Ange Postecoglou

Angelos "Ange" Postecoglou (Άγγελος Ποστέκογλου, Angelos Postekoglou; born 27 August 1965) is a soccer manager and former player who is the head coach of Premier League club Tottenham Hotspur.

Born in Greece, Postecoglou grew up in Melbourne from the age of five.

Angelos Postecoglou was born on 27 August 1965 in Nea Filadelfeia, a suburb of Athens, Greece.

After his father, Dimitris ("Jim"), lost his business following the 1967 Greek military coup, the Postecoglou family migrated to Australia in 1970, when he was five years old.

He grew up in Melbourne, Victoria.

At the age of 10, his parents changed his surname to "Postekos", remarking: "It was a fad in those days to shorten your name if you were Greek, so that's what they did."

Although Postekos is still his surname legally, he opts for Postecoglou.

As a player, he spent most of his club career as a defender for South Melbourne Hellas and played four games for the Australia national team in the late 1980s.

After first joining South Melbourne Hellas as a nine-year-old, Postecoglou rose through the youth ranks to play 193 games from 1984 to 1993 for them in the National Soccer League as a one-club player.

As a player, he was involved in their 1984 and 1990–91 titles, the latter as captain in a famous win over rivals Melbourne Knights.

He was coached by Hungarian Ferenc Puskás, a renowned player whom his father had told him about as a child.

According to Postecoglou, Puskás played a 4–3–3 formation with rigid full-backs and attacking wingers.

Postecoglou built on this strategy in his own coaching; however, his use of attacking full backs in a non-traditional inverted position differs from Puskás.

A knee injury prematurely ended Postecoglou's career at the age of 27.

Prior to this, he represented Australia at youth level in 1985.

Following his retirement, Postecoglou took up the role of an assistant coach at South Melbourne.

Postecoglou represented Australia at senior level four times between 1986 and 1988.

He began managing at South Melbourne Hellas in 1996, winning the National Soccer League twice and the OFC Champions League in 1999.

He then led the national under-17 and under-20 teams.

He gained the head coaching position in 1996, following the firing of Frank Arok.

Postecoglou led South to consecutive National Soccer League titles in 1997–98 (ending a seven-year drought) and 1998–99, as well as winning the 1999 Oceania Club Championship, which in turn led to South's participation in the 2000 FIFA Club World Championship.

After the 1999–2000 NSL season, he stood down from the South Melbourne coaching role when he was appointed coach of the Australian youth team.

He is the only person to have been involved in all four of South Melbourne's NSL title-winning teams, the first two as a player and the latter two as coach.

In 2000, he went on to be named as the starting left back in South Melbourne's team of the century as voted by fans and an expert panel.

Following his domestic coaching success, Postecoglou became coach of Australia's youth sides in 2000.

During his tenure, he played a role in identifying and developing Australian players.

Postecoglou was involved in an on-air argument with football pundit Craig Foster on The World Game.

He was replaced as coach in February 2007 after Australia failed to qualify for the 2007 FIFA U-20 World Cup.

After his departure as coach of the Australian youth teams, Postecoglou worked as a football pundit for Fox Sports and as an elite consultant to Football Federation Victoria.

Feeling that his much-publicised argument with Foster had made him unemployable, Postecoglou coached Panachaiki in the Greek third division, and Whittlesea Zebras back in Melbourne, while running coaching clinics in the city.

On 16 October 2009, Postecoglou was signed as the new Brisbane Roar coach, replacing Frank Farina.

Postecoglou started rebuilding the team by releasing Liam Reddy, Craig Moore, Bob Malcolm and Charlie Miller.

Tommy Oar, Michael Zullo and Adam Sarota were bought by Dutch club Utrecht, and striker Sergio van Dijk went to Adelaide United.

Postecoglou, who asked to be judged a year from the time he took over, proved the critics wrong by winning and playing an entertaining brand of football.

The 4–0 win against Adelaide United in round 13 was highly praised in the media as some of the best football the A-League has ever seen.

Postecoglou led the Roar to the Premiership and Championship in the 2010–11 season, winning the Grand Final 4–2 on penalties against the Central Coast Mariners in front of 52,168 people at Lang Park.

Postecoglou managed Brisbane Roar and Melbourne Victory in the A-League, winning the Premiership in 2011 and the Championship in 2011 and 2012 with Brisbane Roar.

He was the men's senior national team manager from 2013 to 2017, winning the AFC Asian Cup in 2015 and also going to the 2014 FIFA World Cup.

He won the J1 League with Yokohama F. Marinos in 2019, and then won five trophies (including two league titles) in two seasons with Scottish side Celtic.

He became head coach of Premier League club Tottenham Hotspur in 2023.