Former Aston Villa defender Stephen Warnock has shared that training sessions during Martin O’Neill’s tenure at Villa Park felt like “a bit of a free-for-all,” a situation that strained the relationship between O’Neill and current Brighton player James Milner.
On BBC Radio Scotland’s Sacked in the Morning podcast, Warnock recounted, “I thought I’d signed for a holiday club. It was just incredible.”
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He explained that when the team had a Saturday game, they often enjoyed days off on Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday. Occasionally, O’Neill would simply declare, “We’ll see you Thursday and Friday for the Saturday match.”
“Gabby Agbonlahor had a passport with so many stamps. We’re talking about trips to New York, Las Vegas, Miami,” Warnock noted. “[O’Neill] actively encouraged it. After a victory, we’d sit in the changing room and suggest the two stars, Ashley Young and Agbonlahor, ask for time off. They’d inquire, ‘Off until Thursday?’ and he’d respond, ‘Yeah, why not!’
“I’d never seen anything like it. We were performing well at first, but eventually, it caught up with us.”
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Under O’Neill, Villa consistently finished sixth from 2008 to 2010, failing to secure a Champions League spot. Warnock, who joined the team in 2009, linked their Spring performance drop-off to a lack of fitness.
“It became evident around March/April. We weren’t as fit as we needed to be because our training wasn’t rigorous enough; we were doing five-a-sides in short sessions,” he stated. “When we trained, it was a relaxed environment where players were left to their own devices. If you wanted to get fit, you had to do it on your own.
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“This approach didn’t sit well with me. I preferred someone guiding me. I found it challenging to adapt to that level of freedom. I didn’t even relocate from the northwest due to all the time off available.
“There was one meeting where James Milner expressed frustration about wanting more training. Martin replied, ‘Oh, you want to do more work? Don’t you know there’s a treadmill in the gym? Go out and do it yourself.’ To say James felt offended would be an understatement.
“Honestly, it did feel a bit like a free-for-all,” he admitted.
Listen to the full podcast on BBC Sounds
[BBC]