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In a season in which Ange Postecoglou has watched his side suffer repeated blows, the look on the Tottenham manager’s face just 57 seconds into their FA Cup loss to Aston Villa said it all.
The Spurs boss stood motionless with a look of resignation after watching his side fall behind inside the opening minute at Villa Park, where they would crash out of a second domestic cup competition in four days.
The pain of Thursday’s insipid Carabao Cup exit at the hands of Liverpool, who dismissed Spurs’ first-leg advantage with a 4-0 thrashing at Anfield, had barely subsided.
But Sunday’s 2-1 defeat by Villa now leaves the Europa League as the only route for Postecoglou to uphold his claim that he “always” wins a trophy in his second season at a club.
Yet, amid the team’s plight, it is not the manager but the owner, Daniel Levy, who has become the lightning rod of supporter discontent, with chants of “we want Levy out” heard from the away section over a perceived lack of investment in the squad.
Postecoglou has repeatedly referred to the club’s injury crisis when defending his side’s poor results this term and the Spurs boss offered a staunch post-match defence of his players when asked if he felt it would only be fair to judge him once key individuals had returned.
“People can judge me. They can say I’ve done a bad job, I’m not up to it or whatever. That’s fine,” Postecoglou said.
“What I’m saying is you can’t be critical of our players’ performances at this time.
“If you want to measure anything on what they’re doing at the moment, other than the extreme situation they’re dealing with, then I think your analysis is skewed and it’s not objective.
“If it’s to get rid of me that’s fine. Good on you. Go for it a million times. But in terms of this group of players, what they’ve given over the past two and a half months has been outstanding.”
