Keane has final say in LA as Redknapp poised to snap up striker

It’s always been the case with Robbie Keane that, even after he’d blown Ireland’s goal scoring record to smithereens, there have been critics only too happy to accentuate the negatives of his career.

The latest example of a journalist getting on the wrong side of the Tallaght man came after an extra-time goal by Keane clinched the MLS Championship for LA Galaxy on Sunday, when one reporter at the post-match press conference insisted on bringing up a miss earlier in the game in which the striker might have been better advised to lay the ball off to team-mate Landon Donovan for what would have been a virtual tap-in.

To be fair to Keane, however, he leavened his exasperated response with a touch of humour and also an insight into what has made him such a prolific goal scorer wherever he has played.

“I’ve been playing for 15 years,” he replied. “You miss chances, you score chances. I only missed one chance so it wasn’t that bad. Jesus, you’re trying to kill me here. We just won the championship and I scored the winning goal and you’re on about the miss I made. I don’t worry about missing chances. I always tell young strikers that as long as you’re getting into the right areas and you’re determined to keep getting in there, you’ll score goals. Because that’s naturally what you’re good at. So for me, I knew if I got a second chance I’d score.

“In the second period of extra-time (Galaxy defender) Omar (Gonzalez) came up to me and said something and I said, ‘don’t worry, I’ll score’. That wasn’t me being big-headed, that was just me knowing that I’d get a chance and I’d put it away. Thankfully for me, it went into the back of the net and we won the Championship.”

Galaxy’s 2-1 win over New England Revolution saw Keane awarded the game’s MVP gong to go with the same award he’d already picked up for his scintillating form throughout the regular MLS season.

US soccer legend Alexi Lalas this week called Keane “the best designated player” in the history of the MLS, highlighting the Irishman’s unwavering application as being central to his successful three years in the States.

“He’s serious about every training session and every game,” said the former international. “He brings it every game. When your marquee player, who is making tremendous amount of money” — an estimated €4.5 million this year — “does that, that is what you want. Where you get into problems is when players who are young or not making so much money look across a dressing room and see a guy who is phoning it in. That is the beginning of the end. That can be incredibly debilitating for a club – and he is the opposite of that.”

And some old friends of Keane on this side of the Atlantic are taking note. The Dubliner might have signed an extended multi-year contract with Galaxy in March but his former boss at Spurs, Harry Redknapp, is considering a move to bring the 34-year-old back to London on temporary loan to help QPR in their hour of need in the Premiership.

“The MLS market is one that we’ve got to look at,” Redknapp said. “Robbie’s a good shout. He probably would be an interesting player. He would be the ideal type to have around because he would give us something.”