Martin ONeill dismisses talk of him becoming the next Manchester United manager

By Kevin Garside Published: 3:35PM GMT twenty-seven February 2010

Which proceed to Old Trafford? Everton"s David Moyes (left) and Villa"s Martin O"Neill Photo: AP

They can never confess it, of course. That does not stop the rest of football weighing the possibility. Last week, Moyes had the catwalk to himself with feat over United at Goodison. Today the beauty competition repairs to Wembley, where it is O"Neill"s spin to show Ferguson a excellent span of heels.

At 57, O"Neill probably has one some-more big posting in him. The fans of Aston Villa, who have not regularly been kind to him, are increasingly usurpation of the thought that he competence find career achievement at Villa Park. This is the settled aim. Villa"s last prize came fourteen years ago. A decade has upheld given they last contested a final, the FA Cup in 2000. Two League Cups is the total of their labours in the twenty-eight years given Peter Withe bundled the round off a post in Rotterdam to win the European Cup.

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O"Neill tells you that this is his focus, that the greatest pursuit in made at home football is not a have a disproportion for him. "I have never thought about that at all, not for one second, not even when I was up at Celtic. Sir Alex Ferguson will decide, I would reckon probably in the year 2033, when he feels the Champions League has upheld him by one last time. I will have over this earth prolonged prior to him."

O"Neill distances himself from the manifestation with evil charm. The heat of FA Cup feat over Crystal Palace the night prior to is still on him. The Pullman that will take the organisation to London is parked at the door. A clarity of expectation is building. O"Neill is at the centre of the narrative. You clarity he would be happy to speak all day. On an additional afternoon the subject of the Ferguson period competence send him spinning out of Bodymoor Heath in a mist of expletives. On this day, he is happy to fool around keepie uppie with the theme.

"Following Ferguson is the unfit job, absolutely. How most times as he won the championship? Ten times, something similar to that? It has never unequivocally worried me. There is regularly somebody entrance up, somebody whose name is applicable at the time. I never compensate any courtesy to it. I unequivocally suffer my pursuit here. For us to win a integrate of competitions in the subsequent integrate of seasons is what it is all about, to validate for the Champions League, that sort of stuff."

O"Neill takes questions similar to Socrates at the Acropolis, rub-down his chin in contemplation, as if fooling around the disproportion from his mouth in accurate order. "The actuality that I"m confronting Sir Alex Ferguson does not have the difference. The actuality that we are in a last at Wembley is sufficient for you to wish to do your really best, to show off your ability. When you are up opposite Manchester United and Sir Alex in the last it is not so most that you wish to lift your game, you have to if you are to win."

Oh come right away Martin, you have taken 4 points off him already this season, 3 of those at Old Trafford. What"s to fear? Surely you have his measure. The thought prompts an additional toy of the jaw, and a grin that suggests the Priory is the place for any who hold that. "I don"t think that for one second. People have been perplexing for a lot of years to get the magnitude of him. He has finished an extraordinary pursuit even to be at Old Trafford as prolonged as he has, at a bar that is perfectionist success. He has delivered and continues to deliver."

OK, that"s sufficient about Ferguson. O"Neill is singular in the top row of English football in his confluence to a made at home template. This is not about desiring positively in English virtues but in following a line of meditative that respects the joining in that he works. Were he in Italy the core would be Italian, German in Germany and so on. That his captain today, Stiliyan Petrov, is Bulgarian, does not protest the extended brush of O"Neill"s rationale. Neither does the inclusion of John Carew or Carlos Cullar. The bearing of the Villa tender is carried by James Milner, Ashley Young, Gabriel Agbonlahor, Stewart Downing, Emile Heskey, Stephen Warnock, Luke Young and so on.

"I do feel that the heartbeat of the football bar should be (the nationality of) the joining that you are personification in, the core of this organisation is essentially English. That does not meant that I hold all by it. At Celtic I had a organisation of Swedes that desired it to death."

O"Neill is half proceed by his fourth year at Villa Park. According to a little his faith on a normal English make up does not stop at bieing born certificates. After their new assembly Arsenal connoisseur Arsène Wenger reached for the prolonged round hang with that to kick O"Neill. Wenger frequency sees virtues in the antithesis when they get the improved of his team. His stylistic hauteur gets right up O"Neill"s nose. Perceptions, one competence say, have nonetheless to catch up with the elaborating code of journey O"Neill is orchestrating.

"The stats showed that we played 3 some-more prolonged balls than they (Arsenal) did in the game. I had a diminutive grin when Bacari Sagna hoofed it 80 yards up the representation in the initial couple of mins opposite Sunderland. I get irritated. I should have remembered that he pronounced Manchester United were anti-football."

Victory today, O"Neill believes, will substantiate his proceed and strengthen in the Villa players a larger clarity of their own worth. It will additionally keep the discuss rattling along, ensuring that when Fergie retires to the turf, Jose Mourinho will not have it all his own way.