Brendan Behan was right when he claimed the first item on any Irish agenda was a split. Occasionally given to expressing an honest and often contentious viewpoint, Roy Keane would understand. The greatest division in Ireland in recent times has centred on Keane himself. You were for or against him. Families argued, friends didn’t speak, people were defined by their point of view.
The madness reached its zenith in the summer of 2002 when Keane walked out of Ireland’s World Cup squad in Japan. Asked for his reaction by a radio journalist in Dublin’s O’Connell Street, one daft Irish fan said Keane’s return from Saipan was "our September 11". I kid you not: Irishness brings with it its own form of insanity.
As with all circuses, the tents are eventually folded and the show moves on. Keane got on with his life at Manchester United, Ireland replaced manager Mick McCarthy with Brian Kerr, Kenny Cunningham became the new captain and the team adapted to life without its best player.
Later, the Football Association of Ireland commissioned an investigation into how the team prepared. The report vindicated Keane’s complaints about the team’s organisation and preparation. Now the side is more professional, and under Kerr it is doing well. Old wounds were even beginning to heal. So what, then, to make of Keane’s second coming? It depends, of course, on whose side you are on. For me, it is straightforward. His return is a good thing, it enhances the team’s chances of qualifying for the 2006 World Cup and it will allow Keane himself the opportunity to leave international football through the front door. He has been too good an Ireland player for it to have ended in Saipan.
This is somebody who played for Ireland’s schoolboys, youths and under-21s, and 58 times for the senior side. At the 1994 World Cup in America, he was the outstanding player in an average side. There would have been no Saipan without Keane first getting the team there.
Ferguson will continue to protect Keane from himself by not playing him in the weeks that he is on international duty. Whatever his feelings at the outset, the United manager has accepted Keane’s decision and is now supportive.
Not everybody will feel the same, because whatever else the United skipper is guilty of, he could never be accused of inspiring unanimity among football’s diverse community.
Maybe it is wishful thinking, but it would be nice if just this once, the old hostilities were put to one side for the prodigal son. He has been Ireland’s greatest player, both in the red jersey of United and in the green jersey of his country. The arguments should end, or at least be suspended, to allow for a proper welcome back into the fold.