Roy Keane hilariously blamed Gary Neville for his red card in the infamous challenge on Alfie Haaland.
Former Manchester United skipper Keane, was given his marching orders following a reckless studs-up challenge on the Norwegian during a Manchester derby in 2001.
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The pair had already clashed on multiple occasions during their Premier League careers but things took a turn for the worse when Haaland, father of Erling, verbally abused the Irishman whilst he writhed in pain with an Anterior Cruciate Ligament injury.
The incident occurred when Haaland had been tripped by Keane only for the United captain to come off worse during the Red Devils’ clash with Leeds at Elland Road in 1997.
Keane was in no mood to let Haaland’s jibes slide and when the pair came face-to-face again four-years later after Haaland’s move to Manchester City, the tough-tackling midfielder produced a knee-high horror challenge.
Speaking on The Overlap, Keane recalled the incident at Old Trafford and pointed the sensationally pointed the finger of blame at former United teammate Neville for his role in the referee’s decision.
“You didn’t help either running off to the linesman saying it’s only a yellow [card],” a smirking Keane explained.
“Gary ran over saying it’s only a yellow so when you say that to an official he’s going to go ‘well that must be a red’
Neville was left in stitches by Keane’s theory before replying: “So I’m at fault for your sending off?”
Keane, who was handed a five-match ban and £150,000 fine for the challenge, described the tackle on Haaland as ‘not a bad one’ and revealed he did not intend to cause injury.
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“I don’t think that tackle was that bad, “he added. “I know it looks bad. You know when a player does a somersault. I was never going to injure him with that tackle. You can never injure a player with that type of tackle.
“When you’ve played the game you know when someones trying to injure a player. It’s just when someone does a somersault it looks worse than what it was.
“It was a silly game, it was a rubbish game. We were all frustrated we’d just been knocked out of Europe a couple of days before it.
“I’d done my cruciate up at Leeds. Obviously, I tried to trip him and he was stood over me when I did my cruciate, it was a bad injury and he was saying some nasty things when I was injured. I thought well obviously we’ll meet again.”
