THE last time Ange Postecoglou lost a game at Ibrox, defeat to Rangers proved less consequential than usual.
A second title as Celtic manager in the bag, the Australian had one eye on the Scottish Cup final against Inverness when he benched his top scorer Kyogo Furuhashi, Daizen Maeda and left-back Greg Taylor.
From time to time, even a game between Celtic and Rangers is reduced to a meanwhile, the end justifying the means when Postecoglou secured his fifth trophy from a possible six at Hampden before informing the Celtic board that he wished to leave for Tottenham Hotspur.
The Australian returns to Ibrox in the Europa League tonight in rather different circumstances. One win in seven games represents a slump for a Spurs side languishing eleventh in the English Premier League. After Sunday’s 4-3 defeat to Chelsea, defender Cristian Romero aired the club’s dirty linen in public when he appeared to criticise the Spurs hierarchy in public.
‘Manchester City competes every year, you see how Liverpool strengthens its squad, Chelsea strengthens their squad, doesn’t do well, strengthens again, and now they’re seeing results,’ said the defender. ‘Those are the things to imitate. You have to realise that something is going wrong; hopefully, they (the Tottenham board) realise it.
Ange Postecoglou at Ibrox on Wednesday night ahead of Spurs’ Europa League tie
Under pressure Postecoglou addresses the media ahead of the match at Ibrox
‘Hopefully, they realise who the responsible ones are and we move forward because it’s a beautiful club that, with the structure it has, could easily be competing for the title every year.’
His first appearance for a month cut short by injury after 15 minutes, Romero will miss tonight’s game in Glasgow together with fellow defenders Ben Davies and Micky van de Ven and first-choice goalkeeper Guglielmo Vicario.
The fall-out from his comments, meanwhile, rumble on — adding to the air of crisis around the club. For Postecoglou, defeat to Rangers at a hostile Ibrox would be a more dangerous business altogether than the 3-0 loss in a dead rubber league game with Celtic in May 2023.
Postecoglou’s Spurs collapsed from 2-0 up to lose 4-3 against Chelsea on Sunday
Postecoglou suffered defeat on his last visit to Ibrox as Celtic manager in May 2023
Facing the biggest injury crisis of his managerial career, the former Parkhead boss will turn to teenage defender Archie Gray, grandson of former Scotland player Frank Gray and great-nephew of Leeds legend and ex-Scotland winger Eddie.
Virtually the last men standing, Gray — a self-proclaimed ‘massive Celtic fan’ — will play in front of former Parkhead keeper Fraser Forster alongside Radu Dragusin.
‘I have to get creative,’ said Postecoglou. ‘I think Archie is probably the one for us at the moment that we need to try and get to fill in there.
‘He’s done right-back, left-back for us. He’s had to play centre- back a little bit this year during the pre-season.
‘Obviously, with him and Radu, they’re the two main defenders, but we’ve still got five or six games to navigate. So obviously we may have to get creative at some point and deal with it in a different way.
‘It’s challenging. We’ve also got Ben Davies out, who has played a big part for us while the other two have been out.
‘It’s no secret we’re thin on numbers. It is what it is and we can’t change that. We’ve got some big games coming up starting tomorrow and we’ll have to deal with it with what we’ve got.
‘I’m still very confident we’ll be able to get the job done with the players that are out, I suppose.’
Confidence has been thin on the ground of late. Leading Chelsea 2-0 before they collapsed, the latest defeat to Spurs’ great rivals increased the pressure on Postecoglou, despite a 4-0 win at Manchester City last month.
Absolved of blame for the club’s current plight by Romero, the defender was less sparing of chairman Daniel Levy. During his 23-year reign, the club have won just one piece of silverware despite being the fourth-biggest net spenders in English football over the past five years. Managers come, managers go, Levy remains stubbornly hard to shift.
‘I think in the context of the day, Christian was disappointed,’ said his manager in an appeal for unity. ‘He knew that and had to go off. And then watch the team sort of have to feel the pain of another defeat in the manner it happened. He was very emotional.
Spurs have hit a rough patch of form since beating Manchester City 4-0 last month
‘He’s a leader in the club. He hasn’t been able to help us and I think it was his way of trying to, as a leader, to help us and the group in saying that we’re going through a tough time but he believes in what we’re doing.
‘I think the way he expressed it was not the right way, particularly in a public sense, because I don’t feel and it’s certainly not my belief that our kind of challenges at the moment are because of one thing or one person.
‘I think whatever we need to do, we have the power to do that. But it’ll only happen if we kind of stay united as a group.’
The vulnerability coursing through Spurs offers Rangers hope of another memorable night in the Europa League. Victory for either side would secure a place in the knock-outs and enhance their hopes of finishing in the top eight and avoiding the play-offs.
Despite recent events, Postecoglou’s desire to stop Tottenham being the great underachievers of English and European football burns stronger than ever.
‘I just don’t think that it’s one thing that will get us to where we want, and I don’t think there’s one thing that’s stopping us from getting to where we want to,’ he said. ‘I’m as ambitious as everyone else is at the club since I’ve been here to bring success, and that means taking on and trying to make the teams that, in some respects, have extra resources, but we can find different ways of bridging that gap.’
