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Just
as a few weeks ago we ruminated on the imminent departure of Alan
Shearer from the playing fields of English football, so too must
we now begin to prepare ourselves for the impending end of Kevin
Keegan’s immense contribution to the game.
Keegan has recently confirmed that when his current Manchester contract
expires at the end of next season, he won’t be looking to renew
it and will, instead, hang up his boots, or whatever else it is
that manager’s hang up when they’ve had enough.
And though Keegan has come in for his fair share of criticism after
coming back into the game after a lengthy hiatus at the end of his
playing career, few objective observers would denigrate the impact
that he has had, not least on the expectations that we now have
from Premiership football.
The crowds that come to watch football will simply no longer tolerate
dull, defensive football that sees sides string defenders across
the pitch, looking to grind their way to dour draws and the odd
victory. Keegan as much as any manager simply swept that mindset
away, consigning it to the history books, unveiling a kind of football
where attack is the only reason for playing the game, the kind of
glory game that Blanchflower advocated in the 1950s where you win
games by taking the game to the opposition rather than simply boring
them to death. With the might of the Toon Army behind him, Keegan
simply ushered in a new era where football was to be played the
right way, in the right spirit.
And he came within a hair’s breadth of carrying off the top
trophy by virtue of his cavalier football, pushing Manchester United
all the way to the finishing line in 1995/96 before Fergie’s
Cantona inspired side came through to win in the final stretch.
But that team that used the flair of David Ginola, Phillippe Albert,
Les Ferdinand, Peter Beardsley and Faustino Asprilla, backed by
the strength and solidity of the likes of David Batty and Rob lee,
remains something of a benchmark for attacking football in the Premier
League age, a yardstick by which we continue to measure the most
entertaining sides.
Some argue that, ultimately, Keegan’s adherence to his
first principle – attack, attack, attack – cost them the
league title, but surely it was his willingness to keep ploughing
forward all the time that got them into that position in the first
place. It was an instinct that he carried with him when he returned
to football at Fulham after leaving Newcastle, setting in train
the revival at Craven Cottage that now has the club established
in the top flight.
Yet he backtracked from that style of football after taking over
the England job, particularly as the country got towards the serious
job of playing in Euro 2000. But Keegan’s teams need to play
football with a smile if he is to get the best out of them, and
with the manager shackled by the demands of the job and the pressure
imposed by the media, England faltered and Keegan quickly fell on
his sword.
Normal service was resumed almost from the moment he walked into
Maine Road to take on the Manchester City challenge. They swept
to promotion as champions on a glut of goals and since then Keegan
has stabilized their position in the Premier League, a massive feat
at a club that had spent the previous 15 or 20 years yo-yoing from
one division to another, and all of that as the club has moved from
their spiritual, but decaying home of Maine Road to their superb
new stadium.
Keegan continues to get a rough ride from the press at times, a
great pity given that few individuals have done more to enrich English
football over the last 35 years. As much as anybody, Keegan put
entertainment value back at the top of the agenda of this country’s
domestic football. There could be no better tribute to a career
in the game than that.
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