MARTIN OâNEILL believes Sunderland would not be in the mess they now find themselves in if he was still at the helm. OâNeill penned a two-year deal to become the new Republic of Ireland boss this week, with another ex-Black Cats boss, Roy Keane, joining him as assistant. But his sacking as Sunderland manager eight months ago, still rankles with the 61-year-old, particularly as the Wearsiders lie second bottom in the Premier League table with just four points from 10 games. OâNeill insists he would have achieved the feat of his successor, Paolo Di Canio, in keeping Sunderland in the Premier League. And he believes his first three months at the helm - where he won seven out of 10 league games - masked owner Ellis Short to the deficiencies of the squad, with that restructuring only taking place under Di Canio. In an interview with The Guardian today, OâNeill said: âIn the whole debacle, it gets forgotten that when I first joined, they were third from bottom with 11 points from 14 games. âBecause I won a number of games to start with, everyone, including the owner, started to think we had cracked it.â OâNeill, who made seven permanent signings during 16 months at the helm, added: âDi Canio was allowed to bring in 15 new players at a time and then didnât last six games into this season. âSince I left, Sunderland have won three Premier League games. Di Canio, coming in, disparaging about everything, won two of 11 games. Theyâve taken 12 points from a possible 51 since my time. âI wouldnât have minded the opportunity to be signing 15 players. âNothing is certain in this game but my record in management over 20 years would suggest that we would have got the five points needed to stay up.â
First Bruce and now this sad old knacker Why, as the new ROI, doesn't he concentrate on doing his job and show some dignity and diplomacy instead of whinging about Sunderland? Whatever you say he'd dragged us into a relegation dogfight and the team had no fight. No offence to the Irish but I hope he's a total failure and ends up being sacked. I'm sick of football managers whinging about being sacked, it's part of the job ......... what do they want, a cushy job for life? Errrr, hang on, I didn't think that last bit through
The only thing I agree with him about is, he knew we had a **** squad and still do. Oh and we were fighting above our weight.
Would he have kept us up, hmmm who knows. Hindsight is a biatch! We wouldn't have beaten Newcastle and Everton but we wouldnt have been pulverised by Villa. I seem to have erased the other games from my memory.
Drew at home to Southampton and we're beaten at Chelsea. I think we'd have gone under O'Neill but that's in the past ....... sadly he just can't let it go. I wonder what the Irish think about one his very first interviews being blaming everyone else but himself, as usual it has to be said.
It was in decline MoN came and got progressively worse. If he was so friggin great he would have halted the decline. Fact is he couldn't be arsed to turn up and he was lost without his right hand man. Thanks for Danny Graham clever ****, I suppose he be shooting us into Europe right now
I agree, we would have got turned over at sid james and by everton, by that time it would have been too late
Mate, if ever their was a manager who maintained my respect after being sacked by us it was MoN, he's gone way down in my estimation now.
No Martin we would be currently playing in the championship. The football played last season was as dire as I have ever seen it in my lifetime
TBH, if his best shot at saving us from the drop was to sign a useless sack of lard for £5 million he has no excuse for being sacked. He brought a lazy mercenary into a team of lazy mercenaries
He had to go and he knows it, MoN was very much like PDC for me in the respect I was very reluctant to concede they had to go because I liked them both for the men they were. They Both made mistakes which meant no going back, wish Paolo had been given more time though and my issue with the players in his sacking still very much stand.
I was a huge MON fan and have always wanted him as manager since back in his Wycombe Wanderers days. Little was I to know that the football we would play under him was probably the worst football Ive ever seen us play under any manager. I would have loved it more than anyone for it to have worked for him, but in all honesty he would never have kept us in the Premier League, no matter what all of his pundit mates on TV say.
Both him and Bruce weren't exactly sacked on whims. We were declining rapidly under both of them and the change wasn't knee-jerk, or owt like that. Smacks of reputation protection to me.
And now you are trying to justify your new found thrust into the limelight. Every club you managed Martin, you had a trustworthy number 2. The kind of bloke that does a lot without getting the recognition, abit like Cloughie with Taylor. You had a go on your own and your initial impact was very good. You called up McClean from the reserves who was like a coiled spring (ended up like a piece of wire) and gave the club a massive boost, hence our survival(Thankyou). When it came to your first full season without your wingman, you FAILED. We were doomed end of! Please don't embarrass yourself by being bitter and justifying your new job!
For me, there was only one direction we were going under him, unfortunately. I say 'unfortunately' because I was over the moon when he signed for us. Honestly thought he was the man. I guess we'll never know.
