A standoff that Manchester United really don’t need?

“Amazing what happens.”

This episode isn’t one of Sir Alex’s finest and is one of the main things his detractors point to when trying to soil his name. In his book On The Road: A Journey Through A Season, United fan Daniel Harris points to the fact that Sir Alex’s legal battle with John Magnier made it easier for the Glazers to assume control of the club.

The Glazers are such a contentious subject for most United fans, so to try and make Sir Alex culpable for their being in control is massive.

Sir Alex probably won’t reply to these quotes, so we will never know if they are accurate but if he did in fact say ‘I don’t care, no-one does that to me’ it paints a picture of an extremely arrogant Sir Alex.

This is a man that is tasked with steering the ship, so to put himself ahead of the what is best for the club completely contradicts the idea that Sir Alex does what is best for the club. I don’t think there is a defence for this but again we don’t know how accurate these comments are.

Keane also spoke on his refusal to attend Sir Alex’s 25th anniversary celebration,

“Anne Wiley, the club secretary, got in touch, but I didn’t go. Everyone to their own. Martin (O’Neill) said to me, ‘You’ve got to move on’, but I wouldn’t have felt comfortable. ‘No, not for me’, I said. I did get in touch with Anne, didn’t just not turn up. The way it ended, the legal letter, I couldn’t have gone and sat there like everything was great, he would come in and we all stand up and clap. I couldn’t do that.”

Again this has drawn calls of sour grapes, but  it is a tough situation to speak on. We can all state what we would have done, but none of us are Roy Keane. We don’t know how deeply he was affected by the way he left United but the fact he stated,

“The day I left United, in hindsight, I should have stopped playing. I lost the love of the game that Friday morning.”

Gives us a bit of insight.

What we can say is that Sir Alex played a massive part in making Roy Keane great and Roy Keane was a massive part in the great things Sir Alex has achieved here. Keane has often been called the physical embodiment of Sir Alex on field so you will understand that two fiery characters will clash.

If you have two magnets and try to put north and north together they will repel each other and it appears this is what is happening here. Keane is a fully grown man and has the right to make any decision he likes, even if we don’t agree with them. People carry grudges,we are all human. Sir Alex has done the same too, you only have to look at his relationships with people like Brian Kidd and Gordon Strachan.

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I don’t see it as sour grapes from Keane, rather I see it as a man lashing out because he feels wronged. From the tone of his comments I get the impression he would like to be back on the ‘inside’.

He could have simply ignored the invitation to the party and the fact feeling uncomfortable was the primary reason he stated for not going, leads me to believe that he doesn’t bear Sir Alex any real malice.

On the other hand Sir Alex has to look after the team, even if you disagree with his methods, he has always been brilliant at protecting his own. Creating a siege mentality has been one of his most successful tactics, it’s just a shame that on this occasion Keane finds himself as one of ‘them’, rather than ‘us’.

It is probably his unfamiliarity with being in such a position that has caused a fair bit of anger in the Irishman.

This whole situation is a mess and is definitely something that could have been avoided if Sir Alex had not sniped at Keane after the Basel game and Keane hadn’t gone to the press to air his grievances.

It is unlikely that this will have an affect on Sir Alex or his preparations for United’s title defence but it is still a very disappointing, awkward and unnecessary matter.

I would like either to step down and bury the hatchet, but Sir Alex has made a career of being relentless and because of it we are the biggest club in the world whilst Roy never gave an inch and that is part of the reason why he is our most successful captain ever.

Both sides have a claim to being right and I feel at a time like this we should take our Sir Alex and Roy Keane hats off and put our Man United hats on.

I won’t be picking sides and feel in a case like this neither should anyone else.

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