Sporting Bygones: Lack of skill fails to hold back Big Jack in pursuit of glory

He was the oldest member of the squad which won the League Championship, the FA Cup, the League Cup and the Inter-Cities Fairs Cup and would be the first to admit, given the presence of quality players like Billy Bremner, John Giles, Eddie Gray, Paul Madeley and Terry Cooper and others, that he was far from the most skilful member of the squad.

Being skilful was not his job; he was one of Revie's rocks, part of a central defensive partnership with Norman Hunter without which all the quality about them would have not won a tin can.

Perhaps it was the experience of his teenage days, when he worked in mining and almost took up a career as a policeman in his native Northumberland before playing in a trial match for Leeds as a 15-year-old and impressing enough to be offered an apprenticeship, which helped him look on success – and failure – under Revie in a slightly different light to that of his colleagues.

He had known the long, sometimes depressing, always daunting struggle to make it to first-team level, not helped by being the latest in the line from the Milburn clan, taking in uncles Jack, George and Jim, who had all worn the blue-and-gold of Leeds, another uncle, Stan, who had played for Leicester City, and his mother's cousin John – otherwise known as Jackie Milburn – who was worshipped on Tyneside.

If they were not enough, Jack was overshadowed as a young man even closer to home; his brother Robert, who joined Manchester United amid a huge fanfare while Jack was quietly enduring National Service, being widely regarded as the most likely of the two to become a star.

He and Bobby would later make football history but for long years before then, when Jack became established in a Leeds team managed by Raich Carter and built round John Charles, there was little suggestion of the glory to come.

Jack Charlton never forgot – and tried not to let others forget – that football, like life, has more than one side, that sometimes you have to know how to lose before you can understand the meaning of winning.

That did not mean he enjoyed losing; far from it. He and Bremner were so upset after Leeds lost to Chelsea in the replayed 1970 FA Cup final they locked themselves away for a day or two to drown their sorrows, Charlton's despair being underpinned by the fact that it was his header which was flicked on by Dave Webb for Chelsea's winning goal.

He took winning with a smile and a cigar, whether it was a football match or a nice touch at the races with his wife Pat – they married in 1958 – at his side. The rewards as a Leeds player were medals, fame and comfort but not riches; he had to find a job after playing the last of his 629 games for his only club in 1973.

With England, he – and brother Bobby – became World Cup winners in Alf Ramsey's great team but it was not until he took over the Irish national squad as a strictly disciplinarian manager in 1986 that his footballing background and his belief in his own abilities earned him a standard of living which would have been beyond the comprehension of the young Jack Charlton who had gone into the coal industry so many years earlier.

Pragmatism was Don Revie's guiding light – one of his tactical innovations was to have Charlton stand on the opposition's goal-line at corners, generally getting in the goalkeeper's way, a ploy which brought the goal which won the 1967 League Cup final – and Charlton carried it into his career with Ireland.

He had learned the importance of a strong defence under Revie and Ramsey and that underpinned his approach to club management with Middlesbrough (twice), Sheffield Wednesday and Newcastle, walking away from the latter after a few malcontents in the crowd had been abusive to Charlton and his wife.

It was with Ireland that Charlton found satisfaction. He had a quality squad of players, including Liam Brady, David O'Leary, Paul McGrath and Ronnie Whelan and, playing the game strictly to his ground rules, they qualified for the 1988 European Championship, and the World Cups of 1990-94.

It was a period which marked the high point of football in Ireland, a status since lost to the country's grand slam-winning rugby squad and, Charlton was the man obviously in charge, an all-Irish hero until he stepped down after his team were beaten 2-0 by Holland in a play-off match for qualification to the 1996 European Championships.

He left without rancour, having been well rewarded financially and honoured by honorary Irish citizenship, the freedom of Dublin and the unveiling of a statue at Cork Airport.

Typically, the statue has Charlton in fly-fishing gear displaying a salmon, for he enjoyed himself – not least the pace of life – in Ireland. He had his own place there, he had a share in a public house in Dublin's Lower Baggot Street, he was feted when the time was right, allowed to be himself when he wanted to be.

And being himself was all Jack Charlton ever wanted to be so he settled well to retirement back in Northumberland with his family, his fishing and his memories, knowing he is from a different time, when footballers thought nothing of going to a match on the tram, standing shoulder-to-shoulder with the supporters.

Big Jack's Factfile

Full name: John Charlton

Birthplace: Ashington, Northumberland

Date: May 8 1935

Leeds United career: 629 appearances, 70 goals

England career: 35 appearances, six goals

Management career: Middlesbrough (1973-77), Sheffield Wednesday (1977-83), Middlesbrough (1983-1984), Newcastle (1984-85), Republic of Ireland (1986-1995)