‘Nothing changes’ – Postecoglou delivers bleak assessment of Tottenham’s dismal FA Cup display

Ange Postecoglou admitted that not much changes after Tottenham were dumped out of the FA Cup by Aston Villa.

The 2-1 loss marks a second cup exit in three days for the London club, after losing to Liverpool in the Carabao Cup on Thursday.

And while Postecoglou was disappointed with the performance, he says it’s been the story of their season and they simply have to pick themselves up and go again.

He said: “Obviously disappointed we don’t progress. It wasn’t a great start, that’s the last thing you want, and we really struggled to get some control. Then we had an enormous chance at 1-0 we didn’t take to equalise.

“We got a better grip of the game but unfortunately fell short. When you go a goal down it gives the opposition momentum and confidence. You want to wrestle control early and we didn’t do that.

“We were still in the game [at half-time]. We just needed to hang in there. The second half was a lot more like ourselves. The second goal sort of made it a bit more difficult but I always felt we were a threat – unfortunately just not enough.

Joe Hart’s message to Ange Postecoglou. 🗣️ pic.twitter.com/64RbtBPASR

— Match of the Day (@BBCMOTD) February 9, 2025

“We still scored, we had opportunities to create more chances. We were always still in the game but conceding an early goal and a second makes it hard.”

“Nothing really changes. We have a couple of weeks now where we don’t have midweek games.

“This group has done an unbelievable job for two and a half months. I can’t praise them enough, playing twice a week since November. They’ll get the chance to reset now and finish the season strong.

“Europe is still very important to us, we’re still in a great spot there, and we’ll hope to get some players back over the next two weeks.

“We’ll get players back which will help, we had 11 first-team players out today. Take that out of any team for one game and they would struggle – we’ve been doing that for two and a half months.

“The players are going out there and giving everything they can. It would be a lot better if they had some help.”

It remains to be seen whether chairman Daniel Levy will pull the trigger and sack Postecoglou after a dismal week, but with players on their way back from injury, his judgement may be reserved for the Europa League knockout stages instead.