It is highly unusual that Scottish football attracts headlines in the world, let alone the UK, but that’s what ex-Manchester United midfielder Roy Keane has done this week. The Republic of Ireland’s Assistant Coach could very well become the next Celtic manager. This could spell disaster for Scotland’s biggest club.
Undoubtedly it is a huge task for the Celtic board to find a manager good enough to replace Neil Lennon. The Northern Ireland man was very successful bringing in three Scottish Premierships, two Scottish FA Cups and managed to guide Celtic to the group stage of the Champions League.
It is the latter of Lennon’s successes that will be hard to replicate for his incoming successor. A famous 2-1 victory over Barcelona at Celtic Park and guiding Celtic to the last 16 in the Champions League in the 2012/13 season was a monumental feat. The success he has had in Europe has deservedly cemented Lennon’s legacy as both coach and player.
Roy Keane— who has more managerial and coaching experience than Lennon—has inferior credentials. His managerial career did start off brightly with Sunderland when he won the Championship in 2007, securing Premier League football for the Mackems. He also won the “Manager of the Year” in the process of winning the title with his first club. Yet, it could be argued that Sunderland’s parachute payments and heavy investment by Chairman Niall Quinn elevated Sunderland above the rest of the clubs in the Championship.
And then that was it for Keane. The rest of his time in management is mired in controversy and oozes mediocrity. He just about managed survival in his first season as a manager in the top flight but it was his second season at the top which saw his resign over the winter period. He lost five out of his last six games and Sunderland were 18th and looked to be in freefall.
It gets worse—Keane became manager of Ipswich Town and continued his path of mediocrity at the Suffolk club. His first full season in charge involved the typical Keane effect— spend a lot of money and go absolutely nowhere. He signed a whole raft of established Championship players and in his first fourteen games he failed to win a single game. Not one. They did improve, but only to finish 15th. The following season lead to more inconsistency and Keane’s Ipswich dropped to 21st in the Championship before yet another resignation.
If his lack of success is hardly cause for the Celtic board to be alarmed then high transfer spending will. Even with Champions League money coming in, Celtic don’t have the biggest of transfer budgets and they do not really need to spend to secure domestic success once again. After all the Scottish Premiership is practically theirs for the next few seasons at least.
Furthermore, it is well known that Keane can be a very abrasive character. His man-management style was known to hack off his players and board staff—especially at Sunderland. The best example of Keane’s abrasiveness was the training camp incident between him and Mick McCarthy for Republic of Ireland’s preparations for the 2002 World Cup. He decided to quit the squad, blast the manager and coaching staff for inadequate coaching facilities as well as McCarthy’s offence to Keane’s interview with The Irish Times.
Celtic’s majority shareholder Dermot Desmond will evidently be tempted by the fact that Keane can attract global attention for a dying brand in world football. Celtic defender Charlie Mulgrew described Keane as a “big character” and it definitely fits the club’s “bill.” Sure, Keane is a big character but that comes with big problems. Desmond must realise that not all publicity is good publicity, and signing someone like Keane will pay testament to that fact.
In the interest of fairness, it would be extremely difficult for Keane to mess up this opportunity. And he has been good as an understudy and assistant to Martin O’Neill in the Republic of Ireland setup. Yet Keane’s management style is one similar to Sir Alex Ferguson—one that only Ferguson could use, because it is an outdated method in an era of player power.
Keane has to be judged on whether he can succeed in cup competitions—something which Celtic have had some issues with despite being the biggest club in Scotland by a country mile—and in Europe too. Lennon guided Celtic to the group stage of the Champions League. Anything less than that for Keane then he deserves to get the chop.
Yet I hasten to add that all of this is just based on the assumption that Keane’s informal chat with Desmond is to develop into a full time job for him. And furthermore would Keane leave the comforts of ITV? Anyway if he was to become Celtic’s new manager, at least he will not be as bad as John Barnes. Nothing could be as bad as John Barnes.
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