Joseph Kevin Keegan (14 February 1951 – 20 July 2026) was an English football player and manager who played as an attacking midfielder or forward. Nicknamed "King Kev" or "Mighty Mouse", Keegan was recognised for his dribbling ability, finishing and presence in the air, as much as he was for his distinctive appearance and charismatic personality. He is regarded as one of the greatest players of all time and was a widely recognised figure of English football during the 1970s, winning consecutive Ballon d'Ors in 1978 and 1979.
Keegan began his playing career at Scunthorpe United in 1968, before Bill Shankly signed him for Liverpool. There, he won three First Division titles, the UEFA Cup twice, the FA Cup and, in his final season, the European Cup. During this period, he was a regular member of the England national team, and captained the team on 31 occasions, including at UEFA Euro 1980. He moved to Hamburger SV in the summer of 1977 and was named European Footballer of the Year in both 1978 and 1979. Hamburg won the Bundesliga title in the 1978–79 season and reached the 1980 European Cup final. Keegan left Hamburg and played at Southampton for two seasons, before transferring to Newcastle United in the Second Division in 1982. He helped Newcastle secure promotion in his second season, and retired from playing in 1984. He scored 204 goals in 592 appearances in his club career, adding 21 goals in 63 caps for England.
He moved into management at Newcastle in 1992, and the team won promotion to the Premier League as First Division champions in his first full season. Newcastle finished second in the Premier League in the 1995–96 season, despite leading the way for most of the campaign. After managing Fulham for two seasons, he took charge of the England national team in February 1999, but resigned in October 2000 following a 1–0 loss against Germany in qualification for the 2002 FIFA World Cup. In 2001, he became manager of Manchester City for four years, until he resigned in 2005. Keegan had been out of football for almost three years when he returned to Newcastle for a second spell as manager in January 2008, but this lasted only eight months, as he resigned in September following speculation about a dispute with the club's directors. The three clubs he managed were promoted as champions in his first full season in charge of them.
Joseph Kevin Keegan was born on 14 February 1951 at his aunt Nellie's house in Elm Place in Armthorpe, as she had electricity, which made it safer for childbirth. He was the second of three children of Joe and Doris Keegan. His father, a Geordie, had moved to Armthorpe, in Doncaster (then in the West Riding of Yorkshire) to work in a colliery, where he met and married Doris. Keegan attended St Peter's High School in nearby Cantley.
Keegan's paternal ancestors arrived in Newcastle from Ireland. In 1909, his grandfather Frank, an inspector, heroically saved lives in the West Stanley Pit disasters. His father Joe and uncle Frank were Newcastle United supporters, describing their favourite players as Hughie Gallacher and Jackie Milburn. Keegan's father never saw him play for Newcastle.
Keegan was given his first football by his uncle and his first pair of football boots by his father after he won betting on horses. They were a second-hand pair of Winit boots bought from a sports shop run by former Doncaster Rovers centre forward Ray Harrison. Keegan played football at Hyde Park using his baby brother Michael's pushchair as a goal post. As a boy, he supported Doncaster Rovers. His favourite player was Alick Jeffrey, a player once described by Matt Busby's assistant, Jimmy Murphy, as the English Pelé, and once described by Milburn as "the best young player he had ever seen". As a schoolboy, Keegan had a trial for Coventry City under manager Jimmy Hill. Despite being one of two players kept on for an extra six-week period, the club did not offer him a contract. They did offer apprenticeship terms to the right-back Brian Joy, who went on to have a 15-year career in football. Keegan had another trial with Doncaster Rovers arranged by his father, but when he arrived he found out he had the wrong information: the trial was earlier in the day and at a different place.
Keegan participated in various sports, including cross-country running, rugby, and football, and served his school's cricket team as captain. He also boxed at his local club, run by the former British Heavyweight champion Bruce Woodcock. At age 15, Keegan and two friends completed a 50-mile run from Nottingham to Doncaster. In his autobiography, he said this run prepared him physically and psychologically for any running he had to do in future pre-season training or football matches. He left school with O Levels in History and Art.
At the age of 15, Keegan started working at Pegler Brass Works as an office clerk, though he said he was more of a tea boy and messenger than a clerk. Whilst working at Pegler, he played Saturday afternoon football for his local youth club, Elmfield House, and Sunday morning football for the Lonsdale Hotel. It was during this time that a colleague named Harry Holland invited him to play for the Peglers Works reserves. His chance at professional football came when he was playing Sunday morning league football for the Lonsdale Hotel in a match against Woodfield Social in 1966. Keegan was marked by an older player named Bob Nellis, who was so impressed by his ability that he offered him a trial at Fourth Division side Scunthorpe United – one of just two professional sides in the division. This trial led to Scunthorpe manager Ron Ashman giving Keegan his first contract in professional football.
Scunthorpe United could not afford a set of football nets and trained on a rugby pitch at Quibell Park. They also had five-a-side training sessions on the Old Show Ground concrete car park. Keegan took training very seriously, and he did twice-a-week training with teammate Derek Hemstead by doing weighted farmers walks up and down the cantilever stand at the Old Show Ground. In running drills at Scunthorpe, Keegan liked trying to finish first and was told by coach Jack Brownsword that one thing he had going for him was that he was a "one-hundred percenter" and he should never lose that. This was the first of his running drills that would later irritate senior professionals such as Liverpool's Tommy Smith, and Bill Shankly would advise Keegan that he did not have to win all his runs.
Scunthorpe did not have the funds for a full-time driver to drive them to away games, so Keegan and the other younger players would take turns in driving the minibus to and from away games. Keegan, Nigel Jackson, Jimmy Coyne, Alan Olbison and Steve Hibbotson once borrowed Brownsword's stopwatch and had timed rallies around the Old Show Ground with the club's vintage tractor. On Keegan's turn, the tractor crashed and the axle went through the engine. The tractor was very expensive to fix, and the five players were harshly reprimanded by manager Ron Ashman. This experience gave Keegan awareness of his responsibility as a representative of Scunthorpe United. In 1968, Keegan made his debut against Peterborough United at the age of 17, and went on to make 29 league starts in his first season. He became a regular in the first team by the 1969–70 season, playing all 46 league games for the club. That season saw the team reach the fifth round of the FA Cup, beating First Division side Sheffield Wednesday along the way. His low wages at Scunthorpe meant Keegan had to find summer jobs, such as plate-laying at the Appleby Frodingham Steelworks.
Keegan played regularly in a creative right midfield role for the Scunthorpe first team, scoring 18 goals in 124 games for the club. After his first season, he started attracting interest from higher division clubs. In a rare televised interview at Scunthorpe during the 1969–70 season, Keegan tried to play down the interest, stating: "I'm getting first-team football here. Should think if I went First Division, I'd struggle a bit." Not long after this interview, Keegan began to feel impatient about playing in higher divisions and even considered quitting the game and getting a full-time job. Higher division clubs such as Preston North End, Birmingham City, Notts County, Millwall and Arsenal all showed interest in Keegan but nothing came of it.