‘Unacceptable’ – Ange Postecoglou hits out at Tottenham star after Rangers draw
'I expect a level of performance and that wasn't it.'
Tottenham boss Ange Postecoglou described Timo Werner’s performance in Spurs’ Europa League draw with Rangers as ‘unacceptable’.
The Premier League and Scottish Premiership sides shared a pulsating 1-1 draw at Ibrox on Thursday night after Dejan Kulusevski’s 75th-minute strike cancelled out Hamza Igamane’s opener just after half-time.
Both sides squandered opportunities for more goals but a draw is a decent enough result for both sides as they look for automatic qualification to the Europa League knockout stages.
Rangers are in the final automatic spot in eighth, above ninth-placed Tottenham on goal difference.
Postecoglou said it was an ‘important point’ for his side but blasted the performance of Werner, who he subbed off at half-time.
‘When you’ve got 18-year-olds in the team, it’s not acceptable to me,’ Postecoglou said when asked about Werner’s withdrawal.
‘I said that to Timo, he’s a German international. In the moment we’re in right now – it’s not like we’ve got many options, I need everyone to at least be going out there and trying to give the best of themselves.
‘His performance in the first half wasn’t acceptable. We need everybody, including him, to be contributing because we don’t have the depth to leave people out if they perform poorly.
‘I expect a level of performance from some of the senior guys, and tonight wasn’t that.’
On the match as a whole, Postecoglou added: ‘A tough game as expected, obviously with the atmosphere in the stadium.
‘I thought the first half was pretty tight with no clear-cut for either side. When they score straight after half-time the energy levels obviously go up and it’s going to be a tough one to claw back, but I thought we worked our way back in well.
‘I thought the substitutes made a difference and we scored a good goal, had other good moments and a great save by Fraser [Forster] at the end.
‘In the context of where we are in Europe, an important point.’
While Postecoglou was content with a point, the result means Tottenham have now not won in four games since they thumped Premier League champions Manchester City 4-0 at the Etihad Stadium.
They are 11th in the English top-flight ahead of Sunday’s trip to the south coast to face a Southampton side sitting bottom of the Premier League with five points from 15 games.
Rangers, meanwhile, will hope to produce an equally dynamic performance on the weekend when they face Old Firm rivals Celtic in the League Cup final.
Speaking after the Spurs stalemate, Rangers boss Philippe Clement said: ‘I’m very proud about the performance because it’s the way we want to see football being played.
‘Also if you see where this group of players is coming from, from a few months ago and making performances like this now, it is a big, big step forward.
‘On the other side, I’m also disappointed we didn’t take the three points. That would have been even better and would have been the result we deserved today with the performance the players gave.’
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