Graeme Jones has won a bronze medal at the World Cup with Belgium, stood on the touchline when England reached the final of the European Championships at Wembley and even played his part in Newcastle United's transformation under Eddie Howe. Yet it is not lost on the Magpies' assistant manager that his parents, Ray and Rita, have not been there to see it.
"I was so fortunate to have two great parents, but they were taken away too young," Jones told ChronicleLive.
Cancer took them both a quarter of a century apart; Ray was 72 while Rita was just 46. Losing a parent at any age is never easy, but Jones was only a young man, himself, when his mother died in 1991. It was, understandably, a 'horrendous time for everybody'.
