Steve Coogan plays Mick McCarthy in Saipan, a sports film about the Republic of Ireland national football team and an incident involving Roy Keane, but reception is mixed
Football legend Mick McCarthy is said to be “p*ssed” about how he has been portrayed in new sports film Saipan.
Steve Coogan portrays the manager in the movie, released on Friday, which is about an incident involving McCarthy and Roy Keane during the lead up to the 2002 FIFA World Cup. A disagreement between McCarthy, then the country’s manager, and Keane, then the captain, resulted in the midfielder being removed from the squad.
The film has received mixed reviews so far, but today the representation of McCarthy, who since managed in the Premier League with Sunderland and Wolverhampton Wanderers, has been blasted. Ian Ladyman, a journalist, said on a podcast released today: “I know that Mick is p*ssed about it. I don’t think there is issue with Mick about the way Steve has done the role. I just don’t think there is much joy about the way he has been portrayed.”
Speaking on podcast Whistleblowers, the reporter references various scenes which he feels unfairly represents McCarthy, then 43, including a showdown at the end of the film. Mr Ladyman said: “It presents it like a street hooligan bullying somebody’s granddad, and that’s just not the way it was.”
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Éanna Hardwicke plays Keane, then 31, in what Mr Ladyman, a Daily Mail reporter, praises as an accurate representation. While McCarthy reportedly has no issue with Coogan, 60, he is understood to be fuming at the way Saipan has been told. Experienced actor Coogan is said, though, to have spoken to McCarthy, from Barnsley, South Yorkshire, during his research for the role.
“I don’t blame Coogan. I am surprised Coogan took the part. I don’t know why Coogan thought he could do Mick McCarthy. I don’t know why. It is strange casting to me,” Mr Ladyman continued on the podcast, which he hosts with broadcaster Gordon Smart and former Premier League referee Mark Clattenburg.
“I don’t think you should deliberately portray a guy as something he is not,” the reporter added, stating McCarthy has been represented as “a chump, as an unprofessional chump.”
Under McCarthy’s leadership, Republic of Ireland made it to the last 16 without Keane in Japan and Korea in 2002, losing to Spain only on penalties. It is thought, though, some of the players in that squad have watched Saipan and have been unimpressed at the portrayals. However, it has been praised in some reviews with one critic calling it an “amusing vignette” in recent editorial. Saipan is on at cinemas now in Ireland and the United Kingdom.
