John Giles: "I was completely blinkered"
Jackie Tellier
By John Giles
[rationalization meets hindsight meets too-little-too-late]
As a player, I was guilty of crimes which, when I came to analyse them from
a distance, filled me with horror. Thirty years on they are still capable of
sending a shudder through my bones.
So I'm not in the best position to pass judgment on Roy Keane. To defend
some of his actions, particularly his admission of premeditated violence
against Alf-Inge Haaland, might be seen as seeking justification for
outrages of my own. To attack him would be to expose myself to charges of
hypocrisy.
Maybe what I can do, however, is explain him - at least a little. Perhaps I
can give a glimpse into his intense and sheltered world.
The first thing you should know about a professional footballer is that he
has very little contact with the real world. He goes into the game at the
age of 15, comes out at 35, say, and in many ways he is still 15.
He comes back into real life with a set of values which, while logical to
himself, have no intelligent application outside a business which puts most
emphasis on survival.
When I was at the height of my career at Leeds - and had a reputation for a
ruthless approach - I was shocked by a comment of my team- mate Norman
Hunter's wife.
In the middle of a convivial evening she said to me: 'The trouble with you
is that you are completely blinkered. Nothing exists outside the game.'
I protested vehemently. I said I read books, I followed the news, I was a
family man. But in the following years I could see that she was right. Like
Keane, I had a set of values which were mine alone and they had been shaped
entirely by my experiences in the game.
The result was an astonishing gap between my view of what was right, and
what the rest of the world might see.
George Best still refers to the time I kicked him and verbally abused him
when Leeds played Manchester United in the 1970 FA Cup semi-final, a few
hours after he had been found in bed with a girl in his team's hotel.
I was outraged by such behaviour from a fellow pro - just as Best, no doubt,
was appalled when I launched into him.
Like Keane, I wrote a book, but now I wonder why I bothered. It didn't make
much money and there was a good reason for that - I didn't say anything. The
main reason, and you may think this ironic, is that I didn't want to damage
the image of football.
Had I told the truth, my book would have been filled with the vendetta
stories which have hurtled Keane into such controversy.
I waited many years to get even with Chelsea's Eddie McCreadie, who had
endangered my career with a late tackle that damaged ligaments. Then when
the opportunity came I did him with the coldest of calculation.
John Fitzpatrick, a young Manchester United player who had acquired a
reputation for being an up-and-coming hard man, was warned that he should
stay away from me.
But the word was that he had not taken the hint. So when a 50-50 ball came
along, it was seen by both of us as a matter of survival that we got in the
first strike. I did, and it may well have contributed to ending his career.
At the time I didn't feel guilt because, in my 'blinkered' world, it had
been a simple matter of self-preservation.
I could justify my action. I had a living to earn, as a midfielder with a
reputation for skill and creativity, and already my career had been
threatened by unscrupulous opponents. It was the culture of football in a
much more pronounced way than it is today.
It is also worth saying that in my opinion Keane is not a dirty player. He
reacts fiercely, and in the matter of Haaland the only difference to the
episodes which have landed Keane with disciplinary problems is that he had
stored up this particular reaction for a long time.
I would also have to say that in all my years of playing and watching the
game I have seen few more irritating players than Haaland.
He is, frankly, a relentless niggler and agitator and when Keane fouled him
so explicitly at Old Trafford last year the biggest thing on his mind was
the incident in 1998.
Then, Haaland had stood over Keane and sneered that he had been faking
injury when in fact Keane had suffered a knee injury which would cost him
the best part of a season and raise questions about his future in the game.
I justified my own behaviour with the belief that it was something I had to
do - not just for myself but for my younger team-mates. I looked at Paul
Madeley and Peter Lorimer, Eddie Gray and Mick Jones, and decided they were
innocents who needed my protection.
Much has been written about the problems Brian Clough had when he arrived as
manager at Leeds, but I have no doubt the biggest issue was his view of the
game and how that was at odds with the one that I had helped to cultivate in
the Elland Road dressing room.
Clough believed that our attitude was self-defeating, and in the course of
time I was able to see that he was right.
But at the time he was an intruder into something he didn't understand. He
was the equivalent of someone now telling Keane that he cannot live
successfully with his rage and belief that he is always right, and that it
is the rest of football and the world that have got things wrong.
My own life as a player was, I can see now, schizophrenic. Any damage I
might do to a player on the field could be dismissed in the course of an
after-match drink.
Many years after our war, I met McCreadie and we had an amiable conversation
without referring to the days when we'd marked each other down for special
attention.
Keane, no doubt, is able to push aside just as easily revelations that have
shocked a wider world. What he did is not a matter for any deep reflection.
He set out to foul Haaland without any fear of the consequences.
It was the right thing to do, according to his way of looking at the world,
and if there is no defence of his action, beyond the tight, closed little
existence of the professional footballer, it is also true to say that nobody
emerges from the affair with any credit.
Manchester City and Haaland considered exploiting the legal possibilities
opened up by Keane's indiscreet revelations, and we don't deserve any prizes
for guessing that the reason was financial opportunism.
The FA is threatening disciplinary action beyond the four-game suspension
that Keane originally suffered, but is his action any more despicable now
that he has explained his motivation?
I have drawn parallels between Keane's career and my own, but there are
differences. I didn't see the red mist as he does - and that is part of the
explanation for why he has been sent off ten times and I was dismissed just
once.
He reacts and I calculated, but what we have in common is that in our
different times in the game we have been regarded as the kind of players
managers valued above all - players of commitment who live by their own
intensely competitive rules.
I'm not surprised that Keane can justify so much of his behaviour on this
basis, which is so questionable in the real world. I know I did for so long.
courtesy www.soccernet.com
--
See Katia's winning WUSA goal of the year!
http://www.digicastcorp.tv/wusa/index.asp
Philip Lennox Beineke
>basis, which is so questionable in the real world. I know I did for so long.
Wow, what a great article. Frankly, I'm surprised by how
apologetic he is, but his writing really brought out the way
it felt.
P
--
Phil Beineke bei...@stanford.edu
Even the least curious mind is roused by the promise of sharing knowledge
withheld from others -- John Chadwick, The Decipherment of Linear B
Robbie
> Jackie Tellier <jste...@attbi.com> wrote:
> >Inside the mind of a midfield warrior
> >By John Giles
> >
> >I'm not surprised that Keane can justify so much of his behaviour on this
> >basis, which is so questionable in the real world. I know I did for so long.
>
> Wow, what a great article. Frankly, I'm surprised by how
> apologetic he is, but his writing really brought out the way
> it felt.
Agreed. Very ineresting.