Martin O'Neill Republic of Ireland 24032016Sportsfile

'It's a done deal' - O'Neill happy to stick with Ireland

Martin O'Neill says that he is happy to trust Football Association of Ireland (FAI) chief John Delaney over his new contract, despite not having "put pen to paper" on the deal.

The FAI announced that it had agreed new deals with O'Neill and his backroom team, which includes Roy Keane, on Tuesday, but the Republic of Ireland boss revealed on Thursday that his agreement with Delaney had only been sealed with a handshake.

Nevertheless, the former Celtic manager is not concerned, noting that a similar process occurred when he first agreed to take succeed Giovanni Trapattoni in November 2013.

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"We've agreed new deals - it's a done deal - and we want to stay on now," O'Neill told FAI TV. 

"When I was speaking to John Delaney, John felt just for clarification really as much as anything else so that we could go [to Euro 2016] with a free mind. And [I'm] happy to do so. I've been mulling it over for some time and just wanted to do it.

"The very fact that we haven't put pen to paper is no intrusion whatsoever. If memory serves me correctly, two and a half years ago when John asked me to sign up we did so on the shaking of one's hand and I think we actually might have signed to contract about six or seven weeks later.

"It was something like that, but it certainly wasn't in the day that I agreed to do it and here we are two and a half years later. I will have to assume that the same thing will apply to both parties."

The Boys in Green held their first open training session in their Versailles base on Thursday in front of a packed Stade de Montbauron. As they gear up for their Group E opener against Sweden, O'Neill said that it was "great" for his players.

"That was really nice actually," said the Derry native. "Because when you have an open training session outside your own country you would wonder at how well it might be attended and it was great."

Ireland take on Sweden at the Stade de France on Monday, June 13.

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