NEWS: Emmet Malone reports on another Keane bombshell that gave Brian Kerr an early initiation

For the second time in eight months the end of Roy Keane's international career was the only item on the agenda of a press conference hastily convened by an angry and somewhat shaken looking Ireland manager last night. At the Park Hotel in Kilmarnock Brian Kerr looked no less unsettled by the news than Mick McCarthy had last May after the player's now legendary tirade at that team meeting in Saipan .

For the new man, however, the main source of annoyance was the manner in which a commitment he says he obtained last Thursday from Keane that he would return to the fold next month disintegrated and a subsequent agreement, confirmed as late as lunch-time yesterday, that no statement would be made on the situation until after this evening's game against Scotland was out of the way followed suit.

In the four-paragraph statement that was issued by Keane's solicitor Michael Kennedy, initially to RTÉ in time for the six o'clock news, the player said "it has always been my desire to play again for Ireland," but that "the unequivocal advice given to me by my doctors was that I should not return. In the light of such advice I regret that I am compelled to confirm my retirement from international football."

Kerr received word of the statement by phone from his adviser Fintan Drury at 5.20, close to midway through the team's training session, which was halted for 10 minutes while the manager first took the call, and then relayed news of its contents to his coaching staff. The players were told after the session ended.

He gave his reaction to the press when he arrived back at the team hotel beside Rugby Park. He spoke for less than four minutes, as he insisted that the Keane issue would not prevent him "getting on with the job I have been hired to do," and seeing last night's game.

During that time he expressed surprise that an "unequivocal" undertaking by the Manchester United midfielder that he would not only make himself available again for competitive action in Georgia at the end of next month but would also join the Irish squad here in Kilmarnock this week in order to "start the process in relation to his return" had been allowed to stand for just 24 hours. He subsequently made clear his "disappointment" that the news "has broken this evening as I was out on the training pitch".

In between the two events, Kerr made clear, he had been in contact with both Keane and his club manager on several occasions. On Friday both called the Dubliner, Alex Ferguson to make clear his opposition to the midfielder resuming his international career, Keane (after a meeting with Ferguson and the club's medical staff) to say that he was rethinking his decision to come back.

"I was obviously disappointed at that stage and suggested that he should spend some more time thinking about it," said Kerr. Keane seems to have agreed but his decision remained the same and, added the Ireland manager, "Roy called me last night to say that he had made the decision not to play for the Republic of Ireland. I accepted that decision and wished him the best of luck with the rest of his career at Manchester United." Keane, in turn, wished Kerr well "with my future plans for the Irish team."

Kerr may have been disappointed with the sequence of events up to that point and with the fact that Keane had yielded to pressure from his employers to retire from international football but by the time he arrived back from the squad's final training session at Hampden Park last night he was primarily upset with the way in which the news had been announced by Kennedy ahead of this evening's game.

The reason for this remains unclear and suggestions from the Keane camp that the announcement was necessitated by the fact that the story had already leaked to the media in Manchester last night appeared to be without foundation. It was also reported that Keane simply wished, once he was clear about his intentions, to make them public, although this too seems remarkable from a man who has previously maintained complete silence for long stretches when it has suited him.

Whatever the thinking behind his decision it seems remarkable that Keane would first back down on a promise in the face of pressure from Ferguson and nothing short of astonishing that he would again embroil himself in controversy by refusing to keep his decision private until tomorrow morning as agreed.

Kerr is believed to accept that there is, from a club's point of view, an argument to be made on the basis of the medical evidence for Keane limiting the number of games he plays. The 31-year-old would be required to play just six competitive games for Ireland this year but any one of them could, in theory, have ended the career of a player who is currently paid in the region of £5 million annually by United. In the circumstances it came as no surprise to anybody that Ferguson took a stand and set about fighting the club's corner.

If Keane's claim that he always wished to return to the international scene is true - and Kerr clearly believes that it is - it would appear that the player has effectively become the first in many years to be prevented from representing Ireland by his club - the same club where Frank Stapleton apparently felt the need to have it written into his contract that he would be released for the Republic's games.

That would be a terribly sad way for one the finest players, possibly the finest, ever to emerge from the country to have his representative career ended.