Ange Postecoglou personally thanks Roy Keane for ‘amazing’ gift from 26 years ago – JOE.co.uk

Postecoglou has become one of the higher profile Premier League managers in recent years, after becoming the man to lead Spurs to their first trophy in 17 years in the 2025 Europa League, before an ill-fated spell at Nottingham Forest this term.

With the Midlands outfit, Postecoglou survived just eight matches in charge, none of which he won, before being relived of his duties in October.

A fact that is lesser known about the Australian, is that the 60-year-old had a successful managerial career lasting around 20 years, outside of Europe before he started work as Celtic head coach in 2021.

During those years managing outside of the European continent, Postecoglou first crossed paths with Roy Keane.

Back in 2000, he led Aussie club South Melbourne to a tournament known as World Club Championship, now the Club World Cup.

As part of the championship, he faced up against Alex Ferguson’s Man United, in a game that ended 2-0 to the English side.

Speaking on the latest episode of the Overlap, Postecoglou recalled that first meeting with Man United, and Roy Keane.

He said: “I’ll tell you a story about Roy, he won’t mind me saying it.

“After the game, our guys were mad for shirts. Our little no.7 literally man-marked David Beckham for the last 15 minutes, even though he was totally out of position, just to make sure he was there for the full-time whistle.

“Then after the game, a couple of our guys drug control got them, so they missed out. They’ve gone into the Man United room after and said to a couple of the guys, I won’t mention who, ‘can we swap shirts?’

“They said no. Then Roy grabbed them and said ‘give them your shirt will you’.

“Mate they couldn’t speak higher of Roy. The impression that made on my players, they said ‘you wouldn’t believe it, Roy Keane told them to give it’.”