Authors: Trevor Keane
‘I then met with Craig Brown [assistant to Roxburgh] after an epic Cup game against Everton, and Scotland were promising
me a cap too, either at full or B level. Then, true to his word, Jack called Bruce and told him that he wanted to speak to me after training. So at 1 p.m. I took a call in the security office, and straight away Jack asked me what my qualification was. I told him how I was eligible to play for Ireland. He told me that he would have the FAI check it out, and if it worked out, I’d get a call-up. He only promised me one cap, mind, and said that if I wasn’t up to scratch, that was that.
‘Everything checked out, and as Jack had promised I was called into the squad for the Wales game. I had grown up in Glasgow and was a massive Celtic fan, but the way I saw it Scotland had never done anything for me, so to have the chance to pull on the Ireland jersey was the stuff of dreams.
‘I remember the Wales game well. The build-up was strange for me, as I was in a room with the likes of Whelan, McGrath and Aldridge, all big names. We were sitting in the changing-room, and there were a load of balls that needed signing, so the rest of the squad started signing them. However, I didn’t sign any. I mean, I was not a name in the team yet, but Jack must have seen this, so he made a point of saying to me, in front of everyone, “Are you going to sign a ball? You might not be back.” It was his way of helping me feel at ease in the squad.
‘The one thing Jack could do, and I have never met a manager that could do this so well since, he could have a drink and be one of the lads and then just like that he could switch into manager mode. It was an amazing ability to have.’
When Jack first took the job as Ireland manager the mood in the Ireland camp was very sombre. The team was at their lowest ebb after the final years of the Hand regime. As Kevin Sheedy, the scorer of Ireland’s first-ever goal at a World Cup
final tournament, recalls, ‘After Eoin Hand, Ireland needed to take a new direction, and with Jack you had someone who did things his way. He was very straight with people, and all the players knew what was required. If a player was suspended or injured, then the player coming in knew what had to be done. As a coach now myself, if I could take away anything from that time, it would be his honesty, his straightforwardness – you knew what you were getting.
‘Another thing about that team was that Jack brought players into the squad who were late entrants to international football. I myself had been there from the youth levels. I had played in the Under-21s and had then made the step up to the senior side. However, other players did not go down that route. Before Jack there had been some dark days in Irish football. I remember being 5–0 down to Denmark with thirty minutes to go in a game, so the change in fortune under Jack was great.’
The players seemed to respond to the approach of the new management team, and so it was that Big Jack and his motley crew of Irish players set off in search of qualification for their first-ever major competition. First up was a Euro ’88 qualifying group that included Belgium, Scotland, Bulgaria and Luxembourg. Ireland started off the campaign by earning a creditable draw in Brussels, but they were also held to a draw by Scotland in Dublin. In February 1987, however, they enjoyed a fine 1–0 win in Glasgow. Gerry Peyton, who played under four Ireland managers in all, the last of whom was Big Jack, says, ‘The first thing Jack did was set about getting some belief into the team. The Scotland game in Glasgow was one of the major turning points for us. Mark Lawrenson scored after a smart dribble. Following that win the belief and confidence started to come. The players started to
believe in the system, and everyone was beginning to understand their role. History will tell you that it was a Scotland victory over a near impenetrable Bulgaria at home that got us there, but the group matches were very tight, and I suppose in a twist of irony Bulgaria became the Ireland of previous qualifying campaigns, as they hit the post in that game and came close on a number of occasions.’
Ireland qualified for the 1988 European Championship in Germany, and the team were drawn against England in a group of death that also contained the USSR and eventual winners Holland. In preparing for the finals, Ireland won all four of their friendly matches, against Israel, Romania, Yugoslavia and Poland. Peyton says, ‘I think once we qualified for the European Championship in Germany, a noticeable change came over the squad. The victory over Scotland was a case in point. Confidence was flowing through the squad, and that’s what Jack brought to the Irish team.
‘In Germany, the media wrote us off and were claiming that we were only there to make up the numbers and would get thrashed. I remember the morning of the first game, against England. We were having breakfast and were all very nervous. Paul McGrath in particular looked very nervous. There would normally be a bit of banter and a joke, but that morning it was all very serious. Next thing Jack came into the dining area, and it was obvious he could sense that the lads were nervous. He went over to the first table and said, “You lot had better not do something stupid today and score a goal. I’m going fishing tomorrow.” Those couple of lines really helped lift the tension and relaxed the boys.’
In their opening match of the Championships, the World
Cup winner found himself plotting England’s downfall, and he delivered. Ireland met England at Stuttgart and heroically won the match 1–0, with the goal coming from Ray Houghton. It also proved to be a great day for Packie Bonner, who made a string of fine saves.
Gerry explains how the players felt after that famous game: ‘The emotions after the England match were very strong. Packie had made a couple of fantastic saves, and, of course, Ray’s goal had won it, but the team had really performed that day. I remember Liam Brady, who had missed out on the tournament due to injury, was visibly upset, and I think everyone saw the passion that the team had.’
For Charlton, however, it was just another match: ‘When Ireland played against England at Euro ’88 and Italia ’90 I was not overcome with mixed emotions. I was employed by the FAI to manage Ireland no matter who we were playing. I wanted to get a result, and I always sent the team out to get one.’
Ireland met the Soviet Union in their next match, the game ending 1–1, with Ronnie Whelan scoring an incredible goal. Ireland needed only a draw to qualify for the semi-finals. However, they lost their final match, going down 1–0 to the future European champions Holland, but as Sheedy says, ‘You have to remember that we were just six minutes away from the semi-finals, which was an amazing achievement.’ This is backed up by Peyton, who adds, ‘If it had not been for a fluke spin of the ball against Holland, we could have gone further still.’ For his part Charlton was rewarded with the runners-up prize in the
World Soccer
Manager of the Year awards in 1988.
The key to Charlton’s success was not only the brand of football he promoted, but also the relationship he enjoyed with
his players: ‘I like to think that you must treat players as friends. You need the players to understand what you want to do and what you are trying to achieve. With Ireland we had a way of playing. Each player had a part to play. You’ll be familiar with the phrase “put them under pressure”. Well, that was what we wanted to do. Players had to get back behind the ball and pressure the opposition from all parts of the pitch.’
Sheedy agrees: ‘Jack treated all the players as grown-ups, and you could enjoy a pint of Guinness when the time was right, as long as you didn’t abuse the privilege. It helped build a good team spirit. We would head off to the races together, and travelling with the Ireland team was the same as it was with Everton. Everyone got on, and the spirit was good.
‘The thing about Jack, though, was that sometimes you couldn’t tell if he was being clever or if that was just his way. I remember we were playing a game against Wales, and he had written the team on the back of a box of cigarettes, with all the names of the players wrong. I was wondering, “Is he being clever here and telling us it doesn’t matter who these guys are, or is there something else going on?” In my opinion Jack was a very simple and wise man. He knew what he had, and he knew the system he wanted to play. It was a case of the players understanding and fitting in to that system. Lansdowne Road was a fortress during his time in charge, visiting teams found it very difficult to go there and get a result.’
Following on from their success in Germany, Ireland successfully qualified for Italia ’90. The team prepared for the trip to Italy with a two-week training camp in Malta. Bernie Slaven was a late joiner to the squad ahead of the competition, and he remembers the experience, not all of it good: ‘I was very
lucky to play international football. I was twenty-nine when I made my debut against Wales, and thankfully I scored. Jack had said to me that if I played in two games, I might make the World Cup squad, so there was a big incentive there. I missed the next Ireland game, though, as Middlesbrough had a game against Ipswich and Colin Todd pulled me out of the squad. I had a stinker that night as my mind was on Ireland, thinking that I had blown my chance.
‘Thankfully, Jack gave me another forty-five minutes before he named his squad, and I was lucky to get in. I think the fact that Jack was based in Newcastle might have helped me, as it was only forty-five minutes down the road from him, and he could easily come and see me play.
‘I roomed with Gary Waddock, and in the build-up to the World Cup we played a game against Turkey. I only played forty minutes and Gary played the full ninety. We were back at the hotel later, and Gary was lying on the bed. He said to me, “I think I’m going home. You know, I just have a feeling.”
‘When we landed in Malta for the preparation camp I was talking to Niall Quinn, and I saw Jack having a word with Gary. I then saw Gary’s head drop. Back at the hotel Gary told me that he was not part of the final squad and that he was going home. He was upset and rang his wife. Jack came in to see if Gary was all right and turned to me and said, “It could have been you.” Although that showed that Jack could make hard decisions, there was another side to him too, a softer side almost, and he did offer to allow Gary to travel with the squad. After the game against Holland, Mick McCarthy got Ruud Gullit’s jersey and had it signed and gave it to Gary.
‘What people often don’t realise is that while going to a
World Cup is an amazing experience, it can be hard too, especially if you don’t play. You are away for a couple of weeks from family and friends, and at the end of the day you are training hard, probably harder than the others, as you want to make an impression, but you still don’t get on the pitch. The players who did not get a game called ourselves the muppets. It was a joke at our own expense. From my own point of view, I guess I had played no role in getting Ireland there, so Jack was always going to stick with the guys who had led him there.
‘Boredom is the hardest thing at a World Cup, whether you are Ireland, England, Germany or Brazil. You can’t go out and sunbathe, as Jack did not want us doing that, even if we were not playing, so you have to stay in your room a lot. It can be hard. There is no room for letting your hair down.’
The performances in Italy were not so easy on the eye, but the results were impressive, and after draws with England, Egypt and Holland, Ireland eventually went out to the hosts Italy in the quarter-finals by a single goal.
The draw with England once again saw Charlton up against his country of birth. It must have been even harder for Jack to prepare the team for a World Cup match against England, but Kevin Sheedy recalls that Jack didn’t need to say too much to the team: ‘Personally, I think there was a lot of pressure on the players and Jack ahead of the game against England. Our main objective, though, was not to lose the first game. We could not afford that. In some respects it was not just an international World Cup match; it was a bit more than that. It was more like a local derby, an Everton versus Liverpool match or a Manchester City versus Manchester United game. The pressure was building, especially in the papers, and I suppose you could
feel it, but we were pumped up for the game. As I said, it was like a derby, so everyone wanted to play. Going a goal down so early in the game [Gary Lineker opened the scoring after eight minutes] was hard, but we dug in, and then I scored after seventy-two minutes. It was a great experience.’
It was a tremendous achievement for a team with no previous World Cup experience. As Charlton explains, ‘I remember when we came home from Italia ’90 the airport was mobbed. It took us sixty minutes to get out of the airport, then another two and a half hours to get into O’Connell Street. There were kids climbing up poles. We were getting a bit worried about them. There were people throwing things up to the bus, and then when they were falling back down people were jumping out to catch them. We had to get the police to go in front of the bus to keep an eye on people.’
Gerry Peyton continues, ‘When we came back from the European Championship in 1988 about 500,000 people welcomed us home. By the time we arrived home from Italy there were 1.5 million people there to welcome us. Jack’s team had become a phenomenon. Everyone wanted to be a Packie Bonner, a Paul McGrath or a Ray Houghton, and Jack helped these guys become household names.’
Modern-day players such as Shay Given would have looked up to Packie and the others and wanted to emulate them. Successful countries breed successful players. Just as the England heroes of 1966 would have inspired a host of youngsters to take up the game and try to copy the saves of Banks or the shots of Hurst, likewise youngsters all over Ireland were now diving to their right to save penalties and heading the ball into the England net.