[4] Upon visiting New Zealand, with the country upset with this decision, O'Neill described himself as "surprisingly well recognised" and that he "walked through the crowd at Eden Park at one point and that was an adventure.
Andrew Stevenson, a journalist for the Sydney Morning Herald's Rugby Union website 'Rugby Heaven', described the decision as having been reached at a board meeting with the ARU.
We have just staged the best ever Rugby (Union) World Cup and John will leave the game with a much enhanced profile and a significant supporter base."
[14] Journalist Spiro Zavos wrote in his weekly column with the Sydney Morning Herald arguing for the return of John O'Neill to the ARU in 2006.
Successful businessman Frank Lowy became ASA chairman and had the task of creating a new national football competition, tentatively named the Australian Premier League.
[18][19] O'Neill oversaw the introduction of the A-League which reduced the number of teams in the national competition to eight, representing the economically sound regions of Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, Adelaide, Newcastle, New Zealand and the Central Coast of New South Wales.
Under Hiddink's guidance, Australia exceeded expectations through qualifying for the 2006 FIFA World Cup, eventually claiming a Round of 16 finish at the tournament.
[22] Citing personal reasons for his decision to step down, despite rumours in the media that there was tension between O'Neill and Lowy,[23] he described his involvement with soccer as "an exhilarating ride and while we’ve achieved so much, the potential to take the game even further is enormous".
[24] FFA chairman Frank Lowy said "John established the foundation for 'New Football' and he's achieved tremendous success during the past three years,".
He advised the board to follow the centralised model of New Zealand, where head office would control 'players' performance, coaching and medical science across all Wallabies and Super Rugby teams' in Australia, although agreed by the board initially, six weeks later they retracted the plan due to criticism from the major states (NSW, Victoria and Queensland).
He was a director of Tabcorp and Amalgamated Holdings and chairman of Events New South Wales, Star Entertainment Group and Queensland Airports.