Keane revs up Tractor Boys

TRUST Keano to confound expectations. Notwithstanding an excellent performance by a young, fast improving Finn Harps side, you had to imagine that Roy Keane would be considerably less than impressed at seeing his Ipswich Town Championship contenders lose 2-1 to a First Division League of Ireland team at Finn Park on Tuesday night, in what was the Tractor Boys’ first outing ahead of the new season.

But far from delivering his trademark 1,000-yard stare, it was a relaxed Keane who, reflecting on the night’s proceedings in a Ballybofey hotel, opted instead to lavish praise on Harps before going on to describe the match as “the perfect pre-season game for us”.

While Harps will rightly enjoy the prestige of vanquishing much-vaunted opposition, Tuesday night’s game — coming less than six days after the Ipswich players had returned to training from their summer break — was very much a baby step for Keane as he continues to assess his options and build his squad for the kick off of the Championship in a month’s time.

“In every game, there is always something at stake,” said Keane, “and in this one I learned a lot about one or two of my players which is the whole idea of pre-season. You have to remember that this is the first time that I have had the group together because at the end of last season, when we had two games, four or five players weren’t there because they were injured. So I am taking stock very, very quickly of what we have and what we don’t have.”

The positives which came out of the exercise, he said, included a goal from the spot to crown a good showing by 16-year-old Connor Wickham and a full 90-minute debut for Damien Delaney, the Cork-born, twice-capped Irish international who Keane has brought to Portman Road from QPR. Lee Martin, signed from Manchester United, missed the trip to Donegal, but Keane made it clear that there are another couple of players en route to Ipswich even if, until everything is signed, sealed and delivered, he was not inclined to name names.

“We have agreed a price with a club for two players — one of them Irish, though it doesn’t matter where they are from — who I am hoping to meet over the next 24 or hours,” he said. “I have also got one other player in mind, and I would say that will be it. That’s three.”

Asked about persistent speculation linking him to his former Sunderland charges Paul McShane and Daryl Murphy, Keane declined to be drawn.

“I have been linked with about 70 players over the last few weeks since I took the job,” he said. “They (McShane and Murphy) are players that did very well for me at Sunderland and I have a lot of time for them, but I can’t just keep going back to one or two players I might have worked with before.”

Keane was also at pains to stress that, in comparing his planned spending at Ipswich with the millions he paid out for players over the course of his time at the Stadium of Light, the more accurate measure ought to be with the deals he did upon taking over Sunderland when they were still in the Championship.

“My first season at Sunderland I spent in the first transfer window to get us promoted,” he pointed out. “People are quick to tell me how much I spent eventually, but in the first few months I spent four and a half million, maybe a touch less, on Yorkie (Dwight Yorke), Liam Miller, big Stan Varga, Ross Wallace, Kav (Graham Kavanagh) and Dave Connolly. Then in January I bought Carlos Edwards for 1.3 and I got Danny Simpson and Johnny Evans on loan so that was about six million — and if I spend about six and get this team promoted, I would be fairly pleased. It is not bad, six million to get a team promoted.”

Keane hopes Ipswich will be one of among half a dozen or so clubs vying for the big step up.

“Over the last few years you always look at the teams that were relegated and generally two out of the three tend to bounce straight back,” he observed. “So, from our point of view, you look at the teams that came down — Newcastle, Middlesbrough, West Brom — then you look at the Cardiffs, who just missed out, you have got your Sheffield Uniteds. I would like to think that we will be in the mix if I can get a few more players. We need more players because the Championship is very difficult in terms of 12 weeks of the season you are playing three games in a week, so that is the challenge we face. I do have the option of one or two loan players, but I still need a core of Ipswich Town players.”

One of those is Dubliner Owen Garvan, an accomplished midfielder who came up through the ranks at Portman Road and has long been tipped to be promoted from U-21s to the senior team for Ireland.

“He is a talented boy,” said Keane “but I would say talent plays about five or 10% of being a top, top footballer so I need to see the other side of all my players, not just Owen.”

There’s no doubt, however, that Keane expects much from his fellow Corkman Damien Delaney, one of his first signings for Ipswich. It’s not the first coming together of the two men, however, the full back having picked up a yellow card for a late tackle on Keane when Delaney’s then club, Leicester City, played Manchester United all of 10 years ago.

“Lots of people got booked for late tackles on me,” Keane deadpanned. “But, no, he didn’t make that much of an impression on me that day. I thought he was a young kid — he asked me for my jersey, that was the only thing I remember. But you are always watching players, Irish boys, and I’d always keep an eye out for the Cork lads.

“Full back was a position at the club that needed strengthening, Damien wants to improve and he can do that with our club. We have brought him in to try to cement a place at left back. I know he has played in midfield, and at centre half, but any half-decent footballer can play in a few positions anyway so hopefully he is more than a half-decent footballer.”

Ipswich are now off to Portugal for a warm-weather training camp before returning to Ireland for games against Waterford United and Cork City.

As for Keano himself, don’t expect any radical transformation in his managerial style or personality.

“I’ve said it before — there is no comparison between management and being a player,” he emphasised. “I am obviously more experienced from my time at Sunderland but I am what I am, I don’t think I am going to ever mellow too much’ whether that it is good or bad. Sometimes it’s a help, sometimes it’s a hindrance.”