‘Saipan’ review: Steve Coogan and Eanna Hardwicke are a dream team in real-life Irish football drama

Dirs: Lisa Barros D’Sa, Glenn Leyburn. Ireland/UK. 2025. 91mins

Even those with little interest in the beautiful game should be entertained by Saipan, a breezily engaging narrative around the clash of egos between Irish star player Roy Keane and manager Mick McCarthy during the preparations for the 2002 World Cup. Directors Lisa Barros D’Sa and Glenn Leyburn coax finely matched performances from Steve Coogan (as McCarthy) and rising star Eanna Hardwicke (as Keane), and utilise an emotional soundtrack featuring songs from Bob Dylan, The Pogues and The Walker Brothers.

Manages to condense and dramatise true events whilst also acknowledging the bigger picture

These elements should add to the commercial appeal of the latest film from the husband-and-wife team behind Good Vibrations (2012) and Ordinary Love (2019). Wildcard and Vertigo have previously acquired UK and Ireland rights, and this accessible, entertaining film should certainly find a receptive home audience after its Toronto Centrepiece premiere and subsequent London Film Festival berth.

Notoriously uncompromising, Roy Keane carried the hopes of a nation as Ireland’s team captain at the 2002 World Cup in Japan. A lean, flinty Hardwicke (a former Screen Irish Rising Star) nails his unyielding nature. Keane was fiercely dedicated and had little patience for those who failed to match his own commitment. He is all too aware of the rare privilege of leading the Irish team into the tournament, noting that legendary players like George Best never had the chance to compete at that level. As the team head to a makeshift training camp on the western Pacific island of Saipan, Keane is focused on what it will take to win. Those around him seem more intent on having a good time.

Coogan’s coach and former player Mick McCarthy is too much of a pragmatist to earn Keane’s respect. His instinct is to make the most of any situation rather than demand the highest standards. His wife Fiona (Alice Lowe) seems to sum things up best when she reminds him: “football is what you do, it’s not who you are.” Coogan invests McCarthy with a hesitant, apologetic manner, conveying the sense of someone essentially decent but slightly out of his depth. 

Screenwriter Paul Fraser is best known for his collaborations with Shane Meadows on the likes of TwentyFourSeven (1997) and A Room For Romeo Brass (1999), and here manages to condense and dramatise true events whilst also acknowledging the bigger picture. His storytelling is rich in humour – especially when Keane visits their training camp in Saipan, a scrubby practice pitch more accustomed to the presence of a goat than a football team. There is also the small matter that nobody had thought to order any footballs. The more Keane is confronted with the incompetence of others, the more you warm to his intransigence.

Fraser’s screenplay also gets to the heart of the male pride and stubbornness that fuelled the friction between Keane and McCarthy, and shows how it was perceived around the world. The directors neatly layer the drama with lively montage sequences using television coverage, sports commentators and Vox pop interviews from the time to emphasise why this was such a big deal. Impressionist Jon Culshaw adds to the fun contributing the voice of Alex Ferguson (heard but never seen), the one football manager who seemed able to handle Keane.

The use of split-screen often puts Keane and McCarthy in the same frame, but several of their key conversations take place in the most uncomfortable of settings including a cramped airplane toilet and a hotel sauna. There is rarely a chance for the them to be at ease in each other’s company. McCarthy often appears to be the more emollient, but both men rage with wounded pride.