The Nottingham Forest legend Brian Clough didn’t like because he was too clever.
Last week, the former top footballer and manager Martin O’Neill gave an erudite, cutting and witty speech to a packed luncheon at Karl Ward’s usual sell-out sports luncheon at Birmingham’s Grand Hotel.
I know it was that good because I was sitting alongside him doing the interview. My career included many shows covering O’Neill as both as player and as a manager. He was outstanding at both.
He was the Aston Villa manager from 2006-2010 taking them to two Wembley trips – losing in the Football League Cup final and FA Cup semi-final in 2010, plus three sixth-placed finishes in the League.
O’Neill admitted that he regrets the way he resigned at Villa just before the start of a new season.
The owner Randy Lerner was selling James Milner to Manchester City and agreed to Martin signing another midfielder, Scott Parker, but the next day Lerner reversed the decision to sign Parker.
A similar scenario had happened 15 years earlier when O’Neill quit Norwich after the chairman Robert Chase would not let him sign the striker Dean Windass.
Now Martin says the manager should accept whoever owns the club and employs the manager/head coach should be able to make those decisions.
There is no doubt that playing under the charismatic Brian Clough at Nottingham Forest– O’Neill’s main club where he spent 10 years – had an effect on him as a player and manager. But he says that Clough could be quite brutal on him and never praised him.