Postecoglou hails ‘good international break’ as Tottenham get clean bill of health
Tottenham boss Ange Postecoglou was pleased that all of his international players reported back fit following the international break with a couple of injured players also nearing fitness.
Spurs have made a brilliant start to the new season with six wins and two draws from their opening eight matches with Postecoglou’s men sitting top of the Premier League.
But the Australian will have been worried, as every Premier League manager is, that some of his players could return from international duty injured after the latest break.
However, that is not the case and Postecoglou has revealed that he could even be able to call on a couple of Tottenham players who were previously unavailable.
Postecoglou added: “Everyone’s back, the medical reports are good. There’s no issues around the guys from a fitness perspective. We’ve got a few senior international debuts too, Destiny Udogie and Micky van de Ven. It’s been a good break. Gio lo Celso also played for Argentina.
“Brennan Johnson has trained the last few days with the boys who stayed back. In terms of the match being on Monday night should help us. We’ll see how it goes.
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“Rodrigo Bentancur, we will be careful. He’s fully training. He’s been fed into training the last month. We’ve got to be mindful, he’s missed a lot of football. He’s looking good in training. Looking forward to get him back.”
Postecoglou added: “It’s the same as any international break. The first days you welcome it, then the next few days you seek something new.
“It doesn’t change the way I’m thinking. It pains to say we’re very much still in the beginning. My thought is continual development. Everything is in the early stages. Whatever start we have had doesn’t change that it’s the early stages. If you get side-tracked and move away from the plans, you’re going to stumble.
“My thinking is how we present ourselves and how we perform. I think there’s, at the moment, a curiosity around us and around me. There’s nothing beyond that to show you what trajectory we’re on.”
On the start they’ve made and his two Premier League Manager of the Month awards, Postecoglou continued: “Wherever we are is where we are. We have had a real encouraging start to the season. The Premier League Manager of the Month Award is a larger group of people creating an environment for the players to perform.
“We’ve had a level of performance in every game. We’ve had some eventful games but again that’s given us a strong foundation in terms of resilience and character.”
