Ange Postecoglou faces a date with destiny on Thursday.
Lose the Europa League quarter-final to Eintracht Frankfurt and it will be curtains for the Tottenham boss, believes Jamie Carragher.
“It can’t go on any longer,” he told Sky Sports News. “I think if they go out to Eintracht Frankfurt, it probably would be a shake of hands and move on to something different for both parties.”
Jamie Carragher discusses Postecoglou’s future
Postecoglou is presiding over potentially Spurs’ worst Premier League campaign.
A 17th league defeat of the season on Sunday at Wolves means they are just three losses away from surpassing the club-record of 19 Premier League defeats in the 2003/04 and 1993/94 campaigns.
With a 1.15 points per match average, Spurs are also projected to record their lowest Premier League points tally. If they fail to take seven points from their final six games, including trips to Liverpool and Aston Villa, they will fall short of their 44-point season in 1997/98.
The error-strewn 4-2 defeat at Molineux leaves them a dismal 15th in the table and just two points above 17th-placed West Ham, putting them in danger of their lowest Premier League finish (15th in 1994).
“It’s really hard to see and understand how Postecoglou is still in the position as head coach of the football club,” Ricky Sacks of the Last Word On Spurs Podcast told Sky Sports News.
“It just seems pure and utter negligence by [Tottenham chairman] Daniel Levy and Co that this guy is still remaining in a job. It’s unbelievable.”
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‘Make-or-break for Postecoglou’
The hope of Europa League glory has given Postecoglou a stay of execution for now.
The Australian is being allowed to deliver on his promise of “always winning things in my second year”, with Spurs desperate to end their 17-year trophy drought.
But his reign has all come down to Thursday’s second leg in Germany, with the last-eight tie finely poised at 1-1 following an encouraging first-leg display in north London.
“It feels like make or break,” ex-Arsenal striker Alan Smith told Sky Sports News. “They need a win in Europe to rescue their season and for Postecoglou to maybe save his job.
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“Going over to Frankfurt with the fans behind the German team, who are riding high in third in the Bundesliga, that’s going to be quite a task for them, and I’m not entirely confident that they’ve got it in them to handle it.”
History suggests not, with Spurs having won just three of their last 14 away matches in Europe. And their form suggests not too, with Tottenham’s numbers alarming under Postecoglou.
Only the bottom three clubs – Southampton, Leicester and Ipswich – have lost more league games, have a worse expected goals against and have taken fewer away points than Spurs this season.
In fact, since Tottenham’s 4-0 win at Manchester City on November 23, only the bottom three have picked up fewer points than Spurs (18), who have lost 12 out of 20 games since beating Pep Guardiola’s side (W5 D3).
It is a run which has seen them lose at home to relegation-threatened Ipswich and Leicester, the latter’s victory their only one from their last 18 league games.
Carragher said: “Some of the results we’ve seen this season – there’s been mitigating circumstances in terms of the injuries they’ve had – but even when they’ve had their full team, they’ve not been winning enough games.
“And this is not me just going on this season, if you go back to the first 10 games of last season when they were fantastic and top of the league, from then it’s been going on for nearly 18 months with them conceding goals and losing games.
“It’s not just turning on the manager really quickly over a poor run of form, this has been going on a long time.”
Could EL glory keep Ange in Spurs job?
Twenty-five per cent of Postecoglou’s 103 Premier League points were picked up in his 10-game unbeaten start to last season – a period which saw Spurs fans fall in love with the ex-Celtic boss.
Now, many want a break-up, including Sacks.
“His relationship with the supporters is at an all-time low,” he said. “There’s no real connection there to make you feel he can even win the fans back should he progress to the Europa League semi-finals.
“It just feels that there’s been no plan. There’s been no sense of any feeling from Daniel Levy that there’s any kind of back-up with regards to this season, because during the season, there have been a few times where Tottenham should have and could have changed the manager on multiple occasions and have let this situation play out and play out now.
“This is no disrespect to Ange Postecoglou, but he will go down as one of the worst managers in Spurs’ modern history.”
On the other hand, Postecoglou could become Spurs’ most successful manager of the 21st century with Europa League glory. Could lifting the trophy in Bilbao on May 21 change the 59-year-old’s Spurs future?
“Even if Postecoglou somehow miraculously won the Europa League,” Sacks said, “I’d find it impossible to feel how he’ll be there beyond the summer.”
The dilemma will only deepen if Postecoglou comes through his last-chance saloon on Thursday.
