TV pundits ‘genuinely do not have a clue’, says Martin O'Neill

Martin O’Neill has fired a scathing broadside at pundits who questioned his management of the Irish team over the course of a sometimes rocky qualification road to France 2016.

At various times throughout the campaign, O’Neill came in for heavy flak from the RTÉ panel, among other media critics, and although he doesn’t name names, it seems the manager reserves a particular disdain for some of the comments made about him and his players by studio-based ex-professionals.

“If I was to listen to everybody picking my team, I wouldn’t get out of bed in the morning,” O’Neill says in an end of year interview on Setanta Sports. “And if I was to listen to people who I don’t have a phenomenal amount of time for, I would just pull the covers over my face.

“There are people who are in the game, who have had a say for years and years, who really do not have a clue, genuinely do not have a clue. And my experience, my judgement of players, I think is as good as any...

“There are lots of ingredients that go to make up a team. If you are asking me if I refrain from playing skilful players when it is important, I never heard so much drivel in my life. I tell you why: I have managed Celtic and Leicester City where I played wide players all the time. There is nothing I like more than creativity.

“I know my team have a fair idea about flair and they certainly have a better idea about flair than some pundits who don’t even attend matches and are making a judgement from a studio. I don’t mind - I really genuinely don’t mind - a pundit having a say if he is backing it up with some cogent argument or something that he feels might make sense. But if he makes a judgement on something that is factually incorrect, then obviously you are going to have to question it or ignore it. Or both.”

Asked if he felt vindicated in the end by seeing his team qualify for France 2016, O’Neill says: “You mentioned vindication, I think that’s right. I think it’s always a case of trying to prove people right if they’ve backed you or prove people wrong if they’ve been forcibly against you. And, yes, I did feel a sense of that actually when the final whistle went against Bosnia in the second game.

“I felt all sorts of emotions. Relief that we’d done it, sharing in the great delight the fans had that was immediately surrounding me and - that word vindication - that John Delaney and the board had faith in me to try and restore a bit of confidence and self belief about the team again. All those things seemed to come to fruition.”