Keane places Ferguson on his football Mount Rushmore but insists he holds no grudges

Roy Keane has placed Sir Alex Ferguson on his personal football Mount Rushmore, selecting the former Manchester United manager alongside Diego Maradona, Brian Clough and Jack Charlton as the four most influential figures in the game — and delivered the pick with a wry admission that he is ‘not one to hold grudges’.

The comment carries weight given the history between the two men. Keane’s contract at Old Trafford was terminated in November 2005 following an explosive meeting with Ferguson and then-CEO David Gill, triggered by Keane’s notorious takedown of his United team-mates in a never-aired MUTV interview. The pair have not spoken since, and for the better part of two decades Keane has made little effort to disguise his bitterness.

Asked by ITV to construct his fictional Mount Rushmore of football, Keane did not shy away from including his estranged former boss. “Obviously, a manager I spent most of my time with, Alex Ferguson,” he said. “Still disappointed with the way he treated me at the end. But that’s life, I’m not one to hold grudges” — the last line delivered with a smile that suggested he was at least partly aware of the irony.

The tone marks a contrast with his more combative public statements in recent years. At an Off The Ball event in Dublin in 2019, Keane was unambiguous: “I wouldn’t forgive Ferguson. The media spin, how I apparently upset everybody, it was all nonsense.” He went on to challenge the widely held view of Ferguson as a masterful man-manager, citing what he saw as preferential treatment for Ferguson’s son Darren and the manner in which club legends Bryan Robson and Steve Bruce were shown the door.

“People talk about Ferguson’s man-management,” Keane said at the time. “Don’t be kidded on by all of it. I was at the club when Bryan Robson left, when Steve Bruce left, two brilliant servants for Manchester United. And I didn’t like the way they were treated.”

Keane spent 15 years at Old Trafford, captaining the club for eight of them and winning twelve major trophies. He remains one of the most decorated players in United’s history and widely regarded as the defining captain of the Ferguson era — which makes the unresolved rupture between them one of football’s more enduring personal feuds.

Ferguson, now 83 and recovering from a brain haemorrhage he suffered in 2018, has rarely addressed the falling-out publicly in the two decades since Keane’s departure. Whether Keane’s noticeably lighter touch signals any genuine thaw, or simply reflects the passage of time, remains to be seen.