Actually the best part of that video is the writing on the bottom that says "look at Rooney trying to intimidate him (Reyes)" when it is quite clear that Reyes is intimidated 
Martin Keown (and friends) vs Ruud van Nistelrooy incident...
- Thread starter Rozay
- Start date
The Keane discussion is weird. He never went after little number 10s like Zola or easy targets. Virtually every single player he had scraps with was an oppo hard man (Vieira, Shearer,) sly/dirty little git (Haaland, Poyet) or way taller than he was (schmeichal, Quinn). He didn’t even see the worst stuff of the RVN incident as he was talking to Gilberto when Keown did his ape man jump.
Think Duncan Ferguson or Vinnie Jones would beat him up bad badly though.
Think Duncan Ferguson or Vinnie Jones would beat him up bad badly though.
I understand that incident enraged us all at the time but I don't understand the criticism of our players. I doubt anyone was scared of Keown let alone Roy Keane. What I did think happened was that we missed the penalty and felt a heap of disappointment and shock thereafter. That, alongwith having a brain, is the reason Ruud didn't react. Good man. And I presume the others too felt too disappointed at missing the opportunity against bitter rivals to react to the village idiot dancing around like a nutjob.
Therein lies the problem. Someone who behaved like that and not only shows no remorse but is proud of it, should not be given a platform to brag about it in the media.
If Roy Keane went on ITV and said "he should have gone in knee high on him there like I did to Haaland - hahaha", how long would he have a job for? Or even better, criticise City players afterwards for not sticking up for him.
I disagree with the notion the likes of Keane shat it because of ape man Keown - they were probably just a bit put out and shocked that the penalty had been missed and not really in the mood to get into a scrap so suddenly. I’m sure in any other scenario they would have put those Arses in their place.
Utd and Arsenal are two great adversaries that era and they have an unbelievable hatred towards each other.
Arsenal wasn't too please when RVN fouled Vieira who react and got sent off . Utd was then awarded a dubious 90th min penalty which was missed by RVN .
Arsenal keep their unbeaten record and several players got fined and bans for bullying RVN I believe.
And then we have the game which end Arsenal 49 games unbeaten record.... the Battle of Pizza which triggered a mass row and pizza throwing in the tunnel post-match.
Their rivalry was perhaps the most exciting aspect of the premier league for almost a decade . And You do feel the rivalry and passion are missing from the players now.
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I was proud of the lads for not overreacting.
The worst was Van Nistelrooy didn’t even dive, vieira was entirely to blame for stupidly swinging at him and Ruud jumped back like literally every person would. They were truly indignant over nothing, he didn’t even get a red it was a second yellow.
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Bizarre point of view.
99.99% of football brawls are handbags where there is never any intention to do more than play up to the cameras. If players really want to punch each other they would do it like Bowyer and Dyer that was a proper fight. Between team mates as well.
Absolutely. The only injustice in the decision was the second yellow rather than a straight red.
The depth of their delusion is that even to this day, with the benefit of hindsight, they all still genuinely believe that Van Nistelrooy cheated to get Vieira sent off.
This is one of those incidents that shines a light on the occasional perplexing bias of a football fan.
Found the video. Ronaldo and Keane did seem to be the first to react from our side. Incident is at 2:30
Not even the fans. The players.
Patrick Vieira, who has since criticised Wenger for being too soft on the players and has gone on to be a full time coach where you would imagine he would aim to have more considered opinions, still believes that Van Nistelrooy cheated to get him sent off.
He says Wenger was too soft on his players but doesn't take any responsibility for the fact that he got sent off because he tried to kick Van Nistelrooy and no other reason.
I don’t remember Keane picking his fights at all, really funny point of view that one.
You took the smiley right out of my mouth.
I’m racking my brains and can’t think of a single instance or game where keane could have been said to have bottled anything or been intimidated. He was just fearless by nature. Certainly not without fault and his temperment cost is sometimes too but it’s just utter revisionism to say otherwise, he was an absolute warrior on the pitch but now, after the fact, without any evidence he’s said to pick his battles and be intimidated by Martin bloody Keown.
Every player he’s played with says as much, players he’s played against. By sheer virtue of watching him even when he was past his best you’d know this to be total fabrication.even in this instance he’s the first united player with an arm around rvn.
I hate Keown for this still
He sits there now looking like a half shaved ape commentating and whinging about players acting up, “you wouldn’t have seen that in my playing days” etc
He sits there now looking like a half shaved ape commentating and whinging about players acting up, “you wouldn’t have seen that in my playing days” etc
Well you did a regular RedCafe thing of looking at a post, ignoring what it says, perhaps because you either agree with it, or simply have no opinion at all, but decide there is something that you DO have an opinion on, which is similar - so you will just argue THAT point instead, regardless of whether it was made or not.
Nobody else has managed to decipher what you managed to decipher, simply because it wasn’t there, but I guess you had nothing to add concerning what was actually written.
Wenger in his usual biased defense of his players. No wonder his next teams all became soft.Jesus Christ, stop derailing the thread.
Just watched the clip, Wenger moaned as usual, how RVN always seeks provocation, after his player jumped around like a monkey.
It was absolutely scandalous that they got away so lightly. I hate Keown after that.
Think Keown did a bit more than dancing. Between him and has gang they pretty much all committed straight red card offences for violent conduct. Seeing Ruud there almost defenceless with his hands up looking for help still angers me, in the voice of Deontay Wilder - ‘to this DAY!’. No opposition should ever feel like they can get away with that at Old Trafford.
This is like one of those abu comments on every 90s football clips on youtube and facebook.
Keane never backed down from anyone.
Shearer wasn't exactly tall! Keown and vieira had 4-6inches on him
It's great to see young Ronaldo stepping in.
Keane being supposedly intimidated by Keown is based on practically nothing.
Keane being supposedly intimidated by Keown is based on practically nothing.
Ironically for all the complaints of the assault on Nistelrooy it was really a load of hand bags and the video of the tackles in the other video are far worse.
A little tap on the back from Keown and a couple of pushes. Yeah not nice and a disgrace, but people reacting like he got punched and kicked. They've acted like a bunch of childish school bullies, but it's hardly an assault
In this video, there are late challenges, stamp on a foot and we won the game with an incredibly soft penalty.
Don't get me wrong given their actions there is a certain sense of justice by lowering to their level, but neither team can come away from those instances with any class or higher sense of position.
This all said, call it what you want, but that rage filled passion made the games around this time some of the most exciting football I can ever remember. They both got carried away, but the passion is so much more genuine than anything I've seen for years from a United side.
Apparently Ruud wasn't too popular with a lot of united players either. Always thought that was the reason he wasn't fully backed then.
My friend who is as biased a fan you'll ever meet, is so die hard Arsenal he refuses to believe anything was wrong. I nearly came to blows with him several times about it, the last time in fact was 3 weeks ago.
He is such a hypocrite about it. He doesn't understand how anyone can even look at an Arsenal player the wrong way but if they do then they deserve to be hanged. I used his nephew as an example and said if you saw people acting like that to him (nephew being RvN), would you say it's OK cos he 'deserved' it? But of course "that is different"..... failing to understand footballers are humans too with their own families etc.
He is such a hypocrite about it. He doesn't understand how anyone can even look at an Arsenal player the wrong way but if they do then they deserve to be hanged. I used his nephew as an example and said if you saw people acting like that to him (nephew being RvN), would you say it's OK cos he 'deserved' it? But of course "that is different"..... failing to understand footballers are humans too with their own families etc.
Yes, aside from their obvious football ability, that was the defining "quality" of that Arsenal side; Wenger being the chief instigator. For some reason the media seemed happy to propagate their agenda. I remember Solskjaer being forearm-smashed by Sol Campbell at Highbury, resulting in a red card, and for the following several days the papers were full of quotes from Arsenal players claiming Solskjaer cheated, and they'd expect nothing better from a Manchester United player.
I must say that despite my indignation towards the Keown incident, I have always been equally uncomfortable with the next home game in question when we ended their unbeaten run. Think the game showed that they were the better team, and we couldn’t compete with them on a footballing level so had to kick them in order to level the playing field.
I went to Old Trafford for the United 5-1 Newcastle game just after the treble winning season. One of the stand out memories was seeing just how big Duncan Ferguson was. The guy was a giant. Not just tall, but stocky as well, broad shoulders, massive frame. The picture below is a different game and you can see how he is like a scaled up Rooney and Rooney is pretty broad.
Only 6ft 4, so still 3 inches less than Crouch, but the frame difference is significant.
Anyway so yes I cant see many could take on Big Dunc. Vinnie was about 6ft 1or2 as well and maybe even stockier so yes both of them would make 5ft10 Keane look like a couple of divisions below their fight category!
The only thing intimidated by Keown is evolution.
What is funny about that season is the fact it was the Arsenal's "Invincibles" season and this incident was NOT the turning point of it at all. By the end of the year we we're sitting top of the league and it was the season Ferdinand got suspended over that doping issue and that is when the season went sour for us starting with a suprise defeat at Wolves (Irwin having no problem marking a certain C Ronaldo that day). To this day I'm certain they would have lost a game had we put more pressure on them
It is annoying that we could have put that unbeaten thing to bed before it started with that penalty too. Last minute. Record over.
If my memory is selective yours has gone. You're confusing me with someone else. I rate Buchan as the best defender (and possibly captain) I've seen at OT and certainly not Rio.
I've also consistently said what a great player Roy was and am extremely thankful he wore the shirt. But on/off pitch thuggery doesn't define supposed "hardness" for me. For me taking the knocks and keeping a lid on your emotions is the mark of a hard player not pantomine punch throwing and mouthing off in front of the cameras - something he's still doing. Having anger management issues doesn't make a man hard it just means he's more likely to get in a fight.
Great player but a massive dickhead who too often lost his cool.
That Arsenal team were full of wankers bar one or two lads. Lot of them had massive chips on the shoulder. Year later and they were throwing pizza at the greatest manager in the game over a game of football. Keown himself won't apologise for it even years later.
The fact Ruud isn't even interested in the argument makes it worse. No wonder the Nevilles decided to batter them in the match a year later. Then obviously the Highbury incident in 2005 was the big blow-off ultimately.
At the end of the day, United always got the last laugh.
The fact Ruud isn't even interested in the argument makes it worse. No wonder the Nevilles decided to batter them in the match a year later. Then obviously the Highbury incident in 2005 was the big blow-off ultimately.
At the end of the day, United always got the last laugh.
There some strange hate for Keane among some of United fans.
Early in his career, yes, but as a more experienced player "taking the knocks and keeping a lid on your emotions" is exactly what he did.
That incident is case in point. He was the one who went to get Ruud and took him out of the situation.
Then look at the Highbury "I'll see you out there" game. He absolutely bossed that game. With experience, he learned to channel his anger into driving him to play even better which made him such a great leader and captain.
Rumours were that Irwin was the hard man in Utd dressing room.
So if he ‘carefully picked his fights’ he must have been controlling his emotions very well a lot of the time. Not getting involved with big bad guys like Ferguson and Keown and all.
I would also say that because you don’t feel some of Keane’s more thuggish qualities make a hard man, that doesn’t mean keane didn’t have the attributes that do make a ‘hard man’. He was absolutely fearless, never pulled from a tackle, had the strength of character to be the most successful ever captain of one of the biggest teams in the world. Has every attribute I personally associate with toughness, hardness or whatever you want to call it.
Believe it’s a true myth to suggest he ‘chose’ fights.