Kevin Keegan has died. I am sure many of will have memories of him as a footballer and / or manager. Thr one that has stuck in my mind was when he came off his cycle in an episode of Superstars. We can’t go back, yet there is something I kiss about a time, 50 years ago, when famous sporting stars took part in t.v. competitions. And when, having come a cropper, the first move before getting patched up seems to be to have a swift half. Good on you Kev.
Kevin Keegan -Superstar
by 49 Comments
Apologies for the typos.
Curly perm, missing a sitter against Spain 1982.
Was the fist superstar footballer of my generation memory. Even had his own Ice Lolly brand. Memories are clouded, and only really aware of how good he was til he returned to Southampton, and they came close to winning the league. And when he signed for Newcadtle and (seemingly single handedly) took them to promotion.
And then did it again as a manager.
Maybe not truly successful as a manager, but got teams playing some great stuff.
(The ethic seemed to be “you might score 4, but we’ll score 5)
Very sad news indeed, and way too soon. I remember seeing his Liverpool team of the mid seventies against Spurs. Spurs went ahead twice but you knew Liverpool would come back and sure enough, led by Keegan and supported by Heighway they passed the ball and passed the ball never losing patience, never giving possession away, until they found an opening and then struck lethally twice to win the match. It was like the best of Spain but several decades earlier; it was easily the most impressive thing I’d seen on a football pitch.
And off the pitch he always seemed a decent guy as well, not least as one of the few Brits at that time who could go to play overseas and be just as successful in another league, country and culture.
Ah, Superstars. Many happy memories of watching that as a kid. Other than Brian Jacks winning all the time IIRC, I clearly remember Kevin coming off his bike. Wasn’t his knee all cut up with gravel? And while he was still playing too.
On a family holiday at a Spanish hotel at the age of about 10 or so, in the car park we saw a beautiful Rolls-Royce with the number plate “KK1”. I was so excited to learn from somebody that yes, it belonged to the great man, and I spent the next few days hoping to see him and maybe get an autograph.
Sadly I never did – he was probably off playing golf, as all famous people seemed to do back then – but that’s probably a good thing as I think I might have burst with excitement to discover that the legend who featured in so many of my eagerly read copies of Shoot! magazine was an actual flesh-and-blood person who walked among us.
RIP to a childhood hero.
I’m too young to properly remember him as a player, although obviously aware of the reverence in which his playing career was held.
It’s as a manager that I will always remember Kevin Keegan. Specifically that great Newcastle side of 1995-96, who blew a 12 point lead in January to finish second to Man Utd in what is generally considered English football’s Devon Loch moment.
There was a lot of sneering at Keegan when that title charge fell apart. He’d been naive, he’d disrupted his side with needless January signings. Notoriously, he’d exploded in a Sky Sports interview following a narrow win over Leeds in late April, seemingly losing the plot and jabbing his finger at the camera in what was subsequently celebrated as a classic example of the managerial “mind games” with which the football press used to be so tediously obsessed.
But I never saw that season as a failure for Keegan, even if he did end it empty-handed. In fact, I believe that Newcastle side should rightfully be celebrated as an absolute high point of the modern English game.
Between August and about mid-February they played a spellbindingly cavalier brand of football rarely seen before or since, their commitment to attack a romantic’s dream. Two attacking full backs in Barton and Beresford, Peter Beardsley in scintillating late career form sat just off the front, and Les Ferdinand up top. Sir Les, that absolute gent of the English game, enjoying a well earned career high point as he smashed in goal after goal. And then most of all David Ginola, out on the left wing skinning full back after full back, his stylish movement and flowing locks the physical embodiment of the side’s cavalier spirit in a sport that so often rewards its roundheads.
That run of form was probably never going to last a full season, and when it was pointed out to Keegan that some pragmatism might be required to see the title race out he responded in characteristic fashion by going out and snagging Tino Asprilla, a striker with no obvious place in the side but who must have been catnip to Keegan simply by virtue of the maverick beauty with which he played the game. Asprilla made his debut at the Riverside Stadium, helping his side overturn Boro’s early lead with a vital assist and delivering unto Chris Morris a nutmeg of such devastating sublimity that I can picture it clearly in my head even all these years later.
In an era before the influx of foreign talent to the Premier League, at a time when many wise old heads still questioned whether overseas players could cut it in the English game, and long before top class touch and technique was a given, Ginola and Asprilla were alien figures. They were so clearly mercurial, so entirely un-English in their approach as to stand out a mile, and to find two of them in the same side seemed an act of enormous carelessness. Sure, they were up against another foreign player in Eric Cantona, but Cantona had the good sense to occasionally attempt to end a career with a wild lunge, or seek retribution via headbutt – qualities the English game could get behind. Cantona was a man’s man – Ginola and Asprilla were for the lovers.
The Asprilla gambit, of course, did not work. Utd won the league by 4 points – that’s what the history books will tell you. But what the history books struggle to record is the beauty with which that Newcastle side played their football, or the beauty of watching a manager who so clearly believed that football should be played a certain way sticking to his principles even in the face of losing it all. The beauty of watching him lose his cool and implode on camera the way he did; all that passion spilling over uncontrollably. Love it.
Mark Lawrenson said of Keegan that year: “I really think they should have won the league in the 1995–96 season…Kevin could have done it if he’d altered the system very, very slightly. But he didn’t want to betray his principles…I think Kevin wanted it free-flowing in all departments and that doesn’t necessarily happen.” That quote is how I will remember Kevin Keegan. A football manager who did not want to betray his own aesthetic principles – what a thing to be in this day and age, when principles seem more malleable than ever before. When the result is increasingly all that matters.
Newcastle lost. But in defeat they gave us the memorable day they stuck six past Wimbledon, the evening they battered Utd at St James Park and simply could not find the goal they needed, and the 4-3 defeat to Liverpool, a rip-roaring, buccaneering slugfest that is still widely regarded as the Premier League’s best ever game. Keegan engineered all that – the best league game in this country of the last half century – and he ended it slumped over the hoardings, defeated. That’s football. But that’s also beautiful.
Keegan lit up the English game; first as a player, then as a manager. And he did so because, while football is full of winners – full of sides who serially collect a pot or two via campaigns that even their own fans will struggle to recall in years hence – Keegan gave us something altogether more resonant and timeless. A team that lost, but lost so beautifully that you’ll remember them forever. A team whose legend is oddly amplified by the defeat, because their luminescence was so striking as to render the final result incidental. English football’s own Brazil 1982, a what if story we’ll never tire of telling.
I’ve seen a lot of great sides down the years, but great sides ultimately come and go, because the nature of football, or any competitive endeavour, is that someone has to be the best. It’s inevitable. Keegan’s Newcastle will be eternal, because they offered us something altogether more rare; a sense that there are things more important than the end result, that grace and beauty can be its own reward. That football played the right way is an end, rather than a means. That’s what Kevin Keegan showed us, and that’s what I will always remember him for, even as all those other great sides, those winners, recede from memory. I am quite certain I’m not alone. Some legacy, that.
That’s a lovely bit of writing, Bingo. Hats off to you.
Very eloquent and agree with many of the sentiments…but as Kevin indicated, I’m sure he and the players in retrospect would have preferred to have got over the line by ‘winning ugly’ once or twice. In much the same way that the Dutch team of 1974 ultimately didn’t fulfil their destiny as the outstanding footballing team of that year by inexplicably losing the WC final essentially through their own hubris.
Call me a dewy eyed romantic, but I feel the same way about that great Dutch side. Part of the appeal is the thwarted destiny, the knowledge that they should have won the thing and instead had an argument amongst themselves on the way back to the halfway line having taken the lead.
Sport is so much richer for these stories, and there’s something about cruel defeat that spotlights elegance in a way that victory often fails to do.
I’ve no real interest in football, not since I started buying records at 13 years of age, but being from the North East a love of Newcastle United (or Sunderland, dependant on an appalling place of birth accident 😜) is ingrained.
I remember the Keegan era vividly.
That was a beautiful summary.
Fantastic, Bingo.
Beautifully put. I agree with all of it. Winning is nearly everything but what Keegan achieved is a level of love and respect from all football supporters for what he tried to do. It didn’t work, but it was awful close and it was a mesmerising, and wonderful way to play football. Everybody’s* second team was Newcastle – even the kit was brilliant.
*maybe not Sunderland. But I suspected the hated Newcastle a little less with Keegan.
Kevin Keegan told a story of the time Asprilla turned up for training an hour early one Monday morning. Terry McDermott and Keegan were astonished as Asprilla was usually the last to arrive and the first to leave on training days. They congratulated Asprilla on his enthusiasm and it was only when Asprilla pointed to his watch they realised that he’d forgot to put his clock back to adjust to British winter time.
Back in ‘78 all us young Catholic boys had to pick a new middle name when we were making our Confirmation. The screws were pleased to hear so many opt for Kevin – one of the most popular Irish saints – but didn’t realise in all cases it was down to KK..
I first heard of St Kevin from a China Crisis song (Highest High).
From my best mate
“Must confess to a little tear. He was playing for Scunthorpe in the first game I ever saw live.Versus Notts County – I was 6/7. My biggest memory was the vibrancy of the colour! Green grass , floodlights and the two strips. I’d only ever seen football on ( black and white) tv.
I replied “Bless you! First game I went to was Aberdeen v Patrick Thistle.My dad, who had no interest whatsoever in football, took me . Must have been twenty five thousand people there. My hero was Graham Leggat whom you know very well from your sojourn in Canada. Twenty minutes in, a crunching tackle and right in front of me , you could hear the scream, Graham is stretchered off with a broken leg. I may have cried. Aberdeen lost 3-1. Twas and still is ever so.”
Ah, football ..
Fantastic footballer, great personality. Loved by most fans of clubs he was never associated with.
Not many players have the same appeal to neutral fans.
A genuinely great footballer.
I saw him play for England at Wembley. He scored an absolute screamer from outside the box and I was behind the goal. I was about 11, I think. He was the one I was starstruck by. When they came out to warm up pre-game, Keegan and Brooking came close to the end I was at and did long passes to each other across the width of the Wembley pitch.
Another great memory of him was when he co-commentated in a game featuring Romania. He said something like ” Tell you what…if they keep leaving gaps like that…they’re not going to remain ‘ere!”
There was a long silence. The other commentator eventually said that he didn’t know whether to laugh or just never speak of it again. Keegan sheepishly apologised.
He deserves to be remembered more for being a great player rather than the Brut advert and the “Love it” outburst. Because he was great, probably the only world class player England produced in the 70s. When Paul Gascoigne went to Italy in the early 90s, Channel 4 snapped up the Serie A broadcast rights and we got to watch the best league in the world at that time on Sundays (even if we did have to watch a bit too much Lazio and not enough Milan). Imagine if BBC2 had bought rights for the Bundesliga when Keegan transferred to Hamburg. We would surely rate him higher as a player than we do if we had seen him every week, especially when he helped deliver Hamburg their first title in 20 years or so.
Re: “probably the only world class player England produced in the 70s”
I’d say that Peter Shilton was also a world class England player of the 1970s.
and Trevor Brooking (at a push)
Brooking was fabulous and I’d agree with him being world class, but he arguably blunted his fame and status by loyally staying with West Ham when they got relegated. He was probably at his peak then.
Still won the FA Cup for them in 1980 while in the 2nd Division, more than he ever won with England.
This also made him the answer to the fiendish football question ” If Sunderland did it in 1979 and Villa did it in 1981, who did it in 1980?”
OK fair enough. “only outfield world class player England produced in the 70s”.
I’m going to add Glenn Hoddle to that list – he made his debut in 1975. I also think, in today’s televised age where skilful players get much more attention, Tony Currie is there or thereabouts.
Ray Wilkins, Bryan Robson, Emlyn Hughes?
Nope. Robson was closest but you could have gone to Spain, Italy or Germany and found at least one player in each country that was better than all of those.
Does world class mean the best in his position in the world? Keegan was an excellent player, but I wouldn’t say he was the best in the world or close to that.
Never got to watch him as before my time, but he did win the ballon d’or twice in a row, so have to assume he was at least close to being the best in the world?
Well probably, but it’s a subjective award, and you normally have to be playing in a successful club team to be considered. He didn’t play in a successful international team. Not saying he wasn’t a world class player.
My view of world class is are they a legitimate pick in a best 11 side. It isn’t best in position because there could be any number of world class players in a position. Bellingham and Mbappe play in the same position (in different ways and both are world class. Same with Kane and Haaland. I don’t think Hughes or Wilkins were ever in that kind of debate. Robson on his day yes – but he probably didn’t have enough days at the big tournaments. To Bingo’s point above, I can’t think of a Ballon D’or winner who wasn’t world class.
Now there’s a challenge!
In my football watching lifetime, the award to Michael Owen in 2001 seemed a bit soft. By his own account he’d probably already peaked a couple of years earlier.
Don’t know if it’s fair to say he wasn’t world class, but Igor Belanov in 1986 was definitely an interesting choice given some of the other players around at that time. Worth bearing in mind that until 1995 only European players were eligible.
Messi in 2023 seemed a bit generous. I would have picked Salah.
I have a view that if your one of the best 5 players and have won a big cup, then its probably a good shout. I would have given it to Salah as well but it wasn’t undeserved for Messi.
Owen won by a fair few votes. But it wasn’t a massively strong year for others – it was probably his last great season.
I believe that in the 1970s, a high proportion of voters for the Ballon d’Or were French.
In 1977, Michel Platini was only 22 and languishing in obscurity at Nancy, but still managed to come third in the Ballon d’Or.
A very sad day. When he fell of the bike in Superstars (what loon thought is was a good idea to have road bikes racing around a redgra running track?) it was the only time the Bracknell News had genuine national news on its front page. As I recall, Keegan got up and re-raced and won.
We all wanted to be Kevin Keegan when we played kickabouts as kids. It didn’t matter what team you supported, if you scored a good goal, you would shout out “Keegan!”. A few of my mates had home perms to match Kevin’s.
About the fisticuffs with Bremner, Keegan said the following – which sums up 70’s football perfectly:
““I often get asked why I punched Billy Bremner in the Charity Shield. The Queen was there too,” he said. “Four guys came running up to me when I tackled Johnny Giles and three of them were 6ft 3!
“The fourth one was Billy and he’s smaller than me. So I just f*****g hit him to be honest with you! I’d done a bit of boxing and it was one of my better punches!
“When we were in the dressing room and we’d been sent off, we’d taken our shirts off and got an eight-week ban each. But when I got back to the dressing room, my dad came down and said, ‘son, don’t worry about it. He deserved it. I’d have hit him.’
“Door opened, in comes Billy, crying. Billy Bremner, crying! He said, ‘Kevin, I’m so sorry.’ My dad said to him, ‘if you don’t get out of this dressing room, I’m going to hit you as well!’
“I had to say to him, ‘dad, don’t hit him! He’s one of my best friends.’ My dad, he couldn’t work out that we weren’t just enemies.”
Rest in peace Kevin Keegan. You were brilliant.
My nephew, a jet-setting businessman encountered Kevin Keegan at one of these international business seminars where Keegan was doing motivational speaking. He said he was by far the most entertaining and downright nice speakers he ever encountered and he went out of his way to get a photo with him. My nephew is of an age where he never saw him play live or fall off a bike and would have been very young when Keegan managed Newcastle.
We had Emlyn Hughes at one of those events. His speech was short, funny and had obviously been given hundreds of times before. As he was pocketing his fee (cash in an envelope of course) I asked if he’d talk to a couple of Liverpool-supporting colleagues of mine. “Sorry, got another one of these in half an hour” and off he went
Love this.
Everyone else in the squad is looking sheepishly down at their lyrics sheet, Kev is giving it 100%.
Very sad news, Kevin joining Southampton is pretty much why I started supporting the club.
Kev had form:
In 1979 Keegan released a pop record titled Head Over Heels In Love. He told the story of driving in his car with his wife Jean, with the radio on. The DJ told his listeners that he had made Keegan’s song ‘Smash of the Week.’ Kevin smiled at his wife and said, “that’s not bad, smash of the week.” The DJ then proceeded to smash the vinyl record to pieces with a hammer. A modest guy who never took himself too seriously.
Cartoonist David Squires pays a fine tribute to Kevin Keegan in the final frame of this strip:
https://www.theguardian.com/football/picture/2026/jul/21/david-squires-spain-winning-world-cup-final-argentina-shadow-of-donald-trump
Yes, excellent
Perfect.
Very well done. His strips about both Charlton brothers were very moving.
And the one about Cyrille Regis.
That was very good indeed
I’ve just looked at those fixtures thirty years ago… and if Newcastle were unlucky at Liverpool on 3 April, I can verify, as an eye-witness, that they were jaw-droppingly lucky to beat QPR 2-1 three days later.
A game lost in the mists of time admittedly, but an insanely fortunate win.
Mind you, Man. U. were lucky to get a point (how much injury time????) at Loftus Road that March, and QPR got relegated!
QPR have Terry Venables and Rodney Marsh to thank for that relegation… thanks guys.
One day I’ll tell you the story.
Kevin’s a complete legend obviously.
That Cantona equaliser came in the 3rd minute of added time according to contemporary reports, eg Patrick Barclay in the Sunday Telegraph (yes, I looked it up, yes I’m sad). Hardly worthy of the myth of Fergie time…