Martin Hugh Michael O’Neill better known as Martin O’Neill, Irish football manager, was born on March 1, 1952 in Kilrea, Northern Ireland. He graduated from Brunel University with English literature and Sports Science and obtained PGCE from the Universtiy of Surrey. Martin O’Neill is married to Geraldine and lives in Oxfordshire, with his daughers, Aisling and Alana.
Having been capped 64 times for Northern Ireland, Martin O’Neill has scored 8 goals for his country. He captained his country’s national football team in the World Cup finals in Spain (1982), in which Northern Ireland won Spain in Valencia.
Though he played football for Derry City youth club, Distillery FC, Norwich City, Manchester City and Notts County, Martin O’Neill became an accomplished midfield player under Brian Clough’s management in Nottingham Forest. Of the 428 club appearances he has made, scoring 65 goals, 48 goals (of 285 appearances) were scored for Nottingham Forest.
In 1987, he retired from playing football and began his management career in football. Starting from Grantham Town, Martin O’Neill has held managerial position for a short period in Shepshed Charterhouse, Wycombe Wanderers, Norwich City, Leicester City and Celtic before moving to Aston Villa in 2006.
During his tenure with Wycombe Wanderers (1990-1995) as manager, the team emerged victorious with the Football Assocaition (FA) Trophy in 1991 and 1993. The best managerial tactics of Martin O’Neill helped Wycombe Wanderers to win the Football Conference in 1993 and become the Division 3 Play-Off Winners in 1994.
Managing the Leicester City (1995-2000), Martin O’Neill guided the team to win a promotion to Premier League in the 1995-96 season. His coaching helped the team to bag the League Cup, the first time in 1997, and the second time in 2000.
Celtics always lost to Rangers, a Scottish Football Club, but with Martin O’Neill as its talented manager, the team had its first impressive win (6-2) against Rangers. This marked off a series of victories for the team under the brilliant guidance of Martin O’Neill. He became a celebrated manager of Celtic throughout his reign (2000-2005), for the team had set a record of 7 consecutive victories in Old Firm Derbies included in its 213 victories of the 282 games played. He also got his nickname “Martin the Magnificent” while he managed the Celtic FC, which created a British record of 25 consecutive victories in the 2003-2004 season.
Martin O’Neill moved to manage Aston Villa from August 4, 2006 and helped the team to score 71 goals and gain 60 points (Villa’s highest points tally since 1981) in the 2007-2008 season. He improved his team’s overall performance in goal-scoring, counter-attacking, which qualified them for the InterToto Cup by finishing 6th (2007-2008) in the season.
Martin O’Neill has been awarded with the ‘FA Premier League Manager of the Month’ 5 times for his outstanding service. During his tenure as the manager of the Celtic team, he became the ‘SPL Manager of the Month’, 9 times and ‘SFWA Manager of the Year’, 3 times. In 2002, he was voted into the Norwich club’s Hall of Fame and was also awarded the OBE for his exceptional service to football in 2004.
Besides his time at the football clubs, Martin O’Neill pays special attention in following criminal cases and has also attended some of Britain’s infamous trials.
