Ange Postecoglou sends message to Igor Tudor ahead of Liverpool vs Tottenham

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There’s obvious pressure there and it’s a real difficult time. Ange Postecoglou says Tottenham’s players need ‘belief’ (Getty) ‘It all kind of manifested himself in what happened last night, it was almost a worst-case scenario, you’re playing a side away from home, Atletico Madrid, who never drop to a performance level [below], they’re always at a really strong level and it was just a horror start for them.’ Asked what the players need now, Postecoglou replied: ‘It’s hard for me to say and me speaking about it tends to skew the argument.

I think what’s really important right now is there is no way anybody objectively would say these players are performing at the levels they are capable of. They’ve just got to try to ease the pressure on them somehow. ‘I thought last night was a tremendous opportunity for them, they’ve done really well in the Champions League, they’re on a good side of the draw, Atletico away is tough but you’ve still got to take them back to Tottenham, it just felt like the pressure was there. ‘I’m sure they trained on the pitch the night before but the amount of times they were slipping over, I think that’s still pressure, there’s just a real desperation in everything you do, mentally you’re desperate.

Igor Tudor has lost all four games in charge of Tottenham (Shutterstock) ‘It’s hard for me to comment from the outside but, for me, it’s about instilling some belief, show them the kind of players they are, not that they can be, that they are, what they’ve already shown.’ Asked if the expectation of the fans compared to the financial backing from the club needs to be addressed, Postecoglou said: ‘That’s a broader argument but the reality of it is they’ve got to deal with it now, that’s the most important thing. ‘The football club, I said it a couple of weeks ago, wasn’t behaving to me like a big football club in terms of the kind of players it was attracting. What’s important now is where they are in the league, they need to maintain their Premier League status which is obviously paramount to what they want to build. ‘Those kind of questions you kind of go, ‘okay, we want some real direction here’.