Ange Postecoglou hopes to get the opportunity to make Tottenham “bigger than ever”, but will have no trouble relaxing on holiday on Monday if his future remains uncertain.
The 59-year-old is yet to receive clarity on whether he will continue at Spurs after he flipped the script and clinched Europa League success in Bilbao with a first trophy in 17 years.
Postecoglou had been expected to leave after a poor Premier League campaign – which could end with Tottenham in 17th if they lose to Brighton on Sunday – but after being serenaded by thousands of supporters at Friday’s open-top bus parade, the narrative around the Australian has shifted.
“Come Monday, I won’t have a care in the world, but I assume I’ll have an indication at some point. Only because you know there’s some serious planning to do more than anything else, but I won’t have any problem switching off,” Postecoglou said.
“I was overwhelmed by the sea of people and every demographic you can think of. There were grown men crying, women, girls and boys just so ecstatic.
“When you see the sheer magnitude of the numbers, you realise it is a massive club.
“I had a sense of that before I joined but I guess even for the club itself, it reaffirms that missing piece of success and what it can do to galvanise a supporter base and really show the size of the club.
“It’s fair to say it is a massive club and the opportunity now is to make it bigger than ever.”
Postecoglou revealed after victory over Manchester United in Bilbao that he switched his priority to Europa League success in January.
Several league defeats have followed but lessons have been learned and experienced players will be targeted this summer if Postecoglou is kept on.
“Looking back at our pre-season last year, I don’t think it was ideal and there were certain things we needed to do differently,” he explained.
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“The other lesson learned… you need to now bring in some experience for this group in terms of our recruiting.
“I have still felt there has been growth this year and we’ll be much better placed at the beginning of next year to tackle what is ahead than we were at the start of this one.”
Injuries have been one of Postecoglou’s biggest hurdles.
He added: “There were times this year when I thought how many more challenges? Within that, I never felt like ‘this is just too much’ – it’s not how I’m built.
“When in the lowest of times, I still had this thing inside of me that we were going to do something special this year. I just really believed it.
“You can ask the guys in there that every time we got hit with a sort of road block, the one thing I kept saying to them, ‘it’s just going to make the story better’ and it has.”
Postecoglou hopes this week’s celebration give the squad a taste for success and tipped Wednesday’s match-winner Brennan Johnson to become a “mentality monster” after a tough campaign, with his social media account deactivated in September following online abuse.
“Fair to say, he’s one of the ones who has enjoyed himself, but rightly so. And I’m hoping him doing that on such a big stage, he comes back next year as a mentality monster,” Postecoglou added.
