MARTIN O'NEILL

'Martin Hugh Michael O'Neill, OBE', (born March 1 1952 in Kilrea, Northern Ireland) is a former Northern Ireland national football team captain who has previously managed Wycombe Wanderers, Norwich City, Leicester City and Celtic and is currently manager of Aston Villa.

Contents

Early life

Playing career

Managerial career

Leicester City

Celtic

Aston Villa

Outside football

Playing honours

Distillery

Nottingham Forest F.C. 1971–1981

Managerial honours

Wycombe Wanderers F.C. 1990–1995

Leicester City F.C. 1995–2000

Celtic F.C. 2000–2005

Managerial stats

References

External links

Early life

As well as association football, he played Gaelic football as a youth, winning the MacRory Cup in 1970 with St. Malachy's College, Belfast. He attended St. Malachy's College with Irish chef Eamonn ó Catháin and local Belfast legend Aidan Barnes. While at St. Malachy's, he first came to public attention as a soccer player with local side Distillery F.C.. This breached the Gaelic Athletic Association prohibition on gaelic footballers' playing "foreign sports", and the resulting disputes heightened O'Neill's profile. After completing his education at St. Columb's College, Derry, he began a degree in law at the Queen's University of Belfast. He signed for Distillery F.C. and won the Irish Cup in 1971 scoring twice in the final. He also scored against FC Barcelona in the UEFA Cup Winners' Cup in a 3-1 home defeat in September 1971. It was during this period he was spotted by a scout for Nottingham Forest F.C., for whom he signed in 1971, quitting his studies.

Playing career

O'Neill progressed slowly as a player until the legendary Brian Clough arrived at the City Ground as manager in 1975 and made him a key part of his midfield. O'Neill went on to play an integral role in Forest's golden era, in which they gained promotion to the top flight, then won the League and League Cup in 1978, followed by further League Cup success a year later and the first of two European Cup triumphs.
O'Neill was a regular for his country, captaining the Northern Ireland side at a memorable 1982 FIFA World Cup in Spain, which included defeating the host nation in Valencia. He played 62 times for Northern Ireland. At club level he also played for Norwich City F.C., Manchester City F.C. and Notts County F.C. before retiring.

Managerial career

After his playing career, O'Neill began a hugely successful career in football management, initially at Grantham Town in 1987. After a brief spell at the helm of Shepshed Charterhouse, he managed non-league Wycombe Wanderers, and took them into the Football League as Conference champions in 1993. They had narrowly missed out on promotion the previous year after a two-horse race with Colchester United. ^[1]. He became manager of Norwich City in the summer of 1995, but left the club in December of that year due to differences with club chairman Robert Chase.

Leicester City

He joined Leicester City immediately after leaving Norwich. After a difficult start he achieved great success at the club, gaining promotion via the play-offs to the Premiership in the same season as joining the club. Leicester finished in the top half of the Premiership in every season O'Neill was manager. They also won the Football League Cup under O'Neill in 1997 and 2000, as well as reaching the 1999 final of the competition. They finished ninth in 1997, tenth in 1998 and 1999, and eighth in 2000. The two League Cup triumphs saw them qualify for the UEFA Cup each time, though both campaigns were short-lived.
During his time at Leicester, O'Neill held talks to become manager of Leeds United but declined the job after thousands of supporters held up placards saying "Don't go Martin!" in an effort to make him stay.

Celtic

O'Neill did eventually leave Leicester on 1 June 2000, taking over from the team of John Barnes and Kenny Dalglish to become manager of Celtic. It was at Celtic that O'Neill gained his nicknames "Martin the Magnificent" and "the Blessed Martin". O'Neill's first Old Firm game ended in a dramatic 6-2 victory for Celtic over Rangers and did much to overturn the psychological advantage previously held by Rangers. In that first season O'Neill's Celtic won the domestic treble. He was also the first Celtic manager to take the team into the revamped Champions League (a feat he managed three times). In the first season in the CL Celtic were eliminated in spite of having 9 points. Perhaps his greatest achievement was to guide Celtic to the 2003 UEFA Cup final held in Seville. Celtic lost to Porto 3-2 in extra time, coached by Jose Mourinho. In his five seasons there, he won three League titles, three Scottish Cups, and a League Cup. O'Neill also oversaw a record 7 consecutive victories in Old Firm derbies. Also in season 2003-04 Celtic created a British record of 25 consecutive victories. During this time, his name was linked with a number of high-profile jobs back south of the border.
On 25 May 2005, Celtic announced that O'Neill was resigning as manager at the end of the 2004/05 season to care for his wife Geraldine, who has lymphoma.
O'Neill's last competitive game in charge of Celtic was the Scottish Cup final 1 – 0 victory over Dundee United on 28 May 2005, decided by an eleventh minute goal by Alan Thompson. Celtic had an impressive record under O'Neill, playing 282 games and winning 213, drawing 29 and losing 40.

Aston Villa

O'Neill was introduced as the Aston Villa manager at a press conference on August 4, 2006. At the press conference he stated "It's absolutely fantastic to be back and with a club such as this. This is a fantastic challenge. I am well aware of the history of this football club. Trying to restore it to its days of former glory seems a long way away - but why not try? It is nearly 25 years since they won the European Cup but that is the dream."
Villa's form improved substantially following O'Neill's appointment. They had the longest unbeaten start of any Premiership side in 2006-07 (9 games), not losing a league game until 28 October.
Villa suffered a mid-season slump but recovered late in the season, winning their three away games in April under O'Neill's guidance, to end the season how it began with a run of 9 unbeaten fixtures . For this O'Neill scooped the Barclays Manager of the Month for April.

Outside football

Despite never completing his degree, O'Neill remains an avid follower of criminology and has attended some of Britain's most infamous trials, including those of the Yorkshire Ripper and Rosemary West. His fascination began with the James Hanratty case of 1961.^[2]
Martin O'Neill was awarded an OBE for services to sport in 2004.^[3] In 2002, Norwich supporters voted him into the club's Hall of Fame.

Playing honours

Distillery

★ 'Winners'

★
★ Irish FA Cup– 1971

Nottingham Forest F.C. 1971–1981

★ 'Winners'

★
★ European Super Cup – 1980

★
★ European Cup – 1979, 1980

★
★ Football League Championship – 1977/78

★
★ League Cup – 1978, 1979

★ 'Runners-Up

★
★ European Super Cup – 1981

★
★ Football League Championship – 1978/79

Managerial honours

Wycombe Wanderers F.C. 1990–1995

★ 'Winners'

★
★ Football Conference – 1993

★
★ FA Trophy – 1991, 1993

★
★ Division 3 Play–Off Winners – 1994

Leicester City F.C. 1995–2000

★ 'Winners'

★
★ League Cup – 1997, 2000

★
★ Promotion to Premier League – 1995/96

★ 'Runners-up

★
★ League Cup – 1999

Celtic F.C. 2000–2005

★ 'Winners'

★
★ SPL Championship – 2000/01, 2001/02, 2003/04

★
★ Scottish Cup – 2001, 2004, 2005

★
★ Scottish League Cup – 2000/01

★ 'Runners-up

★
★ UEFA Cup Runner-Up – 2002/03

★
★ Scottish League Cup – 2002/03

★
★ SPL Championship – 2002/03 , 2004/05

Managerial stats

Team	Nat	From	To	Record
				G	W	L	D	Win %
Wycombe Wanderers		February 7 1990	June 13 1995	112	52	28	32	46.42
Norwich City		June 13 1995	November 17 1995	20	9	4	7	45.00
Leicester City		December 21 1995	June 1 2000	223	85	70	68	38.11
Celtic		June 1 2000	May 31 2005	282	213	40	29	75.53
Aston Villa		August 5 2006	''Present''	47	16	13	18	32.61

References

1. Martin
2. Bhoy wonder Ian Kehoe
3. Martin's OBE

External links

★

★ BBC biography

★ Grantham Town profile

★ Career information at ex-canaries.co.uk