O’Neill said: “A number of Coca Cola Championship sides asked about taking Gary Cahill on loan and I seriously thought about the idea.
“With Martin Laursen having done so well and, with Gary injured pre-season and reserve games stretched all over the place, it was a possibility.
“Ideally it would have been great for him to go on loan for a month and get four or five games under his belt.
“But you are torn between giving someone the opportunity of getting in proper first team games and worrying in case you do get another injury.
“As it turns out, that happened with Martin Laursen getting injured and we rearranged things at the back to bring Cahill into the side.
“I thought Gary Cahill did exceptionally well at Everton, because he went into that game with only a couple of reserve games behind him, and overall he also did very well against Wigan.”