Martin O'Neill Resigns

Timing could have been better. I am utterly stunned by this...let's hope the new manager is someone to get everyone excited

Jesus! Didn't see that coming, well we'll see if MON was holding Villa back now won't we!??

uummmmmmm.......say what now?!

well done everyone who shouted him out. Especially Albarnista. You have helped our club lose the best manager its ever had and have helped bring on a brand new dark ages for our club. MON you will never be replaced!

As if things weren't bad enough, look at this bunch of no-hopers: http://sports.williamhill.com/bet/en-gb/betting/e/1018766/Next-Aston-Villa-Manager.html

Could this be MoN sacrificing his job to expose the flaws of the "perfect" chairman? its almost biblical.

Check Sky sports Young to sign for spurs within next 24 hours :)

Guarantee, Like a spurs fan said ^^, Breaking news tonight or tommorow will be that 'Ashley Young is heading to spurs'. Can only see this being the case of his resignation as he would of dont it a while ago wouldnt he?

Milner's is theirs now.

Villan444 Didnt live up to expectations, really, oh dear villa fans will realize what they have lost when the new manager does not achieve what he has !

Interesting Stig, lets get Jol keep Milner and Ash and MJ can bring Suarez along with him! UTV!

Feel sorry for you guys but I don't think this was unexpected. The timing is terrible, just hope you get a good manager. They seem to be in short supply at the moment.

Shocked like everyone else but if the assumptions turn out to be true then our best bet is to give the job to Kevin MacDonald for the season at least.

Hiddink!

Ah well. Aint the first aint the last.

LOL Jay

JF - what the inside story on this? They can't keep the lid on this one can they? Randy went home a few days ago, he can't have expected this? Is there something else that we don't know? The timing is so bizarre, someone has broken a gentlemans agreement or promise. Perhaps we should be more worried about our chairman than...

Don't be suprised if a Yank walks in as the new Villa 'soccer boss', and I've just bought 5 season tickets.

No way!!!! Sod the rumours, it's all done now, if Randy sells VILLA there'll be billionaires biting his hand off!

OH BY DOUG CAME BACK. I mean his second term (82-06) just incase someone miss reads it.

In my opinion its definitely Faulkners influence, Randy leaves it all to him and he being 'the golden/devil child' starts flexing his muscles and questioning MON's decisions, even touting Young to spurs. Who is this bloke anyway? In my mind he has too much influence. If the club generates £35-40m in sales of Milner and Young and hands the reigns over to Hiddink, then we'll be fine. I'd even back Kevin and Sid as a duo, finally giving the exciting youth we have a real chance. Allbrighton and Clark can handle it. Bannon and Lowry possibly so. Weimann has bags of potential, and finally we can retire Emile.....so its not all bad. But no one should underestimate what a sad day this is. MON has left Villa in a MUCH better position, obviously with Randy's cash, he has brought a young exciting and mainly British group of players in, and I thank him immensly for that.....the ship has been well and truely steadied, and I think this club has achieved all it could given the circumstances of the last 4 years. Yes, Champions league qualification could have happened, and we could have won the league cup, but thats life. We started beating the 'top four' on a regular basis, and that hadnt happened in a LONG time. He will prove again what a great manager he is, and we will look forward to feverish speculation on possible replacements. Joke of the day...Jol 5/2....he's firmly rooted to Ajax...Im off to betfair! ........VIVA MON.......and thanks for the memories (and just for the record my favourite one is the carling cup semi at VP....10 goals.....a special, special evening I will never forget)

Randy Lerner has some explaining to do, maybe not the dream ticket after all? On MON i think him leaving will, in the long run be a good thing for you. The next manager will probably bring on some of your promising youngsters more like Delfounseso & Albrighton, and inject some much needed flair into a solid but VERY 1 dimensional side, someone other than Shaun Maloney, McGeady or any other ex Celtic player

Have to have some standards Koolbill.

Well, albarnista and co must be creaming themselves. I am gutted, but not totally shocked. Where to now? Looking at the candidates I am far from optimistic. Jol, anyone?

@TheFamousNo7, very greedy owner? MON has spent over 120million in the 4 years he's been at Villa, most of it was wasted on players he didn't play or later sold on, and from selling the players on he returned 39million, that's a huge loss. He's had the money, he didn't use it effectively. Don't get the wrong impression from my reply, I am gutted about MON leaving, and the nature in which he's done so, it'll be hard for us to find a replacement better than him right now. But calling our owner 'Greedy' doesn't seem fair. I will admit that if he was telling MON that he had to sell to buy, then it might of been a little frustrating for O'Neill if he wasn't then being allowed the money from the sales. But if he was going to blow it on he likes of Mcgeady then I don't blame Randy for saying no, MON needed to offload some of the high earners that he wasn't playing before Randy would trust him with more money, and he didn't do that. Plus last summer he went well over his budget so he wasn't in Randys good books as it was.

He was a good manager.

Ok, upon reflection and having come home from a busy day at work I have now calmed down..................a little!! Would love to know who will replace Monny, but fear it will be a while yet and if we do have to wait for the right man then so be it. Hopefully we can keep what squad we have until then.

Mr Fear - are Jaytee's assertions correct? Is the Villa payroll really £11M more than Spurs & £21M more than Evertons? If so, I think that's an extremely important factor in this, if it's true I'm not sure I would be too keen to hand MON more cash without significantly reducing the payroll. If it's true I'm not sure I'd be very impressed with the relative results of MON and I just might put my foot down when it came to more spending, if that causes MON to throw a wobbly and leave...