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Ange Postecoglou has urged the Nottingham Forest owner, Evangelos Marinakis, to maintain faith in him, doubling down on his belief he will win silverware at the club by saying: “If you let the story play out, I’ll tell you how it finishes.”
Postecoglou is under intense pressure before Forest host Chelsea on Saturday after seven games without a win since he took the reins on 9 September. Marinakis is expected to be in attendance and it is thought the Greek billionaire could sack Postecoglou if Forest fail to show signs of progress.
The head coach said he did not speak to Marinakis during the international break and was bullish when questioned about his position. “What I consistently say, and I was mocked and ridiculed for it last year, is: if you let the story play out, I’ll tell you how it finishes,” Postecoglou said. “But I don’t hold that decision in my hands.
“I said last year [while in charge at Tottenham] in my second year I always win things, right? And what’s the key to that? That I’m there in my second year, because it takes a bit of time. But the story always ends the same: you leave me here, let me do my job, it’ll end the same … with a trophy. If I don’t and I’m removed, well, what can I do about it? I can’t win in this situation in terms of trying to convince people. You either see what you see or you don’t; either way it doesn’t affect me.”
Postecoglou, who won the Europa League with Tottenham last season, earning their first trophy since 2008, expressed bafflement at his position being under such scrutiny after fewer than six weeks in charge. He repeatedly mentioned the word “prism” during Friday’s press conference. Asked through which lens he feels the Forest hierarchy view him, the Australian replied: “I’d like to think that when they made this decision they didn’t look at me and see a failed manager who is lucky to be in a job. I think they probably appointed me because they saw something in me that they felt I could deliver at this football club. Now, has that changed in five weeks?
“I can’t answer that question but I’d be surprised because that would probably mean there probably wasn’t a helluva lot of conviction in it to start with. All the interaction and feedback I’ve had with the people at the club, not just the owner but everybody else, they want us to win, they want us to get the results and I understand that.”
The 60-year-old added: “The owner especially, he wants to win, that’s pretty clear; I don’t need any further clarification on that. No one has been anything but encouraging to me. Do I get any sort of sense of where [they] sit with things? I’ve never asked for that, I’ve never sought reassurance for that, wherever I’ve been. What I say to you is what I say to the people around me, or the owner: let the story play out, I’ll tell you the ending. I’ve said it to all of them, everywhere I’ve been appointed.”
Marinakis is mindful of the discontent among Forest supporters, many of whom were against Postecoglou succeeding Nuno Espírito Santo, who led the club into Europe for the first time since 1995-96. Thousands of Forest fans chanted against Postecoglou – and in support of Nuno – during their 3-2 Europa League defeat by Midtjylland at the City Ground, their most recent home match.
“I can’t tell people what to feel or sing,” Postecoglou said. “I’ve never taken it too personally either way, even when the praise comes, because I know it can flip. When we were at Tottenham last year, after the first five games they were playing this Robbie Williams song [Angels] after every game and it was annoying the hell out of me so I told them to stop playing it, because it wasn’t real, it wasn’t genuine. It was trying to manufacture people to feel a certain way and I just don’t believe in that stuff.”
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Postecoglou, who moved into an apartment in the area during the international break, gave an impassioned defence of his appointment. When asked whether this game felt like an ordinary match given the heightened noise around his position and Forest sounding out potential successors, he replied with a five-minute monologue.
At the end of a considered response, in which he said “I just don’t fit, in general”, he added: “You can look at this first five weeks and say: ‘He’s under pressure because he was lucky to get this job.’ Or you can look at it and say: ‘Well, there’s been a major change.’
“I am trying to change the way we play. The players are adapting, but there’s inconsistency in there, for sure. Some will look at the weeds, I look at what’s growing.”
