The Australian has been derided by pundits such as Jamie Carragher, saying his teams play too naively and concede too many goals.
After a 4-3 win over Manchester United in the Carabao Cup, Postecoglou asked if he would rather listen to Liverpool manager Arne Slot, who believes in sticking to his principles as well.
The Australian told reporters: “Jamie Carragher, mate. You can name him. He’ll enjoy that. People tell me he likes me so that’s a good thing. They say, ‘Did you hear what he said? But he likes you as a person,’. So, that’s important to me. Look, it’s all valid, it’s all valid but I don’t need validation from anybody to do what I do. Whether you agree with my approach or not, there is validity in both and I don’t have an issue with that.
“I love the fact people are talking about our games and analysing our games. I think that is important as well for this football club and I’d rather that than us be anonymous and no one talk about us, or we’re just grinding out an existence. I like the fact and as I’ve always said, you have to be prepared for scrutiny, you have to be prepared for criticism and it’s how you react to that, that is more important. I don’t think one is any less credible than the other in many respects, but what I am saying is I don’t need validity and it won’t change what I believe because what I believe is borne from a lifetime of experiences and values that I won’t let anyone tamper with from the outside.
“I’ve said before, whether it is Jamie or anyone else scrutinising or criticising our approach, that’s healthy because to me how you react to that is much more important than that itself because if you’re going to jump every time, it tells me you don’t really have a lot of belief in this building about what we’re doing if we’re always going to worry about what he is saying, or we need someone to say a good thing, or someone already said a bad thing.
“I think it is healthy if it’s coming from the right sort of place. Someone like Jamie, he is there to give his opinion and will not stand there and say, ‘I’ve got nothing to say,’ he’ll give an opinion. Some of the other stuff I kind of don’t understand because I think it’s just about getting headlines, but again if you react to that it kind of says more about yourself than anything else.”