I had a long conversation only yesterday afternoon with York City Manager Billy McEwan and the topic soon turned to Joe, and he confirmed to me that he would have liked to have kept him but at the time we didn't have the money to offer him a decent contract and so he recommended him to Graham Heathcote at Altrincham. He described him as a "really nice lad", "my kind of player" and a player who was "great to work with". Believe me, having spoken to Billy McEwan a number of times, he is not the kind of guy who recommends bad players to fellow managers because he is really conscious of his reputation in the eyes of other coaches.
O'Neill makes goals, he doesn't score them. Ironically we have replaced Joe with Craig Farrell who is I think a better player but has only scored 3 goals in 19 games, and yet I would put him as one of the first names on the teamsheet as I am sure many of you would with Joe O'Neill.
Sometimes, at the level we play at, you just can't have 2 strikers who will get you 15-25 goals a season. You have a class act in Colin Little (from what I saw the other week) and I think Joe will make goals for him. Clubs like York City and Altrincham will never have 2 goal machines up front while we are in the Conference because it's difficult enough for us to hang on to one - look at Andy Bishop! The sniff of some cash and he was off and the vultures have been circling over Donaldson for a while now. Mick McCarthy was at the York-Alty game sniffing after players, and he's the manager of a Championship side!
Believe in Joe, and he will repay you.