Time for Robbie to reveal his gift
WHEN Tottenham manager Martin Jol chose to send Michael Dawson, a centre-back, up front last week in an effort to rescue a wilting cause against Chelsea, who knows what thoughts floated through Robbie
Keane's head as the striker languished regretfully on the bench? Somewhat surprisingly, his future at White Hart Lane has survived the late and frantic manoeuverings of the transfer window. Right now,
Keane must be wondering what future?
Beyond the musings of reporters and fans who support or castigate him,
Keane has never been able to win over the constituency he needed in order for his career to flourish in line with his talent. Managers have signed him in a flush of enthusiasm, and then grown quickly frustrated as they watch him struggle to fit into their game-plans. The indulgence he gets with Ireland is a gift that has been denied to
Keane at club level.
Since leaving Coventry it has been the story of his career. Marcello Lippi astonishingly brought him to Internazionale, fondly christened him 'Baby Irish' and returned him to England within four months. David O'Leary accepted him warmly at Leeds and then told him he was overweight. Without saying anything, Jol handed him the biggest insult of all.
Perhaps it was
Keane's misfortune to arrive at Tottenham while the club was mired in a period of instability that mirrored his own career.
Keane's three years at White Hart Lane have embraced four different managers and the thing that must crush him now is that just when Tottenham appear to be developing a team of genuine European aspirations, his role in their future looks seriously in doubt.
It is a predicament that perplexes those who have played with
Keane and who have been touched by his effervescence and unquenchable spirit. Jason McAteer first remembers
Keane from the US Cup in 2000. Two years earlier
Keane had caused a stir when making his Ireland debut against Argentina in Lansdowne Road, but it was in America that he revealed his bubbly nature.
McAteer was reminded of his younger self. "He was a lively character. He was the life and soul, just a kid really. He was bold and brash and sometimes he had a little bit too much to say for himself. But sometimes you need that kind of attitude to be able to do the things he's done. Now he's established himself and those raw edges have worn off him. He's a player who does his talking with his feet now. His movement is unbelievable. He doesn't lose the ball and he never gives up."
Eight years ago he made his debut for Wolves in a Division One game against Norwich and, just as he would do on his Premiership debut for Coventry exactly two years later,
Keane found the net twice. A few weeks later he banged two past Dean Kiely in a 2-0 victory over Bury. Before that Kiely had only heard snatches about
Keane. Since then he has been one of the striker's greatest advocates.
Kiely remembers being asked about
Keane and replying that he had the football world at his feet for a decade or more. That, he thinks, was six or seven years ago and why
Keane has yet to fulfil his prophecy is a mystery the Charlton 'keeper is trying to unravel.
"Personally I think he's been hard done by," Kiely says. "I've seen Robbie at close quarters and when you see him turn up, put his boots on and train the way he does is enough for me. I find it really difficult to understand why he isn't embedded in the Tottenham side. I just think there are so many things going on in terms of what managers think that if Robbie isn't playing as much as he'd like it's not because he lacks enthusiasm or commitment. He doesn't lack anything."
The prevailing view in the game, though, is that
Keane has flaws, serious enough to hinder his progression as one of English football's top strikers. The feeling at Tottenham is that he can't play alongside Jermaine Defoe who, at 22, has emerged as a serious challenger to Michael Owen as Wayne Rooney's partner up front for England. Had his proposed move to Everton gone through,
Keane would have been taking a step down but, unquestionably, he would have been guaranteed regular football.
"It would be nice to see him settled week in week out," says McAteer. "He'll score goals. Unfortunately, managers use this rotation system and sometimes Robbie is the first player to suffer. I think he's the type of player who needs to play every week. He just seems to get better and better."
Why should
Keane be the first to suffer when teams are rotated? "Because he doesn't really have a physical presence," McAteer says. "Himself and Defoe are similar. Managers like someone up front who's a bit of a presence and that's why Mido is up there for Spurs. He's better in the air than Robbie. Robbie gets lost in all this and gets pushed to one side. He gets a bit part rather than playing every week." If, in Jol's mind, it is a case of
Keane against Defoe it isn't surprising that he would opt for the England striker.
The distance between them isn't that vast, though. Last season
Keane scored 17 goals in 45 games which, considering he started fewer games, doesn't sit badly with Defoe's record of 22 in 44. The previous season
Keane scored 18 goals in 41 games.
THERE are more prolific strikers, but
Keane at least is consistent.
"The boy is a natural talent," says David Pleat,
Keane's former manager at Tottenham. "He's very skillful and a terrific dribbler. He scores good goals rather than simple goals. The only problem Robbie has, you either cope with his talent or you don't. In other words, he falls between the main striker and the one who drops off. He's so enthusiastic he seeks the ball and he goes very deep when you just want his talent to be on the shoulder of the last defender, where he scares them with his skill."
Pleat was aware of
Keane from an early age. John Jarman was his chief scout at Luton in the mid-'90s and knew Eddie Corcoran, the scout who sent
Keane to Wolves. He was reminded of the precocious teenager a couple of years later by Sammy Chapman, chief scout at Leicester. "The boy's a gift," Chapman told Pleat. Twice as manager of Tottenham - when
Keane left Wolves for Coventry and again when he left England for Italy - Pleat tried to bring him to White Hart Lane.
Of
Keane, he says the usual things. He is a straight-forward boy who loves training and, in nearly every respect, is a manager's dream. If only
Keane was a straight-forward player, he'd be the total package. "People after a while look at him and they're not sure," Pleat says. "They start changing their minds and now at Spurs he's going to be displaced by the looks of things."
When
Keane knocked two past the Faroe Islands last October, he surpassed Niall Quinn's 21-goal record in nearly half as many appearances but, as Clinton Morrison will testify, what Irish players achieve wearing the green shirt, while hardly a hindrance, has never been a guarantee of rewards at club level. No less than his club career,
Keane's performances for Ireland have borne close scrutiny.
You can read it two ways. While a record of 25 goals in 58 appearances looks good, the fact remains that
Keane has scored the majority of his goals either in friendlies or against the lower ranked teams in international football. The last truly vital goals he scored came in the World Cup - a penalty against Spain and a last minute equaliser against Germany. Before that you have to go back to Holland in 2000 and Yugoslavia a year earlier.
In one sense, the charge is fair. In the games that matter
Keane, as Ireland's main striker, has lacked a decisive touch in front of goal. However, in his defence,
Keane has arguably grown up in a side that is markedly inferior to its ancestors. It is easy to imagine
Keane flourishing among the talent Jack Charlton had at his disposal, easier still to imagine him profiting during the Eoin Hand era when Ireland played a game that would have suited his gifts.
However he has got there,
Keane has reached a watershed. He is no longer the 'gift' that turned heads on training fields when he was a teenager. His career is entering its second act and what better way to raise the curtain on it than by scoring against one of the game's finest teams.
The football world isn't at his feet anymore. It's time Robbie
Keane went out and grabbed it.
http://www.unison.ie/irish_independe...issue_id=12957
John O'Brien
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