The stage was set for Keane. Timing his run perfectly to connect with Denis Irwin's cross to the back post, he met the delivery flush on the half-volley for the spectacular final goal of the game.

It was November 1993 and his first taste of the Manchester derby.

The capacity for drama has accompanied Keane ever since, with a space reserved for the latest chapter when he emerges at Ibrox this afternoon to play in his first Old Firm derby. It had seemed like one of those heavyweight title fights everyone wanted to watch but the promoters might never be able to arrange. Barring a late injury or Gordon Strachan's whim it will finally happen today:

Keane v Rangers.

Bookmakers are not offering a price on Keane having a controlled, disciplined game but the odds on him being booked or sent off were available the moment he signed for Celtic. Today he is 20-1 to be sent-off and 7-4 to be booked. Those prices are an attempt to exploit the simplistic notion that the combination of Keane's baggage and temperament, exposed to the extreme hostility of Ibrox, would have the same consequence as exposing phosphorous to oxygen. But surely Keane can be expected to draw on his vast reservoir of experience of England and Europe's most daunting fixtures to deal with the inevitable provocation and aggression which will confront him? Despite the fact he has not been sent off in his last 69 appearances, it is the exaggerated prospect of that happening today, or of some other drama swirling around him, which will guarantee he monopolises the crowd's attention at least until the wider aspect of the game provides a distraction.

Celtic as a whole, never mind Keane, have not been seeing red lately. The SPL leaders have not had a red card since Alan Thompson, for a lunge on Nacho Novo, and Neil Lennon, for barging referee Stuart Dougal after the final whistle, were sent off in Strachan's only previous derby at Ibrox in August. The club was heavily criticised in the aftermath of that 3-1 defeat and Strachan took action. "We said we'd try to improve our discipline, " the manager said. What's happened since then? We're now top of the SPL Fair Play league, so we weren't just paying lip service. And we took action all the way through from under-11s to the reserves. We said if any Celtic kid got booked for dissent he would be taken off automatically. We've stuck to that and I don't think we've had any sent off on that score. I can't do that at first team level, it would be a bit silly taking someone off and throwing away a league. But what we can do is make sure that the kids grow up with greater discipline."

Celtic reportedly shifted £20,000-worth of strips with Keane lettering on the day he joined, but only after the Falkirk match four nights ago, during which he scored and quietly dominated proceedings, might he have felt satisfied with the value for money he had given the club.

It was his first compelling performance since his last appearance for United against Liverpool in September. He eased himself into the match, before using his awareness to frustrate Falkirk's attempts to harass him into errors.

"Roy came to Celtic because he wanted a new challenge and to achieve new things, " Strachan said. "He scored his first Celtic goal the other night so he's achieved something that he wanted to. I am sure he wants to win trophies with Celtic so that will be his next goal.

The Old Firm game isn't intimidating. You're only intimidated as a player if you're not very good, or if you have poor players around you. Or as a manager if you go in there with poor players.

That's intimidating. But I am not intimidated because I have good players around me.

What you want is the atmosphere to inspire them."

Simply being at Ibrox will appeal to the devil in Keane today. Ibrox will get its first chance to jeer him when he steps off the team coach and another when he emerges for the warm-up, but the theatre will begin for real when the cameras home in on his face as he lines up in the tunnel.

One of today's few certainties is that it won't be Keane who blinks first.

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