Former Bangor City chairman remembers ‘good friend’ Sir Bobby Charlton

A member of England’s 1966 World Cup-winning squad, former Manchester United footballer Charlton died aged 86 on Saturday (October 20).

Charles Roberts, the former chairman of Bangor City and now living in Oswestry, met Charlton through a business colleague in Manchester.

Bobby Charlton in action in Bangor (Image: Haydn Roberts)

He went on to persuade him to play in charity matches at Wrexham - having been a director at Wrexham AFC - and Bangor City’s stadiums in the late 1970s, along with the late Sir Stanley Matthews

Paying tribute, he remembered Charlton, who had been diagnosed with dementia, as a “very humble guy,” for whom “nothing was ever a problem”.

Charles, 86, said: “Bobby was a good friend of mine. He was just a very humble guy, who raised a lot of money for charity.

“It’s sad that he’s passed away, but he had been ill for a long time. He’d been suffering slowly from dementia for a while, and his lovely wife, Norma, looked after him. They were always together.

“Nothing was ever a problem for him. He was so patient with people wanting his autograph. He never misbehaved, as I can think of!

OTHER NEWS:

• Oswestry bakery worker set to retire after 50 years
• Firefighters called out to incident at north Shropshire pub
• A step back in time to Oswestry and Powys border life in 1980

“The Wrexham and Bangor matches were just magical occasions; Stanley Matthews and Bobby Charlton playing – that’s not bad, is it?! They were happy days.

“I remember he came back from a match in London, which I think he was commentating at, to open our village fete, which was so kind of him.

“That was the nicest thing he ever did for me.”

Charlton, born in Northumberland, won 106 caps and scored 49 goals for England - records for his country at the time.

He also spent several years stationed at Nesscliffe near Oswestry following World War Two.

His family said that he "passed peacefully in the early hours of Saturday morning".