Niall Quinn's press conference:In a moving speech, one of the Republic of Ireland's senior players gives his side of the unfolding drama. Tom Humphries reports

Last week in Saipan, when Niall Quinn went to Roy Keane's room to say goodbye, it struck him that this was probably the last time he would ever speak face-to-face with a colleague whom he had known for a decade and liked for the most part of that time. Keane was somebody Quinn had been through the wars with but the closeness which that should have brought never materialised for them.

Keane was his own self. Quinn was gregarious and outgoing. Still.

And then not through sentiment but through pragmatism Quinn got to Japan and began thinking of what Keane was depriving the other 22 players of. The week in Saipan had turned bitter but with Keane on the field the three games which loom for Ireland could run more sweetly perhaps. He lifted the phone and called Michael Kennedy, the strongest common bond between himself and Roy Keane.

Quinn put in train a process of calls between Japan and London and Manchester which kept him awake night after night this week, which brought the ugliest and most high-profile row Irish sport has seen to the edge of the resolution which everyone wanted. And Quinn did it all while the man he said goodbye to launched a series of personal attacks on him; did it all knowing that Keane had little or no respect for him.

"I'll always regret" says Quinn "that I didn't intervene when Roy started up that night in Saipan. I think in a way he would have looked for me or Stan (Steve Staunton) to intervene to take the meeting a different way. But I was stunned. We all were. How angry he was. I didn't say anything till he was finished and gone. I think I was the first to speak. I asked if I should go after him but it was too late by then."

So with his World Cup ruined, his mind shot and his thoughts on protecting the younger players in the squad, Quinn came to the media yesterday to explain the sequence of events which almost brought Roy Keane back to the World Cup, which led to the players releasing a rather unequivocal statement against Keane just when the olive branch might have been grasped and which ultimately ended in what looks like the sundering of friendships between men like Quinn, Staunton, Gary Kelly and Ireland's greatest footballer.

Sad business to have to do and his face showed it.

Today first. "At 7.30 this morning word filtered around that Mick had offered an olive branch to Roy. By breakfast time thoughts were racing. At half-ten Mick called a meeting which he will speak about in greater detail later.

"He effectively ended any chance of Roy Keane appearing at the World Cup finals. He left the meeting and asked us to have a chat among ourselves to see how we felt about it. We were left with no alternative. All 22 of us voted unanimously to back him."

During that brief meeting Quinn asked every player in the panel in turn to speak their mind. Most had come to the end of their tether. They thought now that if they didn't back their manager he was on the verge of resigning and completely capsizing the boat. They said goodbye to Roy before Roy could say goodbye to them.

For Quinn yesterday's events put an end to a draining process which began last Sunday before Mick McCarthy departed for Kobe to watch a friendly  game.

"I'll give you the chain of events. One of the younger players came to my room. He asked how I would feel about it if Roy came back. I said I'd been thinking the same thing myself. So I rang Michael Kennedy myself and we discussed a way of getting Roy out here again. Roy was angry and upset. I don't hold any doubts that he is sincere in his own mind but all this came about because we feel he was wrong. It took a little time to get anything going."

While McCarthy was in Kobe Quinn began canvassing the players. Some were  hostile to the idea of inviting Keane back but when push came to shove they realised the good of the team and the will of the people back home would be served by having Keane brilliant and broody in their midst again.

"I spent next day, as you do, talking about it. By the end of the day players felt there was a chance if Roy would apologise. Next thing Roy did an article in an English newspaper that knocked it back. It didn't kill it but it set us back.

"Michael told me to pursue it still. Mick wasn't happy at this stage. I pestered him behind the scenes."

By Monday through painstaking work and subtle pressure behind the scene on both McCarthy and Keane all parties involved had got to the stage where they expected an apology to come either on TV or in private. Keane desperately wanted to be in Japan.

McCarthy needed him. One man needed to blink first. Quinn stayed up half the night and then rang his wife Gillian in Sunderland to find out if the apology  had fallen from Roy Keane's lips. Verdict : Inconclusive.

"If Roy Keane had apologised on television I am sure he would have been on his way to Japan," said Sunderland's Republic of Ireland striker, who looked on the verge of tears during the press conference.

"We heard he was going live on TV to apologise. We were very excited about that. We came so close to getting Roy out here. He will never know how close. It was so close to happening . . . but the whole thing has fallen apart. The word coming back from various sources was that a plane had been booked and that Keane was going to apologise on television."

And so it ended. The players issued their statement. Keane countered with an equally terse one of his own. He will continue to haunt their World Cup but not their personal space.

"The conversations I was having with Michael were that Roy was coming around all the time and that the TV was going to be the big one. I didn't want to see Roy lose out and I wanted to try to salvage winners on all sides if possible. The people back in Ireland changed the players' minds.

"It all came about we think because he was wrong. I was desperate for him to apologise, but I don't think he's done enough and it saddens me to say that. But we have spirit and heart in the camp and we are united. All 22 players are fully committed to Mick."

And he gets up and speeds of in a Japanese taxi to the Royal Hotel there to get some kip. Four hours last night. Up early working hard all day everyday though. We have lost a great footballer but as model professional and model humans go we are one up.