Tony Roberts

Early career

Roberts first became involved in football with Bodedern before joining Holyhead United Juniors at the age of twelve. After impressing one of the club's scouts, he was offered a trial with Chelsea but was forced to cancel after picking up an injury. Instead he was recommended to Queens Park Rangers by Brian Law at the age of sixteen.

Queens Park Rangers

He progressed through the ranks at Loftus Road, making his debut against Coventry City in December 1987. He served as understudy to David Seaman during his early years with the club before taking over as the club's first choice goalkeeper after a number of years competing with Jan Stejskal, following the departure of Seaman in 1990. A broken finger sustained in a match against Ipswich Town in January 1998 saw Roberts fall out of favour with the club, resulting in a move to Millwall at the end of the 1997–98 season. In 2003, he was given a testimonial match by QPR.

Retirement and return

Roberts played just eight times at The New Den when he suffered a recurrence of his finger injury which forced him to end his League career. He spent seven months away from football, returning in 1999 with non-League side St Albans City, making his debut in a 1–0 defeat to Slough Town. He later moved to the United States with the Atlanta Silverbacks, where he spent three months before returning to England. While playing in America, Roberts began wearing a splint inside his glove to solve his finger injury…

Roberts had previously been capped at under-18 level for Wales before earning his first cap for the under-21 side on 5 December 1990 in a 0–0 draw with England. His performance in the match earned him his first call-up to the senior side one month later. During his career, he won two full international caps as a substitute in matches against Republic of Ireland on 17 February 1993 and San Marino on 31 August 1996, as well as being selected 30 times as backup goalkeeper to Neville Southall. He also became the first Welshman to be capped at both full and semi-professional level as he helped his country win the non-league 'Home International' series twice.

Roberts combined goalkeeper duties at Dagenham & Redbridge with a coaching role at Queens Park Rangers, and then at Arsenal, whom he joined as assistant goalkeeping coach in 2008–09. He moved to Swansea City as first-team goalkeeping coach in June 2015. In August 2016, he became goalkeeping coach for the Wales national team, where he worked under Chris Coleman. He combined the role with his Swansea job. In June 2018, he left Swansea to join Coleman at Hebei China Fortune. He was appointed to Aitor Karanka's staff as goalkeeper coach of Birmingham City in October 2020, and left at the end of June 2021. In June 2021, he was appointed as the goalkeeping coach of Wolverhampton Wanderers. In August 2023, Roberts moved to Italy to become goalkeeper coach for Serie A side AC Milan before, in September 2024, he joined Norwich City as Head of Goalkeeping. On 8 January 2026, Roberts joined Chinese Super League club as goalkeeping coach.

As a child, Roberts attended Ysgol Thomas Elis and Holyhead County School.