Letter from the Editor

BIG stories breaking on deadline day — and news of the death of Jack Charlton was a very big story — can electrify newsrooms and lead to a form of vaguely organised chaos. We rush to think of how to do justice to a major occcurence, who should be invited to write at late notice, who might have stories that illuminate, and what pictures to use – not least on the all-important front page.

Perhaps you need to be of a particular age to fully appreciate the impact Jack Charlton had on this country, but as soon as his death was announced it was clear we needed to pull out all the stops to properly recognise the scale of his accomplishments. Right now we don’t have a newsroom, thanks to Covid-19. Still, I hope that, regardless, we’ve risen to the challenge of celebrating Big Jack’s contribution to football, and to life, in a fitting way.

On the opposite page, Eamon Dunphy talks about some of his encounters with Charlton, back in those immortal summers when the country was completely under the spell of the team that Jack built. As a relatively new editor of this newspaper, I’m pleased that Dunphy — so synonymous with the Sunday Independent back when

Jack was in his pomp as Ireland manager — is making a contribution to his old paper by speaking at length to reporter Wayne O’Connor. A fond contribution it is, too.

The sports pages have, of course, been radically changed by the sad news. Eamonn Sweeney leads the tributes on the front page and, as ever, Paul Kimmage is a must-read. His close friendship with one of the great stalwarts of the Charlton era, Tony Cascarino, informs a fine piece.

We have much else for you this week. I very much recommend Maeve Sheehan’s blockbuster piece revisiting the infamous Malcolm MacArthur murders from 1982. Again, you’ll need to be of a certain vintage to recall just how seismic an event this was in Irish life. Maeve has spoken to detectives assigned to the case back then, men whose every waking hour was dominated by the case. The result is an enthralling read, on pages 10 and 11.

Also well worth investing time in is Mairia Cahill’s intriguing account of a chance encounter in West Cork last week with Ian Bailey, the man convicted in absentia by a French court for the murder of Sophie Toscan du Plantier in December 1996.

Thanks for reading us — and thank you, Big Jack.