hardly have a player who can be called world-class at the moment.
Both Dejan Kulusevski and James Maddison are quite capable midfielders, with the former being arguably the best player for Tottenham this season.
However, with the propensity to play high line consistently, the inability to defend set-pieces properly and reluctance to change gears while being ahead in a game are the main reasons behind Tottenham’s sorry run under Postecoglou this season.
The Aussie manager refuses to learn from those experiences and insists on playing with his one-dimensional approach.
As his team has found out, a team needs far more guile and pragmatism to be inside the top four of a tough league like the Premier League.
Moreover, as mentioned already, Tottenham hardly have the talents like Liverpool, Manchester City or Arsenal do at the moment.
Therefore, his idea of taking English football by storm has backfired quite seriously. A plethora of injuries has made his task even more difficult.
Tough Fixtures Ahead
Tottenham will take on the two Manchester clubs this month, with a match against Ipswich Town sandwiched between those two.
Manchester United are battling hard for success themselves and Manchester City suffered a humiliating loss at home to the Spurs this season.
However, even then, neither of those matches is going to be easy for Postecoglou’s men.
In order to improve their position in the league table, Tottenham must now earn as many points as possible from their remaining matches.
Losing any of their remaining three Premier League matches could seriously jeopardize Postecoglou’s position.
One might argue that he is already on borrowed time at the club.
It remains a pity given the exhilarating brand of football his team displayed in the first half of the season.
Main Photo
Credit: IMAGO / Sportimage
Recording Date: 09.02.2025