Aston Villa boss Martin O'Neill admits he was out of the country last week on a scouting mission.

He said: "I was abroad on the Tuesday evening, looking at players I thought might come in and be good for Villa.

"That is part of the job - and sometimes it is good respite to get away and look at other teams.

"The league is competitive. It is going to be like that right the way through and we have a particularly tough start to the season."

O'Neill has met with plenty of frustrations this summer and believes the game's greats would be bemused by the changes affecting the transfer market which has seen clubs wilt at the hands of player and agent power.

"I have no doubt Bill Shankly would be absolutely bemused by transfers now - they all would," said O'Neill. "I can imagine having a conversation with Jock Stein and him asking me 'what's going on here?'

"There are things that come up now in transfer dealings that never appeared on the horizon years and years before.

"Sometimes you yearn for those days again but we're in a modern day business and we have to get on with it."