Martin O'Neill: Ten years on

[Cliftonville Villlain]

The optimism when he joined. He wasted tens of millions and then fucked off, kick-starting a decade-long spiral. He's never fully been called to account for the malicious way he left the club.  A few days before he left Villa were in Dublin losing to Bohemians. He never said a word all match and couldn't have cared less about what was happening on the pitch. His mind was made up long before he walked. He was found out.

[kippaxvilla2]

Given the way his career basically went downhill after he left I do believe he regrets leaving. 

[dcdavecollett]

His first sacking was at Sunderland, wasn't it?

[SoccerHQ]

Funny listening to all the players from his era on the Under the Cosh Podcast.

The one with Stephen Warnock is well worth a listen.

Warnock at the time was a key player for Blackburn who had high finishes under Mark Hughes and Big Sam. He praises him massively for all the sports science and psychology. Then he comes here and there are no tactics and training basically consists of laps round the pitch and five a side games. He also confirms Milner calling MON out for lack of fitness in March 2010 just before Chelsea away, Milner dropped the next week.

Warnock at one point states he thought "how the f*** are we 6th" and also he got a mid season review dressing down from MON and lost huge confidence as a result. I remember it like that as Warnock was really good up to the January when he first came in then had a poor league cup final game and his form continue to decline in the run in.

James Collins podcast also gone up in the last week and he says MON used to come into the dressing room at half 1, read out the team or just say the same 11 and subs as last week and walk out!

Downing is the only one to praise him but I'd forgotten we signed him with a broken leg so he couldn't feature until the December of that season.

He basically tried to recreate Clough's managerial style in the 2000s and that had severe limitations with how the game was going. Now it's only the likes of Neil Warnock who can do that and he just gets short term gigs saving clubs from relegation.

[ez]

We really should have won a trophy under O'Neil. We had some great players. The thing is I can only remember one cup run of note when we got to the league cup final.

[dcdavecollett]

To be fair, the less-than-saintly Martin also took us to an FA Cup SF at Wembley the same season as the LC Final (2010).

In both games, we were scandalously robbed on key decisions by the match referees.

Still, best not to make a fuss, eh?

[LeeB]

In both games we were largely shit though.

[dcdavecollett]

Not really the point though, eh?

Teams are allowed to be 'shit' -not that I recall us being that bad in the two games we're looking at -and still be allowed to win within the rules. The only shit performances on those two days were the ones from the match referees who effectively demonstrated their undying loyalty to the Brand Clubs.

See Old Trafford last May for further details...