McLeish: My Heart Goes Out To Speed's Family

Aston Villa boss Alex McLeish spoke about today's news of Gary Speed's death, as well as today's game at Swansea City which ended in a 0-0 draw.

McLeish said he would have agreed for the match to be postponed due to the death of Wales manager Gary Speed, but Swans boss Brendan Rodgers said he wanted the game to go ahead in tribute to the 42 year-old.

McLeish admitted that he thought his goalkeeper Shay Given wouldn't be able to play, as he shed some tears shortly before kick off.

'There was that minute's silence that turned into applause and I was worried about losing Given.

'James Collins was white as a sheet and (Jermaine) Jenas played as his midfield partner at Newcastle so these guys were extremely distraught.

'Shay told me about 10 minutes before I was due to give my team talk.

'My blood ran cold and my players were very upset pre-match. I'm glad it didn't affect their performance.

'Shay showed his concentration and pulled off a great save when we needed it but it is a devastating loss for football and my heart goes out to Gary Speed's family.'

'We would have understood if Swansea had wanted to cancel the game, we would certainly have agreed with that.

'But I think there were too many wheels in motion, that was the official line I heard, but we would have understood.'

Briefly talking about the game, McLeish added:

'We applied ourselves much better than we did on Monday,'

'Swansea are a good side though and they passed the ball around well.

'They had a couple of chances late on, but had they gone in I would have been disappointed because I thought it was a really good defensive performance today.'

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