Will Keane's Journey from Injury to Redemption

On a spring evening in May 2012, two young centre-forwards led the line for England’s Under-19s against Switzerland. One was Harry Kane. The other was Will Keane.

Back then, if you’d been asked which of them would be tuning up for a World Cup semi-final a decade on, most fingers would have pointed at the Manchester United prodigy rather than the Tottenham loanee.

Keane remembers that version of himself vividly.

“I'd never had any setbacks at that point,” he tells BBC Sport. “When you're young, you're fearless. The whole trajectory of my career was up. I made my senior debut for Manchester United. We won the Youth Cup. I was doing well for England. Everything was taking off.”

Then came the tackle that changed everything.

Near the end of that qualifier against Switzerland, Keane suffered a serious knee injury. Sixteen months passed before he played again. Sixteen months at the very moment when a young striker either bursts through the door or gets left in the corridor.

While Keane learned to walk and run again, Kane went to Norwich, then Leicester, then back to Spurs. He turned loan spells into a Premier League career.

“It’s timing,” Keane reflects. “Some lads go their whole career and have a few niggles, but nothing derails them too much.

“That first injury was at a crucial time. I had my foot in the door. The feeling was I would probably have been around the first team.

“If the injury had happened a couple of years later, I might have been an established squad player. When I had it, I missed 16 months at a crucial part of the transition from reserves to seniors.”

From World Cup dreams to a PFA camp

As Kane prepares for Argentina, Keane’s week looks very different.

He is at Champneys Springs in Leicestershire, one of 45 out-of-contract players on the PFA’s 12-week pre-season camp. No crowds, no cameras, no World Cup. Just training pitches, data, and the grind of trying to earn one more deal.

At 33, with 335 senior appearances and 85 goals behind him, Keane believes there is still time for another chapter. He has already switched international allegiance once, representing England up to Under-21 level before winning five senior caps for the Republic of Ireland, the country of his father’s birth.

“A couple of lads I know did the camp last season and spoke really highly,” he says.

“I almost feel like I'm part of a squad, and we're away for pre-season. There are so many staff; medical, coaching, administrative, media.

“It's quite competitive and there are seven or eight games, so clubs can see you're playing. There's an app clubs can sign up to. It's like a PFA transfer list – all our training data goes on it. Clubs can contact us directly, so hopefully if you go somewhere, you can go straight in.”

This is not his first brush with uncertainty. In 2020, as Covid hit, Ipswich declined to trigger a one-year option amid financial doubt. Keane was left in limbo, then found his way back to Wigan, one of eight clubs on a CV that once seemed destined to be far shorter and far more glamorous.

That period changed more than his employer. It changed his mind.

The injuries that opened the door for Rashford

Keane’s first ACL tear was brutal. The second was cruel.

The list of setbacks reads like a medical report. The knee against Switzerland. Then, in February 2016, a torn groin in an FA Cup tie at Shrewsbury while playing for United.

That injury triggered one of those sliding doors moments that define careers.

Three days later, United hosted Midtjylland in the Europa League. Keane would have been involved. Instead, 17-year-old Marcus Rashford took his place on the bench. Anthony Martial pulled up in the warm-up. Rashford started, scored twice, then hit another two in the Premier League against Arsenal that same week.

Keane watched it unfold from the other side of the Atlantic.

“I went to America for an operation, landed in Philadelphia, turned my phone on and saw he scored two more,” he recalls.

At 23, he knew what that meant. His path at United, the club he had supported as a boy and grown up inside, had effectively closed.

He tried to reset at Hull City, newly promoted to the Premier League. It looked a smart move. It lasted six games.

Another ACL. Another 14 months out.

“It was crushing,” he says. “I missed the whole season, and we got relegated. A lot of the young lads still got good moves; Harry Maguire went to Leicester, Andy Robertson went to Liverpool, Sam Clucas to Swansea.”

The conveyor belt kept moving. Just not for him.

Rebuilding the mind at Wigan

By the time he reached Wigan, Keane knew he needed more than rehab programmes and gym sessions.

“I'd used sports psychologists before and always tried to be positive and optimistic, but I started working with someone at Wigan who hadn't worked in football before,” he explains.

“He’s a bit more of a spiritual psychologist. We focus on positive intentions, manifesting, visualisation.

“I’d tried everything in the box, and kept breaking down, so I wanted to do something a bit different.”

The change went deeper than pre-match routines.

“I wish I'd had that when I was younger, especially with the setbacks I had early on. It might have got me back into the right frame of mind.

“For any player if you've not got belief in yourself, and you're lacking confidence, you're not going to perform the way you can.

“I was around the first team at United, then I got the injury, had a few loans in the Championship where I didn't do very well and I started to doubt myself. Wigan catapulted me.

“Before that I should have backed myself. I played with a lot of those lads all the way through, and that's where I was potentially heading.

“If I'd focused on the mental part earlier, it might have been a different outcome.

“Even at times when I picked up injuries, maybe I had a bit of self-doubt which led to something going wrong. If I was in the right frame of mind, maybe one of those bad injuries wouldn't even have happened.”

It is a stark reflection from a player who once moved through United’s age groups as naturally as breathing.

Kane’s certainty, Keane’s perspective

While Keane wrestled with doubt and recovery, his old Under-19 strike partner built a reputation on ruthless certainty.

“His old strike partner Kane, it seems, has no self-doubt,” Keane says with a hint of admiration rather than regret.

“I remember when we were young, people said he wasn't mobile but technically, the time he put into his finishing and his obsessiveness to be the best in terms of shooting, you see it don't you?

“He's so sure of himself, because he's put the work in. He knows he's a complete striker.

“He's obviously got that belief in himself. He might miss one, but he's not going shy away from it. If he didn't have certainty in his mind, he wouldn't be as prolific.

“He's not arrogant, he's just got the confidence that sets top players apart.”

Two careers, once side by side, now live at opposite ends of the game’s spectrum. One man chases records. The other chases a contract.

One more move, and two flags

After ending last season on loan at Reading, Keane left Preston when his deal expired. The market is slow, but he is not panicking.

“There's been a few chats,” he says. “I'm sure they're aware of me. They might be looking for A, B and C targets, but when the season does start, if a club doesn't have a great start, there's a bit of panic and maybe things open up.”

He will keep training, keep visualising, keep waiting.

Internationally, his loyalties are already settled, even if his heart is split.

“It's a hard one because I played for England up until Under-21s, and then seniors for the Republic of Ireland, so I've got a foot in both camps.

“I am proud to represent Ireland. My dad was born there and moved to England. But I've also been born and raised in England, and my family's English.”

He watches England with affection, Ireland with pride, and Kane with the knowledge that, on another night, with another tackle, his own story might have run alongside it.

Instead, he stands on a training pitch in Leicestershire, one of 45 players chasing another chance, convinced there are still goals left in him – and determined that this time, his mind will be as strong as his body.