New Tottenham boss Ange Postecoglou bagged his first job after impromptu pitch at a BARBECUE left everyone stunned
HE is the manager who got his first job thanks to an impromptu gift-of-the-gab speech at a barbecue in Melbourne.
And the one who went on to become the Aussie Sir Alex Ferguson . . . not just for stacking up silverware but for the dramatic away win which saved his skin when all looked lost.
Postecoglou will walk into Tottenham as the Premier League’s first Australian gaffer.
But his managerial career was nearly over two months after taking up his first role with South Melbourne.
Just as Fergie was once one game away from the bullet at Manchester United, so too was the new Spurs chief.
Peter Filopoulos, then general manager of South Melbourne, recalls Postecoglu’s win-or-bust afternoon in 1996.
Filopoulos, now marketing chief of Football Australia, revealed: “He got off to a terrible start and we only won one of the first seven games.
“In fact if he hadn’t won the eighth, the Ange Postecoglou story could have finished then, and I remember it well.
“It was away at Marconi Stallions and Paul Trimboli — his big mate — scored an 89th-minute winner.
“After that the noise about sacking him faded away, we had a great run and reached the preliminary finals.
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“The following year we won the championship, then backed it up the next season to earn the right to be in the Fifa Club World Championship.
“That’s how it has always been with Ange . . . a slow start, then a fast, sustainable finish. He’ll take everyone at Tottenham along that journey.
“I’d tell them all to put their seat belts on and buckle up because it’s going to be a very exciting ride.”
That dodge-a-bullet win at Marconi has all the hallmarks of Mark Robins’ famous FA Cup goal at Nottingham Forest in 1990, when Fergie was so close to the chop at Old Trafford.
It was also a huge relief for Filopoulos, who had insisted president George Vasilopoulous considered the man who spent a decade as a South Melbourne player before injury forced him to quit.
Postecoglou stepped up from assistant to interim boss when Frank Arok was sacked the previous season but was not in the running for the permanent job. Until one fateful afternoon.
Filopoulos said: “We were the biggest club in Australia, with the biggest managers and players, so when it came to replacing Frank, he wasn’t discussed.
“Around that time I invited Ange and his wife to a barbecue at my house for the younger committee members.
“Ange unintentionally did a pitch, all very informal, about his vision, what he’d do differently, where he saw the club in five years, that sort of stuff.
“For 15-20 minutes there was absolute silence. He’s always had a way of articulating himself and that’s when we thought ‘we have our coach’.
We put Ange’s name to the president and after a couple of conversations he had the same feeling. It snowballed from there.
“As soon as he got the job he flipped the football programme on its head.
“We had a massive off-season and I never worked harder with a coach in 30 years.
“He challenged everyone from the kit provider to the sports science and medical teams, people in the offices . . . he tipped it all upside down.”
Just as he did in winning four domestic titles with South Melbourne and Brisbane Roar, plus an Oceania Club Championship at Melbourne.
He led the Socceroos to two World Cups, won a J-League title at Yokohama and five trophies from six — including a treble — in two years at Celtic.
That convinced Daniel Levy he merited a crack at the Tottenham job.
One Postecoglou’s closest footballing pals is Andy Harper, who worked with him as tour manager on an Australia Under-17s trip to France and Belgium.
And former player Harper, now a well-respected commentator and pundit, expects the 57-year-old to make a massive impact in North London.
Harper said: “When you get on to that bus with Ange, it will be a white knuckle ride, and there will be times when you go pretty close to the bends.
“But if you sit tight and trust the driver, you’ll have a beautiful view at the end of the journey.
“He’s not a ‘blokey’ bloke, he doesn’t do dressing-room banter. He thinks the more you weaken the cord through being pals, the harder it is to pull it tight when you have to.
“And he’s also a very smart man, who doesn’t miss a trick. Playing for him, there’s like a Ferrari-engine atmosphere.
“Ange is personable, has great care for his players but doesn’t say a lot and you don’t know what he’s thinking.
“There will be turbulence but once he gets over that, Spurs will fly, and his appointment is massive.
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“I think it’s the biggest in the history of Australian sport, not just football.”
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