TalkSPORT pundit Simon Jordan has hit back following some ‘silly comments’ made by Tottenham Hotspur’s Ange Postecoglou earlier in the season.
The trip to Newcastle United on the weekend was certainly a sobering one for Tottenham who tasted yet another heavy defeat on Tyneside.
Ange Postecoglou‘s side have impressed this season on the back of what was a dreadful campaign under Antonio Conte.
Daniel Levy oversaw a lot of changes over the summer including the sale of Harry Kane which meant the club went in to the campaign with a lot of uncertainties.
However, this hasn’t stopped Spurs from defying the odds and putting in a real fight for a spot in the top four.
There have been some hurdles along the way. The game on the weekend was certainly one of them alongside the defeats against Chelsea and Fulham.
But Jordan has now provided some explanation as to why Postecoglou has made some of the comments he has along the way.
The Australian has always backed his style of play even when it has not worked and Jordan thinks there’s a reason why he is doing so to the media.
What Ange Postecoglou has said that has annoyed some
Postecoglou’s appointment at Tottenham was another uncertainty for the Lilywhites coming into the 2023/24 campaign.
The 58-year-old had never managed in any of Europe’s top five leagues with his biggest job prior being at Celtic.
However, he was backed by Levy during the summer and Spurs made some smart purchases with Micky van de Ven and Guglielmo Vicario.
Despite already surpassing what some will have predicted for Spurs this season, the Lilywhites have endured some poor results.
One of them came earlier in the season when Chelsea beat them at home as Spurs saw a number of players go down with injury.
After the game, Postecoglou was criticised for not changing his high-line tactic despite going down to nine men.
“It is just who we are mate, it is who we are and who we will be for as long as I am here. If we go down to five men we will have a go,” Postecoglou told them media after the game.
Speaking in the wake of the defeat on Tyneside, TalkSPORT‘s Simon Jordan has insisted Postecoglou does not fully stand by these ‘silly comments’.
“I think it tells you that the man has got a belief system and what he’s trying to do is engender the club with that.
“That’s why he made his silly comments after the Chelsea game that, ‘I’ll play that high line if I had five players’ because he doesn’t mean that what he means is, ‘I want this culture embedded in these players that we play a certain way. So then once we’ve learned that we can pivot and play other ways at the same time’.”
Can Spurs finish in fifth spot and qualify for the Champions League?
Just a few weeks ago, the Premier League were looking good to earn an extra Champions League spot through the new UEFA coefficient rule.
However, after last week’s European fixtures, that is now looking a lot less promising with a number of Premier League sides suffering poor results.
And it would now appear that Spurs would need to cheer on their north London rivals tonight in their game against Bayern Munich to have a hope of earning that extra Champions League spot.
Top four football is still on the cards for Spurs, but with some seriously tough games coming up it is looking alike a real tough ask.
Although Spurs may take some confidence from the fact they have not lost a game to any of the top three sides this season.