Martin O’Neill: Stiliyan Petrov looks to secure future
MARTIN O’Neill has hinted at a new contract for Stiliyan Petrov after the Bulgarian’s fine start to the season.
The £8million arrival from Celtic struggled for form over much of the first two seasons but started to come good at the tail end of last term and appears to have hit the ground running in a defensive midfield role this season.
Few people could have suspected a new deal could have been on the cards until Petrov broke back into the team against Bolton last year.
But he spearheaded a revival in Villa’s fortunes which saw them clinch an InterToto place.
Now with less than two seasons on his deal O’Neill is looking to secure his future long-term as part of the wide-ranging contract revue carried out in conjunction with Randy Lerner.
O’Neill said: “Petrov was starting to do it towards the back end of last season and the performances that he has put in this season have to be the norm for him.
“He has been strong, aggressive, he has got to the ball first and when your confidence is up you will do that.
“I thought he has done great. The chairman has made it clear he will definitely sort out players who are doing it.
“I don’t want them to do it for one or two games, they need to do it consistently.
“Stiliyan is getting to the level I would have expected to be normal for him after adjusting to the Premier League.
“It’s a different football to European football, and he’s changed his game to adjust to the side at the moment.”
O’Neill believes Petrov’s slow adjustment to the Premiership can be explained by the players he had around him at Celtic.
“We had Neil Lennon sitting in there playing a role which was giving Stiliyan a licence to get forward,” he said.
“And if you have got centre forwards like Henrik Larsson, who scored goals for fun, and Chris Sutton, who was brilliant for us then an attacking midfielder should score 15 goals a season.
“At Celtic we had lots and lots of the ball so he could get forward and not worry too much about what was happening.
“Here he has had to take on that defensive responsibility which was kind of alien to him.
“Now he’s doing it a bit more at international level with Bulgaria so his role has changed a bit and I still believe he is able to get forward at times. But at the moment with Gareth Barry going and getting more forward than he ever has in his career then we do need someone sitting in and Stiliyan is currently doing that.”
Meanwhile, O’Neill believes his Villa team are slowly developing that Celtic mentality of going out to win football matches.
“There was a good strong mentality about the Celtic side. I think it’s pretty strong here and with a wee bit of luck it’s getting stronger.
“We are trying to get a kind of mentality, whatever you say, but with the crowds coming into Villa Park it’s hard to please everybody.”
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