IT’S the early '90s and in South Melbourne a young Ange Postecoglou is staring four opposition attackers in the face thinking one thing: "I hate this".

The Celtic boss spent his playing career as a full-back, his most hated position, and despite working under footballing legend Ferenc Puskas it was anything but his dream scenario.

Postecoglou, now 56, was one of the unfortunate defenders tasked with stopping the opposition while manager Puskas ordered his attacking team-mates to stay high.

“You’re killing me” Postecoglou would think as he endured the nightmare defensive task, but around five years on he’d be basing his football philosophy on Puskas’ fundamental beliefs.

Celtic boss Postecoglou has received plaudits for his aggressive, high intensity tactics since touching down in Scotland in the summer and earned Glen’s Manager of the Month for October.

And with the benefits of hindsight, Postecoglou spoke candidly of his experiences as a player which helped mould his all-out attack attitude from the dugout.

“When I was a player I was a full-back and I hated it because I loved attacking”, admitted Postecoglou on Open Goal. “It used to annoy me that they put me as a full-back position and I had to defend because I like scoring goals – I wasn’t any good at it but that’s what I enjoyed.

“Ferenc Puskas was my manager – one of the greatest players of all time and he just wasn’t interested in defending at all.

“He used to tell our wingers just don’t come back, even if the opposition were attacking with ten players they were to stay up there.

“I was a full-back so my wingers are standing on the half-way line and I’d have four players running at me and inside I’d be going ‘You’re killing me here’.

“But his thing was supporters aren’t here to watch defenders play they want to watch attackers play and score goals. From then the seed was in my head that I want my attacking players in attacking positions as much as possible.”

Celtic didn’t take long to adapt to Postecoglou’s methods but the Greek-Australian manager still faces questions over his tactics, especially in European competition. However he has batted away any suggestion of changing his line-ups for one-off matches.

He explained: “I don’t understand the question because people always say: ‘Well you need a result, would you change your approach?’ I need a result every week, mate. So if I was going to change it just for that game if that guarantees me a result then I would do that every week but it doesn’t.

“What I do gives me the best chance of success, so if you tell me I need to win this weekend, I’m going to go super aggressive as I possibly can because that is who I am and how I coach. It’s what I believe in and it’s what I can coach.”

Now five months into his time at Celtic Postecoglou has overseen vast improvement in his side’s performances and reckons the belief in the way of playing will only continue to progress throughout the season. And he pinpointed the 4-3 away loss to Real Betis as the moment his players really grew into his system.

He continued: “That first game against Betis I thought, and I think the players got a real belief that you know what, we’re playing a good side here and we’re taking it to them in their own back yard.

“That was when it started sinking into the boys that if we stick to playing this football even against quality we will crack it at some point.

“You’ll probably find some players who didn’t enjoy playing under me, but for the most part I think I have a good understanding with players where in their core most footballers want to play this kind of football.”

That’s not to say there haven’t been times Postecoglou has been questioned by his players, or even questioned his own ethos during his management career or more recently at Celtic.

He said: “I’ve never had a problem with getting it into players it’s then to them to adapt and believe in it and that’s still happening it’s not fully there. I can still see sometimes late in the game they’ll look over to the bench and say ‘you really want us to play out again?’

“It’s human nature and there’s plenty of times I’ve questioned myself and thought maybe I’ll just ignore their look and tell them I didn’t see it but I can’t so I always say keep playing.”