O'Neill: Tables are for nutters

Aug 17 2007 By Bill Howell, Birmingham Mail

MARTIN O'Neill has labelled as "nutters" anyone taking the slightest interest in the Premier League table.

Spurs boss Martin Jol has already had to fend off reports of a job-saving interview with his chairman Daniel Levy, while O'Neill has viewed with astonishment newspaper and TV listings which sit Villa five places off the bottom.

Villa travel to Newcastle tomorrow and O'Neill said: "There is an amazing rush to judge these days.

"Not even after one game - at half-time in your first match! I won't get caught up in it because it is absolutely crazy. I have never heard anything so ridiculous in all my life.

"Back in my day you didn't print a league table until after four or five games, certainly not less than three.

"I noticed the other night that when some teams have not even played two games they have the table written up and some sides are in the Champions League positions. It is nuts. Absolutely nutty."

O'Neill insists his team are still full of confidence after their opening-day defeat to Liverpool and says he is "remarkably upbeat" for their chances this season.

"Confidence is a brittle thing. Sometimes you can go half-to-half, sometimes match-to-match, sometimes you can get ten-minute periods. Generally the players' outlook to the season is very bright.

"We have played one game and we have a very difficult game tomorrow against an in-form side, but the overall outlook to the season is very bright indeed - and I am not just saying that. I am really upbeat."

"I have got a lot of confidence in the team, I am confident I can add to the squad and then we will be a decent team."

O'Neill still bemoans the narrow margins which condemned his side to that first-day defeat.

"We were three-and-a-half minutes away, and a referee's decision from getting a draw."