Aston Villa boss Martin O'Neill has warned his players about empty gestures about staying at the club.

O'Neill said: "I am not going to presume on players good nature to stay around if they genuinely didn't want to stay around.

"I think by the nature of what we are trying to achieve at Villa, I think there is something happening here.

"No, we haven't rushed things but we intend to put a bigger, stronger squad together next year, please God. That is what we are trying to do.

"We want to be up there challenging. And we haven't done that yet.

"But as Sir Alex Ferguson says, it takes a fair length of time to get there. And time is something that people don't have much of."