Carlton Football Club coach Michael Voss has shared the lessons he learned from his trip to North London where he spent a week with Tottenham Spurs manager and diehard Carlton supporter Ange Postecoglou.
It became a fact-finding mission of sorts, for Voss, but the three-time AFL Premiership player found a lesson everywhere he looked.
“Look, Tottenham’s a massive club,” Voss said in an interview with AFL.com.au.
“The transformation they’re trying to create there, and what’s been going on behind the scenes, made me realise just how big it is to try and change a club’s direction or a club’s culture.”
He said he noticed how every piece needs to be aligned having spent time in every department from the Academy, to recruiting to the coaches and Ange.
“I look from afar now and I see them struggling a bit with injuries and that sort of stuff, but what I also see is a really strong alignment in what they’re trying to create. They look like they want to see that through. It would probably be the best decision they’ve ever made.”
During his trip to Tottenham, where he watched a 1-1 draw with Fulham, Voss was a sponge trying to learn from one of Australia’s best sporting minds in Postecoglou.
“Nothing replaces being able to sit with a coach and watch them at work,” the 1996 Brownlow Medal winner said.
“That’s the benefit I get. When you get to sit and watch a coach at work, how they address their players, how they review a game … it was a great experience for me to be able to sit in a room and listen to Ange address the result that they had.
“I’m told it was an unexpected result, but the way he managed it and how he sold his vision and how he gave great clarity in the way they were able to play … I can’t play soccer, but I thought, ‘I could do that!’ It was really clear. It was really simple.
“He installed great belief in his playing group, even though they might have been a little bit unsure about themselves. I’m not there every day, but I walked out and thought, ‘That sounds pretty good to me, he’s got me!'”
Voss felt that it was a change of pace and an invaluable opportunity, because as a head coach he no longer gets that chance much to sit back and observe rather than control.
