Inside the crazy world of Keane: the truth about his ‘flamethrower’ personality

There's a lesser-known story about Roy Keane and car parks that deserves a mention. For some it will confirm a stereotype, but it also serves as a warning to Ipswich Town fans faced with an invitation to come out.

This dates back to January 2006, when Keane was nearing the end of his playing days at Celtic. His debut was a cup match at the Clyde part-timers, where the ground was small and the words tended to carry the wind, which Paddy McDonnell might not have taken into account.

Today he is a successful comedian, but at the time he was a doorman supporting Celtic and had a few too many drinks on the ferry crossing. As his team fell behind en route to an embarrassing defeat, McDonnell made a few comments about the railing.

“I was really drunk and shouting at them because Celtic were getting beat,” he told Mail Sport this week. 'At one point I said something bad: I called Keane a gypsy from Cork and I shouldn't have said that.

“I knew Neil Lennon quite well and he's obviously on the pitch with Roy. Lennon came over and said, 'Will you stop shouting?' When Keane sees this, he starts approaching Lennon: “You know that guy?”

'Long story short, six weeks later I came over for a home game. Neil said if I came over on Friday after practice he would give me some signed shirts. I just had to meet him in the parking lot.

“So I get there, see his car and jump in.” Next thing I know, this arm comes out of the backseat, grabs me in a headlock, and a voice says, “Don't ever say that to me again or I will.” f****** are you in.” Neil says, “Come on, let him go!” and Keane says, “Don't ever call me that again.” Well, I agreed – I almost choked!

'Keane then gets out of the car and calmly walks away. Lennon sits there and says, “I didn't know he was going to do that!”

'To this day I don't know if it was all a joke. But it definitely put me in my place and I'll tell you what, when that weekend happened with the boy from Ipswich, my phone stopped ringing with all my friends.'

If there's a predictable moral to the story, it's that Keane-baiting has rarely been clever, whether it comes from the mouth of Alf-Inge Haaland or a fan fresh off a drunk boat.

It is equally true that the desire to go fast has passed on to Keane's experts. It is the calling he seems willing to give up forever, but one in which he has emerged as the most compelling analyst on our screens. In a realm where too many people employ soft touches, Keane is wonderfully uninhibited, a flamethrower in an age of safety matches.

There is more to his style than that, and there always has been, but he has made it a virtue not to hold back.

As always, it was the great Des Lynam who said it best. “There are hundreds who don't have an edge,” he told Mail Sport on Tuesday. 'I can't name anyone who has as much of an edge as Roy. I would have really liked to work with him, but you would also be a little nervous asking him a stupid question. He could jump down your throat. It's good television.'

The mystery is how long he chooses to remain in his broadcasting posts and that gives serious relevance to Sunday's incident when an Ipswich fan insulted Keane as he carried out his on-pitch duties for Sky Sports after the 1-1 draw . against Manchester United.

The supporter, Neil Finbow, has since posted on social media about the confrontation which culminated in Keane suggesting they meet in the Portman Road car park.

Given the nature of Keane's time as Ipswich manager, a period between April 2009 and January 2011 in which he oversaw just 28 wins in 81 games, Finbow had a lot to say.

“I told him he went to a World Cup and broke Haaland's leg and wrote it in his autobiography,” he wrote on Facebook.

“I hate that guy and it has been simmering since he was fired all those years ago. I reminded him that he set us back five years and ruined our football club.'

Seeing Keane's anger in response is to be reminded of something he said earlier this season, during one of his regular appearances on the Stick to Football podcast.

It's the forum where his humor is given room to breathe, but he honestly admitted that these hostile conversations could drive him away.

To contextualize what the worst of these might look like, he referred to the September 2023 encounter when a violent Arsenal fan headbutted him after a match in the Emirates.

“Hopefully in about 12 months I'll be out of this rat race,” he said. 'I love football, but the hassle of matches, going to matches and the fuss of fans… A few months ago I was standing in court while someone headbutted me. Do you think I enjoy that side of it? Absolutely not. Be an expert in 10 years? Absolutely not, I guarantee it.”

It's a prospect that should fill Sky executives and their viewers with dread.

Sky sources say they have had several conversations this week about what happened in Ipswich and sympathize with Keane, who has kept his head down at the Soho Farmhouse, a luxury retreat in the Oxfordshire countryside, since the row.

But inevitably there will be a thought in the back of his mind that the former United captain might one day act on those impulses to run. For a rich man at the age of 53, it is not worth deciding that it is flak. Most hope the actions of a few idiots don't ruin his patience.

Currently, Keane is contracted to do around 20 Super Sunday broadcasts per season and while it is understood he will be back on screen before Christmas, it is not yet known whether he will appear again this weekend.

The long term, or rather Keane's 12-month prognosis, is less clear, and no one doubts a character who has made no secret of being a reluctant, accidental expert. Through Keane's autobiography, The Second Half, we learned that he only accepted ITV's offer to be part of their production of the 2011 Champions League final because he read his horoscope on the morning of their phone call.

It told him, “You can't keep saying no to people.” Feeling a bit bored having just left Ipswich, he did it to kill some time.

Sources who know him well claim that Keane would prefer to be involved in management. Of course he can live without sitting on the grass, and he has talked about how much he appreciates being able to choose how he spends his days. That he may hate the feeling of being 'trapped' in the structures of football. But he is confident he can make it.

That remains the case even now, almost a decade and a half after leaving his last top role at Ipswich and five years after his last coaching position, having spent time at Aston Villa, Nottingham Forest and the Republic of Ireland.

Earlier this year he held talks about taking over from Stephen Kenny with Ireland and said the role is a 'dream' of his. He also lamented that the 'ship has sailed'.

It is undoubtedly a source of some frustration for Keane that, since leaving Forest in 2019, the microphone has been his main connection to the game.

If there is any irony, it is that the outspokenness of his opinions on television, or rather the perception that he could start a fight in an empty room, will have put off a few owners. A former Premier League chairman told Mail Sport he would have had the same reservations, even in appreciation of his leadership at United and the years he spent under Brian Clough and Sir Alex Ferguson.

Maybe they are right about that; it's a stigma that Keane has been complicit in and has acted on, possibly inadvertently building one of those 'traps' he despises so much.

But Keane's caricature is also misleading. A prominent Sky source this week described him as an 'absolute pleasure to work with, no fuss, no aggro'. Another said: 'Brilliant professional and colleague. Does hard work and is genuinely funny.'

This was recently shown on ITV when discussing the England debut of his future son-in-law, Southampton centre-back Taylor Harwood-Bellis.

After scoring against Ireland, Keane was asked about the 22-year-old's engagement to his daughter and he didn't hesitate to say: 'It's not done and dusted yet – a lot could change in the future. Keane household, I'll tell you.'

His one-liners are sometimes lost in the clips of outrage and criticism. But there is a softer core, as most know by now.

It was in January that Graham Coughlan, then Newport County manager, told Mail Sport such an excerpt, dating back to 2007 and Keane's time in charge of Sunderland. When Coughlan played against him for Sheffield Wednesday, his face was crushed by a goalkeeper's knee.

“My nose, my teeth and the roof of my mouth were all destroyed,” he said. 'I was spark.

'Before I know it, Roy has followed me through the tunnel on the stretcher to the dressing room. He stayed with me and made sure I was okay.

“When my wife came down, Roy said, 'Okay, we better get back to running the team.' He did a lot more than my Wednesday boss, Brian Laws, bothered to do.”

Sky would have reason to be calm at the prospect of Keane walking away – Mail Sport understands he has often shared those reflexes with his colleagues, dating back to 2014, when he told ITV his heart was no longer in it.

He can usually be talked about, believe it or not, and that is the fate of an emotional figure.

He's the kind of guy you could jump out of the backseat of Neil Lennon's car. The kind that's always up for a fight. The kind that invariably makes every broadcast better.