Ange Postecoglou left his role as Australia National Team manager in 2017 after beating Honduras to seal The Socceroos progress to the World Cup in 2018. The Greek-born Australian left the national team gig due to a standoff with the National Association but had been linked with moves to England, Belgium and Greece.
Optus Sport detailed that it was Sunderland that wanted Ange as their manager in late 2017, asking ex-Black Cats player Michael Bridges for a reference. Bridges was living in Australia and had seen Postecoglou win the A-League and the J-League, as well as implementing an impressive style of play with the Socceroos.
Bridges explains that former Rangers Chief Executive Martin Bain enquired about a reference for Postecoglou and received a detailed, glowing endorsement from Bridges. However, Bain opted to go with Chris Coleman, who was unable to save the Black Cats from relegation to League One, where they have remained since 2018.
The Australian panel on Gegenpod seem to be huge admirers of Ange, claiming that he will be his own man and not merely a board puppet. The 55-year-old hasn’t managed in Europe but he will know how big a task managing Celtic is and it is his job to capture the imagination of the support as he nears the appointment of his life.
There is likely to be an arrogance around the appointment of Ange as he is an unknown quantity to many of us; however, there is an element of excitement due to the snippets of interviews that have surfaced of ‘The Boss’. Ange clearly doesn’t suffer fools gladly and his record with Brisbane Roar and Yokohama F Marinos prove that he can provide a winning mentality to his teams in a short space of time, even if the budget is not there. Hopefully he will be provided with a sizeable budget and Celtic will reap the rewards from his tenacious, uncompromising style by blowing Rangers away.
The Covert Agent at Goal outlined that Postecoglou had even had offers from English Championship clubs in 2017 but waited until after he had secured the World Cup status of the Aussies before walking away. He