Roy Keane has a certain reputation as a manager. He is said to be hugely demanding of his players, while it was also said he was not afraid to put his thoughts across to his players at times.
However, the Irishman does not necessarily agree with that summary. He has often said in the past that he was actually quite laid back as a manager.
Speaking at The Overlap Live alongside Gary Neville and Jamie Carragher, he even recalled how his first team talk at Sunderland was was ended up becoming very lighthearted due to the intervention of former Ireland striker David Connolly.
Keane revealed that while speaking with the players ahead of his managerial debut, he spent far too long discussing the opposition goalkeeper. That wouldn't have been too much of an issue in itself, if not for the fact that Connolly would inform him that the player in question had actually been sold a few weeks prior.
Believe it or not, I was quite relaxed when I was a manager. I was really quite relaxed.
I didn't lose it that many times with the players because, especially at Sunderland, we had a decent group of lads. We lost a lot of games but they always had a go, honestly that was all that ever interested me.
It was the same at United. For all that perception about me, I didn't do much shouting...
When you go into management, sometimes it's dead intense but you also need a light moment.
My first team talk at Sunderland, we played Derby County away. This was the first time I had spoken to a group of players. We're in a hotel near Derby, I'm speaking to the players and thinking 'I've got to get this right and win the players over'. You over-analyse things sometimes in your head.
I'm speaking about Derby and I go on about their goalkeeper for a bit long. I said 'he's not great on crosses, get into him, somebody nail him in the first few minutes', I kept going on.
There was a player in the background, David Connolly who was one of the strikers, who had his hand up down the back. I'm thinking 'he hardly needs the toilet'.
I keep going on and eventually I go 'Dave, what is it', you know this was my big moment.
Then he goes: 'You know that goalkeeper you keep going on about? Yeah, he was sold two weeks ago."
I said 'there you go, the scouts can't do their jobs properly'. Everyone was dead relaxed after it and we won 2-1. You can talk about team talks, but you need these light moments. You can win players over.
You could only imagine Keane's reaction when he heard that the player had left.
It certainly broke the ice with the group, with Sunderland going on to have an excellent season that ended with promotion to the Premier League.
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