Ange Postecoglou may have made a fast start at Tottenham but he says the long-term approach taken by Liverpool under Jurgen Klopp is a template for the club to follow to achieve success.
Spurs host Liverpool live on Sky Sports on Saturday Night Football, with both sides unbeaten and aiming to build on their impressive early-season form.
However, despite Spurs winning four and drawing two of their first six Premier League games under Postecoglou, the head coach has insisted it will take time for his work to bring rewards and earlier this month suggested it may take at least another two transfer windows or more to turn the squad into what he wants it to be.
Klopp’s first trophy with Liverpool – the Champions League in 2019, won by beating Tottenham in the final – didn’t come until his fourth season in charge and Postecoglou says that shows patience can pay off in football.
“We look at Liverpool, Arsenal, even Brighton now – there’s a plan there that they’ve stuck to,” said Postecoglou. “It hasn’t brought short-term success if you look at the trajectory of those teams.
“They’ve believed in something and allowed it to grow. They all had a different way to do it, with different managers with different levels of experience.
“There are definitely lessons there, but you look over the course of time – teams who have dominated over longer periods have normally had a plan or ideology to follow and they’ve stuck to it.
“It’s not easy, because short-term results mean pressure and scrutiny and some clubs buckle under that. Liverpool’s short-term success didn’t come straight away, but they saw if they backed Jurgen they’d reap the rewards.”
Postecoglou – who revealed Spurs will be without the injured Brennan Johnson this weekend and will need to make late checks on James Maddison and Heung-min Son – also praised Klopp for taking the tempo of the Premier League “to another level”.
He believes a positive performance and result for his side in this fixture will give them further momentum after twice fighting back to draw at arch-rivals Arsenal last Sunday.
“Can we impose our style of football against another top-class opponent who play differently to last week’s opponent?
“The more we go through these tests gives us the belief to keep going down this road and accelerating the growth,” Postecoglou said.
“We’re at home – it’s not a small, incidental thing but we’ve had seven games so far and only two of those have been at home. It shows the resilience of the group that we’ve come through that with strong performances and results.”
Postecoglou also acknowledged Liverpool’s trophy-laden era during the 1970s’ and 1980s’ planted the seeds for him to become a manager.
Postecoglou has made no secret of his childhood love for Liverpool and recalled on several occasions how he used to watch matches in the early hours of the morning in Australia with his dad Jim.
Kenny Dalglish was an early hero for the 58-year-old and he believes watching the teams of Bill Shankly and Bob Paisley win European Cups helped shape his pathway to a coaching career that has seen him manage across the globe.
“I was just consumed by football,” Postecoglou said. “I just loved reading about the history of football clubs and the great people within them.
“Certainly Liverpool at the time there was always a unique story there about this mythical boot room where all the magic happened. For me, it was almost like reading fairytales all the time.
“Obviously that has an influence, yeah it does because that’s where all the seeds are planted, my love for the game.”
Dalglish would have been the Liverpool player on Postecoglou’s wall as a child, but he was quick to point out that is no longer the case.
He added: “I was mad about Kenny Dalglish. Everything was about Dalglish for me, whether that was Celtic or Liverpool. I was a mad Kenny fan.
“It was just about that time when I was what 12, 13 and you know we look for heroes in our lives. He was it for me, scoring in the European Cup finals and the way he played.
“Like any kid, I had the posters up on my wall, so Liverpool was my team, but you grow up, things change. I used to love Happy Days back then too, but I don’t have pictures of the Fonz on my wall today either!”
Klopp: No European football gives Spurs an advantage in top-four race
Liverpool boss Klopp, meanwhile, described his team’s trip to north London as “a really tough test”.
Klopp, who said Trent Alexander-Arnold is set to return to the match-day squad after recovering from a thigh injury, expects a different challenge at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium to those his side have faced during the tenures of recent Spurs bosses Antonio Conte and Jose Mourinho.
“Both teams will play football. That is good news and a little bit new news because at Tottenham in recent years you played against maybe the best counter-attacking team in the world. It’s unbelievable what they set up there.
“We [used to speak] about that before the games, wherever you lose the ball the next ball would find [Harry] Kane, and Kane would find Son and end up in a one-v-one situation with the goalie.
“Now it’s much more possession-based, based on creative ideas. In the analysis, we saw things where they are not perfect but they have a full week to work on all these things and can create new routines for set-pieces or change the way they attack or defend. That’s a massive advantage.
“I know he’s a top coach and they will have spent some time creating difficulties for us. We hope we’re as well prepared.”
Tottenham’s free week came courtesy of an early exit in the Carabao Cup but with no European football, Postecoglou is set to have a lot more time on the training ground with his players than Klopp this season, given Liverpool is in the Europa League.
Klopp sees this as a reason why Spurs – and Chelsea, who are also without European football – will be rivals for a top-four finish this season.
“Tottenham is not in European football at all. Chelsea is not in European football. Two heavyweights having the whole week to train, without the travel and stuff like this, it’s a massive advantage,” said Klopp.
“So getting into the Champions League will be a massive, difficult task this year because of well-rested, big animals.”
