Ange Postecoglou heaps praise on ‘lucky’ Tottenham for second-half performance | OneFootball

Ange Postecoglou claps the supporters after the match.

Tottenham manager Ange Postecoglou praised his team for the self-belief they showed in the second half of their incident-packed 3-3 draw at Manchester City.

Dejan Kulusevski’s late header earned Spurs a point from a thrilling match in which they trailed 2-1 at the interval.

Postecoglou told Sky Sports: “It was an entertaining game. We were lucky to be in it at half-time to be fair, City could have blown us away during that period, similar to us last week against Aston Villa.

“We hung in there second half a lot better, a lot more control, a lot more belief in the team, and we get our reward for that which is great for the lads.”

Asked about what he had said to his team at the break, Postecoglou said: “I don’t want to be unfair on the players, it wasn’t anger at them. It was more trying to get them to believe in themselves a little bit more than they did in the first half.

“It’s not easy – I’m always mindful that on the touchline, everything looks very simple, but out there when you’re facing an unbelievable football team, it’s difficult. It was just a message to them that, whatever happens, I’ll take responsibility for, particularly if it doesn’t go well, but go out there and just believe in ourselves, and I think they did that second half.”

On the character the side showed, he continued: “It has been there all year, the last few results have hidden that a little but we are at the bare bones a little bit. I have asked players to play in unfamiliar positions but we have still played some decent football. I think the character has been there all year but we certainly needed it today.

“City are an unbelievable team and there are times where you just have to hang on like we did today.”

On giving the ball away in dangerous areas, Postecoglou added in an interview with the BBC: “Yeah we did give the ball away a lot and far too easily, but it wasn’t due to pressure. It all looks easy from the sideline, but in this arena against that team it is easy to make mistakes. I thought a lot of it was down to us second guessing ourselves.

“Second half they played with clearer heads and left that to one side. We rode our luck a little bit but the players did what they needed to do. That’s part of football, we had a chance at half-time, showed resilience to come back and right up until the end we were still trying to score.”