Ange Postecoglou jokingly said the Sky Sports studio was “probably going into meltdown at my lack of tactics” as the Australian reflected on a chaotic 4-3 win over Manchester United.
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Tottenham survived two calamitous errors from stand-in goalkeeper Fraser Forster to set up a League Cup semi-final against Liverpool, staying on track for their first trophy since 2008.
The home side were cruising at 3-0 in the 54th minute of a captivating tie in London after two goals from Dominic Solanke and one from Dejan Kulusevski.
But Forster’s mistakes allowed substitutes Joshua Zirkzee and Amad Diallo to pull the score back to 3-2 with 20 minutes to go.
It was one-way traffic after that, with United totally on top, but Spurs scored a fourth as Son Heung-min found the net from a corner and they held on despite a late Jonny Evans goal.
Speaking to Sky Sports after the game, Postecoglou said Tottenham “made it harder than it should have been”.
“We were in control, played really well, we looked like we were going to manage the game, but two unfortunate moments, the first one affected Fraser for a bit and the second one came as a result of that,” he said.
But in spite of that, unsurprisingly a defiant Postecoglou remained confident in the team’s playing style and said he would continue to tell his goalkeepers to play out the back, even if taking such risks led to two goals and nearly cost Tottenham Friday’s game.
“I love football and watching teams that go out there to entertain,” Postecoglou told Sky Sports.
“Obviously we want to be successful and we won’t be if we make things difficult like we did tonight.
“I like the whole game. Are you not entertained? I know the studio is probably having a meltdown over my lack of tactics.
“We’re not going out there to try and grind out 1-0 victories, we’re trying to keep folks entertained. I can’t see how that’s a bad thing.
“It’s part of football, mistakes will happen. From the context of how we play as a team, there’s nothing we need to change. It doesn’t get me any credit in the bank as an astute tactician, but so be it.”
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Tottenham was without 10 senior players for Friday’s game, including Timo Werner who woke up in the morning with a high fever and was subsequently ruled out.
It was the kind of bad fortune Postecoglou has come to expect this season, with the Australian joking that he doesn’t roll up to game day “looking for good news”.
“It’s just ridiculous,” he said.
“And the fact that we’re still putting in these levels of performance.. we’re getting, I believe, some real enormous growth in this period that maybe won’t be evident until down the track, but I just think there’s so much sort of good stuff in there at the moment, even though it’s a tough period still.”
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