O'Neill the Uncle Tom

**bwagner** · 07/06/2006, 10:43 AM

O'Neill 'wanted England chance'
EXCLUSIVE O'NEILL INTERVIEW

Listen to the interview in full
Five Live Sport
7 June, 1900-2200 BST
Martin O'Neill has revealed he would have accepted the England manager's job had the FA offered it to him.
The Northern Irishman - who topped a BBC ICM poll about who should succeed Sven-Goran Eriksson - was overlooked after being interviewed for the job.

He told Five Live Sport: "It is one of the great jobs in football. Had it been offered, then I would have been absolutely foolish to turn it down.

"But I didn't get the job. I have no recriminations and it's over."

Steve McClaren eventually took the job after Luis Felipe Scolari rejected it.

The former Middlesbrough manager, who is assistant coach to Eriksson at this summer's World Cup, will take on the role full-time after the finals in Germany.

I'm not sure whether I ever considered myself right in the frame

Martin O'Neill

Ex-Celtic and Leicester boss O'Neill believes McClaren was always a front-runner because of him being on Eriksson's staff.

The 54-year-old Northern Irishman met FA officials to discuss the job and said: "I think the interview went fine.

"Whether people on the other side of the table were impressed, unimpressed, had their own particular agenda, eventually you can come up with all sorts of reasons, the fact is when the dust settled I wasn't the England manager."

Even when Scolari pulled out of the running, O'Neill had resigned himself to the fact that he would not get the job.

"I didn't think I was back in the frame. I'm not so sure whether I ever considered myself right in the frame.

"I did the interview and some time later another manager was appointed."

However, he remains open to the possibility of returning to football in the near future, despite apparently turning down the chance to succeed McClaren at Middlesbrough.

"I think my wife would want me to get back to football because I'm an absolute nuisance about the place at the moment," he said.