Ryan McGowan, one of Ange Postecoglou's former players, has spoken about "the worst 16 hours of my life" after having to sit next to the new Tottenham Hotspur head coach on a long-haul flight.
The 33-year-old St Johnstone defender found himself on the wrong end of his fellow Australian's sense of humour during a flight from Sydney to Dubai. It ended up being a difficult journey for McGowan when he realised that it had been set up for him to sit next to the national team boss.
"I'd been up to a bit of mischief with some of the senior boys beforehand, which I now seriously regret," he said on the Sacked in the Morning podcast with ex-Scotland managers Gordon Strachan and Craig Levein back in December. "I was at Hearts on my £100 a week and I used to put all my coffees on the senior boys' rooms because they could obviously afford it, but I didn't know they could pick the seats when we were flying from Sydney to Dubai.
"I got my ticket and it was 1A, business class up the front. I get on the flight, all set up and the next thing Ange comes and he's sitting right next to me."
As if sitting next to the boss wasn't bad enough, the now Spurs boss did not say a single word to the midfielder for the entire trip, a little prank he would play on players.
"I am sitting there just sweating. I was so nervous. He didn't speak to me once. Not even like, 'how are you?'" said McGowan. "He did a podcast a few months ago and he said, 'I used to love doing it. It used to freak all the boys out'."
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The intimidated player was so fearful about waking Postecoglou as he slept between him and the aisle that he decided against going to the toilet for the full 16 hours of the flight.
"I held it in the whole way. No way was I waking him up," he admitted. "Some of the boys were ordering wine. I was like 'just water, thank you'. When we got there, he just up and left."
When McGowan was asked how it was to be a player working under Postecoglou his answer mirrored many who have trained under the 57-year-old.
"He's the best coach I've worked with," he said. "He is so distant and so scary, you are petrified of him - I still am. He'd have certain rules that were just non-negotiable.
"As an average player, I liked that. He just told you what to do and you tried to do it as best you could. He was very good at that.
"There are certain managers who are like, 'go and express yourself'. I can't express myself at all. Just tell me what to do and I'll try to do it!"
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