Fresh Blackburn Rovers doubts cast as Michael O'Neill decision looms - "he may not want to stay" | OneFootball

FLW's Blackburn fan pundit reveals how confident he is about Michael O'Neill remaining at Ewood Park past the end of the season

Michael O'Neill has turned the ship around at Blackburn Rovers over the past couple of months, and it looks like Championship football will remain at Ewood Park, when it looked all but certain that relegation was on the cards.

Rovers were only one point adrift of safety when it was announced that the Northern Ireland manager would be juggling both roles between now and the end of the campaign, but they'd won just one in 10 before the hire, and that was a slim 1-0 home win against Sheffield Wednesday.

But, since O'Neill came in, Blackburn have picked up the ninth-most points in the Championship, winning games against the likes of Millwall and Birmingham City away from home, plus coming out victorious in the Lancashire derby against Preston North End.

Now, Blackburn are four points clear of the drop, and enough has been seen over the last 11 games to make fans want the Northern Irish boss to switch his full focus back to club football, despite him stating that he planned to "revert back to the status quo" come the end of the season, with his contract with the IFA not running out until 2028.

Blackburn Rovers dilemma addressed on where Michael O'Neill's future lies

There have been claims earlier this month from Alan Nixon that Blackburn were willing to buy out O'Neill's contract with the IFA, with the journalist citing that Rovers would need to part ways with £250,000 to do so.

Ultimately, the dual-boss will then have a decision to make whether he would even want to part ways with Northern Ireland and return to a full-time club role, and FLW's Blackburn fan pundit, Simon Middlehurst, has some doubt that he'd even want to do that.

"I'm 50/50 on this one," Simon told FLW, when asked if he felt O'Neill would remain at Ewood Park past the end of this season.

"Part of me thinks that he will be at Blackburn next season, but the other part of me thinks that he's seen enough of what happens behind closed doors, and with the squad being very small, that he may not want to stay.

"He also has a good thing going on with Northern Ireland currently, getting them to the World Cup qualifiers, which is the closest they've been for a long, long time."

After heartbreak in the World Cup play-offs, losing to Italy in the semi-finals, the focus for Northern Ireland will now be to qualify for the Euros for just the second time in their history, with 2028's tournament taking place in England, Wales, Scotland and the Republic of Ireland.

Middlehurst and the majority of the Blackburn fanbase hope that O'Neill won't need to worry about qualifying for that tournament, but the fan pundit isn't too convinced that the Venky's would even pay out his contract, giving him the option to leave his national post for Ewood Park permanently.

"So, I'm 50/50. It depends on whether Blackburn are willing to pay the compensation, too, and we all know that Blackburn aren't very forthcoming when it comes to paying up," Middlehurst continued.

"But I would love to see him at Blackburn next season. He's done a great job, kept us all together, and he's potentially going to keep us up, when at one point it looked certain that we were getting relegated.

"So, we'll see what happens in these next few games."

Blackburn Rovers must do everything they can to tempt Michael O'Neill away from Northern Ireland this summer

Ultimately, the job is far from done in terms of staying in the Championship this season, with Oxford United, Portsmouth and West Brom, the three sides below Blackburn, all showing fight and keeping up with Rovers, who themselves are five games unbeaten.

With Southampton, Coventry City and Sheffield United to come before the final day meeting with Leicester City, Rovers will most definitely be incurring a struggle to maintain the current four-point gap that they have between themselves and the drop zone.

Therefore, understandably, there hasn't been much noise when it comes to the Venky's shelling out to bring Michael O'Neill to the club permanently. If he can keep Blackburn above the dotted line, though, they must be prepared to do everything possible to ensure that he stays.

As it stands, Blackburn will likely be embroiled in yet another fight down at the bottom of the Championship, but the presence of the Northern Irishman may be enough to steer them closer to mid-table. And, if his current form translates across a whole year, they could end up being outsiders for the expanded play-offs.

That kind of wishful thinking seems a long way away now, though. The current focus is on remaining in the Championship. After that, it'll be towards trying to tie their interim boss down for the long term.