Aston Villa: Martin O’Neill stews over Emile Heskey’s controversial England comments
Oct 14 2009 by Mathew Kendrick, Birmingham Mail
Martin O'Neill
But O’Neill is reluctant to respond until he has had a chance to digest Heskey’s quotes and speak to the player he signed from Wigan for £3.5 million less than nine months ago.
“You can ask me as much as you want about it, but I won’t have anything to say at this moment,” said O’Neill.
“I’ve been away from my desk for a couple of days so I will genuinely have to sit down and have a think about it before I make any comment.
“Players need to remember themselves here. The World Cup is not next week, not before Christmas and not even before Easter. It’s a long long way away.
“The side picked if the World Cup was just round the corner might be a lot different to the one picked for next summer.
“There could be five changes or more with things like injuries or loss of form.
“There’s players at this football club with proper ambitions to be in the England reckoning next summer – and so they should.
“That’s people like Ashley Young, James Milner, Stewart Downing, Gabby Agbonlahor and Emile Heskey, but I wouldn’t get overly concerned about all that just yet if I were them.”
Agbonlahor is set for his first competitive start in tonight’s World Cup qualifier against Belarus at Wembley because Wayne Rooney is sidelined with a calf problem.
O’Neill is delighted that Agbonlahor, whose first two caps came in friendlies in Germany and Spain, is back in the reckoning for his country.
“I think Gabby’s confidence is high enough already,” said O’Neill.
“Capello was obviously going to go as strongly as he could in the first game against Ukraine, but there is talk that Gabby has got a chance of starting against Belarus.
“That would be a major boost for him. It would be nice for him to get on and play well, hopefully without too much pressure for him to deal with.
“I used to joke that I wanted my players to get picked, but not to play. But that’s not the case. I was as thrilled for Gabby as I was disappointed for Ashley Young, but these things will come again.”
