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Kevin Keegan Born0000-00-00 |
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Bio Written by Monksie
Kevin Keegan replaced Joe Royle as Manchester City’s manager in May 2001 following the Blues’ relegation from the Premiership just a year after achieving promotion. Keegan had been out of football for almost year, having infamously resigned as England manager in the Wembley tunnel immediately after England lost the final game at the old stadium to Germany in September 2000. He was seen as a popular choice by the supporters, having transformed Newcastle United from Division One relegation certainties to Champions League qualifiers inside four years, and then promoting Fulham from Division Two but leaving them for the England job before the end of his only season at Craven Cottage.
Keegan immediately began reshaping a somewhat demoralised City squad into one for the front-runners for an automatic return to the top flight. He signed Stuart Pearce on a free transfer from Newcastle and installed the former England full-back as captain and then added Israeli international Eyal Berkovic for £2 million from Blackburn Rovers. Other lesser signings followed as City started the new campaign with a 3-0 Maine Road win over fellow promotion favourites Watford. The Blues soon reached the top of the table with a 4-2 win at Burnley but lost their way somewhat following injuries to Berkovic and striker Paulo Wanchope.
After losing 4-0 at home to Wimbledon and away at West Bromwich Albion, Keegan reached for the chequebook to recruit Ali Benarbia, who made an inspirational debut in a 3-0 home win over Birmingham City less than 24 hours after flying to England to complete his transfer. The little Algerian genius starred again in a 6-2 away hammering of Sheffield Wednesday as City started to justify their pre-season billing as favourites to go up.
Their progress was occasionally hampered by the odd draw or defeat, such as losing 2-1 at Portsmouth and Crystal Palace in November and December, but these were offset with wins over Gillingham and Grimsby Town. During the Christmas and New Year programme City followed this up with a 5-1 home thrashing of leaders Burnley and then a 3-1 win at Sheffield United which returned the Blues to the top of the table in August. They remained unbeaten in the League until a 2-1 away loss at Wimbledon, but dropped only five more points for the rest of the season after losing at relegated Stockport County and drawing at Rotherham United. At one point in February City trailed Wolves by eight points but, due to having progressed to the fifth round of the F.A. Cup, they built up a number of games in hand and, once they caught up on the backlog of fixtures, they stormed to the Championship, eventually being promoted without actually kicking a ball by Wolves’ defeat at Millwall before hammering Barnsley 5-1 at home the next day to seal the title. Shaun Goater finished as the division’s top scorer with Darren Huckerby not far behind him. Chinese international captain Jihai Sun had joined and Jon Macken had been signed for £5 million from Preston North End after scoring against City in both league encounters and he chipped in with a few goals towards the end of the season. City finished with 99 points and 108 league goals, scoring a total of 124 goals in all competitions. Had Pearce not missed a last-minute penalty in the final game at home to Portsmouth, City would have set a new all-time club scoring record of 109 league goals in a season. Along the way fans’ favourite Paul Dickov was sold to Leicester City but Cameroon central defender Lucien Mettomo and Danish left-back Niclas Jensen arrived and paid no small contribution to the promotion. Also, Shaun Wright-Phillips scored his first senior goals for the club and gave early warning of the talent clubs would be coveting within a year or so. Pearce retired at the age of 38, explaining that he could not continue for the next season since “I’d only embarrass myself in the Premier League”, with only the second championship medal of any kind during his playing career either as a professional or amateur. He joined the Blues’ coaching staff on a rolling 6-month contract.
With the job of getting the Blues back into the Premiership at the first attempt emphatically completed, Keegan set about rebuilding City for their return to the top flight in what was to be the club’s 80th and last season at Maine Road. His brief was that, a year later, City must start life at their new City of Manchester Stadium as a Premiership club. He signed ex-United goalkeeper Peter Schmeichel before the end of the Division One season and shattered the club’s transfer fee by recruiting Nicolas Anelka from Paris St Germain for a cool £13 million. Newcastle United failed to offer on-loan French central defender Sylvain Distin acceptable terms and Keegan paid £4 million to bring him to Manchester. Cameroon international Marc Vivien Foé also arrived on a year’s loan from FC Lyon. The Blues lost 3-0 at Leeds United on the opening day of the season, but all present agreed that the final scoreline flattered the home side. Darren Huckerby scored the winner in the first home game, a win over his former club Newcastle, and Anelka contributed his first goals for the club in a 3-1 win over Everton a week later.
City blew hot and cold and even went almost a month without scoring as Chelsea and Liverpool - courtesy of a Michael Owen hat-trick - won 3-0 apiece at Maine Road. Suddenly the doubts over whether the Blues could survive in the top flight surfaced but they answered them with wins at home to Bolton Wanderers and away at Birmingham City and West Brom before the big one: the final league derby match at Maine Road against Manchester United. Shorn of central defenders Steve Howey and Distin during the midweek League Cup defeat oat Wigan Athletic, City faced the Reds with a makeshift central pairing of Richard Dunne and Lucien Mettomo. Benarbia was by now a peripheral figure who rarely started matches, but Eyal Berkovic continued to pull the strings in midfield, and never so effectively as in the Blues’# 3-1 win over their local neighbours. Anelka opened the scoring with Goater adding two, the first after being gifted the ball by United’s captain for the day Gary Neville and the second after an incisive move seeing Berkovic’s measured pass leaving Goater with just the ‘keeper to beat and silence the travelling support behind the goal.
Typically, City followed the euphoric destruction of United with a tame 1-0 home defeat by Charlton Athletic a week later, their infamous inconsistency still haunting them. Foé grabbed his first goals for the club as they came back from two down to grab a point at Charlton a month later but a 3-2home defeat by Spurs at Maine Road set the Blues back again. Foé (2) and Benarbia saw City beat Aston Villa on Boxing Day and by now it was evident that City still had enough resources to stay up. Following a 1-0 loss to Liverpool in the third round of the F.A Cup Keegan went back into the market as the newly-enforced transfer window reopened in January, agreeing to bring Leeds’ Robbie Fowler for £7 million. The deal initially fell through but, following a restructuring of the payments and a personal visit by the manager to Fowler’s Merseyside home the ex-Anfield star signed at the second time of asking. This just a couple of weeks after Fowler had been warmly applauded onto the field as a second-half sub for Leeds at Maine Road as the Blues won 2-1, mainly thanks to an absolute screamer from Jensen in the second half.
February was a torrid month for the Blues as they lost 5-1 at home to championship contenders Arsenal, going 4-0 down in less than half an hour a further 5-0 pasting was received at Chelsea. Worse still, a poor performance in a shock 2-1 home defeat by relegation strugglers West Brom left any outside chances of European qualification in tatters. Easter arrived and City pulled off a surprise 2-0 win at Spurs, scoring both goals inside the opening six minutes, and repeated their 3-0 December win over already-relegated Sunderland with an Easter Monday win by the same score, Fowler adding only his second City goal to Foé’s brace. As the season drew to a close the Blues consolidated a top-half finish on their Premiership return by coming from behind to win 2-1 at Liverpool courtesy of Nicolas Anelka’s finish after a superb one-touch move, Anelka’s late penalty and an amazing second-half Schmeichel save when he tipped a fierce shot onto the bar, lost his footing but somehow caught the ball as it dropped down on the goal-line. All that was left was a celebratory goodbye in the last-ever City match at Maine Road. Players and managers from the 1950s onwards performed perimeter walks on the pitch before kick-off but the Blues failed to offer a decent showing, losing 1-0 to Southampton with Shaun Goater skippering City on his last appearance for the club, receiving a tumultuous standing ovation as he was substituted in the second-half. The result was for once incidental however as the occasion seemed to matter more.
City moved into their new City of Manchester Stadium home, part of the SportCity complex in the recently-created Eastlands part of the city. The ground had been converted from its 40,000 capacity as the main stadium for the 2002 Commonwealth Games at a cost of £20 million to the club, who were to lease it for 250 years after which time it will pass into the club’s ownership. More restructuring of the squad took place, but with the huge sum already paid for the stadium’s conversion Keegan had a significantly smaller transfer budget than the year before. Goater joined Reading on a free transfer but the summer was marred by the untimely death of Marc Vivien Foé during a Confederations Cup match in July from an undiagnosed vascular condition. Although his City loan had expired and Portsmouth appeared keen to sign him, it had been widely expected that Foé would sign a permanent contract with City for the coming season. As if this were not enough, Ali Benarbia announced his retirement from football - only to sign a contract with Qatari club Al-Rayyan a couple of weeks later - and Eyal Berkovic slapped in a transfer request barley two weeks before the start of the season. Schmeichel had retired so City needed to recruit an experienced goalkeeper and at least two midfielders, on the assumption that Berkovic would leave before the closure of the transfer window at the end of August. David Seaman joined on a free transfer from Arsenal, ex-German World Cup left-back Michael Tarnat came to Manchester on a Bosman while Keegan spent £2 million recruiting Trevor Sinclair from West Ham United and French midfielder Antoine Sibierski from Lyon.
Following Foé’s death there was good news for City: each season UEFA offered a UEFA Cup place to the best-placed team of the country winning the Fair Play League. England had won the honour for the first time in many years and, since the top five English clubs in the national Fair Play League had already qualified for European competition, the sixth-placed English club - i.e. City - were invited to play in the competition for the coming season, entering at the second Preliminary Qualifying round. They were paired with League of Wales side Total Network Solutions (TNS) with the first game in Manchester. Thus, their first competitive match at their new home would be against an amateur side from Llansantffraid in mid Wales.
Keegan set about replacing those who would no longer be at the club for the coming season. League runners-up Arsenal had released their former England goalkeeper David Seaman, who joined the Blues on a one-year contract. Former Germany left-back Michael Tarnat also signed a one-year on a free transfer while £2.5 million was paid to West Ham United for utility midfielder Trevor Sinclair. French midfielder Antoine Sibierski arrived from Racing Lens and, with Paulo Wanchope due to return after missing the entire 2002-2003 season through injury, it was felt that City had now compensated for the loss of the players who had moved on over the summer.
Nicolas Anelka scored the first goal at the new stadium in a 2-1 friendly win over Barcelona a week before the season started and City followed that up with a 5-0 hammering of TNS at home. They beat Charlton 3-0 at the Valley in the first league fixture and hopes rose that at last, with home crowds of nearly 50,000, consolidation in the top flight, European progress assured and a great start to the campaign in hand, City could at last kick on and make a meaningful impact after several years of floundering around the lower divisions. They actually led the table for twenty-four hours after only three games but then struggled to win matches as a drift towards mid-able set in. Keegan responded by signing midfielders Claudio Reyna and Steve McManaman - the latter on a free transfer from real Madrid - in an effort to bolster the squad further. They made their débuts in the club’s first home league win, 4-1 against Aston Villa in which Anelka grabbed a hat-trick. This was followed up with a 6-2 slaughter of Bolton Wanderers at home as captain Distin scored his first City goal, Anelka and Wright-Phillips grabbed a pair each but the latter was sent off. With the so-called “home ground jinx” conquered (Belgian club KS Lokeren being overcome 4-2 in Europe with narrow home and away wins) City looked set for a great season once again. However, their 2-0 November win at Southampton was to be their last in all competitions for three months as a losing and scoreless league run surrounded a pallid exit from Europe at the hands of Polish lower league side Groclin Dyskobolia on the away goals rule. David Seaman had struggled in goal and retired after sustaining a serious shoulder injury in a 4-2 defeat at Portsmouth. With only teenagers Kevin Stuhr Ellegaard and Kasper Schmeichel available - Nicky Weaver was still injured - Keegan moved swiftly in the transfer market to capture England ‘keeper David James and Iceland’s no.1 Arne Gautur Arason as his deputy. James was Cup-tied for the F.A. Cup games in which Arason deputised splendidly. By now Eyal Berkovic - who had played in less than half a dozen games - finally got his wish to leave City as he joined Portsmouth for a nominal fee.
Although losing 3-1 at Tottenham in the League Cup shortly before Christmas City reached the fifth round of the F.A Cup, drawing 2-2 at home to Leicester before running out 3-1 winners in the replay with Jon Macken scoring his first City goal as a top-flight player. They followed this up with arguably the greatest F.A Cup comeback of all time in a fourth round replay at Spurs. The home side took the lead in the first two minutes, star striker Anelka went off injured and Spurs raced into a 3-0 half-time lead. Worse followed as Joey Barton received a second yellow card for dissent as the teams left the field for the break but amazingly the Blues roared back as Distin, Bosvelt, Wright-Phillips and Macken struck to set up a St Valentine’s Day visit to Old Trafford in the next round. It should be noted that the result came on the end of an 18-match winless streak in the league but the Cup adventure ended in the derby as United won 4-2 after losing Gary Neville to a first-half red card.
It was in another local derby that the winless run came to a dramatic end however. Bolton Wanderers took an early lead but two Fowler goals and an own goal secured three precious points for the now relegation-haunted Blues. Sweet revenge for the two Old Trafford defeats was gained in a 4-1 win in the first-ever derby match at the City of Manchester Stadium, effectively ending the Reds’ fading interest in the title race., and City’s first home win since the Bolton demolition the previous October. They continued to struggle though and almost lost at home again when Wolves took a 2-0 home lead but a Wright-Phillips injury time equaliser saved the Blues. However, a week later Southampton were convincing 3-1 winners as the possibility of City’s first season at their new home ending in relegation now seemed a real prospect. A draw at Leicester - in which former Blue hero Paul Dickov had a last-minute penalty saved by David James - preceded a 1-0 win over Newcastle which effectively saved City from the drop. A full house on the last day saw the Blues end their first season at their new home with a 5-1 hammering of Everton. Amazingly, during his post-match interview Keegan announced (unprompted) that he would be retiring from football after the next two years, finishing as Manchester City’s manager in May 2006.
Changes were made during the close season. Tarnat and Gerard Wiekens left at the end of their contracts and, to the surprise of many, Wanchope was sold to Malaga for £500,000 after another year plagued by injuries. Arason also left, needing first-team football in order to maintain his position as Iceland’s first-choice ‘keeper. The City of Manchester Stadium staged an international mini-tournament in June as part of England’s final preparations for Euro 2004, the home side drawing 1-1 against Japan before hammering Iceland - with Arason in goal - 6-1. Keegan set about making further changes to the squad, bringing Belgian international ‘keeper Gert de Vlieger to cover for James, and two new full-backs, Ben Thatcher from Millwall and Danny Mils from Leeds, after a season on loan at Midldesbrough. The luckless de Vlieger suffered a serious injury during a 3-1 friendly win at Wolves and Dutch ‘keeper Ronald Waterreus was recruited on a short-term loan. Tellingly, Arthur Cox retired as Keegan’s assistant and mentor, and Stuart Pearce stepped up as a full-time coach for the first team, with responsibility on defensive training and tactics.
With the previous season’s poor league showing still fresh in the memory City’s following viewed the coming campaign with considerably less optimism than the year before, and a single point from the first three games seemed to support the pessimism. City soon turned matters around with a thumping 4-0 home win over Charlton and a 2-1 victory at Crystal Palace. The usual inconsistency set in but it had been noted that bolstered by the new full-backs and the excellent form of defensive pairing Richard Dunne and Sylvain Distin, City were at least picking up draws in games they might have been expected to lose, and nowhere was this more evident than in a goalless Old Trafford derby when Dunne was the star of a complete rearguard action. The Blues became the first - and eventually only - side to beat eventual champions Chelsea with Nicolas Anelka’s penalty the only goal of the game. Even then the injury jinx struck yet again as Trevor Sinclair and Sun Jihai fell victim to serious injuries which ended their season. With the transfer window closed and no experienced replacements available Keegan finally turned to his young reserve squad as defenders Stephen Jordan and Nedum Onouha plus Irish midfielder Willo Flood came in. Flood scored a cracking goal in the 1-1 home draw with Norwich City but fell out of favour again.
A fluke Dunne own goal cost the Blues two points on Boxing Day but they beat Southampton and Crystal Palace at home to start the New Year in the top half of the table. Hopes of progress in the F.A. Cup were dashed by a 1-0 third round defeat at Oldham and now serious questions were being asked of the team and its manager. Another Wright-Phillips screamer earned a point at Arsenal and another was gained after a goalless draw at Chelsea as the champions elect laid siege to the City goal, superbly defended by Dunne and James in particular. City ended the season as the only team to defeat the champions and also the only side not to concede a goal to them, but you wouldn’t have thought so judging by their abject display in a 2-0 loss at West Brom, in which the referee mysteriously disallowed Dunne’s missile of a free-kick.
With the 4-1 derby win of a year ago still fresh in the memory the visit of United was eagerly anticipated and it seemed third consecutive home win over the Reds was on the cards as City dominated the first half-hour, with Steve McManaman missing a great opportunity with a header. Their luck deserted them after the hour though as Wayne Rooney benefited from two dreadful deflections off Dunne to score the only goals of the game. Another poor showing appeared to be on offer at Norwich as the home side scored twice in the first twenty minutes, but City - aided by a second-half sending-off - nabbed all three points in the dying moments courtesy of a scuffed Robbie Fowler shot. By now top scorer Anelka had been sold to Fenerbache for £7 million and former Dutch international Kiki Musampa, a product of the famous Ajax youth system of the mid-1990s, joined on loan until the end of the season.
Once again the Blues were injury-ravaged for the visit of Bolton on a Monday night fixture and Keegan turned to the youngsters once again. Flood came back in to cover for the absence of the injured Wright-Phillips whose younger brother Bradley was now a regular on the substitutes’ bench having scored on his début during a 3-2 defeat at Midldesbrough in early December. City never got going in the game as Bolton - hoping to finish high enough in the table for European qualification for the first time in their history - made the mort of their physical and direct no-nonsense approach to grab a scruffy 1-0 win. The Blues had failed to register a meaningful shot at goal all night and not even the relatively bright showing of substitute Lee Croft could lift the fans’ mood as the knives were by now well and truly out for Keegan, who cut a worried and disconsolate figure on the touchline, seemingly incapable of inspiring his team to at least match their opponents for effort.
Four days after the Bolton defeat news leaked out that Keegan was to part company with City after less than four years in charge. Whether he resigned or was dismissed was never confirmed and so far he has remained silent since leaving the club. Once again, as with Newcastle and England, the man known as Mighty Mouse during his playing career had made an excellent start as manager at a new club, only for the relative success to fade leaving the club in question to start again. He had gained a reputation as a charismatic and inspirational manager who adopted a gung-ho “let’s get at ‘em from the trenches” attitude but had little tactical acumen with which to back it up. During the last two years or so of his Manchester City career he had spent a fortune on players such as Fowler, Tarnat, Sibierski, Reyna, Seaman and McManaman who had failed to live up to the expectations he had created for them. When Eyal Berkovic left in January 2004 he claimed that the real reason why City were struggling was because Keegan “had lost the dressing room” and that the players no longer believed in their manager. At the time the Israeli’s comments were seen as sour grapes, given that he had fallen out of favour with the man who had after all brought him to the club, but subsequent interviews with certain experienced players in the time since Keegan’s departure would seem to support Berkovic’s views.
Whatever the reason for his inability to take City further along the road to recovery after years of underachievement, it has to be said that Keegan gave City fans a taste of the good old days during the Division One championship as the Blues carried all before them, playing a brand of fast, passing and attacking football reminiscent of the club’s heyday of the late 60s and early 70s under Joe Mercer and Malcolm Allison. He also produced two convincing derby match wins after almost a decade of continual failure in the fixture, including a win in the last-ever Maine Road derby. The last two seasons of his reign will obviously be viewed as relative failure by observers, but for the first two City fans everywhere will be more than grateful. Perhaps when the dust has settled and the wounds have healed Keegan will be guest of honour at a home game in the future. I would certainly say that overall, for keeping us in the top flight for at least four years, he definitely deserves it.
Kevin Keegan replaced Joe Royle as Manchester City’s manager in May 2001 following the Blues’ relegation from the Premiership just a year after achieving promotion. Keegan had been out of football for almost year, having infamously resigned as England manager in the Wembley tunnel immediately after England lost the final game at the old stadium to Germany in September 2000. He was seen as a popular choice by the supporters, having transformed Newcastle United from Division One relegation certainties to Champions League qualifiers inside four years, and then promoting Fulham from Division Two but leaving them for the England job before the end of his only season at Craven Cottage.
Keegan immediately began reshaping a somewhat demoralised City squad into one for the front-runners for an automatic return to the top flight. He signed Stuart Pearce on a free transfer from Newcastle and installed the former England full-back as captain and then added Israeli international Eyal Berkovic for £2 million from Blackburn Rovers. Other lesser signings followed as City started the new campaign with a 3-0 Maine Road win over fellow promotion favourites Watford. The Blues soon reached the top of the table with a 4-2 win at Burnley but lost their way somewhat following injuries to Berkovic and striker Paulo Wanchope.
After losing 4-0 at home to Wimbledon and away at West Bromwich Albion, Keegan reached for the chequebook to recruit Ali Benarbia, who made an inspirational debut in a 3-0 home win over Birmingham City less than 24 hours after flying to England to complete his transfer. The little Algerian genius starred again in a 6-2 away hammering of Sheffield Wednesday as City started to justify their pre-season billing as favourites to go up.
Their progress was occasionally hampered by the odd draw or defeat, such as losing 2-1 at Portsmouth and Crystal Palace in November and December, but these were offset with wins over Gillingham and Grimsby Town. During the Christmas and New Year programme City followed this up with a 5-1 home thrashing of leaders Burnley and then a 3-1 win at Sheffield United which returned the Blues to the top of the table in August. They remained unbeaten in the League until a 2-1 away loss at Wimbledon, but dropped only five more points for the rest of the season after losing at relegated Stockport County and drawing at Rotherham United. At one point in February City trailed Wolves by eight points but, due to having progressed to the fifth round of the F.A. Cup, they built up a number of games in hand and, once they caught up on the backlog of fixtures, they stormed to the Championship, eventually being promoted without actually kicking a ball by Wolves’ defeat at Millwall before hammering Barnsley 5-1 at home the next day to seal the title. Shaun Goater finished as the division’s top scorer with Darren Huckerby not far behind him. Chinese international captain Jihai Sun had joined and Jon Macken had been signed for £5 million from Preston North End after scoring against City in both league encounters and he chipped in with a few goals towards the end of the season. City finished with 99 points and 108 league goals, scoring a total of 124 goals in all competitions. Had Pearce not missed a last-minute penalty in the final game at home to Portsmouth, City would have set a new all-time club scoring record of 109 league goals in a season. Along the way fans’ favourite Paul Dickov was sold to Leicester City but Cameroon central defender Lucien Mettomo and Danish left-back Niclas Jensen arrived and paid no small contribution to the promotion. Also, Shaun Wright-Phillips scored his first senior goals for the club and gave early warning of the talent clubs would be coveting within a year or so. Pearce retired at the age of 38, explaining that he could not continue for the next season since “I’d only embarrass myself in the Premier League”, with only the second championship medal of any kind during his playing career either as a professional or amateur. He joined the Blues’ coaching staff on a rolling 6-month contract.
With the job of getting the Blues back into the Premiership at the first attempt emphatically completed, Keegan set about rebuilding City for their return to the top flight in what was to be the club’s 80th and last season at Maine Road. His brief was that, a year later, City must start life at their new City of Manchester Stadium as a Premiership club. He signed ex-United goalkeeper Peter Schmeichel before the end of the Division One season and shattered the club’s transfer fee by recruiting Nicolas Anelka from Paris St Germain for a cool £13 million. Newcastle United failed to offer on-loan French central defender Sylvain Distin acceptable terms and Keegan paid £4 million to bring him to Manchester. Cameroon international Marc Vivien Foé also arrived on a year’s loan from FC Lyon. The Blues lost 3-0 at Leeds United on the opening day of the season, but all present agreed that the final scoreline flattered the home side. Darren Huckerby scored the winner in the first home game, a win over his former club Newcastle, and Anelka contributed his first goals for the club in a 3-1 win over Everton a week later.
City blew hot and cold and even went almost a month without scoring as Chelsea and Liverpool - courtesy of a Michael Owen hat-trick - won 3-0 apiece at Maine Road. Suddenly the doubts over whether the Blues could survive in the top flight surfaced but they answered them with wins at home to Bolton Wanderers and away at Birmingham City and West Brom before the big one: the final league derby match at Maine Road against Manchester United. Shorn of central defenders Steve Howey and Distin during the midweek League Cup defeat oat Wigan Athletic, City faced the Reds with a makeshift central pairing of Richard Dunne and Lucien Mettomo. Benarbia was by now a peripheral figure who rarely started matches, but Eyal Berkovic continued to pull the strings in midfield, and never so effectively as in the Blues’# 3-1 win over their local neighbours. Anelka opened the scoring with Goater adding two, the first after being gifted the ball by United’s captain for the day Gary Neville and the second after an incisive move seeing Berkovic’s measured pass leaving Goater with just the ‘keeper to beat and silence the travelling support behind the goal.
Typically, City followed the euphoric destruction of United with a tame 1-0 home defeat by Charlton Athletic a week later, their infamous inconsistency still haunting them. Foé grabbed his first goals for the club as they came back from two down to grab a point at Charlton a month later but a 3-2home defeat by Spurs at Maine Road set the Blues back again. Foé (2) and Benarbia saw City beat Aston Villa on Boxing Day and by now it was evident that City still had enough resources to stay up. Following a 1-0 loss to Liverpool in the third round of the F.A Cup Keegan went back into the market as the newly-enforced transfer window reopened in January, agreeing to bring Leeds’ Robbie Fowler for £7 million. The deal initially fell through but, following a restructuring of the payments and a personal visit by the manager to Fowler’s Merseyside home the ex-Anfield star signed at the second time of asking. This just a couple of weeks after Fowler had been warmly applauded onto the field as a second-half sub for Leeds at Maine Road as the Blues won 2-1, mainly thanks to an absolute screamer from Jensen in the second half.
February was a torrid month for the Blues as they lost 5-1 at home to championship contenders Arsenal, going 4-0 down in less than half an hour a further 5-0 pasting was received at Chelsea. Worse still, a poor performance in a shock 2-1 home defeat by relegation strugglers West Brom left any outside chances of European qualification in tatters. Easter arrived and City pulled off a surprise 2-0 win at Spurs, scoring both goals inside the opening six minutes, and repeated their 3-0 December win over already-relegated Sunderland with an Easter Monday win by the same score, Fowler adding only his second City goal to Foé’s brace. As the season drew to a close the Blues consolidated a top-half finish on their Premiership return by coming from behind to win 2-1 at Liverpool courtesy of Nicolas Anelka’s finish after a superb one-touch move, Anelka’s late penalty and an amazing second-half Schmeichel save when he tipped a fierce shot onto the bar, lost his footing but somehow caught the ball as it dropped down on the goal-line. All that was left was a celebratory goodbye in the last-ever City match at Maine Road. Players and managers from the 1950s onwards performed perimeter walks on the pitch before kick-off but the Blues failed to offer a decent showing, losing 1-0 to Southampton with Shaun Goater skippering City on his last appearance for the club, receiving a tumultuous standing ovation as he was substituted in the second-half. The result was for once incidental however as the occasion seemed to matter more.
City moved into their new City of Manchester Stadium home, part of the SportCity complex in the recently-created Eastlands part of the city. The ground had been converted from its 40,000 capacity as the main stadium for the 2002 Commonwealth Games at a cost of £20 million to the club, who were to lease it for 250 years after which time it will pass into the club’s ownership. More restructuring of the squad took place, but with the huge sum already paid for the stadium’s conversion Keegan had a significantly smaller transfer budget than the year before. Goater joined Reading on a free transfer but the summer was marred by the untimely death of Marc Vivien Foé during a Confederations Cup match in July from an undiagnosed vascular condition. Although his City loan had expired and Portsmouth appeared keen to sign him, it had been widely expected that Foé would sign a permanent contract with City for the coming season. As if this were not enough, Ali Benarbia announced his retirement from football - only to sign a contract with Qatari club Al-Rayyan a couple of weeks later - and Eyal Berkovic slapped in a transfer request barley two weeks before the start of the season. Schmeichel had retired so City needed to recruit an experienced goalkeeper and at least two midfielders, on the assumption that Berkovic would leave before the closure of the transfer window at the end of August. David Seaman joined on a free transfer from Arsenal, ex-German World Cup left-back Michael Tarnat came to Manchester on a Bosman while Keegan spent £2 million recruiting Trevor Sinclair from West Ham United and French midfielder Antoine Sibierski from Lyon.
Following Foé’s death there was good news for City: each season UEFA offered a UEFA Cup place to the best-placed team of the country winning the Fair Play League. England had won the honour for the first time in many years and, since the top five English clubs in the national Fair Play League had already qualified for European competition, the sixth-placed English club - i.e. City - were invited to play in the competition for the coming season, entering at the second Preliminary Qualifying round. They were paired with League of Wales side Total Network Solutions (TNS) with the first game in Manchester. Thus, their first competitive match at their new home would be against an amateur side from Llansantffraid in mid Wales.
Keegan set about replacing those who would no longer be at the club for the coming season. League runners-up Arsenal had released their former England goalkeeper David Seaman, who joined the Blues on a one-year contract. Former Germany left-back Michael Tarnat also signed a one-year on a free transfer while £2.5 million was paid to West Ham United for utility midfielder Trevor Sinclair. French midfielder Antoine Sibierski arrived from Racing Lens and, with Paulo Wanchope due to return after missing the entire 2002-2003 season through injury, it was felt that City had now compensated for the loss of the players who had moved on over the summer.
Nicolas Anelka scored the first goal at the new stadium in a 2-1 friendly win over Barcelona a week before the season started and City followed that up with a 5-0 hammering of TNS at home. They beat Charlton 3-0 at the Valley in the first league fixture and hopes rose that at last, with home crowds of nearly 50,000, consolidation in the top flight, European progress assured and a great start to the campaign in hand, City could at last kick on and make a meaningful impact after several years of floundering around the lower divisions. They actually led the table for twenty-four hours after only three games but then struggled to win matches as a drift towards mid-able set in. Keegan responded by signing midfielders Claudio Reyna and Steve McManaman - the latter on a free transfer from real Madrid - in an effort to bolster the squad further. They made their débuts in the club’s first home league win, 4-1 against Aston Villa in which Anelka grabbed a hat-trick. This was followed up with a 6-2 slaughter of Bolton Wanderers at home as captain Distin scored his first City goal, Anelka and Wright-Phillips grabbed a pair each but the latter was sent off. With the so-called “home ground jinx” conquered (Belgian club KS Lokeren being overcome 4-2 in Europe with narrow home and away wins) City looked set for a great season once again. However, their 2-0 November win at Southampton was to be their last in all competitions for three months as a losing and scoreless league run surrounded a pallid exit from Europe at the hands of Polish lower league side Groclin Dyskobolia on the away goals rule. David Seaman had struggled in goal and retired after sustaining a serious shoulder injury in a 4-2 defeat at Portsmouth. With only teenagers Kevin Stuhr Ellegaard and Kasper Schmeichel available - Nicky Weaver was still injured - Keegan moved swiftly in the transfer market to capture England ‘keeper David James and Iceland’s no.1 Arne Gautur Arason as his deputy. James was Cup-tied for the F.A. Cup games in which Arason deputised splendidly. By now Eyal Berkovic - who had played in less than half a dozen games - finally got his wish to leave City as he joined Portsmouth for a nominal fee.
Although losing 3-1 at Tottenham in the League Cup shortly before Christmas City reached the fifth round of the F.A Cup, drawing 2-2 at home to Leicester before running out 3-1 winners in the replay with Jon Macken scoring his first City goal as a top-flight player. They followed this up with arguably the greatest F.A Cup comeback of all time in a fourth round replay at Spurs. The home side took the lead in the first two minutes, star striker Anelka went off injured and Spurs raced into a 3-0 half-time lead. Worse followed as Joey Barton received a second yellow card for dissent as the teams left the field for the break but amazingly the Blues roared back as Distin, Bosvelt, Wright-Phillips and Macken struck to set up a St Valentine’s Day visit to Old Trafford in the next round. It should be noted that the result came on the end of an 18-match winless streak in the league but the Cup adventure ended in the derby as United won 4-2 after losing Gary Neville to a first-half red card.
It was in another local derby that the winless run came to a dramatic end however. Bolton Wanderers took an early lead but two Fowler goals and an own goal secured three precious points for the now relegation-haunted Blues. Sweet revenge for the two Old Trafford defeats was gained in a 4-1 win in the first-ever derby match at the City of Manchester Stadium, effectively ending the Reds’ fading interest in the title race., and City’s first home win since the Bolton demolition the previous October. They continued to struggle though and almost lost at home again when Wolves took a 2-0 home lead but a Wright-Phillips injury time equaliser saved the Blues. However, a week later Southampton were convincing 3-1 winners as the possibility of City’s first season at their new home ending in relegation now seemed a real prospect. A draw at Leicester - in which former Blue hero Paul Dickov had a last-minute penalty saved by David James - preceded a 1-0 win over Newcastle which effectively saved City from the drop. A full house on the last day saw the Blues end their first season at their new home with a 5-1 hammering of Everton. Amazingly, during his post-match interview Keegan announced (unprompted) that he would be retiring from football after the next two years, finishing as Manchester City’s manager in May 2006.
Changes were made during the close season. Tarnat and Gerard Wiekens left at the end of their contracts and, to the surprise of many, Wanchope was sold to Malaga for £500,000 after another year plagued by injuries. Arason also left, needing first-team football in order to maintain his position as Iceland’s first-choice ‘keeper. The City of Manchester Stadium staged an international mini-tournament in June as part of England’s final preparations for Euro 2004, the home side drawing 1-1 against Japan before hammering Iceland - with Arason in goal - 6-1. Keegan set about making further changes to the squad, bringing Belgian international ‘keeper Gert de Vlieger to cover for James, and two new full-backs, Ben Thatcher from Millwall and Danny Mils from Leeds, after a season on loan at Midldesbrough. The luckless de Vlieger suffered a serious injury during a 3-1 friendly win at Wolves and Dutch ‘keeper Ronald Waterreus was recruited on a short-term loan. Tellingly, Arthur Cox retired as Keegan’s assistant and mentor, and Stuart Pearce stepped up as a full-time coach for the first team, with responsibility on defensive training and tactics.
With the previous season’s poor league showing still fresh in the memory City’s following viewed the coming campaign with considerably less optimism than the year before, and a single point from the first three games seemed to support the pessimism. City soon turned matters around with a thumping 4-0 home win over Charlton and a 2-1 victory at Crystal Palace. The usual inconsistency set in but it had been noted that bolstered by the new full-backs and the excellent form of defensive pairing Richard Dunne and Sylvain Distin, City were at least picking up draws in games they might have been expected to lose, and nowhere was this more evident than in a goalless Old Trafford derby when Dunne was the star of a complete rearguard action. The Blues became the first - and eventually only - side to beat eventual champions Chelsea with Nicolas Anelka’s penalty the only goal of the game. Even then the injury jinx struck yet again as Trevor Sinclair and Sun Jihai fell victim to serious injuries which ended their season. With the transfer window closed and no experienced replacements available Keegan finally turned to his young reserve squad as defenders Stephen Jordan and Nedum Onouha plus Irish midfielder Willo Flood came in. Flood scored a cracking goal in the 1-1 home draw with Norwich City but fell out of favour again.
A fluke Dunne own goal cost the Blues two points on Boxing Day but they beat Southampton and Crystal Palace at home to start the New Year in the top half of the table. Hopes of progress in the F.A. Cup were dashed by a 1-0 third round defeat at Oldham and now serious questions were being asked of the team and its manager. Another Wright-Phillips screamer earned a point at Arsenal and another was gained after a goalless draw at Chelsea as the champions elect laid siege to the City goal, superbly defended by Dunne and James in particular. City ended the season as the only team to defeat the champions and also the only side not to concede a goal to them, but you wouldn’t have thought so judging by their abject display in a 2-0 loss at West Brom, in which the referee mysteriously disallowed Dunne’s missile of a free-kick.
With the 4-1 derby win of a year ago still fresh in the memory the visit of United was eagerly anticipated and it seemed third consecutive home win over the Reds was on the cards as City dominated the first half-hour, with Steve McManaman missing a great opportunity with a header. Their luck deserted them after the hour though as Wayne Rooney benefited from two dreadful deflections off Dunne to score the only goals of the game. Another poor showing appeared to be on offer at Norwich as the home side scored twice in the first twenty minutes, but City - aided by a second-half sending-off - nabbed all three points in the dying moments courtesy of a scuffed Robbie Fowler shot. By now top scorer Anelka had been sold to Fenerbache for £7 million and former Dutch international Kiki Musampa, a product of the famous Ajax youth system of the mid-1990s, joined on loan until the end of the season.
Once again the Blues were injury-ravaged for the visit of Bolton on a Monday night fixture and Keegan turned to the youngsters once again. Flood came back in to cover for the absence of the injured Wright-Phillips whose younger brother Bradley was now a regular on the substitutes’ bench having scored on his début during a 3-2 defeat at Midldesbrough in early December. City never got going in the game as Bolton - hoping to finish high enough in the table for European qualification for the first time in their history - made the mort of their physical and direct no-nonsense approach to grab a scruffy 1-0 win. The Blues had failed to register a meaningful shot at goal all night and not even the relatively bright showing of substitute Lee Croft could lift the fans’ mood as the knives were by now well and truly out for Keegan, who cut a worried and disconsolate figure on the touchline, seemingly incapable of inspiring his team to at least match their opponents for effort.
Four days after the Bolton defeat news leaked out that Keegan was to part company with City after less than four years in charge. Whether he resigned or was dismissed was never confirmed and so far he has remained silent since leaving the club. Once again, as with Newcastle and England, the man known as Mighty Mouse during his playing career had made an excellent start as manager at a new club, only for the relative success to fade leaving the club in question to start again. He had gained a reputation as a charismatic and inspirational manager who adopted a gung-ho “let’s get at ‘em from the trenches” attitude but had little tactical acumen with which to back it up. During the last two years or so of his Manchester City career he had spent a fortune on players such as Fowler, Tarnat, Sibierski, Reyna, Seaman and McManaman who had failed to live up to the expectations he had created for them. When Eyal Berkovic left in January 2004 he claimed that the real reason why City were struggling was because Keegan “had lost the dressing room” and that the players no longer believed in their manager. At the time the Israeli’s comments were seen as sour grapes, given that he had fallen out of favour with the man who had after all brought him to the club, but subsequent interviews with certain experienced players in the time since Keegan’s departure would seem to support Berkovic’s views.
Whatever the reason for his inability to take City further along the road to recovery after years of underachievement, it has to be said that Keegan gave City fans a taste of the good old days during the Division One championship as the Blues carried all before them, playing a brand of fast, passing and attacking football reminiscent of the club’s heyday of the late 60s and early 70s under Joe Mercer and Malcolm Allison. He also produced two convincing derby match wins after almost a decade of continual failure in the fixture, including a win in the last-ever Maine Road derby. The last two seasons of his reign will obviously be viewed as relative failure by observers, but for the first two City fans everywhere will be more than grateful. Perhaps when the dust has settled and the wounds have healed Keegan will be guest of honour at a home game in the future. I would certainly say that overall, for keeping us in the top flight for at least four years, he definitely deserves it.