Ange Postecoglu speaks after the Premier League match between Everton and Tottenham Hotspur
Under-fire Ange Postecoglu admitted that Everton “capitalised” on his Tottenham Hotspur side’s struggles but insists he takes full responsibility for their plight. Spurs have now lost five of their last six Premier League games and their 3-2 defeat at Goodison Park leaves them just four points and one place above David Moyes’ men in the table.The Australian said: “It wasn’t great the first half, the majority of that is down to me obviously. I changed the team and changed the structure.“We had a couple of setbacks in terms of the player availability. We struggled to get control of the game and their lads capitalised on that.
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“At half-time, we had a mountain to climb but fair play to the players again, they keep going to the end but ultimately we fell just short.“I had 11 fit players, so I tried to find a way to fit them into a structure. The players tried hard enough but it didn’t work.”Postecoglou bemoaned his club’s current injury crisis and said: “It’s a pretty extreme situation. We’ve lost three significant players since the last game and we’ve already got seven or eight out.“We lost Dom (Solanke) really late in training, innocuously. At some point, that will change and we’ll get some players back but right now it’s the situation we’ve dealt with and the responsibility lies squarely with me to try and get us out of it.“The club is well aware of our situation and they’re doing their utmost but as far as I know at the moment, there’s nothing imminent. Hopefully before now and the end of the window, something comes up.“I separate myself from all that. This is not about me but what is about me right now is that I have a responsibility for the group of players that I do have to try and get us through this.“That’s what we’ve got to focus on and for me to focus on anything else is abstaining myself from the responsibility I have. I’m determined to get us out of this.“The club is doing their best to help the players. We’re asking massive jobs of 18-year-olds and 17-year-olds out there, trying to win games for us and others who are just playing, week on week so it’s more about getting the players help, rather than getting me help.”The 59-year-old maintained he was unfazed by his own position being questioned, even if he doesn’t have the tools to do his job. He said: “I still believe that the responsibility lies with me to get this right and that’s how I sit with things. Whatever the circumstances are, and it’s fair to say it’s a challenging situation for sure, a lot of it is out of your control as a manager when you’re losing players in the manner that we are at the moment, but I’ve still got to steer us through.“If I’m worrying about myself or the cards I’ve been dealt with, it’s a dereliction of my duties and my responsibilities and that’s how I see it. These are the cards I’ve been dealt, and it’s up to me to get us out of it and I’ve got to be good enough to do that.”
