Former Dundee boss James McPake has heaped praise on Ange Postecoglou after the Celtic manager took time out to offer him help and advice.
McPake revealed Postecoglou devoted half an hour of his time to provide guidance to the ex-Dens gaffer following a 4-2 win for the Parkhead side on Tayside back in November.
He says post-match chats between bosses are a rarity these days due to Covid-19, but insists the 56-year-old Aussie was only too keen to sit down and talk football.
And the meeting left a lasting impact on first-time boss McPake, who was sacked by Dundee in February.
"I believe, speaking to other managers, he sits down and talks to you," he told BBC Sportsound.
“I think, the 4-2 game at Dens, he must have spent about half an hour with me - which is rare nowadays with Covid because you don’t go into the offices.
“You don’t do what was historically done as managers where you invited the opposition managers in for a beer or a cup of tea.
“But he spent a bit of time and he spoke… it was just a bit of guidance. But he just came across as a really good footballing man who had a lot of time particularly for younger coaches.
“I can’t speak for anyone else but certainly myself and my staff at the time were very impressed by him.
“We were very impressed by the way he sets his team up and the fact he sticks to his guns as well.
“He’s been questioned, he didn’t have a great start at Celtic but he stuck to what he was doing and now the fans get excited
“When they get it right they’re a proper team - we lost 6-0 and that could have been 12-0.”
Grateful McPake admits he was "humbled" by Postecoglou and the way in which he took an interest in his work at Dens.
He insists it "shows the type of man" the former Australia manager is.
McPake continued: “I had never met him! I met him at Celtic Park and he congratulated me on the promotion.
“I thought, oh well, you go away and obviously he’s read up and done his homework and seen, ‘ah, they’ve got a promotion’.
“I just thought it was just a throwaway comment but when they came to Dens, it was kind of like… I don’t want to sound bad but he came to me.
“And it was more of a, ‘let’s just have a chat’, and it was for 20 minutes, half an hour. ‘How’s your training going’, in the lead up to an international break, ‘how are you going to approach it’.
“I went away and spoke to a lot of people about it. I’ll be honest, I felt very humbled.
“Celtic were flying at that time, he’s the Celtic manager and no disrespect to Dundee but I was the Dundee manager.
“He went out his way to come and speak to me so I’ll be grateful for that and it shows the type of man he is. There aren’t enough in football that want to help you, in my opinion.”
