As he sits back and relaxes during the flight to Milan today, even Robbie Keane must be a little startled by this latest twist in his already spectacularly fast-moving career.

Two years ago, he had Brian Kerr and Mick McCarthy arguing over him. Last summer Bryan Robson, John Gregory and Gordon Strachan were all eager to sign him up. Now Inter Milan's Gabriele Oriali has decided to get in before the mainland Europe rush. And so, a new chapter in his remarkable rise looks set to begin.

Born and raised in Tallaght, Keane started his footballing days with local club Fettercairn United before being picked up by one of the southside's leading schoolboy clubs, Crumlin United.

From there, the youngster moved to Wolverhampton Wanderers despite interest from far bigger clubs. It was not to be the last time that his tendency to trust the right people and follow their advice was to pay off for him.

Having quickly broken into the senior team at Molineux and going on to average around a goal every three games for the first division club, the bigger outfits renewed their interest in the Dubliner at the start of last season. Initially, Wolves boss Colin Lee scorned the approaches remarking at one point that "talk of £5 million is a joke. That wouldn't even buy one of his arms and it's his legs that are supposed to be valuable."

However, the financial realities of the situation at a club that had repeatedly spent heavily in failed attempts to win a place in the premiership were soon impressed upon Lee. And last August, while Gregory appeared to lose his nerve, Strachan used the bulk of the money received from Leeds for Darren Huckerby to do precisely what he had said he would do at the time . . . buy somebody better.

Again, with potentially more lucrative offers on the table, Keane signed up for one of the lesser clubs. The 19-year-old scored twice on his debut and added another 10 over the course of the season. By the spring, Inter were said to be interested and a horde of Italian journalists descended on his Highfield Road to size up the striker.

Despite his astonishing progress at club level, though, it is his international performances which have reportedly caught the eye of the Italians.

In the Czech Republic a little over two years ago, Keane became the second-youngest player ever to be capped by the Republic and, a month later in May, he gave a strong hint of his potential at that level with an outstanding performance against Argentina in his first game at Lansdowne Road.

At the time, Keane was still heavily involved with Kerr's youth team and there was considerable tension between the two Irish coaches over whether the priority for the teenager should be friendlies with the senior team or competitive outings with the under-age side.

The player himself appeared to have little trouble balancing the two and went on to play a key role and score three goals in Ireland's victorious campaign at the 1998 European Youth Championships in Cyprus.

For McCarthy, meanwhile, he had by February of this year - when was again outstanding against the Czech Republic - taken his senior tally to six goals in 14 games. He became such a central figure, in fact, that much of the criticism of the Republic's coach in the wake of Ireland's failure to qualify for this summer's European championships focused on the decision to rest Keane in Zagreb in order to keep him fresh for the match a few days later against Malta. In hindsight, it must be a decision which McCarthy bitterly regrets having taken.

Now, for the first time, Keane and his advisers are prepared to take a major gamble of their own. The fact that Inter are happy to pay £13 million sterling, as well as a healthy wage, in order to get their man would tend to indicate that they rate the 20-year-old very highly indeed.

There will certainly be no guarantees for the young Irishman at Inter Milan. Already battling for their place in the frontline at the San Siro are no fewer than six strikers - Ronaldo, Hakan Sukur, Christian Vieri, Ivan Zamorano, Alvaro Recoba and Adrian Mutu.

In the face of such competition, things may start to come a little more slowly for Keane, but then he, like his advisers, clearly think that he is ready to take on the best strikers around as well as the best defenders and so far, at least, they haven't been calling it too badly.