Roger was an utter class act… in the 80s I grew up in the same village he lived and through business he was acquainted with my stepfather. One evening he was at a dinner party at our house (I was around 10 years old at the time) and i asked him if he’d be up for a game at the local school pitches (he agreed), so the next Sunday morning, me and a few mates went to his house and see if he was up for a game… no answer to his doorbell, so we threw some gravel at his window, sure enough the curtains twitched, he opened his window and with bleary eyes he told us he’d be down in 30 mins.
We went playing, convinced he’d fobbed us off and sure enough 30 mins later he jogged up to the pitches and then gave us 60 mins of playing 60’s, headers and volleys and of course ‘world cup’ with one of englands finest - me and my four mates were in awe.
After an hour we all sat around asking him questions. I asked him about Geoff Hursts fourth goal - was it really over the line? His answer was simple - “watch my reaction, I was the closet person to the ball, I’m goal scorer and my first reaction was to turn and celebrate’… everytime I see ‘that’ goal I think of Roger and a great Sunday morning playing football with my mates and a World Cup winner - stuff of dreams
RIP Roger
