It’s Saturday at 8.45am. I’m sitting three metres away from my TalkSport co-presenter, Charlie Baker, who is in turn sitting three metres away from our producer, Joe. We are trying to come up with a vaguely amusing text subject for our show that starts in 15 minutes. We settle on village cricket anecdotes – back after months, it’s a goldmine of funny stories.
I tweet out a question and the answers start rolling in – a guy whose mum insisted he wear a bike helmet while fielding, a model aircraft crash-landing into the umpire’s leg and a team with five volunteer fireman who all left the field when a call came in.
Our guests are booked – Dean Ashton to preview Norwich v West Ham, Brian Deane on Sheffield United among others.
It’s 8.47am. Tony Cascarino – host of the Weekend Sports Breakfast – pokes his head out of the studio to tell us the sad news about Jack Charlton. It won’t be announced until 9. We have 10 minutes to cancel our plans and set up a show to pay tribute Big Jack – one of 11 men to win the World Cup for England and who transformed the game in Ireland.
Cascarino has to go back on air, and run through a Premier League preview, despite knowing that his friend and one of the biggest influences of his career has just died. Landlines that haven’t rung for weeks ring. Has someone made an obituary? Where is it saved? Will it be ready in nine minutes? Pre-made obituaries seem slightly cold and callous. There are meetings about who we expect to die in the next few weeks, months or years. Anyone renowned and approaching 80 has a ready-made obit on the shelf – whether in print or packaged up for TV and radio.
It’s 8.51am. To my shame, there’s so much I don’t know about Jack Charlton. I knew he was part of that Leeds side – but not that he was a one-club man. I knew nothing of his short-lived stint as a miner, nor of his managerial achievements at Middlesbrough or Sheffield Wednesday.
It’s 8.59am. We break the news. Meanwhile, producers have the unenviable task of trying to get in touch with potential guests. I genuinely don’t know if we have the right to be the bearers of this news. We contact Mick McCarthy. He graciously agrees to come on. It is hard to hear him tell us that our message “knocked him sideways”.
Mick is on hold while Shane, an Irishman who’s called in, talks about sharing a joke with Jack on a plane. “He was a great man, I know there’ll be a lot of people in tears and in mourning – he was the best thing to happen to us.”
Mick immediately acknowledges Shane’s point: “I’m glad to hear that guy born in Ireland say he [Charlton] lifted the country, because I’ve said it a number of times and it doesn’t kind of resonate the same way from me. It’s almost like we’re all patting each other on the back, but to hear other people who were there and at the games – I’m delighted he said it because Jack did lift the country.”
The whole tone of the programme is set by Cascarino – who stays with us after his show has finished. He is joined by Ray Houghton and they tell some wonderful stories, touched with humour and love. Ray’s voice cracks. Suddenly it feels like we’re in a pub remembering a mate – not getting all the facts right, but it doesn’t matter.
“We ended up going to Harry Ramsden’s the day before a game and doing the Harry Ramsden’s challenge,” says Cas. “It was giant fish ’n’ chips and sausage and pie – the whole team ate it and we played, was it Liechtenstein? I think it was Liechtenstein?”
“No, we actually lost 3-1 to Poland the following day at Lansdowne Road,” Houghton interjects. “In Harry Ramsden’s at that time there was this massive big fish and if you finished it you got it for nothing and Gary Kelly finished the lot off – and he got absolutely mullered the next day by Toni Polster – ah that’s right it was Austria. Did he get a hat-trick?”
“I can’t remember but he didn’t have to do much,” replies Cas. “We couldn’t move,” shouts Ray.
It feels like the laughter echoes out of the studio. It turns out Polster got two in that 3-1 win after Cascarino and Houghton had combined to put Ireland 1-0 up early in the second half. The affection in their voices is joyous.
Barry Glendenning comes on. He is genuinely moved. Those who listen to the Guardian Football Weekly have rarely heard his emotional side – nor have those who’ve worked with him for the best part of a decade. “He wasn’t just admired. He was loved. The day we beat England in Stuttgart in 1988 is still one of the greatest day’s of my life. I’m kind of surprised by how affected I am.”
It takes moments like this to realise what sport is really for. What the actual point is. When you step back for one moment. Amid the hours and hours of mindless transfer gossip, fake rage about VAR, and where shoulders begin and arms end. Added to real concern about where the money comes from and where it goes. And real rage about the racism and homophobia that doesn’t end.
But why do any of us love sport? It’s our memories of moments, of times spent with family and friends – where we were, who we were with, what we did. It moves us and it defines so much of us – more than we probably realise.
Jack Charlton moved so many in life. And even this Saturday morning, hours after he has passed away in his sleep, he is moving us again.
It’s 11am. Game day begins. Football stopped for a pandemic, but it doesn’t stop for one man. I am thankful to all those people who came on, despite their sadness, to express themselves so well. I hope, in a tiny way, we did Big Jack justice.