Roy Keane's resignation as Sunderland manager yesterday was sad on a number of levels. Keane is one of the premiership's great characters. Always blunt and direct, he is an engaging man with a fierce demeanour. He has terrified the opposition both as a player and as a manager for years and the league will be a less colourful place without him.
Sunderland on paper are a big club. They have a big fan base, a massive stadium and in recent years have ploughed a lot of money into buying players. And I guess therein lies the reason for Keane's resignation.
In reality, despite the financial injection that Sunderland has had, they are still a small club by premiership standards and so Keane's job was always going to be a tough one. They cannot compete on a financial basis with the likes of Man U, Chelsea, Villa, Arsenal, Man City, Liverpool and Spurs, whilst at the same time it was always going to be difficult to lure big names to the a location which Europeans would not perceive to be very glamorous. Sunderland's neighbours Middlesborough suffer from the same problem.
Therefore, Keane's job was always going to be a tough one. I reckon he did a fairly good job and it was typical of the man that he left on his terms.
So what next for the Irishman?
Given the nature of the guy, I think he would make an excellent manager of a top side or maybe even an international team.
As a player, Keane always demanded the highest of standards from himself and his team mates. Perhaps as a manager, he could get the best out of quality players and therefore a top 4 club might be tailor made for him. One always got the feeling that managing average premiership players at Sunderland frustrated him.
Would his old club United consider him as a replacement when Sir Alex finally retires? He certainly has some of the character traits of his old boss. Ferguson has notoriously not allowed any player to get bigger than the club and over the years has axed big name players. Beckham, Stam, Ince, Van Nistelroy and indeed Keane himself are a few examples and you could see Keane adopting a similar approach.
He would certainly get 100% of effort from each of his players and there can be no doubting his standing as a motivator. There will of course be questions surrounding his eye for a player as some of his signings at Sunderland have not proven to be great buys but I refer to my point earlier of how difficult it must be to lure really top names to the north east. Certainly were he managing United or Chelsea, recruitment would be a lot easier.
I sincerely hope that Keane will return to the premiership soon. He is an admirable man who cuts through the nonsense and gets to the point, and he doesn't mind who he upsets in the process. When he does come back, he deserves a top quality position so he can endeavour to have the same success as a manager as he did as a player.
In the meantime, he'll have plenty of time to walk his dog as he plots his comeback.
Ferd. Not one to comment very often on football, but have read a fair few articles on Keane's departure from Sunderland, probably because of many of the qualities you have mentioned. Whilst singing his praises as a charismatic individual, who actually achieved a fair bit in his time with Sunderland, I have noted a number of voices pointing out a "cowardly" side to his character. Allegedley he himself declared that he wasn't one to stick around when things got tough, which takes the don't like to lose thing a little too far. Then there was his way of actually not turning up to training or even seeing the team until Thursday of a week. Not sure if this is the norm for football managers (unless you're B.Clough), but this all seems to point to the sense that he is perhaps a little precious to be a manager, where you take the lion's share of the blame. Anyway, as I said, football is not my specialist topic but it seems we should wait to see what he does next. My guess is he may have had enough already.
Yeah, it's been interesting reading all the stories about Keane. There's all sorts of sides to his character appearing which, if true, seem extraordinary.
Apparently he resigned via text message which is incredible!
Nonetheless, he remains a highly intriguing man and the premiership will be a less interesting place without him.
Hang on a minute! A top four club????
Here's how I see it...
Either Keane choked massively OR if the rumours are to be believed he completely lost the dressing room. Either way he ballsed it up.
Yes Keane was an amazing player and I wonder if people aren't a little scared to state the bleedin' obvious which is he is clearly isn't that great a manager. It's OK to criticise Keane, he isn't actually going to come round with his dogs and 'do' your knee ligaments with a typically high challenge.
He is obviously a good Championship manager (like Warnock or Dowie) but he is equally as clearly not a Premiership/international manager.
He failed - fact.
One thing I do agree with is that he should definitely be put in charge of Man U when old booze nose Fergie finally naffs off, that way I can sit back and watch with glee as the dirty red scum slip into the division they belong - conference North.