Ange Postecoglou to quit Socceroos in November

Some people are calling for Ange sacking now. One of the reasons is that Mooy not being a starter but a bencher. In this regard, this is absolutely ridiculous. Remember Kewell was ON the bench and substituted in by Guss to replace the big ears (in the do or die match Australia vs Uruguay, 2005)? Ridiculous! How old is Mooy in 2005? 15! The commentators' saying of this Guss' arrangement is a master stroke. Remember? In a game that may be need extra time to settle, a main player is conserving energy on the bench is not very unusual. This bench sitter may become a stun substitute later. Also, when Brad Smith was injured, Ange replace him not with a defender but a mid-field attacker, Mooy. Why is this? It is up to people's interpretation. However, it can be pre-planned. Also, some allege that the first goal lost to Syria in Sydney would not eventuate should there be a 4-defenders lining up (attacking Ange's 3 at the back tactic). Is this saying reasonable? Yes, 3 at the back is controversial. However, the number of defenders at the very back depends on where the ball is at a certain time. For a simple exaggerated example, during corner kicks there would not be 4 defenders lining horizontally at the back. So, when Mark Miligan made a wrong pass, there were enough defenders at the back. If you watch the re-play, there were only 2 Syria attacking players against 4 to 5 socceroos players. That loss of the first goal to Syria has nothing to do with the 3 at the back formation. Also, it does not mean to blame Mark Miligan. Milligan is a good and versatile player. It is not necessarily that a good player will not make mistakes. We all make mistakes sometimes. The most disastrous mistake that we have seen recently is made by the USA defender in the match vs Tabasco Trinidad. This USA fullback failed to clear a ball from a cross (without any pressure) but chipped into his own goal. Concluding these sayings here, Ange's 3 at the back is controversial but the goal conceded in the match vs Syria in Sydney has nothing to do with 3 at the back. It was just a bit of unluckiness. What is Ange's job content? Firstly, rejuvenate the national team. Secondly, qualify the Russia World Cup. Has he rejuvenated the national team? Has he failed the qualification yet? The many so called experts in the Australia soccer circle are ignorant or pretending to be ignorant with a conspiratorial hidden agenda?

Lippi. Baggio hater. Juve lover. The one who screwed Inter. Lead Italy to last in a group which included NZ. Lippi S... manager

I'm sure Farina won a trophy with the n.t.

Ange will hang around long enough to see if he can get the million dollar bonus to get us to Russia. After the qualifiers he is off to his new job overseas. He is only staying for the bonus.

Punter - I cannot understand your second paragraph..You say let's forget the Barcelona way,how can we in this discussion when it is documented that AP was an admirer of the same.. I think you may have misunderstood when I mentioned "countries" who were changing the tactical applications to the "Barca" system. I should have said "clubs",mentioning the likes of Real,Athletico Madrid,Bayern Munich ,Juventus,and even Chelsea in England all successfully nullifying the Barca system in competition where they met. In fact winners and runner's up in the European Champions league over the last 11 years show a remarkable spread across those identities. What does interest me is that you appear to accept we don't have the players to successfully copy a Barcelona at their peak ,the question that arises is does AP recognise that fact.? While his intent has always been admirable it is the "arena", that is National football, that has proved to be an are in which he does receive justifiable criticism. Cheers jb..

On this http://www.news.com.au/sport/football/socceroos-coach-preached-the-australian-way-now-its-time-to-live-up-to-it/news-story/2c55d64bf7a49c068ece136cf1ac5777 One of the sayings is Mooy's not happiness of sitting on the bench. In this regard, this is absolutely ridiculous. Remember Kewell was not the bench and substituted in by Guss to replace the big ears? Ridiculous! Mooy is in EPL so he should play. Is this right? This is ridiculous again. According to Marcello Lippi, not necessarily the best player at a certain position should be selected. Mooy can be not selected if Marcello Lippi is in charge. "On the strategic aspect of coaching, Lippi emphasizes the importance of the mutual relations between players. Players must all follow the same plan and play for each other, "not" for themselves. Lippi argues that "a group of the best players do not necessarily make for the best team," according to wikipedia. What is Ange's job content? Firstly, rejuvenate the national team. Secondly, qualify the Russia World Cup. Has he rejuvenated the national team? Has he failed the qualification yet?

Bring back Guus!

All good points, NU, though I differ on the WC. I don't believe we will get past Honduras. If Ange is still in the job, and persists with his absurd back three, their pace will shred our defence. Personally, I am hoping that the derbies and general excellence of football will lift the A League. While the MV-SFC attendance was disappointing, for example, the CCM/Jets crowd was excellent. Not qualifying will not be a disaster. It may, in fact, help the A League by turning focus on the domestic comp, and help the game by demanding, as is happening in the States, that player development problems are addressed.

JB, totally agree with your last statement if only for his own good health he should go, for the knives are out for him. JB from a tactical viewpoint, let's forget the Barcelona way or the next 'super coach change', we are not there to change, the countries you mentioned are Spain, Holland, Italy, Germany are all in a position to tinker with the 'new formations', new tactical changes, the Socceroos are not. Now Ange picked the latest Fad, the 'Barcelona way' & why not they have created the most dominant team in the modern history (say 1980 onwards). What this showed was we do not have players with high technical ability, in the last 2 campaigns (2010 & 2014) we relied on the trusted 'more physical, robust & fitness style'. Please don't pick on me on these words, but they were even our golden generation team, the most technical team going, outside of 2-3 players. It reminds me of the change in Roger Federer after he lost in 5 sets to Lleyton Hewitt after leading 2 sets to love. He said he realised he was a better tennis player then Hewitt, it's only his fitness & mind were not at Hewitt's level. The switch from stronger, fitter teams winning premierships, champions league, world cups, Euros to the more technically gifted countries, clubs & players, Leicester withstanding. All one has to do is look at the Sth American qualifiers, with most of the players now playing in Europe, they are harden professionals with their high technical skills.

punter - For one so well versed in the game you surprise me somewhat with this comment.. In it you attempt to reduce the games mentioned into incidents and instances that occurred during those games. That my friend is an extremely dangerous road to take. Tactical football is under constant change, as one "super coach" develops a "new" strategy, so too does another coach sit back,analyses the salient points in that strategy, and attempts to countermand those points with a strategy of his own. This I feel has been Ange's "Achilles heel". In his desire to change the way he perceives we in Australia play the game he embarked upon his own strategy to attain that change ,and based his plans on the "team of the time" Barcelona. Working with a limited squad of club players there is little doubt he succeeded at Brisbane Roar and as others struggled to catch up,he basked in the undoubted successes of his charges in the local competition. But like "old father time" constantly moving forward, the tactical side of the game was changing and perhaps it was time to move on for AP,(we'll never know),but somehow his tenure at Victory did not last long enough before the founding fathers of the FFA, making the same mistakes as their predecessors, offered him a job he could not refuse,the chance to "work his magic" at national team level. Now I suspect you know that club coaching is as different from national team coaching as chalk is to cheese and so we find this comparatively inexperienced club coach thrust into the limelight of international football. It is now his aims and hopes for the future of Australian football begins to stack up against what has happened to the "Barca plan" he uses as a cornerstone to his plan and we find in Europe and other areas the "Barca plan" is now starting to "date" as other well paid coaches come up with tactics to nullify that plan's perceived benefits. We see teams from Germany, Italy , France and even Spain start to tinker with formations and player types who can nullify any perceived advantages enjoyed by the Catalans. This to me is the fact of life that Ange found almost impossible to match due to the standard of player and availability of the same, to try and achieve his aims. Facts prove this. In the last World Cup the Dutch team we played were experimenting with a back 3 formation (that was hurriedly changed at half time) and here in the last few months we have had Ange introduce the same tactic to the Socceroos ,some 4 years later. The man has to be admired for his tenacity in sticking by his beliefs but he also has to realise there is a whole phalanx of "doubting Thomases" watching and waiting to question his every move. That is part and parcel of being a National Coach. Perhaps it is time for him to go,even if only for the good of his own health. Cheers jb.

He is being mentioned in the media and just this morning I heard him say that no one in the FFA has approached me. Sounds like he would be interested if approached?

I cannot agree more that we lack the midfield thrust, speed & creativity to play out from the back at speed. This was our undoing. But it's the playing to our strengths under Pim & Holger that has seen world football gone so far forward & Australia is still stuck in the 2006 mode until Ange took over. I don't wholly back Ange, because some of selections were beyond me, his relentlessness to play only 1 way, knowing we don't have the cattle, his stubbornness to manage the game day situation were all also baffling, but I stand that Ange has moved Australian football more then any of his predecessors has since the 1970s.

This is the sort of criticism that I don't understand, yes blame his tinkering, blame his selections, blame him for trying to make Australia do something they cannot do. But Ange has hardly started Timmy & here we have someone saying he's building team around Timmy, blaming Ange for hitting the posts blaming Ange for Milligan's mis-pass that led to the first goal. For all the criticism of Ange, Syria, who I rate the 2nd best team after Japan we have faced during this Campaign, really had limited opportunities on goal, in 1st game despite a period of dominance, it was only the penalty that threaten Ryan's goal. In the 2nd match the mis-pass & the the free kick in the 120 mins that had me worried. Not too bad for a poor defensive coach that one of the better teams in Asia over 210 mins only had a dodgy penalty, a poor mis placed pass & a free kick in the 120th min as threats to our goal.

Yeah he has copped a bit of criticism, but rightfully so Asia isn't as easy as many think, in particular the away games in Mid East and SE Asia As an England fan as well I understand it is often a case of pulling players together mid club-season and getting them to gel quickly and getting a result in awkward places even if it isn't flashy Same with Asia, Verbeek copped a lot of stick but he managed the pathway excellently, perhaps too excellently and a lot of Jounros and Craig Foster especially don't get that technical and tactical and efficiency of performance is only half the equation, half of management lies in motivation and managing the psychology of the players, eg to persevere to hold onto a result or to dig deep and turn things around and get a result when things look shaky That said one thing that has always rather bugged me about Ange is this "Plan B is do Plan A better" which may be fine for club football where you can drill it into the players and over the season little quirky results or goals against you tend to correct themselves but in Cup and Playoff football it is a different story, in this case the story about Guus Hiddink having various pieces of paper outlining his plans about what he would do at 30, 60 mins etc if the score or situation was a certain way comes to mind A lot of this probably lies with the FFA/Clubs climate and knock-on effect, probably no longer likes the working environment but he is regrettably adding fuel to the flames

This isn't good timing at all As we can end up with a scenario whereby FIFA has to put a normalising committee in charge over the Sport in general amidst the antics surrounding the FFA's obsession with maintaining a stranglehold on power, the cloud over the Coaches position can and likely will impact the players focus ahead of Playoffs vs Honduras which can make a difference and we can end up not qualifying A potential triple whammy lies in the fact the A-League may be sub-par because Victory NT active fans have virtually packed it in - putting aside there does seem to be an effort in GA areas once again - and RBB aren't flavour of the month anymore and they've been neutered by Spotless Stadium, so whereas in the past the energised A-League would have meant missing the 2014 World Cup wouldn't have been the end of the world, it isn't the backstop it would have been Very surprised the MV vs SFC crowd was only 24k, a real sign of subdued enthusiasm All in all still think we will get to World Cup though, hopefully a new FFA with a proper sense of balance between clubs and central organisational body will be found (Lowy FFA was an over-correction of the Soccer Australia era) and we can do better in the long term

His game plan is outdated. Not even Barça play tiki taka any more and you have to have players as good as Barça for it to be effective or else you're just too slow and ineffective. I feel it's a little unrealistic of Oz supporters to expect us to commit men forward and play an attacking style of football. The reality is that I don't expect us to make it past our play off and if we do we will probably have a squad in the bottom 5 in terms of quality. At this point Oz should concentrate on being compact and hard to beat before any delusions of grandeur. So basically Ange out, Tony Pulls in...

I think its time for AP to go me thinks.

After much thinking I think you are right.

I see that no one has mentioned Arnold as a possible replacement. Is that totally out of the question?

No problem. I'm not of a timourous disposition, so go for it. Maybe you've been having too many veggie burgers, you need to harden up. Or, just keep whining. You're masterful at the whine.