By Cathal Dervan

It’s always a dilemma. You’re in the shower, singing the latest Franz Ferdinand hit to your heart’s content, when the mobile phone rings and you have to drop the shampoo microphone and make an on-the-spot decision.

Do you ignore the phone buzzing away at the side of the sink and move on to the latest Oasis anthem to hit your shower time repertoire?

Or do you drop the shampoo, open the shower curtain, stagger across the bathroom, grab a towel and try to dry your hands before the buzzing stops?

Go on, admit it, you’ve been there. You’ve been lost in the fantasy world that is your best Frank Sinatra impersonation when the phone has gone off, you’ve jumped out of the shower and got to it just as your second cousin twice removed has begun to leave a message on your voice mail about his 40th birthday party.

Every time that’s happened I’ll bet you’ve sworn blind that there’s no way you’re ever going to disrupt the whole shower routine again just to answer a call from someone who can’t be bothered to use caller ID just in case you might recognize their number and ignore them.

I’ve been that wet soldier. I have dropped everything — not a pretty picture by the way — and stumbled across the en-suite only to curse the fact that Patsy from Ballinasloe would bother to ring me about nothing of any consequence on a Monday morning.

That’s why I no longer get remotely interested when my “Smoke on the Water” ringtone goes off if I am anywhere near bath water at the time. I just ignore it, add another drop of Head and Shoulders to my head and shoulders and get on with the whole cleansing process.

That scenario was repeated Chez Dervan last Friday morning as I prepared myself to depart for an afternoon interview with the Meath golfer Damien McGrane, a fellow member at Headfort Golf Club and a man now making quite a nice name for himself on the European Tour.

I was already into the second verse of “Do You Want To,” ahead of Friday night’s visit to the brilliant Franz Ferdinand gig in Dublin with eldest child, when the phone first went live, somewhere around a quarter to 12 Dunshaughlin time.

I ignored it the first time. And the second time. The third time I thought about answering it, but then calls four, five and six all went unanswered. When it rang for the seventh time in two minutes I knew there was something up.

Fearing a death in the family I just had to take action, so I got out of the shower and answered the phone to discover that Roy Keane had left Manchester United – BY MUTUAL CONSENT.

Anyone and everyone wanted to tell me the biggest news of the year. Just a few weeks after criticizing his teammates in an MUTV interview that was subsequently banned by the club, Keane was out the Old Trafford faster than one of his tackles.

Was I surprised? Only by the timing.

Regular readers will know there was little hope, in my opinion, of another contract for Keane once his current deal ran out next summer after the deterioration in his relationship with Fergie.

The row in Portugal last summer and then the MUTV rant were just the straw that broke the camel’s back. Like Mick McCarthy before him, Ferguson eventually got to a place in his life where he had to choose between a gifted but troublesome player and his team.

Like Mick, Fergie put the team before any one player.

Rightly so. No player is bigger than the team, no matter how good they are.

Just as Roy Keane talked himself into trouble with Ireland and fooled himself into thinking he was bigger than the team, they carried on at the World Cup without him. Likewise, Fergie and United are already getting used to life without Roy.

They won’t be the same without him, of course. Ireland are a poorer team since the decline of Keane at his best, but Ireland, and United, will still play football next year.

I’m not so sure about Roy. Yes, he’s one of the Premiership greats and the best Irish player of his generation, but how many more managers will be prepared to take a chance on him? Not too many I suspect.

He’ll get a club for 18 months, probably a big one in Spain or Italy, but how many managers will rest easy with him in their dressingroom?

And how many players will welcome him into their circle knowing full well, like their boss, that somewhere along the way he will blow up again?

That’s what happened last week. Keane blew up at United once too often for Fergie’s liking and for his own good. Now he will have to find a new venue for his explosions.

I just hope I’m not in the shower the next time he decides to dominate the news once again.