Saipan (2025)

Talk about open goal? I remember the controversy back in 2002 as the Irish team struggled to prepare for their World Cup campaign. You’d also have had to have been living under a large rock not to have known that Roy Keane was an independently minded individual whom even Alex Ferguson had difficulty in keeping under control, and that Mick McCarthy (Steve Coogan) was charged with managing a national side with less resources that the average English championship side. When they arrive in Saipan, they discover a pitch better suited for sheep, an hotel that had seen better days and believe it or not, they have no footballs! What now ensues had me firmly in Keane’s (Éanna Hardwicke) corner. This depiction clearly showcases him as the only professional amongst some players bent on boozing, golfing and enjoying themselves. Now I dare say that Messrs. McAteer, Quinn et al might dispute their characterisation here but the thrust of just how amateur things were is hard to disbelieve. With that established, and having already taken a swipe at the FAI gravy-train blazer-brigade, we settle down to something designed to expose the angry and sometimes irrational conflict between the captain and the coach - and for me, this is where it just doesn’t work. Hardwicke does fine, but Coogan is completely unconvincing. Indeed, had the real McCarthy been that inept I doubt they’d have made their flight from Dublin in the first place. There simply isn’t anywhere near enough effort put into his personification, especially for people who don’t follow this sport, and what we end up with here is something more akin to a shadow of the man. At times, the production is a mess with some actuality quite clumsily mixed in with the drama that makes it difficult at times to separate fact from fiction, and so many of the set-piece confrontations appear dramatically contrived as this over-written affair lurched to what I felt was a remarkably shallow evaluation of some very highly paid, spoilt, brats. I did like that fact that his paper boy wore a Beckham shirt, though.