Linked with a return to international management, Ange Postecoglou certainly won’t be doing so with Australia after a controversial exit in 2017.
The 59-year-old, who was sacked by Tottenham after winning the Europa League, went out on his own terms when managing his national side, but not everyone was pleased.
Postecoglou left Australia just after making the World Cup and still hasn’t been forgivenGetty That’s even with an emotional press conference when saying goodbyeThe GuardianPostecoglou had coached two top division A-League sides before the promotion to lead his country in 2013 which began with a short run-up to the 2014 World Cup.
In Brazil the Socceroos finished pointless at the bottom of their group, and Postecoglou’s rebuild began shortly after with a Gold Cup win in 2015.
The fourth year of his five-year contract saw him return Australia to the World Cup, but just two weeks after that feat he announced his farewell in a rare emotional press conference in November 2017.
“After a great deal of thought and soul-searching, the journey for me ends as Socceroos coach,” he said in front of the media.
“It has been a privilege for me to coach my country’s national team. To lead them at the 2014 World Cup, to win the Asian Cup in 2015 and now to have qualified for the World Cup next year. I said we would do it and we have done it.”
Things then took an emotional turn as Postecoglou repeatedly stopped to wipe his nose and take deep breaths while discussing the impact the job had on his family.
“All this, however, has taken a toll on me both personally and professionally,” he continued.
“I have invested all I can knowing how important a period it was for Australian football. It is with a heavy heart that I must now end the journey. I loved this job but it has been all encompassing.”
He went on to pay tribute to his three boys ‘who make him smile every day’ and his ‘beautiful wife’ seeming to regret missing the birth of one of their children due to his football commitments.
The former Celtic manager also said he didn’t want to be unemployed for too long, and that turned out to be very much the case when just a month later he was named the new manager of Japanese J League side Yokohama F. Marinos.
Postecoglou had success in Japan under the gaze of Man City’s ownersgettyPostecoglou had warned that may be the case, but the speediness of his return to football didn’t exactly go down well back home.
Leading Australian outlet Fox Sports said ‘One month ago, he was emotional and exhausted’ and that it ‘hasn’t taken long to get over his rest period’.
They added: “Now, what will ultimately most confound and disappoint Socceroos fans, is he is back at work as they continue to wait, somewhat anxiously, for a coach to helm a team for the big dance, in just six months’ time.”
The outlet went on to theorise that Postecoglou’s choice of Yokohama was down to the club’s owners The City Group.
The Manchester City consortium still have a 20 per cent stake in the team, and success in Japan may have drawn their attention.
The success came with the J League title in 2019 and two years later Postecoglou became a key figure in Europe with Scottish giants Celtic, before joining the Premier League with Spurs.
His plan did the trick, and it’s one that he never regretted even with a lack of empathy back home.
“People in Australia have struggled with it, but it’s just the way I am,” he said while coaching in Japan.
“It’s just me as a person and my journey in life. When I feel the time’s right, I feel the time’s right.
“No regrets. I had a fantastic four years. It was obviously a tough decision but it was something that I’d thought about for a very long time.
“When the World Cup is on there will be a little part of me that has a little bit of angst towards not being there, but I’m certainly hoping that they will do well there and I’ve got a real belief that they can.”
Postecoglou went further too, saying it wasn’t just about his career, but the fact Australia had no interest in growing football in a country where other sports take priority.
Postecoglou plotted a path from the Australian league to the Premier League“I walked away from a World Cup. We qualified and I walked away,” he said. “The reason I walked away was I just didn’t enjoy what I was doing.
“I think I’ve said all along, it’s not just doing the job and winning games of football. It’s got to be a higher purpose and my higher purpose in Australia was to change the game. I just don’t think that will happen.
“One of my major drivers for doing what I did was to do that – to change football in Australia. And that’s the reason I left. I felt I hadn’t made an impact at all.
“That’s easier for me to deal with than to think maybe I still can now with what I’m doing. I just think I’d be disappointed, so I’d prefer to think it’s not going to happen.”
“If I can compare [Australia] to a country like Japan who also have the tyranny of distance and baseball’s pretty strong, they plant a lot of resources into football and you can see that that’s making an impact. I don’t see Australia down that road.
“When you look at what the Matildas did at the [Women’s] World Cup, unbelievable… but you still won’t see an influx of resources to the game. You won’t. I guarantee it.
The emotion of the press conference was lost on fans when Postecoglou took a new job less than a month laterGetty“They’ll build stadiums and other teams will use them. I just don’t think the nation as a whole has that inside them to understand you can make an impact on the world of football but it requires a kind of nationalistic approach that I just don’t think Australians at their core are really interested in.”
talkSPORT host Ally McCoist wants to see Postecoglou managing Scotland – a long shot, but not as long as Australia with those bridges still burning.
He has instead been linked to a surprise move to Saudi Arabia, with Al Hilal contacting him over an immediate return to the dugout.
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