Jack Charlton believed in simplicity, in football and in life
By that stage I had made three international appearances under former Ireland manager Eoin Hand, but I hadn’t got back in for a year and a half; of course I wanted to play. That memory of Jack is so vivid and so lasting, the cheeky grin, the shotgun verbal attack. He is the most extraordinary man I’ve known, funny as hell, a maverick, off the wall.
Jack Charlton, a member of the England 1966 World Cup winning side who went on to become a cult hero as Republic of Ireland boss, died on Saturday aged 85.
The elder brother of fellow World Cup winning teammate Bobby was also an integral part of the Leeds side that won the 1969 League title and the 1972 FA Cup. He also managed Middlesbrough, Sheffield Wednesday and Newcastle United.
Jack believed in simplicity, whether in life or football. He didn’t want first-class travel or luxurious accommodation. He hated that. He loved everything being against the odds and injected that into the Ireland team, which was the perfect outlet for him. By that stage, he did not want to be around footballers 24/7. The job suited him.
For Italia 90 we travelled second class and stayed in a hotel in Sicily where the running water was rust-coloured and there was no airconditioning. I was sharing a room with Andy Townsend and, at one point, we were lying there watching a slow ceiling fan going round and laughing at how it was like Apocalypse Now. “You’ve got a bed, it’s fine, get on with it.”
Jack liked us to go on days out and visits, whether it was to the local mayor or the Pope.
We met John Paul II and visited the Sistine Chapel. The Pope had been a goalkeeper when he played football so he got chatting to Packie Bonner, who went on to make a mistake in the quarter-finals against Italy. After that game Jack thanked everyone, wished us all a good summer and finished by saying: “Packie, the Pope would have saved that one.”
It’s no secret that Jack let us go out and have a beer while other squads, such as England, were locked up early and very jealous of us. Considering what was at stake we might have pushed it too far at times — we had two kegs of Guinness in the hotel one night and played party games with the police. But we always focused when it came to training and games.
He let us know before the Italy game in Rome that if we had a player like Gary Lineker we could possibly win this tournament, because none of our forwards was very quick — John Aldridge, me, Niall Quinn, Frank Stapleton, David Kelly, John Byrne. Jack wanted someone who was blisteringly quick. He had been hoping somebody with an Irish connection could come through. We never had it.
Things changed a lot for the 1994 World Cup in the US. We had our own rooms and they were much nicer. But the same relaxed ethos was applied and we were kept busy and played games (not always involving having a drink). It was always fun and enjoyable.
It might sound like we were too relaxed but we took it seriously — it was the World Cup. When you woke up on the morning of a game you focused; that was natural. It was just good we weren’t locked in our rooms.
As a manager, Jack was a genius at getting the basics right. The way he wanted his players to close down the opposition was very reminiscent of today’s trend for pressing and he was great on set pieces. He had an instinctive understanding of the way teams from eastern Europe, Africa or South America would play.
Sometimes we would be sitting in front of him and he would get his cigarettes out. There would be writing on the cigarette packet and he would start reeling off information. It would be all so simple, but he was very knowledgeable,
He always saw it as “we’re not changing, they adapt to us, that is our strength”. He was very good at that.
Jack was sensitive in his own brutal way, too. He dropped me after we played Egypt at the 1990 World Cup and although the conversation in the hotel reception was typically hard-hitting — “you were f … ing rubbish, you’re out” — you could tell he didn’t want a confrontation. He was a worrier. We’d see him walking about, preparing what he was going to say.
My dad wore a wig and one time Jack overheard me and some of the others talking about that, having a laugh. He went ballistic. “Don’t you take the piss,” he said. “Our kid (Charlton’s brother Bobby) lost his hair and it caused him all sorts of bother.” He was fiercely protective and cared enormously about the people he liked. In return, he inspired ferocious loyalty.
I played golf with him once and never stopped laughing. Instead of putting he would push the ball towards the hole until it went in. “That’s par,” he’d say. It was cheating but he was always so desperate to win. It was the same with cards. Nobody would dare beat him. “Do you want to f … ing play on Saturday, or what?”
He got sensitive only when it got personal. If Jack liked you he would protect you.
His biggest attribute as a manager was that he treated the team like men. You might not like what was going to come and you might not like his decision-making, but he would treat you like a man. We had players playing at Liverpool, Manchester United, two at Arsenal, all playing for big clubs.
At the end of the Jack era, he told us that our legs were gone. He said to a number of players, “We can’t play like we used to because none of you can run like you used to.”
Before we played Holland in Liverpool in the Euro 96 playoff, he was really bothered because he knew we couldn’t match their running ability. Before the game it had always been 4-4-2. He had a meeting and he wanted to play a 4-5-1 formation. I think he was right on that.
In the preparations for that playoff we were all laughing because we were shown a video and realised that it was not the Dutch team we were watching. We were watching the Dutch Under-21s and Jack said, “Just f … ing watch it, they play the same way.”
In all the times I knew Jack he never mentioned he had won the World Cup except once, when we drew 1-1 at Wembley. I was a substitute and before the game I was walking around the track at the stadium with Jack. He was getting abuse off the England fans. He said to me: “I won the World Cup with this nation. I never got offered the job as England manager.” He was muttering to himself as we walked around — it showed how sensitive he was.
My time playing under Jack for Ireland was the most fantastic time. The greatest and funniest moments of my career were from that era.
Former Millwall, Chelsea and Aston Villa star Tony Cascarino played 88 games for the Republic of Ireland between 1985 and 1999, most of them under Jack Charlton.
THE SUNDAY TIMES
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Elland Road, 1988. Millwall had just beaten Leeds United and a tall fella was waiting for me outside the away dressing room. “I saw you at Gillingham,” he said. Oh, OK. “I thought you were f … ing crap.” Right. “Now. Do you want to come and play for Ireland?” That was my introduction to Jack Charlton.