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Jack Charlton was more than Ireland's greatest manager - he changed the country

Republic of Ireland manager Jack Charlton after the FIFA World Cup 1990 Group F match between Republic of Ireland and Netherlands - Sportsfile
Republic of Ireland manager Jack Charlton after the FIFA World Cup 1990 Group F match between Republic of Ireland and Netherlands - Sportsfile

A Northumberland lad, a Leeds colossus, an English World Cup winner, but perhaps most evocatively of all, an Irish legend.

Jack Charlton’s impact on football in Ireland was monumental, his achievements unsurpassed, the most successful manager of the national team. Yet, as impressive as that might be, it only covers a small part of his legacy because he did far more for football across the Irish Sea than qualify for Euro 88 and the World Cups in 1990 and 94.

To focus on what Charlton achieved on the pitch cannot possibly do justice to the impact he had on the country, politically, socially, but also emotionally.

In a sense, he united Ireland, transforming the “Garrison Game” as it was disparagingly called – because of its popularity in the towns that housed British Army barracks – into the mainstream sport it is today.

The former defender did not only earn popularity among the already converted, those who had already fallen for soccer’s charm in the working class areas of Dublin and other football bastions like Dundalk and Sligo, winning over the initially hostile and sceptical with results and performances.

Incredibly, he brought conservative, Catholic Ireland with him too. An Englishman who converted politicians and priests, Republicans and Nationalists.

Such was his influence, that by the time he left in 1995 football was no longer  viewed with suspicion as the English game, a foreign sport introduced by invaders to a country which resisted partly through its enduring passion for traditional Irish sports like Hurling and Galic football - it was Ireland’s game too.

“There's a nostalgia show that is repeated a lot on TV here that features an image I'll always remember, it's an old man crying with joy when Ireland beat Romania on penalties to reach the Italia '90 quarter finals," explained Dan McDonnell, chief football writer of the Irish Independent.

Former Republic of Ireland manager Jack Charlton is introduced to the crowd ahead of the Three International Friendly match between Republic of Ireland and England  - Sportsfile
Former Republic of Ireland manager Jack Charlton is introduced to the crowd ahead of the Three International Friendly match between Republic of Ireland and England - Sportsfile

"Men of that Irish generation wouldn't cry that often in public. That was Jack’s real impact. His time in charge was almost like a bridge from an old church dominated Ireland, a more conservative Ireland, towards the present day. He was an Englishman uniting Ireland and bringing new popularity to a sport that a lot of the traditional pillars of our society would have rejected.

“You have to remember that until 1971, the GAA (Gaelic Athletic Association) banned any athletes who either attended or played in a soccer match. It's football to me but you still have to call it soccer here sometimes because Gaelic football is our native game. Most schools in the country only had a GAA team. There were parts of the country where soccer was frowned upon, it was called the 'foreign game' or the 'garrison game' because the strongest rural clubs were in towns that had a strong British army presence back in the day.

“But when Jack brought Irish teams to major tournaments, everyone shared in it. To qualify for the Euros in 1988 and beat England was big, but Italia 90, that is a generation defining moment. For someone my age, who was seven or eight when that tournament took place, that tournament is a reference point in our lives that resonates today.

"Just like in England, the 1980s were tough in Ireland, grim really. There was mass unemployment, mass emigration, but that tournament, it allowed people to stand proud. To see our flag being flown proudly on a world stage. It really did give a lift to the nation's confidence.

“He was loved by the country, but he remained a proud Englishman too. When we didn't qualify for Euro '92 - drawing twice with England when we should have beaten them at Wembley - Jack was open enough in saying that the best team had missed out but he would still be cheering England on in the finals. You wouldn't get many Irish heroes saying that.

“The strange thing is, there is so much grief in Ireland following his death, we have to remind ourselves that it will be the same in England, he won the World Cup for England, he lived and managed from England, but we tend to think of him as one of ours."

Republic of Ireland manager Jack Charlton splashes water on Tommy Coyne, - Sportsifle
Republic of Ireland manager Jack Charlton splashes water on Tommy Coyne, - Sportsifle

That theme is picked up by the former Republic of Ireland international John Anderson, who was in Charlton’s first squad to play Wales in March 1986. Appointed a month earlier, the first foreigner to take the job after the Football Association of Ireland had failed to get their first-choice target, the former Liverpool manager Bob Paisley, Charlton started in the same fashion he would lead the national team for the next nine years.

“It didn’t happen over night, “Anderson explained. “The first couple of games we played, he took a huge amount of criticism for the way we played, he’s an Englishman coming over here.. it could have turned very nasty. But once you start winning games…

“The appointment didn’t go down well, people didn’t think it should happen, but he became a national treasure, he became one of our own. Italia 90 had the same impact in Ireland as it did in England.

“There were hundreds of thousands of people lining the roads from the airport into Dublin. You would have thought we had one the World Cup. The country was so proud of that team and him. You will not see anyone have that impact on Irish football, nobody going into that job will have the same effect on the country as Jack did.

“In the late 80s or early 90s, if Jack had ran for President he would have won by a landslide. That’s how popular he was, how loved he was. It’s not what he did just football, it was he did the country, the economy, getting to those tournaments, it did wonders for the country. He is an adopted Irishman, he has green blood.”

But what was he like to play for? “Jack was Jack,” said Anderson with a laugh. “He spoke the same way to the President as he would to the guy who made the tea. There were no airs and graces. He never forgot where he came from, his roots.

“His first team against Wales, at the first team meeting he said this is how we are going to do it and if you don’t like it, the door is there and you can leave now. The players just looked at each other and thought ‘phwooar, ok here we go.

“We had been a nice team, we played in a European style, out from the back, nice football, but he said ‘we’re not going to be nice anymore, we are going to get into people’s faces, we’re going to upset team, we are going to be physical and combative… which his teams were, but they also some great players and they could play when they needed to.”