Villa begin Barry discussions
14 May 2008 - 12:56:54
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- Villa begin Barry discussions
Aston Villa manager Martin O'Neill has confirmed that he and club owner Randy Lerner have held talks with captain Gareth Barry to try and keep the England midfielder at Villa Park.
The 27-year-old has been the subject of a recent bid from Liverpool and has also been linked with Chelsea and O'Neill is well aware that Barry has been unsettled by the speculation.
He told the club's official website: "We've spoken to Gareth and our situation remains the same - that everyone at Aston Villa Football Club wishes very strongly that Gareth will stay.
"Obviously he's at a big stage of his career. He's 27 years old and he's been here almost ten years. He's due a testimonial and if he sees the club continuing to progress we definitely want to keep him.
"He still has two years of his contract to run and Liverpool have put in an offer that, well, it's almost debatable whether it is an offer.
"Things are very much up in the air and the main aim for the chairman and myself is to try and keep him at the football club. That's what we're trying to do.
"You can make people see out their contracts, but in essence we would want a pretty amicable solution to all of this and we're still hopeful that things can be resolved in favour of Aston Villa.
"I'm never overly confident, but what I would say to the fans is that we're doing our utmost and we'll continue to do so. We want to show Gareth that we mean business.
"Gareth, despite what has been said in some newspapers, has never expressed unhappiness at Aston Villa. We want to keep him and we've got certain things in our favour.
"We want a solution that everyone is happy with and the last thing you want to do is keep an unhappy player at the football club, but Gareth Barry has not expressed his unhappiness at Aston Villa."