“As the crow flies, Micah. He’s not flying down the M6!”
The evolution of Roy Keane from surly, old-school, ‘just try harder’ pundit to comic gem continues at pace.
As he gets further and further from his playing and managerial days, the former Manchester United and Ireland captain is easing off the throttle and enjoying life. Often teaming up with serial messers like Micah Richards, Jamie Carragher and Ian Wright, as well as the excellent Mark Chapman, has seen Keane drop his guard and show another side of himself.
While he is still capable of calling out players and teams that drop off in standards – David De Gea, Leeds United, Jordan Pickford and Bournemouth all copped it on Sky Sports, last weekend – Keane is coming across as more chilled and comical than ever.
On the latest instalment of The Overlap, Keane was paired with Gary Neville and pitted against Richards and Jill Scott for an FA Cup Final quiz based around Manchester City and Manchester United questions. While the victors just got to celebrate, the losing team would have a tough forfeit – winning the jersey of their old rivals.
The first question was a nice loosener for Neville and Keane as the former United teammates were asked how many cards they picked up in Manchester derby games. As the pair mused how many times they picked up cautions or were sent off, Jill Scott joked, “It is Roy Keane.”
“I’ll crack the jokes around here, Jill,” Keane fired back.
Roy Keane constantly ribs Gary Neville
The United vs. City quiz was only five questions each, and a tiebreaker, but the video lasts 32 minutes and at least a third of that is Roy Keane and Gary Neville debating and agonising over questions.
You can see that competitive fire still burning within Keane – he wants to win. This is still the same Keane that stormed out at the end of a table quiz, claiming it was fixed, after an Alex Ferguson-led team won the day.
When he was not ribbing Neville for a myriad of crimes real and imagined, from their United days, he was trying to put the squeeze on Richards and Scott and debating every call. Their questions were simple while he was being thrown grenades.
There was one jibe at Ferguson, his old boss, for claiming he’d never put the club ahead of himself yet missing a Manchester derby to attend the wedding of his son. There was another at Steve McClaren, when Keane remarked the players coached the team when the assistant was briefly left in charge.
The quiz ended at 3-3 and we were down to a tiebreaker with the following question:
As the crow flies, what is the distance (in miles) from Manchester Piccadilly to Wembley Stadium?
Keane and Neville went for 155 while Richards and Scott plumped for 146.
Richards drew out the answer reveal before his face dropped. Neville called out 156 miles, the answer, and Keane was off.
“Get in there! Yes, well done. Brilliant! One mile out. Brilliant!”
Roy Keane and Gary Neville celebrate. (Credit: The Overlap (via YouTube)Team City take the forfeit
And so it was that Roy Keane and Gary Neville avoided the forfeit of donning Manchester City jerseys.
As City tossed his blue jersey aside, he remarked, “Might hang on to that. Have something to wash the car with.” Soon enough, though, he was folding the jerseys back up and saying it was important to ‘show some respect’.
It was left to Scott and Richards to wear United red, and they duly obliged:
The only quibble we would have with a lot of what The Overlap does is we almost see too much of the lads now.
Neville, Keane and Carragher are going on tours around venues all summer and there will be endless clips, skits and social media videos doing the rounds.
The old Top Gear gang have been pastured out to farming shows and Amazon Prime specials. Football’s Last of the Summer Wine crew are ready to fill that breach.
WATCH HOUSE OF FOOTBALL HERE:
Related links.
- FA Cup age old tradition broken ahead of this weekend’s final
- Ole Gunnar Solskjaer calls for “neglecting” Glazers to sell Manchester United
- Man United line-up transfers for two strikers as alternatives to Harry Kane
- “Disgrace to the club” – Norman Whiteside story on nightclub “raid” sums up Alex Ferguson’s early years at Man United
