Incensed Postecoglou lashes out at Newcastle handball saying that “it’s the angriest I have ever been” post loss.
Incensed Postecoglou described himself as “really, really angry”, the “angriest I think I have ever been in my career”.
After Saturday’s 2-1 home loss to Newcastle, he reiterated that his players were “denied the right rewards for a fantastic performance.”
There was little question as to what he was referring to, despite his repeated refusal to clarify that he was discussing the referees and the choice to keep Newcastle’s equaliser for handball. “I believe it’s evident,” he stated.
“Whether people agree with me or not whether it wasn’t handball or it was accidental, I’m just not interested in any of that discussion. What I’m saying is, on any given day with a fair and even playing field and logical thought processes, we would have won that game.”
His Newcastle counterpart, Eddie Howe, was studiously diplomatic. “It definitely hit Joelinton’s arm,” he said, “but I’m not in control of the referee’s decision. I believe the arm is down in a natural position and the referees and VAR have followed the protocols.”
The fact that so many things, not just refereeing, are working against him makes Postecoglou very angry. Spurs suffered a bug after injuring his goalie, left-back, and three center-backs.
“Radu [Dragusin] and Archie [Gray] were bed-ridden all week,” he said. “Fraser [Forster], he’s still bed-ridden and struggling with it. There’s a couple of others struggling. At half-time, Radu didn’t have any more to give. On Thursday, we had 11 fit players for training.
“But I don’t care about that, what I care about is the players put in an unbelievable performance, fantastic football, created chances, denied them and having to defend strongly, which we did. It’s unfair on them more than anything else that they didn’t get the rewards.”