Gary Neville has revealed how Roy Keane refused to shake Mark Clattenburg’s hand during a frosty meeting between the two in 2022.
Clattenburg has been in the news recently after Nottingham Forest, for whom he works as a referee consultant, issued a statement accusing VAR Stuart Attwell of showing favoritism towards Luton in the relegation battle.
The former official then doubled down on the club’s sentiments in his exclusive column for Mail Sport on Sunday, before Neville insisted Clattenburg “must resign” from his position at Forest.
Now, during the last episode of Stay with football along with Neville, Jill Scott, Ian Wright and Jamie Carragher, Keane told Neville: ‘He’s your mate Clattenburg!’ You were on top of him in the World Cup.”
Neville then replied: ‘Now you’ve opened a can of worms!’ Basically, we were walking around this place at the World Cup, the three of us were chatting and Mark Clattenburg walks up to us.
Gary Neville (left) revealed how Roy Keane refused to shake Mark Clattenburg’s hand
The former Red Devil recreated the icy meeting between the two during the World Cup
Keane (left) later explained the reasons for his hostility towards Clattenburg (right).
Keane then quickly chimed in, much to the amusement of his co-hosts, and said: “But he was strutting his stuff, wasn’t he?”
After the Irishman’s comment was laughed at, Neville continued: “Well, he worked with us at previous World Cups as our refereeing consultant, we trained with him and got to know him a little bit.”
“Basically, we were walking and I said, ‘Hey Mark, how are you?’ and then Wrighty says, ‘Mark, it’s good to see you!’ and then he [Keane] It hangs a few meters back.
“And then he walks up to Roy to shake his hand and Roy says [makes aggressive handshake motion]. Not a word of a lie!’
Jill Scott then turns to Keane to ask if he really did that, to which he turned and bluntly said, ‘Yes!’
Neville continued: ‘He threw his hand! And I’m like, ‘What’s going on here?! I know he’s a bit feisty but…’. You [Keane] We kept walking and we stayed talking to him and I said: ‘Ref, is there a problem?’
Explaining his hostility towards the former Premier League referee, Keane replied: “He had said something in a book after working with us.”
Keane claimed that Clattenburg had “said something in a book” that left a bitter taste in his mouth.
Neville was shocked by Keane’s hostility towards the former Premier League journeyman.
Wright, who also participated in the encounter, said: “When we finally caught up to him, we said, ‘What happened there?’ and he said, ‘I don’t know. I think I remember him saying something.’
Elsewhere in the episode, Neville spoke about Clattenburg’s role at Nottingham Forest, stating that his arrival has given the players “an excuse” to lose games.
Forest, who were beaten 2-0 by Everton on Sunday, criticized “three extremely poor decisions” in a furious post-match statement, claiming Attwell was a “Luton fan” and that PGMOL were warned of this before the clash . at Goodison Park.
Shortly after the match, Forest said: “Three extremely poor decisions, three missed penalties, which we simply cannot accept.” We notified the PGMOL that the VAR is a Luton fan before the match but they did not change it. Our patience has been tested several times. The NFFC will now consider its options.’
Forest were furious with three refereeing decisions during their 2-0 defeat to Everton on Sunday and alleged VAR Stuart Attwell was showing bias towards relegation rivals Luton.
He said: “Since Mark Clattenburg came in, they’ve won one game in the last 10 games.” In the previous 10 games they won four in all competitions.
“Football players or employees of any business are never given a way out or an excuse, ever. It has given them an excuse not to win.
“It may sound really crazy, but when you put that drain of negativity when you have your coaches or players, like Neco Williams, who came out on Sunday and is going to get in trouble, talking about referees and how everyone is against them, that strategy is not working.
“What they have to do is completely change their mentality and forget about the referees. They need to get Clattenburg out of the management box and concentrate on the football because, if they are not careful, they will go down because of this.”