How Celtic boss Ange Postecoglou continues to have an impact on former side Yokohama F Marinos

By Lewis Laird

June 20, 2022

Celtic boss Ange Postecoglou has made himself known as a coach who brings success to whichever side he manages.

The 56-year-old has won trophies across the globe, in Japan, Australia and now Scotland, having lifted the league and cup double last campaign.

Not only has he shown the success he can bring to each of his clubs, but he also had a habit of creating and leaving a legacy which will live on for years to come.

There is no better example of that right now than Ange’s former team Yokohama F Marinos.

The J-League side currently sits top of the league after 17 games, leading previous champions Kawasaki Frontale by one point.

And Ange may still have had his part to play in Yokohama’s early success so far in this campaign.

Postecoglou’s former assistant at both Melbourne Victory and Marinos, Kevin Muscat, is in charge of the Japanese league leaders and has recently credited the Celtic boss for helping him get to where he is now in his early managerial career.

Speaking in a recent interview, the ex-Australian internationalist was full of praise for Postecoglou and revealed that he is still in close contact with the 56-year-old.

He said [Keep Up]: “This was very important in my career, spending that 15-16 months with Ange. I had all these ideas, people talk about vision, philosophy and all the buzzwords, but you have this game style of the way you want to play, and I felt at the time it was really significant.

“Then the most difficult thing is bringing that to life. How do I get this group of people to implement that vision? I was fortunate at that time with Ange, and if you recall, we played without a striker (at Melbourne Victory).

“We played with two strikers, we call them strikers, but they were actually really high and wide – Marco Rojas and Archie Thompson. Everyone else would call them wingers because they were on the wing, but they were strikers in our team and scored a number of goals.

“It was great learning for me because I thought: how are we going to get this group that have never done it before? How are we going to get this group of people to play like this? That was the whole mechanics and implementation of a certain way of playing.”

Muscat added: “I consider Ange a friend and a mentor. A mentor is obviously someone you can unconditionally trust for council.

“We speak about things. Sometimes there will be messages when I wake up or in the middle of the night. He is always watching the games, always watching our games and likewise.”

Ange’s legacy with Yokohama lives on a year after his departure

After moving to Japan in 2018, Postecoglou took Yokohama to their first title in over a decade and was highly regarded by the support at his former club.

Despite leaving over a year ago, the former Socceroos boss is still having an impact on the club as they push for another league title this season.

That is the sort of impact Ange is keen to leave at Celtic when he inevitably moves on further down the line, and he appears to be putting those building blocks in this summer.

Fingers crossed, that isn’t something we will need to worry about for many years to come. But, it is always good to see that we appear to be in safe hands for both the short and long-term future under Ange.

In other news, Erik Sviatchenko absolutely loving what he’s seeing from Matt O’Riley at Celtic.