Roy Keane isn’t angry, he’s just disappointed

Towards is usually two syllables, but Roy Keane laughs the word out in three. “Ultimately, it’s still nowhere near good enough to try and get towards the middle of the table,” he says on Sky Sports, more “tuh-huh-wards” than towards. Keane cannot believe the sentence coming out of his own mouth, and is laughing because Manchester United are in the relegation zone, where they have never been after 10 top-flight games since 1986 – seven years before he joined the club aged 21. The bewilderment also comes from United having just conceded four goals at Old Trafford. In his 12-and-a-half years there up to 2005, not once did this happen. Not once, in any competition. In 1994-95 alone, United shipped just four home goals across the entire Premier League campaign, while 4-4 was a scoreline Keane never witnessed at United. Now, a club Keane no longer recognises. One of the worst insults for this current mess is that their greatest ever captain is no longer angry at what he is watching. He is just disappointed. “It’s almost getting boring now,” he said in response to presenter Mark Chapman stating this is “rinse and repeat”. The cycle is something Keane cannot relate to either. The barmy draw against Aston Villa goes down as Michael Carrick’s last game in charge, with Mauricio Pochettino becoming their eighth permanent manager of the post-Sir Alex Ferguson era. That is more coaches than Keane played club football under. For 15 years, all he knew was Brian Clough and then Fergie, while on international duty it was predominantly Jack Charlton then Mick McCarthy. All were no-nonsense managers embodied on the pitch by Keane, who in turn demanded nothing below 100 per cent from his teammates.Keane took that to the dugout, but save for a Championship trophy with Sunderland, his approach was better served in the studio as huggers Pep Guardiola and Jurgen Klopp arrived to embrace the new era of man-management. Calls for Keane to take interim charge of United persisted – even in recent weeks – with a belief he would at least put a rocket up the squad, but punditry suits him. His diminishing affinity with United suits Sky Sports even more. He joined them in 2019 and willingly two-footed the club he won 17 trophies with from the off, the venom almost visible as he lay into pale imitations of the team he once led out. The anger has proved box-office. Head to Sky Sports Premier League’s YouTube page and among their most watched videos are his rants, one an eight-minute compilation titled “Roy Keane’s ANGRIEST moments discussing Manchester United” with 4.6m views. It went up four years ago and is a reminder of the energy Keane once had, like in June 2020, when a freshly-shaven Keane furrowed his brows and declared “I am flabbergasted” with a look that could kill when analysing Harry Maguire and David de Gea’s first half against Tottenham Hotspur. One of Keane’s infamous lines, “that’s his job,” aimed at De Gea, was from the same game. “The most overrated goalkeeper I’ve seen in a long, long time. I’d save this.” Fast forward to 2026 and Sky Sports’ latest Keane compilation centres around his “funniest moments” instead, a recognition the Irishman’s timing and delivery outstrips countless comedians, while also an indication he has softened – in part thanks to Micah Richards’ presence next to him. But Keane has also seemingly given up on United because what else is there to say? The club’s doom loop is perhaps best summed up by a resurfaced 2020 tweet where Julian Nagelsmann and Pochettino are talked up as possible candidates. United have left pundits repeating their lines as well, although more than ever in this podcast era there is greater space to vent. Like Gary Neville, Keane juggles Sky Sports with The Overlap, where he has to muster the will to talk United all over again. Forty-four minutes of The Overlap’s latest Stick to Football podcast is dedicated to United – its overall runtime is 69 minutes – while a fortnight ago the same gang talked United for more than an hour. Gary Neville wanted Keane to start, but the latter seemed hesitant. “You don’t have to,” he initially replies. There was no gusto in the lengthier response that followed, but that is also no surprise given he saw this coming last season. He remained critical of Bruno Fernandes in 2025-26, refusing to join the love-in and calling out the “circus act” that was the current United captain’s pursuit of the assists record over results. Read more Opinion: Sir Jim Ratcliffe’s treatment of Michael Carrick is shameful Analysis: Inside Carrick’s Man Utd sacking: ‘Broken promises’ and Holland’s backseat role He was also against United appointing Carrick permanently from the start. “If United win every game until the end of the season, I still wouldn’t be giving him the job,” he said in January. “They need a bigger and better manager.” Now that manager is be bigger and better, but arguably out of touch with this league. You wonder what energy Keane has left to do this all again in 12 months time.