VIDEO: Roy Keane: Clubs must embrace change

Roy Keane has urged Ireland’s schoolboy clubs who might feel threatened by the new U17 National League to embrace change and put the development of their players first.

“Sometimes people are afraid of change,” he said at the launch yesterday. “And people want to hold onto their players at their clubs. I can understand that but you’ve got to do what you think is right for the player. That’s what it’s about. .

“At schoolboy level, they don’t own the player. It’s not like slavery. You’re there to help them and coach them and wish them well and go, ‘listen, if you can go onto another level, whether League of Ireland or England, then that’s what you’re there for’.