I asked Robbie Keane two questions in my entire career as a journalist.
Even doing that was tough.
It was difficult to sit in the same room as him and try to act professional or even normal. You couldn’t listen to his stories about where he used to jump gates and run down lanes to make it for football training without fawning.
When you sat in the same room as Robbie Keane, you were very aware that you were sitting in the same room as Robbie Keane.
You were very aware of 18 years beforehand when he hit his first goal for Ireland against Malta. You remembered who you were with and what you were doing when he sent the country into delirium by putting the ball in the German net.
You thought about the seven different managers that had come in to take charge of Ireland in Keane’s time, the players, the legends from three different decades of football that all looked up to the Dubliner for every one of his 67 international goals. You thought about the 145 times he pulled on the crest and represented his people and it was very damn easy to just get distracted and think, Jesus Christ, that’s Robbie Keane.
Once, I asked him if it was the worth reminding the manager that the country’s best goalscorer is still in the squad and not being used. Fawning.
“I don’t have to do that,” he cut me off. “I think 67 goals does that.”
The whole press room laughed, we were all licking up to him. We moved on. I never asked him again.
After the Germany match last October, when the Irish had stunned the world champions and they did it with Robbie Keane sitting on the bench for the whole night, he was asked about his own personal feelings. It couldn’t have been easy for the captain, the record-breaker, the icon to be left out on a night like that.
“I’m very proud,” he said. “I keep saying it: It doesn’t matter who’s playing and who’s not. It’s about the nation. It’s about everybody coming together and everybody trying to achieve one goal and that’s to qualify for France.”
It’s about the nation.
For 18 years, that’s all it ever was about for Robbie Keane.
He might’ve finished with all the coolness and conviction of an assassin and moved with the restless energy of a teenager for 35 years as he cut open defences and ghosted by markers with all the ability of a man who could demistify the game of football, but it was only ever about serving the nation for Robbie Keane.
When he was half-fit, he was here servicing Ireland. When he was out of form, he was here scoring goals. When he moved to America, he was back at every opportunity so he could help out in whatever way he could – even when he was reduced to a bit-part role.
“I have never stopped chasing the next one,” he said in his retirement statement as the country prepares to wave goodbye to its finest ever product.
In some sense, he’s still that kid making his way to Crumlin to play with United, eyes burning with a dream, heart pumping with pride. He never lost sight of the magnitude of what he was doing and he never tired of trying to do more.
In the end though, his body aged and Keane had to bow out after three major tournaments with his country.
But he bows out as a legend and he goes with the well-wishes of every Irish man and woman who know exactly where they were for all of Robbie Keane’s historic moments.
He bows out as a fabric of this country’s culture.
And, when Landsdowne Road prepares to bid farewell and thank you to Robbie Keane on August 31 2016, they’ll be waving goodbye to the greatest of all time.
Never again will we see the like of Robbie Keane. Never will we ever forget Robbie Keane.
