Keane was right - but he should've taken down Fergie too
There was just one thing wrong with Roy Keane's brilliant MUTV rant, argues Rob Smyth - it didn't take Sir Alex Ferguson to task for what he's doing to Manchester United.
As usual, it took Roy Keane to cut through the crap and deliver a damning and entirely valid verdict on the dramatic demise of Manchester United. In fact, there was only one problem with Keane's MUTV rant - it didn't go far enough. If Keane was truly uncensored, it would be fascinating to get his views on the influence of failure specialist Carlos Queiroz, who has neutered United's attacking elan. And what would really boost MUTV's dismal ratings would be Keane's views on his manager.
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Keane has been his master's voice for the past decade, and now he is barking against Ferguson. The United manager, under fire from all corners, will feel the harsh bite of his captain's criticism more than the rest combined. When United won the Premiership in 1999, the first part of the Treble, Ferguson charged giddily onto the pitch and went straight to embrace one man: Keane. When, a few weeks earlier, Keane and Paul Scholes received yellow cards in Turin that would rule them out of the European Cup final, Ferguson spoke of Keane's "tragedy" and his desire to appeal the decision. He didn't even mention Scholes's name. This was love as its most unconditional.
Ferguson and Keane have had as close a relationship as any between manager and player in football history. They saw in each other a mirror image of themselves. Ferguson cut Keane slack for his misdemeanours; Keane gave Ferguson the most influential and talismanic footballer since Maradona, a man without whose iron will a team of superstars just could not function. Now, as then, Keane was at the centre of all that is going on Old Trafford: it is he for whom Ferguson changed his system to the hated 4-3-2-1 last season; it is he who United look so rudderless without; and it is he who, after months of everything being brushed assiduously and patronisingly under the carpet, has finally told it like it is. United are an absolute shambles at the moment, and nobody else at the club seems willing or able to face that fact.
Unsurprisingly, Keane's comments were vetoed by Ferguson. It is not the first time they have fallen out (there was a much-publicised contretemps in Portugal this summer) and the thawing of their relationship is symbolic of Ferguson's demise. Keane's values - the remorseless pursuit of excellence at all costs; the bristling intolerance of the bullshit and excuses of modern sport - have not changed. Ferguson's have. He has become resigned to and tolerant of a mediocrity that Keane cannot countenance.
Ferguson, of course, has always been sensitive to criticism. The BBC are currently being ignored, and if he had his way he wouldn't do any press conferences. He has even taken to saying "Well done" at the end of pre- and post-match TV interviews to the startled interviewer, presumably for not asking any difficult questions. Why did you sell Jaap Stam, Sir Alex? No, really, Sir Alex - why did you sell Jaap Stam? What does Liam Miller do to earn more per week than most of your supporters earn per annum? Why are you earning £4m per year if, as Ryan Giggs says, you have given Queiroz "the responsibility to train us, prepare us for games, organise the team and decide the things we need to work on"?
The culture of fear duly created, Ferguson has been able to get away with doing as he pleases. The consequence is that only in the underground world of fanzines and pub talk is the truth that dare not speak its name being spoken: Sir Alex Ferguson has demonstrably, irrefutably lost the plot.
Most United fans have had enough. They have had enough of 4-3-2-1; of an abuse of the heritage of the club that has not occurred since the Sexton years; of the moronic twitter of the man they lovelessly call Carlos Queirozzzz; of the fact that only a Scouser, a sub-standard Leeds fan and a Portuguese pretty boy show the requisite desire; of a gaping chasm where once there was the best midfield in Europe; of the apathy of Lord Chav Rio Ferdinand; of Sir Alex Ferguson.
This should not be confused, as it has by Arsène Wenger among others, with a lack of respect for Ferguson, or gratitude for what unprecedented happiness he has brought to the club. "Every single one of us loves Alex Ferguson," is a song that will be heard around Old Trafford for years to come, and the joy Ferguson has brought imbues the failure of an essentially decent man with a brutal poignancy. But if you love someone you have to set them free and, based on the unforgiving demands of modern football, and his performance over the last five years, Ferguson does not deserve to be manager of Manchester United. Reputation and gratitude are not enough.
In United's glory years, Ferguson told of a trick he would use at the start of each season to keep his players on their toes. He would assemble the squad and show them an envelope, in which, he said, were two or three names of players he felt had taken their eye off the ball, and who he was keeping an eye on. In reality, the envelope was empty (although Paul Ince and David Beckham were sold for precisely that reason). But if Ferguson opened it now, he might get a seriously nasty surprise.
The problems go back to the summer of 2001, when he sold Stam, paid £28.1m for the curse known as Juan Sebastian Veron and killed a golden goose that was delivering a Premiership every year in pursuit of a farewell European Cup at Hampden Park. Since then, he has made some desperate mistakes. These are not borderline errors of judgement; they are decisions that fly in the face of all rhyme and reason.
There is his record in the transfer market, with at least three Klebersons for every Gabriel Heinze and the shocking failure to address the decline of a once-majestic midfield; the delegation of significant power to the ruinous and incessantly negative Queiroz, which has made United neither successful nor entertaining, despite Queiroz's belief-beggaring proclamation that: "We are producing the most exciting, attacking football in the league".
Then there is the inexplicable persistence with a phalanx of incompetents. Like John O'Shea; once referred to as looking like a thin Peter Kay, now he just looks like Peter Kay. Like Alan Smith who, for all his admirable endeavour, has more chance of being the new Eminem than the new Roy Keane. Like Scholes, who has been rewarded for a season of sleepwalking with the captaincy. Like Ruud van Nistelrooy, who surrenders possession time after time after time and then falls over. Like Darren Fletcher, a teacher's pet in the McClair mould who is, at this stage of his career, simply not good enough.
Then there is the incessant tinkering - Fletcher ahead of Ronaldo for the last two, must-win league games; dropping Ronaldo, Scholes and Wayne Rooney to derail United's title charge at Crystal Palace last season. In the summer, with that match in mind, Stubborn of Govan said he would no longer rest players in league matches. That lasted about a month.
Nor is it the only strange comment Ferguson has made of late. Previously he has always related to the fans; now he seems to have contracted Queiroz's contempt for the people who pay him £4m a year. Take his recent declaration that United only know how to attack, or his pathetic, hair-splitting assertion that United were playing 4-4-1-1 and not 4-4-2 after they scored three whole goals in one half at Fulham last month. Most insulting of all was his suggestion that disgruntled United fans could go and watch Chelsea.
Now, if reports are to be believed, Ferguson is ready to bite off his purple nose to spite his face and let Keane go. If he does, it will be the final proof: Sir Alex Ferguson has demonstrably, irrefutably lost the plot.
culled from here:
http://football.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,9753,1606172,00.html
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