Source: SKY_Sports
O'Neill plans to strengthen
Martin O'Neill has vowed to strengthen his squad over the summer as Aston Villa's late-season woes continued with a 3-1 defeat at Fulham.
Villa looked on course to challenge for a UEFA Champions League berth, only for a dismal winless run - which was only halted with Monday's 1-0 success over Hull City - to leave them out of the running to finish in the top four.
Ashley Young levelled following Danny Murphy's opener from the spot in an even first half at Craven Cottage, only for the home side to take control after the interval with a brace from Diomansy Kamara.
O'Neill admits that the workload put on his limited number of troops has hampered their progress and is keen to bring in new faces over the summer.
He told Sky Sports: "You can come up with a number of reasons. People have talked about the size of the squad and it is definitely something we will look at during the summer.
"Players have been on the go for a long time and ourselves and Fulham have used the least number of players this season, but today I wasn't sure tiredness would be a factor.
"We seemed to have stopped the rot on Monday, but we lost today."
The Villa boss remains confident his side can hold off the challenge of Everton and finish in fifth spot, and insists that despite their recent woes their season should still be considered a success.
He added: "Remarkably after all this run we're still fifth in the league with two games to go, so we must have had a pretty decent season up until recently.
"I think we're still capable. We have two very important games as far as we're concerned and I don't think anyone is starting to think about holiday time.
"I accept the fact that it has been a pretty long season. The players have done remarkably well, we just can't throw it up now.
"The first-half performance would suggest that we have got the energy, but the second half was definitely disappointing."
