Looks like Keane has jumped!

[milltown row]

lets make life easier. keane is a dirty gobshite, useless manager and has no fight.

talk about dragging this thread into the gutter. lets all agree with j70. no need to debate  or have other views.

[magpie seanie]

There is no doubt he has his flaws and no-one has any problem with constructive criticism. There was a lot of stuff on this and other thread that couldn't be "constructive criticism" though.

[Old Bill]

Great piece by walsh of the sunday times. Astonished by the fact that Keane and Quinn only communicated bt text or thru the clubs secretary. Also amused at a story that i seen in one paper today saying that Keane marched his players outta a hotel when he noticed that the hotel was trying to pass off tap water as bottled water! He took them to a hotel down the road! Clown no bottle he got out at his first serious downer.

[new devil]

what paper was this?

[magpie seanie]

Great piece by walsh of the sunday times. Astonished by the fact that Keane and Quinn only communicated bt text or thru the clubs secretary. Also amused at a story that i seen in one paper today saying that Keane marched his players outta a hotel when he noticed that the hotel was trying to pass off tap water as bottled water! He took them to a hotel down the road! Clown no bottle he got out at his first serious downer.

The bit in bold is obviously completely incorrect but now seems to be the mantra of the barstool anti Keane brigade. Sunderland were in the relegation zone several times last year (including much later in the season) with a worse squad and very few teams within 5 or 6 points of them. So last year things were in worse shape several times and he steered them through.

Also - in terms of bottle - I think to question his bottle is at best fanciful. If he lacked bottle how did he achieve what he achieved as a player? I'm not going to go into individual performances - they are well known at this point - but on top of that he was THE most influential player on the most successful team in Britain for a decade.

One other thing - if Niall Quinn had no problem with Keane or how they communicated then why should people posting on an internet forum? And I'm pretty sure (though I'll check) that the article didn't say it was a "fact" that they "only communicated bt text or thru the clubs secretary".

[Old Bill]

From The Sunday Times
December 7, 2008
Why Roy Keane finally cracked
An isolated figure whose love of the game had gone, the Sunderland manager knew he could not continue
David Walsh, chief sports writer

Why Roy Keane finally cracked
An isolated figure whose love of the game had gone, the Sunderland manager knew he could not continue
David Walsh, chief sports writer

"It's something I've got to try. I keep asking myself, 'Do you want to get back on that roller-coaster?' I think I would be a good manager. But I'm sure if you ask any manager in the world, he would tell you he thinks he is going to be a good manager when he's going down that road. But very few are, it's a tough bloody life. If you think being a player was hard, a manager is a hundred times worse." - Roy Keane, two weeks before becoming manager of Sunderland

In the end, it is the details that fascinate us. Did Roy Keane really inform his Sunderland chairman by text message that he was resigning as manager? Did he leave without saying goodbye to his players and staff? Could it really be that he deliberately chose to go two days before yesterday's match against his old club at Old Trafford? More fundamentally, was the game no longer worth the candle?

In the search for the minutiae, the bigger picture stands before us unnoticed. He became manager of Sunderland on August 28, 2006. On that day, Sunderland were bottom of the Coca-Cola Championship. They are now a Premier League team close to the bottom but with enough good players to haul themselves upwards. Mid-table, or perhaps slightly higher, is their Everest.

Was that failure? Hardly. Yet his walking away from his first managerial job is deeply disappointing for those who believed in him and reassuring for those who neither believed nor liked him. That has always been the thing about Keane, there was no neutral ground. He swapped one island for another, one shirt for another, a tracksuit for a suit, and always the fascination grew. But this exit diminishes Keane because it raises a serious question about his ability to manage a football team. For more than two years, he did a good job, improved the club, but then left at the first truly difficult moment.

Before you would give this man a job, you would want to know what in God's name happened at Sunderland?

THEY called it Niall Quinn's magic carpet ride and you have no idea how much he would have hated that nonsense. But it began in the spring of 2006 when Quinn, a former and much-loved Sunderland player, went in search of the wealthy men who would help him buy his old club. A fellow with a string of pubs, a property developer, another publican, another developer and then Sean Mulryan, the daddy of them, who built much of Canary Wharf. Two billion, they say he made. Once Mulryan was in, the others quickly got on board. The Drumaville Consortium was up and running.

It was, though, Quinn's baby and from what the investors could tell, he wanted to be the club's next manager. They had tried to get Martin O'Neill but he said no. Quinn reiterated that he would do it if they didn't get the right man. It was decided to invite Keane to a meeting at Mulryan's house in County Kildare.

First, he was asked if he would be prepared to work with Quinn and said he would. His short career at Celtic had been a mistake and he just wasn't sure what he wanted to do next. Critically, considering what would unfold two and a half years later, Keane's passion for professional football had been dimmed by his experience of it.

Manchester United had fired him eight months before. A Friday morning that began in the normal way on the training ground ended with a meeting and a sacking he never saw coming. Vulnerable is the man who forgets there is also a bullet for him. That leaving broke his heart but it is only now we can see that clearly.

When Keane said he would be prepared to work with Quinn, the Drumaville backers thought that was grand then, just get the two boys together and take it from there. They were jolted when he reacted badly to finding Quinn already in the house. Keane might be prepared to work with Quinn but they needed to first square things. Having expressed his displeasure to his hosts, Keane turned to Quinn.

"Niall, you and I need to speak outside." They spoke in the corridor, mostly Keane talking, Quinn listening and some sort of agreement was reached to put behind them the bitterness of their falling-out over Keane's exit from Ireland's 2002 World Cup squad. Then they returned and talked turkey with Sunderland's new backers. The money men were greatly impressed by Keane, especially Mulryan.

They wanted Keane to take the job but he wasn't sure he was ready for management and turned them down. Into the breach came Quinn and Keane went off to the FA's coaching centre at Lilleshall. He had deliberately chosen not to sign up for the course preferred by ex-professional footballers and instead found himself in the company of men who ran underage teams, Sunday league teams and, in one case, a pub team. People who had scrimped and saved to be on the course, many of whom wanted nothing from the game except the joys of involvement. Keane was in his element, their love melted his cynicism. He was ready again for the challenge of professional football.

By now Quinn was managing Sunderland but the bus Keane had missed was actually heading straight for a warehouse wall. Four matches into Quinn's reign, Sunderland were in trouble and the call to Keane was quickly made. Drumaville had the manager they wanted. Because they wanted him badly and admired him in the way that so many do, they put themselves in a relatively weak position and him into a strong position.

After his short stint as manager, Quinn's natural position was chairman. He had, after all, put the consortium together and received a significant shareholding. He saw his job as the buffer between his new manager and the club's owners, liaising between a strong-willed manager and a group of men who knew virtually nothing about running a football club.

But the difficulty for Quinn is that Keane isn't like other people and couldn't just decide that all the reservations he had felt about his former Ireland teammate now counted for nothing. In Keane's eyes, they were never going to be friends and if they were going to work together, it would on the manager's terms.

So, certain practices became enshrined. The chairman would be expected to stay clear of the manager's way; he would not come to the dressing room, neither did Keane want to see him at the training ground and it became standard practice for the manager and chairman to communicate by text message. If they had to communicate in a manner unsuited to text messaging, they used the secretary, Margaret Byrne, as the go-between. "Mags," as they called her, was highly rated by both men.
It was not the ideal manager/chairman relationship but as long as the team was winning, no-one outside of the club noticed. For over two years it worked, partly because Keane was good at management but also because Quinn got the Drumaville backers to pay up every time Keane went to the transfer market. He named the player he wanted and almost always, the money was provided. Such was the esteem in which the manager was held that none of the others expected him to justify the spending. They remember him going to one board meeting and that was it. No-one expected him to join the owners for a cup of tea after the game; that wasn't his style.

Once, Mulryan made a rare visit to the Stadium of Light. It was rare because among his many sporting passions, there is no place for football. He wouldn't cross the street to watch a game and only got involved because it seemed an interesting business opportunity. And Keane fascinated him. He met the man and instantly decided he was a genius. Of course, there was a touch of madness there as well but what did you expect?

Knowing Mulryan's faith in Keane, another Sunderland director thought Keane should take the trouble to join the owners for a few minutes on the day Mulryan was present. "Roy, would you please come up after the game and meet Sean and the lads?"

"I don't do that s***," replied Keane.

"This is unreasonable, Roy."

"I don't do directors," said Keane. But they considered they had the best young manager in the Premier League and weren't put out. Their investment was in good hands.

WHEN did it all begin to go wrong? Perhaps in the decisions to sign Pascal Chimbonda, El Hadji Diouf and Djibril Cisse; players with up-and-down careers that never quite tallied with the levels of their talent. In his first Premier League season, Keane had tried to go with British and Irish-born players but at the end of that campaign, he knew the team needed more quality.

The transfer market found his weakness and the club's. Not long before Drumaville bought Sunderland, the club had fired its

chief scout to cut costs. When Keane arrived, there was no meaningful system of recruitment in place. And neither was he starting from a good place: good recruitment is as much contacts as the ability to judge players. When you've been a loner, recruitment is a nightmare.

Keane got players, plenty of them, but not the ones at the top of his list. As time passed, he was reminded of what it was that irritated him about very well-paid footballers. The lack of professionalism, the gloves and the bobble hats and the scarves some of them tried to wear at training, the meticulous way they fixed their hair before leaving the changing room, the bullshit of the badge-clutchers who played for no other reason than the money.

He tried to sort them out, railed against low standards, bad timing, excess body fat, and when three of his players were in a nightclub two days before the Chelsea match, he wondered what he was doing. A couple of months before that, the team hadn't played well at home to Northampton in the Carling Cup, a few supporters abused him and afterwards, he reminded people he had not come to Sunderland to be abused and he would not accept it.

All the time, the sense grew that Keane wasn't enjoying his work. There were reports, too many to dismiss, of flare-ups on the training ground involving the manager and too often, one saw the fear in the players' performance.

The case of the midfielder Liam Miller was revealing. Three times he was transfer-listed by Keane. Miller decided to keep his head down, work hard and try to play his way back into the team. Keane noticed the effort, praised the player's renewed efforts to journalists and once used Miller's tenacity as a stick to beat other players when they had underperformed. Miller wasn't in the dressing room when that was said and Keane never spoke directly to him.

That refusal to develop relationships with the players, to balance sometimes vicious criticism with a little empathy, meant that when the string of defeats came, Keane's limited enjoyment of the job disappeared, replaced by demons who came to torture his soul. The only way to face the challenge of bad results is together and Sunderland, the manager and his players, were anything but together. In the circumstances, text messages to the chairman were of limited value.

Keane's adviser and friend, Michael Kennedy, urged him to sign the two-year contract offered. Keane refused to sign, saying he hadn't done enough to merit an extension. Most managers, feeling the heat, would have snatched that contract and signed it before getting inside. Keane retains a nobility that went out of the game when big money arrived.

Whatever the medium for his resignation message, the end was inevitable because he no longer had the stomach for the fight. That probably isn't accurate enough. Rather, he no longer had the stomach for the game.

People noticed that when kids came to the training ground, he smiled and was soon bantering away with them and bringing them on a tour of the facilities. It was as if he was back on that FA course, talking with the bloke who ran the pub team, listening while the fellow was saying why he preferred 4-3-3 to 4-4-2 and loving it. At the training ground, he would show the kids into the changing room, "Careful now, lads," he would say, "or you'll be tripping over the hair gels." They didn't notice the loathing, but it was there.

If Keane is to come back, either he or the game will have to change.

Great piece by walsh of the sunday times. Astonished by the fact that Keane and Quinn only communicated bt text or thru the clubs secretary. Also amused at a story that i seen in one paper today saying that Keane marched his players outta a hotel when he noticed that the hotel was trying to pass off tap water as bottled water! He took them to a hotel down the road! Clown no bottle he got out at his first serious downer.

The bit in bold is obviously completely incorrect but now seems to be the mantra of the barstool anti Keane brigade. Sunderland were in the relegation zone several times last year (including much later in the season) with a worse squad and very few teams within 5 or 6 points of them. So last year things were in worse shape several times and he steered them through.

Also - in terms of bottle - I think to question his bottle is at best fanciful. If he lacked bottle how did he achieve what he achieved as a player? I'm not going to go into individual performances - they are well known at this point - but on top of that he was THE most influential player on the most successful team in Britain for a decade.

One other thing - if Niall Quinn had no problem with Keane or how they communicated then why should people posting on an internet forum? And I'm pretty sure (though I'll check) that the article didn't say it was a "fact" that they "only communicated bt text or thru the clubs secretary".

I didnt question his bottle as a player and i wouldn be a member of the anti keane brigade. I would be critical of his man management of players in particular Liam Miller whom he put on the trandsfer list no less than 3 times and dropped anton ferdinand last week for a minor media interview. Plus he took a quote directly out of Ronan o Garas autobiography and spun it as is own last week. Quote escapes me at the moment but ill try and find it. His comments in the media within the last few weeks were downright zany. Similar maybe even worse then Stan ' Im the gaffer' Staunton.
Read the bloomin thing in bold. Although Sunderland were in a dog fight last year he was completely trusted by the Quinn led board. It was different this year as Mr Short was putting a bit of pressurre on and questioning Roys dealings in the transfer market. Thats where he bottled it. When there was a slight bit of oppisition form up stairs he ran a mile.

[J70]

lets make life easier. keane is a dirty gobshite, useless manager and has no fight.

talk about dragging this thread into the gutter. lets all agree with j70. no need to debate  or have other views.

What the hell did I do, apart from ask you what Liverpool had to do with this issue?

[Declan]

A great article by David Walsh - fascinating stuff altogether. The thing about the whole transfer dealings is the one facet of the job that I find hard to understand. Players and characters like Chimbonda, Diouf etc would be the complete antithesis to Keane yet he still bought them -Still can't get my head around that

[Billys Boots]

Good article alright Declan, though Walsh isn't (historically) above using poetic licence to underline his point.

[Declan]

though Walsh isn't (historically) above using poetic licence t

Ah that's only when he's writing about certain cyclists BB

[Leo]

A good attempt at de-mystifying the Keane mythology in an article by Simon Barnes in The Times today.
In short it is an intellectual appraisal of the old mother's lament "Look, everybody is out of step except our Roy".
As for poor Triggs, who said it was a dog's life?

[WeAreBlueWeAreWhite]

I only have a very small passing interest in soccer,I couldn't really care less about Roy Keane or Sunderland,which also means I have no reason to dislike him.
I have to agree with this post by the wobbler

It's amazing how some people will try to protect Keane's name no matter what, and will steadfastly refuse to allow the same levels of constructive criticism to be applied to Keane as to all other public figures. 

Those who do support Roy are certainly very biased and seem incapable of seeing any wrong in the situation he has left that club Sunderland,even from my view as a neutral I can see he really left the club in a awful mess and just walked away from them when the going got tough..The money he spent was a farce,what was it 100million or something? I doubt the big Spanish or English clubs spend that or do they?
Also I would like to comment on a few posts from new devil in particular,Your first post about Mick McCarty not being a real Irish man or something to that effect was a disgrace IMHO I'm not sure how many times he played for Ireland but as far as Im concerned any man that pulls on a Irish jersey for any sport is as much a Irish man as the fella playing along side him,and then you posted something where you said that player(sorry i can't think of his name) got what he deserved when Keane injured him on purpose that imo was a really immature post and it really shows how blinkered you are towards Roy and just proves what the other posters are saying that Roy fans seem incapable of seeing any wrong in him no matter what,and I'm surprised the Roy fans didn't pull him up over that,or do they all believe that player deserved it? I would be shocked to think any sound minded person would believe such nonsense.

[new devil]

I only have a very small passing interest in soccer,I couldn't really care less about Roy Keane or Sunderland,which also means I have no reason to dislike him.
I have to agree with this post by the wobbler

It's amazing how some people will try to protect Keane's name no matter what, and will steadfastly refuse to allow the same levels of constructive criticism to be applied to Keane as to all other public figures. 

Those who do support Roy are certainly very biased and seem incapable of seeing any wrong in the situation he has left that club Sunderland,even from my view as a neutral I can see he really left the club in a awful mess and just walked away from them when the going got tough..The money he spent was a farce,what was it 100million or something? I doubt the big Spanish or English clubs spend that or do they?
Also I would like to comment on a few posts from new devil in particular,Your first post about Mick McCarty not being a real Irish man or something to that effect was a disgrace IMHO I'm not sure how many times he played for Ireland but as far as Im concerned any man that pulls on a Irish jersey for any sport is as much a Irish man as the fella playing along side him,and then you posted something where you said that player(sorry i can't think of his name) got what he deserved when Keane injured him on purpose that imo was a really immature post and it really shows how blinkered you are towards Roy and just proves what the other posters are saying that Roy fans seem incapable of seeing any wrong in him no matter what,and I'm surprised the Roy fans didn't pull him up over that,or do they all believe that player deserved it? I would be shocked to think any sound minded person would believe such nonsense.

Why bother posting if you only "have a small interest in soccer " you "couldn't care less about Roy Keane or sunderland" again why bother?

If you read over my post you would find his name to be haaland (Alf Inge Haaland) do you know anything about the history between these two?

[WeAreBlueWeAreWhite]

I only have a very small passing interest in soccer,I couldn't really care less about Roy Keane or Sunderland,which also means I have no reason to dislike him.
I have to agree with this post by the wobbler

It's amazing how some people will try to protect Keane's name no matter what, and will steadfastly refuse to allow the same levels of constructive criticism to be applied to Keane as to all other public figures. 

Those who do support Roy are certainly very biased and seem incapable of seeing any wrong in the situation he has left that club Sunderland,even from my view as a neutral I can see he really left the club in a awful mess and just walked away from them when the going got tough..The money he spent was a farce,what was it 100million or something? I doubt the big Spanish or English clubs spend that or do they?
Also I would like to comment on a few posts from new devil in particular,Your first post about Mick McCarty not being a real Irish man or something to that effect was a disgrace IMHO I'm not sure how many times he played for Ireland but as far as Im concerned any man that pulls on a Irish jersey for any sport is as much a Irish man as the fella playing along side him,and then you posted something where you said that player(sorry i can't think of his name) got what he deserved when Keane injured him on purpose that imo was a really immature post and it really shows how blinkered you are towards Roy and just proves what the other posters are saying that Roy fans seem incapable of seeing any wrong in him no matter what,and I'm surprised the Roy fans didn't pull him up over that,or do they all believe that player deserved it? I would be shocked to think any sound minded person would believe such nonsense.

Why bother posting if you only "have a small interest in soccer " you "couldn't care less about Roy Keane or sunderland" again why bother?

If you read over my post you would find his name to be haaland (Alf Inge Haaland) do you know anything about the history between these two?

I posted to offer a neutral opinion on the matter,one that has no bias which it is clear you are unable to do,so don't try to take the attention away from yourself and what you posted by asking such irrelevant questions as to why i choose to post my opinion on a discussion board.
I am well aware of the history between the two players,I just couldn't think of his name while I was posting.

I really can't believe someone with any sort of intelligence would really believe that the player in question deserved to be the victim of such a tackle,from what I'm aware Roy actually injured himself in the first encounter between the two,though I notice another poster claimed on this thread that Haaland did injure Roy but I don't think that was the case.
To be honest I think you are just being stubborn and you do realise what you said is wrong,or maybe I'm giving you to much credit by saying that..
I'm not sure what county your from new devil but If that happened to a county or club  player of yours because he had mouthed off at a player in a previous match would you then think that player from your own county or club  deserved to be tackled and receive what could have been a career ending injury? somehow i doubt it.
I would be interested to hear from the other Roy Keane fans if this is a common thinking that the player deserved what he got?

[magpie seanie]

I would be interested to hear from the other Roy Keane fans if this is a common thinking that the player deserved what he got?

I'll regret this.

If you genuinely want an answer I'll answer the question but I hope you read all the answer and don't just cherry pick to suit your own ends.

To define "what he got" is important especially with the amount of disinformation circulating about this incident. "What he got" was a very bad tackle that hurt him superficially (there is no evidence to the contrary that I'm aware of). Probably harsh to say he deserved it but he may have been as the saying goes, asking for it. Standing over a guy who has just done his cruciate telling him to stop faking injury wasn't that bright now was it? Even Keane has admitted it wasn't right but sometimes you do things that aren't right.