New Tottenham Hotspur manager Ange Postecoglou tasted defeat in his first match in charge as West Ham United secured a 3-2 pre-season friendly victory in Australia on Tuesday.
Postecoglou – who left his job at Scottish champions Celtic to take over at the Premier League side – was able to name Harry Kane in his starting line-up alongside James Maddison, their £40 million signing from Leicester City.
Kane continues to be linked with a move away from the club this summer with Bayern Munich leading the chase for the striker, who was given the captain's armband by Postecoglou.
But the 29-year-old, who has now entered the last 12 months of his contract with the North London club, failed to find the target at the Optus Stadium in Perth.
He had an early close-range shot well saved by goalkeeper Lukasz Fabianski but was relatively subdued before being substituted at half-time.
Spurs found themselves two goals down inside 25 minutes with Danny Ings, and Divin Mubama finding the back of the net for the Hammers.
Postecoglou named a completely new XI for the second half and fought back to level with two goals in three minutes from Giovani Lo Celso and Destiny Udogie.
West Ham, though, were not to be denied and Italian striker Gianluca Scamacca secured the victory with a cool finish 12 minutes from time to make it three wins from three in pre-season for David Moyes' side.
“I would like us to score more goals than last year, it's something we are hoping to improve on,” said Moyes, who lost the services of Declan Rice this summer after the Hammers captain joined Arsenal in a £105 million deal. “We were good on the counter-attack and took the opportunities.”
It was a match Tottenham should have won having enjoyed 72 per cent of the possession and having 30 attempts on goal to West Ham's four.
Despite the defeat, Postecoglou said that he still saw signs of how he wants Spurs to play going forward. “Yeah I think so,” said the Australian coach when asked whether his style of football was on show during the defeat. “From my perspective that's what we were looking for tonight.
“We've obviously been working really hard in training and I didn't expect the lads to be super sharp because this is the stage where you're getting your conditioning but we have been working on stuff.
“We want to see some of that out there and I think in both halves there was a real willingness from the boys to try to put in place the stuff we've been working on. At times it looked good but we're still very much in the infancy of trying to establish the way we want to play and our structures.
“For me the key thing is are they trying out there to implement it and for the most part it was really good.”
West Ham opened the scoring when striker Ings finished off a superb Jarrod Bowen cross with a header past new Spurs goalkeeper Guglielmo Vicario.
Tottenham's defence was again exposed by an efficient West Ham as 18-year-old Mubama headed another slick set-piece into the net.
Postecoglou rang the changes at half-time, flipping his team entirely, and it did the trick as Tottenham battled back into the match.
They were rewarded when Lo Celso scored from close range before debutant Udogie levelled in the 71st minute with a brilliant header. But Scamacca scored against the run of play to deny Postecoglou a winning start.
