Roy Keane truth told by owner as Irishman among frontrunners to be next Sunderland manager
Roy Keane is among the favourites for the job
Sunderland remain on the hunt for a new manager after Michael Beale was sacked last month, with Republic of Ireland and Manchester United legend Roy Keane among the favourites for the job.
Ex-Rangers boss Beale won four of his 12 games before losing his job at the Stadium of Light and was replaced by Mike Dodds in a caretaker capacity until the end of the season.
Will Still is the 6/4 favourite to be the next permanent manager of the Black Cats with gambling.com. In a recent interview, Still made his intentions clear that he wants to manage in England and that he would be happy to take a job in the Championship for an ambitious club.
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Keane is listed at 2/1 to make a return as Sunderland boss, despite having not managed in his own right since 2011, reports The Manchester Evening News.
Keane, as a former Sunderland manager, is regularly linked with a return to the Stadium of Light. He was mentioned amid Beale’s appointment in December, and was the frontrunner for the Sunderland job after Lee Johnson was sacked in 2022, but a deal fell through and Alex Neil was appointed.
Sunderland owner Kyril-Louis Dreyfus, however, insists that 2022 link was nonsense. “The Roy Keane potential with Sunderland played out much more in the media than it really did in conversations that we had in the club,” he said.
Juan Sartori, who co-owns Sunderland, explained that while having Roy Keane on board would’ve attracted more attention to the home ground of the team, he wasn’t the right person for the role. Sartori stated: “I think Roy Keane would have been fun, definitely good for the [Sunderland ‘Til I Die] Netflix series, but maybe we had a third season of disastrous finishing.”
Scott Parker is 5/2 to be the next man through the door at the Stadium of Light. Given Parker’s successful track record at both Fulham and Bournemouth, he could be seen as the one of the more sensible appointments the Sunderland leadership could make.
Steve Cooper (4/1) is another manager with a promotion on his CV – and his was more impressive than most. Nottingham Forest were in danger of going down to League One when he took charge. By the end of the same season, they were celebrating a place in the Premier League.
Dodds’ odds, meanwhile, have drifted from 12/1 to 25/1. His caretaker spell in charge has so far resulted in two successive defeats.
