During his first season as Sunderland manager, he took the club from twenty-third position in the Football League Championship to win the league and gain promotion to the Premier League. Three years on from the 1999 “Treble”, and fresh from Saipan, Keane was one of the biggest names in world football and his book garnered huge attention. bestselling memoir of Roy Keane, former captain of Manchester United and Ireland - co-written with Man Booker Prize-winner Roddy Doyle.

Brilliantly reviewed, Roy Keane's riveting, brutally honest autobiography has the potential to be one of the year's biggest paperback bestsellers. There is much that is defiant and enjoyable in their respective refusal to take a single step back in the face of the kind of over-managed pettiness that dogs the modern professional sportsman’s life – both men refuse to let the management decide when and where they can see their wives, for example. I wasn't disappointed as Roy took me on a "warts and all" journey through his childhood, his personal life and his controversial footballing career. The former midfielder also records an incident where he head-butted Peter Schmeichel, leaving the goalkeeper with a black eye.

He was poor in the transfer market and hopelessly optimistic (not like him) about the team's prospects at both Sunderland and Ipswich. The game was abandoned at half-time, while across the country, Clarke's parent club were getting whooped 3-0 by Luton Town. He was clever enough to realise that if he made it a prison camp, his main men wouldn’t come and if they didn’t turn up, we would not be as formidable as we were… It was important for the players to be social. Like Clough, he had his own way of doing things, but, even if only to a point, it worked for Ireland.

Overall the story is of a fascinating life of a determined figure whose achievements have been matched by controversies caused largely by the same determination and qualities that led to his success in the first place. I’m always wary of sports autobios that come out while the athlete still has an active career, but this is uniquely insightful and honest in ways that, say, Zlatan Ibrahimovic’s autobiography could never be. It can be fascinating to see how the same events or relationships are told differently with the benefit of more experience or changed dynamics. His tolerance for anything that didn’t meet his standards was incredibly low – yet slightly hypocritical when his own drinking had to be having a damaging impact on his own game. Despite the involvement of such an esteemed novelist and author of The Commitments, there is no doubt that the voice is Keane's .Our hero, close to godlike, even though he says it himself, wins through multiple battles and triumphs: he carries his brothers ( Darren Fletcher and the Nevilles in the case of Keane, Trotty and Harmy for KP) when they falter, he never once wavers in his fortitude or spirit, lends glory to all he touches, but is inevitably, at the last, misunderstood and betrayed by men who, in honour and courage, are barely fit to lace his Nikes. If I’d been this madman out for revenge, why would I have waited years for an opportunity to injure him?