Robbie Keane – A Tottenham Legend

It is inevitable that as soon as the veteran striker retires, Robbie Keane will be inducted into the Tottenham Hotspur hall of fame. Before he came to Spurs he was somewhat of a nomad within the footballing world, playing at Wolves, Coventry, Inter and Leeds, all before he had turned 22. Yet after his £7million move to Tottenham in the summer of 2002, Robbie Keane had noidea that his latest in a long line of clubs would be his home for the next 6 years, a fact manager Glenn Hoddle had alluded to at the time.

Keane made a solid debut in the 3-2 victory over West Ham, winning a penalty at the same time, yet his debut goal did not come until the 2-1 win over Blackburn Rovers. He continued to contribute to many victories during the season, with a marvelous hattrick over Evertonat the lane and finished the season with 13 goals, though Tottenham only managed to finish in 10th place. His superb goalscoring record for Spurs continued into the next season, where although Tottenhamwere battling with relegation, he racked up a tally of 16 for the campaign.

Robbie Keane’s future at the club was then thrown into much doubt after the 04-05 season, where, although Keane scored 17 goals in the season, he was playing as the 4th striker for much of it. Then after storming off down the tunnel after being an unused sub in the game against Birmingham, his future looked pretty much doomed, and the travelling Irishman looked like he was to move on again.

No transfer emerged during the summer, with the transfer of Kanoute leaving Spurs with no option but to hold onto Keane, and that was possibly the best bit of news that the Spurs faithful had heard, though they were not to know it yet. Keane again started out on the bench, but as Defoe’s form began to deteriorate, Keane stepped up to the plate. He finished the season with 16 goals and reestablished himself as the first choice striker again, and leaped backed into the hearts of Spurs fans everywhere.

The following two seasons established Keane as an out-and-out goalscorer, pinching goals from nothing and impressing many pundits with his high workrate, and his partnership with Berbatov was seen as the best partnership of the league. With many of the big clubs focusing on one top scorer like Henry, Rooney and Lampard and later Adebayor and Ronaldo, Tottenham had the almost unique strike force of two equally prolific forwards. They scored a combined tally of 91 goals in their two seasons together, yet transfer rumors persisted of Berbatov’s imminent departure and it seems that the Keane/Berbatov partnership is all but over.

This does not affect the fact that Keane, and his goalscoring record, is key to the Tottenham success of the last few years and it is in no doubt that Robbie will be a great striker for many years to come, and it is only a matter of time until he is inducted into the Hall of Fame.