“Are you f***ing kidding me?” – Tommy Tiernan was not having one Roy Keane answer during his interview

Patrick McCarry

As a father of six children, Tommy wasn’t having that answer from Roy!

Tommy Tiernan meeting Roy Keane for a pow-wow saw many Saturday night television viewers switching over to RTE to catch it all unfold. Along with some tense moments and Keane stare-downs, Tiernan gleaned a few nuggets from the former Manchester United and Ireland captain.

While not everyone was left enamoured with the interview, on The Tommy Tiernan Show, some revelled in what, at times, looked to be more a battle of wills than a chat between two popular public figures.

There were a couple of times when Tiernan’s questions, and admissions, got Keane to drop his guard – notably when he discussed Cork, nights out in Manchester and early courtship of his wife, Theresa.

On the couple’s first date, Keane conceded that he had messed up by not having much to say. “It went very badly,” he said.

“We met, I picked her up, and I’d met her [before] when I had a few drinks, so the chat was slightly different. We went for a spin and I said, ‘Do you fancy going to the pictures?’, because at least at the pictures you can just watch the movie, you don’t have to chat too much!

“And she said ‘No, I went last night with my friends’. So I said, ‘Do you want to go for a drink?’. She said, ‘No’.

“So I drove back to her car – and this was all in the space of 10, 15 minutes. She asked what I was doing and I said, ‘Well, you don’t want to go to the pictures, you don’t want to go for a drink. What else can we do?’ And she got out and I said, ‘I might see you next week?’ She said, ‘I don’t think so’ and slammed the door. That was it. That was our first date.”

Tommy Tiernan didn’t accept one Roy Keane answer

While Tommy Tiernan did get Roy Keane to revisit the Alfie Haaland red card incident, from 2001, he often strayed away from football chat to try get more personal recollections and observations from the Cork native.

As a father of six, Tiernan was eager to find how Keane – father to four daughters and a son – finds fatherhood. Their exchange went as follows:

TIERNAN: How many of your kids are girls?

KEANE: Four.

TIERNAN: And how’s that?

KEANE: Brilliant. No, it is. Brilliant. Really good kids. They’re good.

TIERNAN: What’s the hardest thing you’ve found about being a dad?

KEANE: (After a long pause, thinking) No…

TIERNAN: Are you f***ing kidding me, are ya?! Really?

Keane said there may come a time as his daughters get older and bring home boyfriends that it may be a different matter.

“I’d say it’d be fair intimidating meeting you now, in all fairness,” Tiernan joked. “Clint Eastwood in the kitchen!”

At the tail-end of the long chat, Tommy Tiernan described Roy Keane as, “One of the most incredible athletes this country has ever produced.” It was the tables turned. Keane wasn’t having that.

“But it’s easy to lead good players and good characters,” he contested. “Very, very easy.”

“It’s hard for you to take a compliment, is it?!” Tiernan shot back.

“You’re a born leader, anyway,” the host later said.

“No,” said Keane. “I don’t see it that way. I’ll disagree with you on that.”