Ronan Keating has been unfairly savaged online by trolls over his performance in Melbourne.
The Boyzone star, 47, took to the stage at the Flemington Racecourse on Tuesday to kick off the Melbourne Cup race alongside singer Ricki-Lee Coulter.
He belted out the beloved 1999 hit When You Say Nothing At All with pitch perfect precision, and got the crowd involved with a sing-along.
However, without justification trolls have laid into the 90s star over his performance, calling the event’s selection of him ’embarrassing’ and ‘desperate’.
@wendy_chucky took to social media and said: ‘Ronan Keating.. always wondered who makes these decisions, racing industry trying to lure the younger crowd but here we have a man whose last hit was in 1991. Embarrassing.’
‘How desperate is the #MelbourneCup2024 getting in Ronan Keating, was no one else available?’ asked @shrimpsquiggles.
‘Do we need Ronan Keating? #MelbourneCup’ asked @MattThomas1405, while @_goldenlaura added: ‘Ronan Keating is such random entertainment.’
‘I’m sorry, but who organised the entertainment for the Cup?? Like really? Ronan Keating???’ asked @aussiechic81, as @SamTomlin539 wrote: ‘Having lived in the UK in 1998 when Boyzone were everywhere, Ronan Keating’s present-day revival as an Australian B-lister continues to feel very surreal.’
Poor Ronan is due to spend more time in Australia, despite the slightly frosty online reception from Aussies.
‘We are in Sydney mainly and we will be here until next year,’ Keating told 9News in an interview ahead of his performance on Tuesday, as per Herald Sun.
‘We have re-evaluated life a little bit and the plan is to spend more time here in Australia and near family, we love being here.’
Ronan and his wife Storm Keating, who is an Aussie native, married in 2015 after meeting when the boyband star was a judge on the X Factor in 2011.
They wanted to give their two kids – Cooper, 7, and Coco, 5 – an ‘Aussie lifestyle’ after Storm enjoyed just this growing up on a cattle station in Far North Queensland.
Before Storm, Ronan was married to Yvonne Connolly from 1998 to 2015, in which time they welcomed children Jack, 25, Missy, 23, and Ali, 19.
This comes as Ronan reflected on his own journey to stardom at a young age after One Direction star Liam Payne’s death aged 31, after he fell from his hotel balcony.
In 1993 aged just 16 – the same age as Payne was when he joined One Direction on the X Factor – Ronan formed Boyzone with Keith Duffy, Michael Graham, Shane Lynch, and Stephen Gately.
‘I joined a boyband at 16. These lads (One Direction) were put together at such a young age; the industry is a really difficult, tough place,’ he began.
‘There’s nobody there really to manage that for all of us kids, when we were kids, to guide us through it.’
‘Nobody gives you any sort of media training; nobody helps you deal with what’s about to happen,’ he added.
Following their formation, Boyzone achieved international success and topped the UK charts six times.
They officially split in 2000 but have reunited on several occasions since for landmark tours, including their Back Again… No Matter What shows in 2009.
This was the last time the star shared the stage as a five-piece before Gately’s death at the age of 33 due to a congenital heart defect.