Prologue

All organisations have their own culture and English Premier League club Tottenham Hotspur's (or Spurs as they are commonly referred) is centred on the concept of Glory. It's an interesting word. Definitions tend to include such elements as honour, beauty and achievement. The word appears multiple times in the Tottenham lexicon: "Glory, Glory, Tottenham Hotspur", "The Game is about Glory" and my personal favourite "It is better to fail aiming high than to succeed aiming low. At Spurs we set our sights very high, so that even failure will have in it an echo of glory". That last one, attributed to former player and club legend Danny Blanchflower, is particularly relevant to the current generation, because infamously Tottenham Hotspur have been hearing the echoes of failure consistently for quite a while now. Seventeen trophyless years, to be precise.

Through my own career journey as a consulting engineer, I became fascinated by the concept of an organisation's culture and how a good one, established and promoted through effective leadership, creates success. I ultimately summarised my own recipe for leadership thus: hire brilliant people, create an environment in which they can flourish and glow in the reflected glory of their achievements.

Translate that simple recipe into what has been going on at Tottenham and the problem is clear. Creating an environment in which the team can flourish should mean being true to the culture of the club ....Glory! The last three managers have been so lacking in ambition to play with honour, beauty and ultimately achievement that we might characterise them as inglorious. Nuno, Mourinho and Conte - the Inglorious Bastards!

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But now in the unlikely guise of an Australian, to the great delight of those of us who prosecute our support through the Australian supporters club OzSpurs, we have a manager who gets it. Big Ange Postecoglou.