Ange Postecoglou does not have to look far for evidence of what the FA Cup means to Tottenham.

When Postecoglou and his players are preparing for Friday night's third-round tie at home to Burnley, they will be in the company of legends: Gazza, Lineker and Mabbutt in 1991; Ricky Villa a decade earlier; Greaves and Blanchflower in the 1962 Final against the Clarets.

"The people who have had success at this club are rightly honoured," Postecoglou said ahead of the game. "If you walk around the home dressing room, those are the only pictures we have got up there; teams and individuals that have won things, because we know how important they are to this club.

"We don't hide those things away, you absolutely put them up as an example of what you want to be."

Postecoglou, who grew up watching FA Cup Finals in the dead of night in Australia, is likely to evoke the past in his pre-match address to the players, but the 58-year-old will be as conscious as anyone that Spurs could do with some more recent inspiration pieces for the dressing-room walls.

Fraser Forster was the only member of the current squad alive when Spurs last won the FA Cup 33 years ago — also their last appearance in a final in the competition — and for an overwhelming majority of supporters, patience has run out.

Fans have grown particularly frustrated at the perception that Spurs would rather finish in the top four than win a cup. Mauricio Pochettino actually made no secret of his disdain for the domestic cups, while Antonio Conte twice crashed out of this competition to Championship clubs.

Even the experience of big Champions League nights have worn thin when they appear to come at the expense of a crack at silverware at home.

Postecoglou, though, insists the club's ambitions in the League should have no bearing on their desire to win the FA Cup.

"You start every season with the ambition and dream of winning silverware, because you know the impact that has on the fans more than anything else," he said. "I don't know why whatever your ambitions are in the League has to impact your ambitions in the cups."

Postecoglou is plainly aware of the strength of feeling both among fans and inside the club, but he also warned that the FA Cup must not become a "holy grail" for Spurs this season.

"There can't be a desperation to win a trophy because it cures all ills, because it doesn't," he added. "I am determined to bring success to the club, but it is not a desperation for something that will give us some respite for what is ahead. When you're a big club, there should be a constant demand for success."

In other words, Postecoglou wants to put Spurs in a position of challenging for major honours every season, rather than win a cup to briefly sate fans.

The head coach had his fingers burned by the frustrating Carabao Cup exit at Fulham in the second round in August, when he made nine changes, although he insisted the critical reaction would not inform his team selection tonight.

"People are allowed to criticise, I don't always get it right. I put out a team that I thought could win us the game that night," he said.

Given Spurs's long wait to win a competition they once dominated, a weakened team on Friday would be considered near-unforgivable by some fans if Spurs were beaten, though Postecoglou has so few options that wholesale changes are improbable.

Rare starts for Oliver Skipp and Bryan Gil is about the closest Spurs could come to an experimental XI.

Spurs have just one League fixture — the visit to Manchester United on Sunday week — between now and January 31, which should ease the pressure on their depleted squad, while centre-half Micky van de Ven's return to contention is an enormous boost.