• Keogh, 33, turned down offer to stay on reduced wages • Defender to be out for a year after crash on night out

Richard Keogh has been left distraught after Derby sacked him on Wednesday. The club captain sustained serious knee ligament injuries when he was in the car that his teammate Tom Lawrence crashed into a lamppost after a boozy night out on 24 September.

Keogh, 33, has had surgery and is expected to be out for 12-14 months, giving him a return date of the end of next year. His contract, under which he was paid £24,000 a week, was set to expire in June 2021.

Derby’s Richard Keogh told he will play next year after 'alcohol-related' crash Read more

Derby had told Keogh he could stay and see out his deal. Yet they stunned the central defender by saying he had to accept a massive pay cut in order to do so.

It is understood Derby offered him only a fraction of the money he would otherwise have collected over the remainder of his contract.

The club’s hardline stance was unacceptable to Keogh and now they have told him he is no longer in their employ. Keogh has instructed his lawyers in the matter and the Professional Footballers’ Association has also become involved.

Keogh had been out with Lawrence and other Derby players, including Mason Bennett, after a team bonding day. Lawrence’s car went into the back of Bennett’s, before going across a roundabout and hitting a lamppost.

Keogh was left unconscious at the scene and Lawrence and Bennett fled. They returned 45 minutes later, when they were arrested. The men admitted drink-driving and failing to stop at the scene of an accident when they appeared at Derby magistrates court on 15 October. They avoided jail sentences but each was ordered to carry out 180 hours of unpaid community service and banned from driving for two years. Lawrence and Bennett were not in the Derby squad for the home win against Birmingham on 28 September but Lawrence has played 90 minutes in all five of the club’s subsequent matches. Bennett has been used twice as a substitute. Derby also fined both of them six weeks’ wages.

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Keogh is understood to feel badly let down by Derby, for whom he signed in the summer of 2012 from Coventry. He started in 316 of the club’s 330 Championship matches before the crash, plus all 10 of their play-offs games. Keogh, who was pictured on crutches at Pride Park last Wednesday when Derby beat Wigan, has been left to begin what is set to be an arduous rehabilitation on his own.

Derby said they had terminated Keogh’s contract with immediate effect for “gross misconduct” and that he had the right of appeal within 14 days. They added: “The club will not tolerate any of its players or staff behaving in a manner which puts themselves, their colleagues, and members of the general public at risk of injury or worse, or which brings the club into disrepute. The club will be making no further comment at this time regards this matter until the conclusion of any potential appeal.”