Celtic were aware Ange was interested in the Tottenham job for at least two weeks. The writing was on the wall before his agent travelled to Glasgow for the final league game of the season. A rear-guard action continued to no avail.
What’s more, attempts to sign him up on a long-term contract were rebuffed for a year. Ange was always ‘happy’ with the way things were. With a manager rejects more pay on the basis that he is happy, it is a bit like your significant other telling you they are ‘fine’. You might not know what’s coming your way, but when it does, it will not be a surprise.
Despite knowing he preferred to reject more money on the basis it would inhibit his exit options, Celtic hoped to resolve the situation. This was on the basis on Ange’ age and profile. At 57, he was on the circuit for a long time without troubling clubs with bigger budgets.
English clubs often have a snobbery for achievements in Scotland, especially when they are not replicated in Europe, where over two years, Ange bettered only Ferencvaros, Midtjylland, Alkmaar, Jablonec. The negative column has Leverkusen, Real Betis, Real Madrid, Leipzig, Shakhtar Donetsk and most painfully, a preseason Bodo/Glimt.
Until he was able to move the dial in Europe, Celtic hoped Ange would sail below the radar of most in England, and definitely thought that a ‘big six’ club out his reach. All that changed when Tottenham recruited Scott Munn as chief football officer. Australian Munn goes way back with Ange and was his backstage pass to the top tier.
Despite that European record, I cherished our former manager. He was personable, understood and shared our club’s values and played attractive, successful football. In London, he replaces a permanent manager who was on £15m a year, I expect he’ll be on a salary of around £10m – for half that, I’d knock out Tottenham Quick News.
This is the football business, we did not miss a beat when he left Yokohama midseason. If you take umbridge at a manager who left one club to come here, then left us at a more appropriate moment, football is not a sport for you to follow.
The Third Season Problem
What do Jose Mourinho and Ange Postecoglou have in common? All their successes come in the first two seasons in the job. Neither has won a league title in a third or later season. This glass ceiling is echoed in Ange’s four-year tenure as Australia manager, where he won the Asian Cup in his second year but did little to trouble his memoirs afterwards.
Ange and Jose are both impact managers. Both will transform your club, but equally struggle to reinvent themselves in the Alex Ferguson manner. A friend (And CQN’er) has long expressed a concern that this is because opponents eventually figure Ange out, and that he is unable or unwilling to pivot.
It is moot now. No matter who follows, our expectations of another treble next season under Ange are forever fixed, but let’s be clear, we have lost Ange Postecoglou (57), not the reincarnation of Jock Stein. He is replaceable and although there are huge risks with any appointment, there are reasons to be hopeful.
Brendan
Let’s say the obvious. If he gets the job, we get behind the manager and move on, bigger picture, and all that. For now, he’s not for me. I am troubled by his recruitment record (Dembele was on the slate before he arrived and Sinclair had already played for him) and by his credentials as a team player (I have just deleted a lengthy explanation of this as it might make backing him near impossible). The manner of his exit is of less consequence.
Who next?
Celtic thought they had the managerial recruitment game mastered when Brendan Rogers arrived in 2016. When they returned to the market in 2019, the rules had changed, there were no candidates of Rogers’ quality, indeed, there were no new candidates who inspired confidence they could succeed in bossing Glasgow’s unique challenges, a scenario Neil Lennon coped with.
Ange Postecoglou was plucked from obscurity because Celtic were determined never again to be left without options they could get behind. He was a Mark Lawwell nominee, even before Mark joined to become head of recruitment and scouting. We will explore what’s needed in the position in more detail in the days to come, but for now, I am happy to find another manager with a low profile in the UK, on the ground experience in a value market and a desire for a crack at the Champions League.
We move on.
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TOM MCLAUGHLIN on 6TH JUNE 2023 3:33 PM
TONTINE TIM
One big flaw in your story — you forgot to name him. Was it Dave Mackay?
*naw he wisnae there at the time but he did us a favour as Jock wanted tae sign the beast who was training with us and Dave up on holiday heard and alerted Bill Nicholson to him who snapped him up immediately
Bournesouprecipe on 6th June 2023 1:50PM
I’ll be going for a refund if they give it to David Moyes/ David Martindale/ David Silva/ Marco Silva/ Sterling Silva/ Raheem Sterling/ Steven Gerrard/ Steven Naismith/ Stephen McManus (I’ll waive refund if your no higher than No2, big man)/ Andy Walker or Annie Walker… and I’ll be charging interest.
sterling furniture near tillicourty or dougie donnelly
SAINT STIVS on 6TH JUNE 2023 4:16 PM
sterling furniture
A legend in his own furniture shop!
Celtic took a fairly high risk punt on Ange and it paid off – big time. Now he’s left us for the same reason people in sport always do – more money. That’s the beginning and end of it.
Celtic are now in a very sound financial place and the manager’s post should attract a very decent calibre of candidates. One of the new manager’s top priorities must be to improve our European performances. In the last 25 years we have featured in one UEFA final (Martin O’Neill) and only three times in the last 16 of the Champions’ League (Gordon Strachan twice and Neil Lennon once). That is dismal stuff for a club of our stature.
Quad
I am with you re liking Muscat.
He is a tough guy who has followed Ange and succeeded.
Wouldn’t be a badge kisser but wouldn’t take any shit from media or anyone either.
TONTINE TIM
Ok I give in.
https://youtu.be/rA2-6ZlOXeg
All the mumping and moaning….. We won a treble……
Give this wee tune a play.😂
It’s at times like this I wish Garry was here with his input into who the new manager should be.
GB Delaneys Dunky 💚🇮🇪
John Kennedy has told the board he wants to leave. Not unexpected. No guarantees a new manager will want him.
Ange will inherit Harry Kane. Will he stay or will he go ? Harry that is.
I used to be undecided, but now I can’t make my mind up if he is the real deal. Harry that is.
Is it true that Mr Kane has made more goal line clearances than any other EPL player. ?
If so, what does that say about the Spurs defence. ?
I really hope our most influential player is not on Ange’s radar.
Being a Celtic supporter is not always easy, but it’s always worthwhile.
HH.
It’s Andoni Iraola for me, if only for the creative banners the GB could get from his surname….
HH
Incidentally John Kennedy is 39.
It’s about time he spread his wings. But he won’t go on the cheep.
I was just messing around with figures and despite a period when we were never close for nearly a decade; the split of titles in my lifetime is:
Celtic 55%
Rangers 36%
Aberdeen 5%
Dun Utd 2%
Sevco 2%
there’s Paul’s generation of domination right there!!!
https://news.stv.tv/west-central/police-attempt-to-trace-man-in-relation-to-assault-at-celtic-park-glasgow?utm_source=app
Burnley78
Muscat not a bad shout but still seems a tad unproven for my liking.
TOM MCLAUGHLIN on 6TH JUNE 2023 1:35 PM
TMcL – apologies for late reply – work is a bugger
The trouble with your comment – it’s full of common sense
I on the other hand, I have Paranoia in my Celtic DNA
I always think there is something going on
I will make every effort to chill – but its hard !!!
67ECW
No more badge kissers hope the board move swiftly to hire a manager.We are still the team in Scotland.Couldnt care less about him.KTF Hail Hail.
BURNLEY78, I am aware of that.
My point is, that Brendan had set it up , that even John Kennedy could have stepped in and won the league
I am old enough to realise managers come and go and I was always expecting this day to come. However it has come as a bit of a shock to many and that’s because of the person Ange portrayed himself as. He portrayed himself as someone cut from a different cloth and we all bought it. Myself included.
Maybe, just maybe, this has caught him by surprise and that explains the questions on his character.
However I can’t help feel that Ange, the person, is not who I thought he was and for that I am extremely disappointed.
cheerio ange. Big challenges to come soon – new manager, VAR/hunpens and trying to find talent to cope with canterwell
Ange outwfitted the Board, re extending his contract, maybe it’s time to move on from the 1 year rolling deal.Not criticising the Board BTW
Who next? Who knows, but it looks like they’ll need to bring a backroom team with them!
Some have bentioned Potter, but I have a niggling doubt that he’s just ‘too nice’ for the role. As someone else mentioned earlier, treating the Scottish media with barely disguised contempt is almost as much of a prerequisite as having an eye for a player…
If not Potter, maybe Jaissle from Salzburg, Iraola from Vallecano or Farioli from Alanyaspor….but Knutsen would be my choice…need to wait and see
Jonny Hayes as player manager with Liam Scales as captain….done deal
Too much in one day
Ange wants a new challenge
Ange gets a 4 year deal at Spurs
I do not know how much that is worth
But if Conti was getting £15m a year – we can assume Ange gets £10m (a guess I know)
Then
The PGA and the DP World Tour tell us LIV Golf is the antichrist
Then do a deal with LIV Golf – Saudi Arabia now bankrolling the game of golf
I wish for an honest man to simply say I did it because I will make a right few quid
Please don’t hit me with PR statements about the good of the game
Hey ho
67ECW
ST TAMS @ 4:59 PM,
You touch on the weirdest aspect of Lenny’s second coming.
He was told everything was in place and shouldn’t interfere with the set-up, he openly admits he hasn’t a scobie what the set up is and how to implement it
But everything was in place and we won another treble.
Then Lenny is appointed full time and quite rightly from his perspective gradually changes the set up
The more he changes the worse things get
It is beyond bizarre for me
If the rumours are true, guess JK salvaged enough for AP to be impressed and the manager put his own stamp on things, in quick time it must be said
Hail Hail
Remember not so long ago the media ramped up Ange to England? I wonder who leaked that info to them.
On another note when Peter Lawwell screwed the Resolution 12 boys over he should never have been allowed inside our stadium again.
Oh how we all laughed when he said “ he was a very lucky man “ !
Remember that throughout the last two seasons, the media ramped up Ange to England whenever a vacancy cropped up? This is not just a post January ’23 phenomenon, no matter how hard some of our tinfoil hat brigade want to infer…
Eratic, the very same chest-thumping speech to the crowd where he quoted Tommy Burns while his agent was actively working their ticket down south….
Slán leat Ange agus go raibh maith agat.
Ange gave us some of the most exciting football seen in Scotland for years. Fast, hardworking, skillfull players with great team spirit.
However, like Brendan, he refused to accept that his style would not stand up in the big leagues of Europe and the consequences were plain to be seen by all.
I genuinely feared the upcoming Champions league if we refused to accept our lack of physicality and lack of a plan B, where we defend for most of the game.
That being said, I will miss Ange and wish him well.
My fear is losing Jota, Hatate, Johnston and possibly Kyogo if Kane leaves Spurs.
We have the guts of a good squad but it needs beefing up.
The mosy ridiculous statement I have read in years was McCoist saying that Ange was leaving because Beale now had his measure. Oh my, the deluded live amongst us.
https://media.balls.ie/uploads/2015/05/Sylla.jpg
https://media.balls.ie/uploads/2015/05/RBlinker.jpg
https://i.pinimg.com/originals/d9/53/e3/d953e3b5c941c6b1b8b3bef0de5f0d84.jpg
https://i.pinimg.com/originals/d5/27/8e/d5278e826e1b8d489441c3f54951fcc9.jpg
“ Ange , you’re nothing to me now. You’re not a brother, you’re not a friend. I don’t want to know you or what you do. I don’t want to see you at the hotels, I don’t want you near my house. When you see our mother, I want to know a day in advance, so I won’t be there. You understand? “
Michael Corleone CSC
https://i.pinimg.com/originals/e2/75/23/e275230e12b9cc4684d5c32e966c6fa4.jpg
STPATRICKBHOY
No more badge kissers hope the board move swiftly to hire a manager.
If the new manager wins 5 trophies out of 6 he can kiss as many badges as he likes.
I’ll ask again. Why are people cruticising Ange for mentioning Tommy Burns?
He was praising the fans and thanking them for their support. Hiw does his leaving negate that?