The Times’s editorial chiefs had a change of mind - change of heart? - on Tuesday evening. The first edition front page made no mention of the Hillsborough inquest verdict.
The second edition was different, as you can see above. A picture of snow-clearing in Teesside was replaced by one of the relatives of the Liverpool 96 singing You’ll Never Walk Alone, a photograph carried on the front page in all editions of the Guardian and the Daily Telegraph.
The Times also replaced its banner at the top of the page, about “status handbags”, with a cross-reference to its Hillsborough coverage on pages 12 and 13.
It was surely significant that the Times’s Liverpool-based football writer, Tony Barrett, took to Twitter after noting his paper’s failure to carry a front page report.
He sent two tweets. One, posted on Tuesday evening, simply said: “Unbelievable.” That generated a host of replies in which people realised he was bemoaning his paper’s lack of coverage.
The second, posted early on Wednesday, said: “To everyone who’s been let down, I’m so sorry.”
Although the Daily Mail and Daily Express did not splash on the inquest, both carried prominent boxes. The New Day, the Daily Star and i plus the Independent’s tablet edition all provided front page coverage.
Regional daily newspapers across Britain carried page 1 articles about the verdict, which also led every TV and radio bulletin on Tuesday afternoon and evening.
So the only paper that made no reference at all to the story on its front page, in any edition, was the Sun. How wise, given its history, was that?
