Roy Keane’s New Book – The Best Bits!

I recently read John Steinbeck’s “The Pearl” in which a peasant called Kino finds fame and fortune but is still never happy.

Coincidentally, the second part of Roy Keane’s memoirs have been leaked and it’s not a pretty read for many of his former workmates and opponents.

Sir Alex Ferguson & Carlos Queiroz

Keane recounts how his relationship with Sir Alex Ferguson and his assistant Carlos Queiroz started to go sour at a training camp in the Algarve. “He was just on my right shoulder,” said Keane, about Queiroz. “How I didn’t f*****g hit him – I was thinking, ‘The villa in Portugal, not treating me well in training’ – and he just used the word ‘loyalty’ to me.

“I said, ‘Don’t you f*****g talk to me about loyalty, Carlos. You left this club after 12 months a few years ago for the Real Madrid job. Don’t you dare question my loyalty. I had opportunities to go to Juventus and Bayern Munich.”

As Ferguson tried to intervene, Keane launched a scathing attack on his boss. “We need f***ing more from you. We need a bit more, gaffer. We’re slipping behind other teams”. He didn’t last much longer at the club.

Peter Schmeichel

Keane also describes a drunken brawl with Peter Schmeichel on a pre-season tour of Asia, which woke up Sir Bobby Charlton. Tensions that had built up for years between the two finally reached boiling point, which led to fisticuffs on the 27th floor of a Hong Kong hotel.

Keane was so inebriated that he had to rely on Nicky Butt’s account of the fight. A Keane headbutt had left his keeper with a black eye, which the Dane brushed off in a press conference as having occurred during training.

Alf-Inge Haaland

The Ireland and Aston Villa assistant manager also revisits his relationship with the former Manchester City midfielder, which caused so much controversy in his first autobiography. He insists “there are things I regret in my life, and he is not one of them”.

However, Keane maintains that he didn’t set out to deliberately injure the Norwegian, who later claimed the tackle finished his career. Keane clearly feels this is nonsense, pointing out that Haaland played again four days later.

The Class of 92

Keane clearly doesn’t have much time for the growing cult of the “Class of 92”, claiming their role at the club has become “exaggerated”, and that its members are “not shy on plugging it”.

Keane also dismisses Paul Scholes’ perceived boy-next-door image, claiming his former team-mate has “more of an edge to him. Everyone thinks he lives in a council flat”.

Cristiano Ronaldo

Probably the person to come out of Keane’s new tome in the best light his his former team-mate Cristiano Ronaldo, who Keane “liked straight away”.

“He had a nice presence and a good attitude” and Keane knew within days that the Portuguese would go on to become one of the “best players in the world”.

On Leaving United

The upside? Keane kept his United club car for three months after he’d left Old Trafford and reveled in this little act of one-upmanship over his former cub. “I drove some f—–g miles in that car. Every little victory is vital”.

However, the initial commute to his new club Glasgow Celtic began to take it’s toll. “I used to get an early flight up to Edinburgh or Glasgow, and I’d hire a car and drive from there to the training ground. One morning a taxi driver picked me up, to bring me from my house to Manchester Airport.

“I got into the taxi at about six. My flight was at seven. In the middle of winter. And the taxi driver asked me: ‘Do you miss being at United?’ It was six in the f—in’ morning, it was freezing — black outside. I looked at him and I went: ‘What do you think?’ We laughed”.