Eamonn O’Keefe: How Cork City missed out on Roy Keane but cashed in on Big Jack
Roy Keane pictured in his Cobh Ramblers days.
THE Football Association of Ireland needed to be more professional and use its power more effectively in the running of the Leagues - they should be seen to be operating strictly in line with legislation and protocol.
As one example, it was not uncommon for teams to backdate contracts... I once signed a player just after the deadline and went to see Chris Herlihy, the Cork City chairman.
“No problem,” said Chris, “we’ll sort that!” Apparently, there was a way of stamping the envelope with an earlier date to indicate it had been sent days before. So, as long as it arrived with the envelope dated within the deadline it was OK?
I said to the chairman at the time, “It’s a pity that you didn’t do that with Roy Keane!”
Chris then proceeded to tell me what had happened during the Roy Keane episode…
Apparently, Keane had signed for Cork City in between the seasons. The then secretary, Seamus Casey, still had a couple of contracts outstanding, as negotiations were still underway with other players.
The manager realised that they would all be completed in a couple of days, so Seamus was told to hold fire on posting the contracts. These contracts had already been signed so they could then all be posted together, using recorded delivery.
During those couple of days, whilst Seamus was holding back the signed contracts, Cobh Ramblers spoke to Roy, expressing their interest in him. Roy informed them that, unfortunately, he had already signed with Cork two days earlier. It was unfortunate because Cobh had offered him more money than Cork had!
Cobh immediately phoned the FAI headquarters to see if the player had been registered and they informed them that he had not — so Cobh Ramblers immediately signed Roy Keane and then rushed the signed papers to the FAI who, in turn, registered him as a Cobh player!
When the contracts eventually arrived back with Seamus Casey, he found that the one pertaining to Roy Keane was rejected due to the fact that he was already registered with another team.
Roy Keane was later sold to Nottingham Forest for £100,000, with a clause to say that Cobh Ramblers would receive a second payment if, or when, he was sold on. The second payment turned out to be quite substantial as, of course, Roy was bought for £3.75 million, by Manchester United in 1993!
So, all the stick that Seamus Casey has received over the years, because he didn’t post Roy Keane’s contract as soon as he had signed it, would seem to have been ‘a tad’ undeserved — Seamus had just been following orders!
I also started working on the commercial side of things and I had provisionally booked Jack Charlton to speak at the Jurys Hotel, at what was to be its first Sportsman’s Dinner.
At a board meeting above the pub (very professional, I know) I told the board members that I was organising a Sportsman’s Dinner and that I was due to meet up with Mr. Peter Malone (the Manager of the Jurys Hotel) the following day. All funds raised would go towards Cork City Football Club. They were all very supportive and the chairman asked what they could do to help. I took out a copy of the table plan and explained that it was very simple: Jurys Hotel could seat 250 people in their main function room, with plenty of room for a top table.
“I expect each of you, as board members, to take responsibility for two tables of ten (there were eight of them) and each ticket will cost 25 pounds. Also, Bill and myself will take two tables between us.”
Bill and I had not been in Ireland for very long and so just one table each would present a challenge!
The board members all agreed with my proposals and I told them that I would now aim to confirm the provisional booking of Charlton as our guest speaker.
“Money-wise, this should bring in more than a home gate,” I told them, “if everybody pulls their weight.”
The next day, Bill and I arrived at Jurys Hotel to attend our meeting with the manager, Peter Malone, who was extremely professional and very taken with the idea of his hotel being used as the venue to entertain 250 people on a Monday evening — when he would normally anticipate business to be quite quiet. He also realised how much publicity and media coverage would automatically ensue with the arrival of Jack Charlton, the Irish team manager. These points were not lost on Bill and myself either and, with this in mind, we confidently outlined our demands.
“We are prepared to pay up to 10 pounds, per head, for a high-quality, sit-down meal; we shall require four free suites for guests and speakers; we also expect the hotel to fill one of the tables, to honour this first event which we intend to be the first of many.”
Peter laughed out loud. “You don’t beat about the bush, do you? Let me speak to my head chef a minute. You two have a coffee whilst you wait and then, when I come back, I’ll give you my figures!”
Peter returned as we were finishing our coffee, carrying some papers, looking very businesslike, and announced: “Now, Mr. O’Keefe! I’ll tell you what I can do, shall I? The best — and I mean, the best —price that I can do a meal for is 12.50 a head. I can throw in two rooms for Jack Charlton and one other person — and we will be delighted to take a table for Jurys Hotel. That means that we can invite some of our best clients to the event, here at the hotel, people who work with, or serve us, in the area.”
“Well, thank you for your time, Mr. Malone,” I replied, with a smile, as I rose from my chair. “We still have a few alternatives to check out but I will come back to you as soon as possible.”
“Eamonn, you won’t get a better venue than Jury Hotel in Cork,” said Peter. “You’re probably right,” I agreed. “But how often will you get the Irish national team manager down this neck of the woods - and the publicity that that will bring? I have to get the best financial deal that I possibly can for the club.”
“Eleven pounds!” Peter suddenly said. “And that’s robbery!”
“I said ten pounds,” I insisted. “If you agree to that — and four rooms, not two… the President of the FAI will also be staying after all — then I’ll say ‘yes’, here and now.”
Peter leaned forward and shook my hand to seal the deal and said: “If you ever give up the football, come and see me!”
As we left the building, Bill turned to me and said, in surprise, “I didn’t know that the President of the FAI was coming?”
“Neither did I, we’d better hurry up and invite him now though!”
Our next stop was Cork Multi-channel, the cable television company which, at the time, had around 40,000 subscribers throughout Cork City. I wanted to know if they would be prepared to film the build-up and, in exchange for this coverage, I offered them the banner space immediately behind the top table so that all the press photographs would automatically advertise their company.
I asked them to donate 1,000 pounds into the kitty — that amount would easily cover the costs of the return flights for the three main guests. I also planned to promise them a private interview with Jack Charlton too (not that he had agreed to one!).
They hummed and haw-ed for a week or so but came back to me and said that it was unlikely that their bosses would agree to donate that kind of money, regardless of the promise of the Charlton interview.
There was still a few weeks to go before the dinner when events suddenly took a turn for the better, due to a fantastic bit of luck... Bulgaria had played Scotland in a European Championship qualifying round and Scotland won 1-0 thanks to an all-important Gary MacKay goal.
The result meant that the Republic of Ireland had qualified for the Championship for the first time in their history. And guess what? The manager — who became an instant hero — was already booked to come to Ireland, to Cork City.
Overnight, everything revved up a gear. If I had had a thousand tables, I could have filled them. Multi-channel phoned me to say that they had decided, after all, to accept the £1,000 deal that we had discussed.
People were now phoning to ask for entire tables rather than individual seats but, even though I managed to secure another two tables from Peter Malone, the seats were completely sold out. As the pace gathered momentum, Bill and I went once more to Jurys Hotel. Peter Malone invited us into his office. He was a true pro.
“This is costing us a packet,” Peter declared, laughing. “The directors have insisted that the meal is a top-quality steak meal, cooked and presented in sight of the guests by the chefs on the day!”
“We didn’t agree to pay for all that!” I protested. “I know,” smiled Peter. “But they have realised that every man and his dog is going to be there. Jurys’ reputation is on the line here - so best steak it is!”
“Just so long as it stays at a tenner a head…”
“I can assure you that the deal is the same — I won’t be breaking our agreement,” Peter replied, as he shook hands with us.
Top man.
The evening of the Sportsman’s Dinner was everything that we hoped it would be. We collected Jack Charlton from the airport and called in at Multi-channel T.. where they ‘just happened’ to have an empty studio, ready and waiting for an interview… Jack was brilliant. He sat down and made himself comfortable whilst they fiddled around with his microphone and then he chatted away to them, quite happily. They thanked him profusely for calling by and we went on to Jurys Hotel to settle him in his room. As we left the studio, Jack said: “You slipped that one in, Eamonn…”
“What?” I asked.
The big man just smiled! He went down a storm that evening. The club made thousands of pounds and everybody had a fabulous night. It all went like clockwork.
In time, we organised another three of these fundraising Sportsman’s Dinners. After Jack Charlton, we were honoured to welcome Sir Alex Ferguson, Tommy Doherty, and the late Emlyn Hughes as our subsequent guest speakers.
I was attending the fourth, with the late Hughes, when part way through the evening Seamus Casey, Cork City’s secretary, handed me a brief note asking me to go to the Beechers Pub the following day, for an emergency meeting.
I popped the note in my pocket and enjoyed the remainder of another successful fundraising evening, with the players and guests. I arrived at the Beechers the next day, as requested, and I was met by Christy Looney who led me upstairs to the function room.
I wasn’t sure who I was expecting to be there as part of this meeting but it turned out to be just Christy and myself. He sat down in front of me and said, simply, “The Club has decided to terminate your contract, Eamonn. I’ve been given the job of telling you because the other feckers haven’t got the bottle to come and do it themselves. I’m sorry. It’s purely financial and we can’t keep paying out all the time. We are all subsidising the players’ wages and we have to cut back somewhere.”
I shook his hand and agreed that the chairman should have had the balls to tell me himself — but, hey! That’s the way it goes.
“We’ll have to sort out what they owe me then,” I commented. “I’ve still got ten months to run on my contract — and I’m on a player’s contract too.”
During the conversation, Christy had also said that the club could not have continued to pay out rent on the bungalow where I was living either. By this time, I had bought a house in Ireland but it was being renovated and I had never actually stayed in it. I had brought Michael Conroy (Binzer) and Phil Harrington over and we were now all living in the bungalow that the club had rented.
“What about the lads?” I asked him. “They have player’s contracts — where are they going to stay?”
“Will they stay?” Christy asked.
“Of course they will,” I retorted. “They’re professionals and they’re on a contract.”
“I don’t know, I really don’t,” replied Christy.
“You’ll have to speak to Richard O’Brien, the accountant and the club director about your contract.”
There wasn’t really anything more for us to say, so I suggested that we go down and have a pint.
“After all, we are in a pub!”
Down we went and got the beers in. I had always got on well with Christy Looney and I did understand why I had been voted out. If they were now paying out of their own pockets, something had to give — and Cork City gate money wasn’t covering the overheads. It made sense. Those directors were hard-working lads — they weren’t loaded with money and they all had family commitments. They had, basically, bitten off more than they could chew.
The following day, I was fielding calls from journalists from all over Ireland. One phone call, in particular, caught my interest… It was from the St Patrick's Athletic manager, Brian Kerr, and he asked me if I was willing to play for them and to sign until the end of the season. I told him that I would let him know and then I went to see the accountant.
“Eamonn, I’ve been instructed by the board to say that we have no money,” he said.
“Okay,” I replied. “Then I’ll have to involve a lawyer for my manager’s contract and the FAI regarding my player’s contract.”
I wrote to the FAI and appointed a lawyer, who spoke to the club about the contract and informed them of the outstanding amount that was owed to me. In the meantime, I agreed to play for St Patrick's Athletic, after the FAI said that they agreed that Cork City were, indeed, in breach of their contract with me and that they intended to deal with it over the next few weeks.
I’m still waiting, FAI. It is a matter of principle now — it seems to me that Cork City have never been made answerable for their actions. To anybody.
I left Cork with a lot of mixed feelings. I couldn’t fault any of the lads, who had always given me 100% — even when there were no showers and the training facilities, lights kept going out… I would have to climb under the church hall stage to flick the trip switch back on again — often up to three times a night.
I find it quite extraordinary when I look back on events and realise how some people’s lives have been affected and completely rerouted by their decisions to join me in Ireland…
The fact that Phil Harrington went on to marry an Irish girl and they had two children together… And Binzer, all these years later, is still living over there and he now works for the FAI. Their lives took a totally different path from the ones that they were on — and that was all as a direct result of the Commander’s recommendation to Cork City’s chairman, that I should manage their team…
Which was, of course, a knock-on effect of my having arranged that first trip which, in turn, had enabled Harry to be over there in the first place…
Fate!
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