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It wasn't all lamping the ball forward and closing down - Jack could do tactics with the best of them

Paul McGrath

Jack Charlton talks tactics with Paul McGrath before Ireland's 1994 win over Germany in Stuttgart. Photo by Ray McManus/Sportsfile

SPORTSFILE

Jack Charlton talks tactics with Paul McGrath before Ireland's 1994 win over Germany in Stuttgart. Photo by Ray McManus/Sportsfile

July 12 2020 06:54 PM

One thing people often ask me about Jack Charlton is whether I was ever frustrated by his 'put 'em under pressure' tactics.

After all, at that time, Ireland had players like Liam Brady, Mark Lawrenson, Ronnie Whelan, Kevin Sheedy and Ray Houghton. With lads like those, we could have played 'keep ball' against any team in the world.

Instead we hoofed the ball a lot and, while the Irish people loved us, in world football we were feared - but definitely not loved. 'Neanderthal football' was one description of what we were doing back then.

But my answer was always "No, I didn't mind" - because Jack had found a system that the best teams in the world struggled with and that would take us a long way in the game - all the way to a World Cup quarter-final in fact.

But it wasn't just all about lamping the ball forward and closing down teams.

When it was wanted Jack's Ireland team could come up with a bit of sublety, given to us by the boss. Here's two examples.

Ray Houghton leaves Gordon Strachan on the deck during the European Championships qualifier in Hampden Park, Glasgow in 1987

Ray McManus / SPORTSFILE

Ray Houghton leaves Gordon Strachan on the deck during the European Championships qualifier in Hampden Park, Glasgow in 1987

The first was the Euro '88 qualifier in Scotland in 1987, when, in order to get all his best players on the pitch, Jack picked me at right-back and Ronnie Whelan at left-back.

He trusted us as players to get the job done in a strange position. And we won 1-0. However those selections were not ones of a man who was rigid in everything he did.

The second example came much later in Jack's Ireland career, when we went to play the then World Champions Germany, in a friendly in Hannover just before the 1994 World Cup.

By then Jack knew that, with big Quinny out injured for the World Cup, and the heat and humidity of an American summer again us, we'd have to come up with something different than hustling all the time.

So, against Germany, Jack said we should, when the Germans had the ball, just get tight on our men - give them no option for passing the ball.

And it worked brilliantly. Time and time again that afternoon, I saw these superbly technical German players waving their arms about because they had no one available for a pass, to continue with the style of football they wanted to play.

Again, Jack had come up with a little twist that saw a top team baffled by what we were trying to do.

So, when you are talking about Jack as a football manager, don't just see the cloth cap, the gruff manner and Packie Bonner whacking the ball forward.

Jack Charlton could do tactics with the best of them. And he helped us beat the best of them for ten wonderful years.

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