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Tottenham Hotspur centre-back Van de Ven has admitted he "was completely surprised by" the club's move to part ways with former manager Postecoglou.

The Australian's two-year tenure was terminated a mere over two weeks after he guided Tottenham to victory in the Europa League final, securing the club's first piece of silverware in 17 years.

However, this European success was not matched in the domestic league, with the side ending up in a lowly 17th position in his last campaign at the helm.

He was replaced by ex-Brentford manager Frank during the off-season, but Spurs currently sit in 11th place, with 22 points from 16 games, following a 3-0 defeat to Forest on Sunday.

"He is a fantastic manager. I still really like him," the Dutch defender stated on The Overlap podcast.

"I'm not sure how everything went behind the scenes. It came as a shock. It was odd how everything went afterwards - he's the manager that won silverware to the club," he added.

"Later, when he was dismissed, I texted to my father and my friends and said, 'I never expected this.'"

The Rise and Fall

The Australian manager arrived at Tottenham from Scottish champions Celtic before the 2023-24 season, replacing Antonio Conte. He made a bright start with his attacking style of play, collecting an impressive points haul from his first ten league matches.

Nevertheless, that unbeaten run was halted with four defeats in five matches, and the team's season tailed off, ultimately missing out on Champions League qualification by a narrow two-point margin.

The following season, they won just 11 out of 38 league matches.

Tactical Concerns Revealed

Although he enjoyed the attacking approach, Netherlands international the defender believes the team was missing a "plan B" and disclosed he and defensive partner Cristian Romero discussed adopting a more defensive approach with the manager.

"I enjoyed the attacking football at that time but I like what we have now with our current manager. We are more secure defensively. I don't like getting exposed every game on the counter-attack," he said.

"At the beginning under Postecoglou, no team was accustomed to playing against our system. We were playing exceptional football."

"However, managers analyse everything and people knew what we were doing. Sometimes we lacked a plan B and we were being caught out. We lacked solutions to resolve it."

"On one occasion Romero and I walked up to the manager and suggested we should change some things and be more defensive to make sure we win those games. He was responded, 'I agree with you but I expect you two guys to sort this on the pitch, ensure everybody knows.'"