Tottenham boss Ange Postecoglou admits his key career motivation has been not being forced to return to work as a bank teller!
Victory over Sheffield United today would mark Tottenham's best season start since 1965.
My first job, in 1997, I took over South Melbourne: the club I played for," he recalled. I was 30 years old, I quit my job at the bank as a teller. What a bad job, I hated every day. That's the only thing that's driven me my whole career: I never wanted to go back to that.
We started the season, I woke up and it was our fifth game. If we'd lost that game, we would have been last on the ladder. The club I took over was the biggest club, at the time. We won 1-0. Scrappy game.
There was supposed to be a board meeting that night with our President, who was a pretty smart cookie. He said he was sick and there was going to be a vote of no confidence in me, apparently. That didn't happen. We went on the rest of the year and finished well."
Postecoglou continued: Brisbane in my first year, the same thing. Yokohama, we just avoided relegation my first year there.
With all these things, you can say: 'Jeez, you're a lucky bugger because people stuck by you'. But I'd like to think people didn't stick by me because I was lucky; they saw something there that they didn't want to miss out on.
Every one of those clubs, Celtic the same, they all got rewarded. All the beginnings have been difficult; I haven't had one that's been smooth. But, when I reflect on it, they're the stories I tell. I don't tell the stories of us winning things."