Roy Keane is set for a sensational comeback as manager at Sunderland AFC. This brings back memories of his last position as head coach of a club. More than a decade ago the Irishman was manager at Ipswich Town and if you believe David Norris, the team’s former captain, it was a shall we say ‘eventful’ time, particularly for the players – with volcanic eruptions and flashbangs at 5am.
“I loved him, honestly,” said David Norris, active for the Blues from 2008 to 2011, once in an interview with The Athletic About Roy Keane: “He made me his captain. He had that aura. It still feels great to know that Roy Keane chose me to be his captain.”
Keane came to Ipswich in April 2009 after two seasons at Sunderland, the club where he is now so much in demand again, even reaching the semi-finals of the League Cup with the second division side in the 2010/11 season.
When Norris scored the winning goal for Ipswich in one of his first games under Keane, the Irishman called out to him in the cabin aisle: “That’s my captain. Just so you know!” For Norris it was an unparalleled accolade. “Can you imagine what it feels like to hear that from him? It made me feel like 30 meters tall just because he said it,” Norris continued.
However, he also spoke about the contradictory character of Keane, who on the one hand took care of him after a serious injury and made sure that Norris got the best doctors, but on the other hand put down, yelled at and benched him in front of the entire team after the captain had dared to object.
Ipswich under Roy Keane: Flashbangs at 5am
“He came up to me after a game and yelled in my face, ‘Who the hell do you think you are?!’ He completely tore me up. We won the game, but I was out in the next game. His message was clear: don’t mess with me,” the 40-year-old continued.
Probably the toughest phase Norris experienced with his teammates during the pre-season under Keane before the 2010/11 season, which led the team to the British Army’s 7th Parachute Regiment in Colchester.
In Colchester, Norris and Co. were regularly woken up at five in the morning by stun grenades, had to sleep outside under the open sky like paratroopers, dig in or sleep on beams. When the first grenade flew, Norris literally “wet his pants” with fear.
It was “a test” for the entire group. “If someone couldn’t run anymore, we had to help them. So there was a deeper meaning to it. We had to stick together. But some people were probably thinking, ‘This is crazy.'”
Keane? “Mess with him and you pay the price”
The whole contradiction of Keane’s character was impressed on Norris by one event in particular. At the end of the pre-season, the former Ipswich captain claims, Keane pushed the entire squad to a team night. “He said, ‘Go out together, have a drink, but don’t get in trouble, don’t get arrested and be there for the meeting at 9 a.m. tomorrow morning.'”
And when the team followed Keane’s orders, he criticized each individual for it, questioning the character and claiming he didn’t think he could win anything with them.
“If someone had been arrested they would have gone nuts, claiming that we had ridiculed them and tarnished the club’s reputation. But that’s the way he is: if you mess with him, you’ll pay the price. If you don’t do, he questions your character,” Norris said.
Despite everything, Norris maintained a very good relationship with Keane. When he was released in January 2011 in 19th place in the championship, the central midfielder even wrote to his coach in farewell: “Coach, I’m sorry for you that you lost your job. I had a part in it. We have you let you down as a player. I wish you all the best for the future!”
“What a guy!”: Roy Keane is currently without a club
Keane is said to have thanked Norris afterwards. “He wrote back that he was glad I was his captain: ‘If we had had 20 of your kind we wouldn’t have been in this situation. If you need anything, you have my number.’ What a guy!”
Following Keane’s sacking at Ipswich, the now 50-year-old joined Ireland as assistant coach, where he was sacked after the 2018 World Cup over a scandalous altercation with players Harry Arter and Jonathan Walters.
After a brief stint as assistant coach at Nottingham Forrest to Martin O’Neil, whom he had already assisted with the Irish national team, Keane was without a club and therefore worked as a TV pundit for sky. Ipswich Town were relegated to the 3rd division in 2018. Norris is still playing football at the age of 40 – in the seventh English division at Lancaster City.
