Shocking News As Roy Keane Offers Words Of Encouragement To Manchester United Stars

Shocking News As Roy Keane Offers Words Of Encouragement To Manchester United Stars

Manchester United seem to be missing leadership on the pitch right now. They are going through a transitional phase as players like former Everton man Romelu Lukaku, 2nd time Red-Devil Paul Pogba and former Arsenal star Alexis Sanchez are still finding their groove at the biggest football club in the world.

Mourinho is more than able to manage star-quality players like the stars mentioned but he cannot get in their heads and make them play like they have known each other for years. It’s always going to be a little challenging to integrate footballers with strong personalities into a squad that is still being built mainly of big-time players with salaries and expectations to match.

Times have changed as the attitude and motivation of many footballers is not the same. Things have evolved as massive money is now involved whether it be the transfer fees paid or the wages players receive or both. Even shrewd managers like Mourinho are learning how to manage players who increasingly have more and more power.


Man United legend, Roy Keane is not one to go easy on the modern day players when he speaks out but he surprised a few when he had this to say last night on ITV about the current United stars as reported by Metro:

“Pogba is a really good player. He is under a lot of pressure at the moment, there is a lot of speculation about him, he was left out tonight – but you’d still have him in your starting XI.

‘Off the field, he has a big personality – social media, his haircuts, the cars he drives, he needs to bring that on the pitch.’

‘United’s problems aren’t just with Pogba. Lukaku needs to do more, Sanchez has got to do better, they need to reinvest in some defenders,’

‘You can’t keep pointing the finger at Pogba, but the lad has got to do better.’

‘Of course he lost a couple of possessions, but he gave us also stability – because we had a good percentage of ball possession for the way we play a match away from home against a good team like Sevilla.

‘We had a good percentage of the ball and that means control of the game and I think Paul had responsibility on that.

‘And I am also happy with Matic. So I think the three central midfield players had good control and Paul was part of that.”

This sounds like healthy and constructive comments regarding what is happening right now at Old Trafford which is somewhat of a surprise given some of the controversial comments Roy Keane has made over the years.

Keane enjoyed some serious success when he first moved into coaching guiding Sunderland to promotion to the Premier League in his first season in charge at the Stadium of Light in 2006-7. Keane had a somewhat tumultuous second season in charge of the Black Cats which ultimately led to him leaving in December 2007.

Keane then went on to join Ipswich Town of the Championship where he stayed for one and a half seasons before getting the boot in January 2011. After a pretty disappointing spell at Portman Road where Keane never had Ipswich challenging for the promotion places or even the play-off places, it was no surprise when he left.

The United legend then became Republic of Ireland manager Martin O’Neill’s assistant in November 2013 and helped the Irish team qualify for Euro 2016. Keane did combine his role with Ireland by becoming assistant manager at Aston Villa under Paul Lambert but Keane quit in November 2014 just 5 months in to the role at Villa Park.

Roy Keane undoubtedly has a brilliant football mind but given his tendency to “explode” sometimes it is hard to see him ever having a role at United under Jose Mourinho. Paul Scholes with his outspoken views is another former Red-Devil who could add to the United coaching set-up but again like Keane he has a poor relationship with Jose Mourinho so it is highly unlikely that United will get the benefits of two of their most decorated players on the coaching staff at least under the Portuguese boss.