Dunphy v Giles: It’s the best soap opera in town
Happily, this afternoon’s European Championship opener against Russia is coming live from Moscow to a television set near you, as well as to the one in the pub down the road. Today, for 90 minutes at least, rows about pay per view and whether or not Irish football has unique cultural value, can be put on hold. But whether even an absent Roy Keane can be kept out of the spotlight for that long is a moot point.
Last Saturday, Roy was present and incorrect on The Premiership on RTE, his sly dig to the head of Jason McAteer, and subsequent red card, ensuring that everything else would have to play second fiddle. The producers were probably delighted - nothing keeps bums on seats quite like a bit of controversy, after all - but Bill O’ Herlihy, like Basil Fawlty, had the uncomfortable look of a man who’d started out with the best of intentions only for the whole thing to blow up in his face.
The much-publicised hostility in question, of course, was between John Giles and Eamon Dunphy. One’s first reaction on hearing of their falling-out was amusement, as well as regret that Dermot Morgan wasn’t still around to knock some classic gags out of it. From Eamo having John’s baby to the two conducting their own version of a Saturday scrap - this was sports broadcasting almost indistinguishable from soap. Hard But Fair City, you could call it.
YET when the programme finally kicked off, the reality was anything but funny. Here were two grown men, the best pundits in the business, and formerly good friends, unable to even so much as look at each other, as they were invited to give their reactions to the events of the day.
And, as usual, the Dunph couldn’t resist being instantly judgmental and omniscient. While Giles contented himself with saying that he couldn’t understand why Niall Quinn had chosen the moment of Keane’s sending off to approach him, Eamon was somehow in a position to immediately inform us that Quinn was “fannying”, his gesture “a PR stunt” and one rightly rebuffed by a good professional like Alex Ferguson.
In fact, Quinn’s biographer Tom Humphries revealed on Monday that the Sunderland striker’s approach was a genuine attempt at conciliation after Keane had been jeered throughout the game. Quinn had intended to talk to him in the tunnel after the match but when the red card was shown, realised that it might be his last chance to shake his hand before Keane left the ground. Furthermore, according to Quinn, Keane accepted the handshake.
Bearing in mind that Roy Keane believes he was sold out by Niall Quinn in Saipan and that he, in turn, called Quinn “a coward” and “a muppet”, the idea of bridges being built is not only admirable but something that could profitably be contemplated by Giles and, especially, Dunphy.
One doesn’t need to underestimate the importance of sport to conclude that absolutely nothing in Roy Keane’s account of the trials and tribulations of his international career justifies the amount of bad blood, bile and festering resentment that has been left in the wake of, first, the World Cup, and now the publication of his book. Life is too short for this.
Meanwhile, by way of cheering us all up, there has been an early submission for ‘Colemanballs’ of the year by Alan Green, who recently told Radio 5 live listeners that Blackburn’s Tugay was “rolling around like a dead man”.
Good stuff, but it still has some way to go to matching such classics as “The crowd think that Todd handled the ball - they must have seen something that nobody else did” - Barry Davies.
“They compare Steve McManaman to Steve Heighway and he’s nothing like him but I can see why - it’s because he’s a bit different” - Kevin Keegan.
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