Keane contract withdrawn from sale

A document purporting to be Roy Keane’s personal copy of his first contract with Manchester United has been withdrawn from sale on eBay.

The document went up on the website on Monday and by Wednesday evening had attracted bids well in excess of its £2,000 (€2,400) asking price.

However, yesterday a message on eBay read: “This listing was ended by theseller because the item is no longer available.”

A series of questions had appeared on the page questioning how the seller, who had the username Capshark, had come into possession of the document. One answer read: “The item is genuine, I can assure you, but there is no certificate of authenticity because it’s a case of ‘finder’s keepers’.” However, it read: “If Roy Keane knocked on my door tomorrow and asked for it back, I’d have to give it to him.”

The person said they had been working with a firm in Britain which had come into possession of a “thousands of documents ... mainly to do with players taking out insurance, investments, and pension policies”. He said he came across Keane’s contract and “put it to one side as you would”.

“But for me finding it, this would have been shredded a few years back,” he added. “I have no idea of what it’s worth, as I cannot find anything like it to have been offered for auction before. I have no wish to keep it, as I’m not a fan of Man Utd and I’m not a collector of any kind.”

The documents on eBay included; a four-page contract signed by Keane, Alex Ferguson, and then Manchester United chief executive Martin Edwards; and on Manchester United-headed paper, a seven-page document detailing the full offer made to Keane in terms of earnings and other benefits.

It stated, amongst other things, that Keane was entitled to a “basic wage” of £250,000 from Jul 1993 to Jun 1997.