O'Neill's plan for Europe

Aston Villa boss Martin O'Neill believes that the club are more than capable of qualifying for Europe automatically as they lie in 6th place in the Premiership, but the Villa boss revealed a contingency plan was in place to qualify via the Intertoto Cup.

"It's just covering bases, but we've got a chance to qualify automatically for Europe and we're going to try and charge on if we can," O'Neill explained.

"We've got ourselves into a position where we've got a 12-game season and we'll be going into it all guns blazing. The boys have been magnificent during the first two thirds of the season.

"We are making good progress and I couldn't ask any more from the players. They have given me everything.

"We had a superb finish to last season, being unbeaten in the last nine games, and it would be nice if something similar happened again.

"Entering the Intertoto is in no way a signal that we've given up hope of qualifying for Europe automatically. Nothing could be further from the truth."