His passport still bears the name “Angelos Postekos”. It was the name legally given to him by his parents, eager for their children to fit into their adopted home, aware that they would face enough obstacles – a different language, a different culture, a different skin tone – without throwing a long name into the bargain.
But he always hated the name Postekos. To him it smelled too much of embarrassment. Of apologising for who you were. Of changing your essence to please others. Of compromise. And so, as soon as he had any say in the matter, he resolved he would be known by the name his father had used, and those who came before him, back in the old country. Before everything changed forever.
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And so it is the name of Ange Postecoglou that sits just behind Ruud van Nistelrooy in second place on most oddsmakers’ lists of the next Premier League manager to get the sack. Andoni Iraola at Bournemouth appears to be first choice to replace him. According to reports, there has already been some contact and terms are not expected to be an issue.
The vultures and the pundits have been circling for weeks. Marco Silva at Fulham still has his admirers. Brentford are bracing themselves for an approach for Thomas Frank. Meanwhile Postecoglou continues to prepare his Tottenham team for the visit to Stamford Bridge, a ground where Spurs have won once in 35 years. Everything here seems to be pointing in one direction.
Of all the clubs Postecoglou has faced in his long career, Chelsea are the only one to have beaten him the first three times in a row. There is a kind of circularity here, given it was that first defeat – a 4-1 Chelsea win at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in late 2023 – that sealed his legend in English football, while also setting the madcap template for what was to follow.
As it turned out, this would not be Postecoglou’s first experience of constructing an elite footballing outfit from the bare minimum of usable resources. Reduced to nine men by the dismissals of Cristian Romero and Destiny Udogie, Spurs continued to defend with a daringly high line, continued to launch waves of startling attack. Chelsea picked them off in the end. It was Postecoglou’s first Premier League defeat. But it also made his name. The name he chose for himself.
Postecoglou was five years old when he stepped off the boat in Melbourne in 1970, too young to understand the complex waves of violence and politics and opportunity that had washed him there. The Postecoglous came from a long line of successful merchants. Dimitris Postecoglou, Ange’s father, owned a furniture business in Athens. Life was comfortable. Life was good.
Then in 1967, a right-wing military junta seized control of the country, imposed a terrifying autocratic regime, liquidated the family business and forced the Postecoglous into exile. And so on to the boat to Australia they stepped, to a land where they would have no money, no language, no job and no roots.
Growing up in suburban Melbourne, Ange would piece together his gilded past in snatched fragments. There was always love and there was always optimism but there was always nostalgia, too, for Europe, the motherland, a certain longing for everything they once had, everything that was taken from them. For the days when the Postecoglou name was taken seriously.
We are, in life, shaped by who we once were. How must it feel being raised in a new world stripped of the glories of the old? How does that define you? Postecoglou’s father is no longer here, but as he later put it: “If I can make a difference and somehow his name continues on, I’m hoping those sacrifices he made were worthwhile.”
Perhaps it helps to make sense of Postecoglou’s career, then, to see it as a kind of honour mission, even a vengeance of sorts, the sacred duty of restoring the Postecoglous to their rightful place. This is why the most reliable way of rattling him is to disrespect those A-League titles, those AFC championships, his fair‑dinkum schtick. It strikes at his greatest insecurity: the fear of being once again a low-status outsider in a big, frightening world.
Even his footballing philosophy, that unshakeable faith in his methods, can be seen through the same prism. The noise is just noise. Individual victories and defeats come and go. What matters is the project as a whole: the art of staying steadfast in a fragile and capricious world. Power can be seized in an instant, and power can be lost just as quickly. All that matters, when the paths of history begin to diverge and the momentum starts to shift, is being on the right side of the break.
Tottenham and Postecoglou have been through hell this season. Injuries upon injuries, fixtures upon fixtures, criticism upon ridicule, defeats upon defeats. Through it all, he has endured: a little prickly at times, a little weary and browbeaten at others, but still essentially faithful. “Surviving tough times can often unite people,” he said in an interview with Australian television last week. “Because there’s nothing down the track which will be anywhere near as bad as what we’ve gone through.”
Postecoglou knows this lesson in football because he knows it from life. The vultures and the pundits are circling. Everything seems to be pointing in one direction. The smart money reckons Postecoglou is toast if he loses. But what if he pulls out a win?
The fixtures ahead are kind. Injured players are coming back. An international break has offered time to work, time to recuperate, time to reset. A coin toss of a quarter-final awaits against Eintracht Frankfurt in the Europa League. Win that, win the next, win the next. It feels outlandish beyond belief. We are reminded that this is the same man who as Socceroos coach once declared his ambition to win the 2018 World Cup.
But everything Postecoglou ever earned in his life had to be built from a clean, clear vision. A significant minority of the fanbase still adores him and a good proportion still sympathise for his plight. The dressing room is still on his side. You draw your greatest strength from your moment of greatest crisis. This is what you have to believe. Because if you don’t, who else will?
