Bobby Robson

Club playing career

Although Robson had signed professionally, his father insisted he continue to work as an electrician. He spent the day working at the Festival of Britain site and trained three nights a week at Fulham. Eventually, this took its toll on Robson and he gave up his trade for full-time professional football. In 1950, Robson made his first-team debut for Fulham, recently promoted to the First Division, in a match against Sheffield Wednesday. He came to regard Fulham as "a nice club, a social club...", but "never... a serious, championship-challenging club". Indeed, he and Fulham were relegated from the top-flight in the 1951–52 season, but he made his return to the First Division, four years later, when he signed for Vic Buckingham's West Bromwich Albion in March 1956. The transfer fee of £25,000 was a club record for West Brom at the time. He made his West Brom debut in a 4–0 home defeat to Manchester City on 10 March 1956. In 1957–58, he was the club's top league goalscorer; his tally of 24 goals included four in a 5–1 win against Burnley. Often playing as a midfielder, he went on to play 257 matches and score 61 goals for West Brom, and he captained the team for the 1960–61 and 1961–62 seasons. However, in August 1962, he returned to Fulham after a disagreement with West Brom vice-chairman Jim Gaunt over his salary. The ongoing dispute over both minimum and maximum wages in the game, instigated by Robson's teammate Jimmy Hill and the Professional…

Early club management

In 1959, the then England manager and the Football Association (FA) director of coaching, Walter Winterbottom, suggested to Robson that he take a coaching course at Lilleshall. He obtained coaching qualifications during his second spell at Fulham, and coached Oxford University A.F.C. Robson made his debut as a manager in January 1968 at his former club Fulham, against Macclesfield Town, then in the Cheshire County League, in the third round of the FA Cup. Fulham were struggling with 16 points from 24 matches. Despite the acquisition of the young Malcolm Macdonald, Robson could not save the club from relegation to the Second Division, and he left them in November with the club sitting eighth in the Second Division. He discovered he had been sacked not from the club itself, but from the headline "Robson sacked" on an Evening Standard placard outside Putney station.

Ipswich Town

Robson moved on to Ipswich Town in 1969 and it was there that he established his reputation as a successful manager, supported by the club chairman John Cobbold and then later by his brother Patrick Cobbold. He was offered the vacant job at the Suffolk club after a chance encounter with Town director Murray Sangster while scouting at Portman Road for Chelsea manager Dave Sexton. After four mediocre seasons, Robson led Ipswich to fourth place in the First Division and success in the Texaco Cup in the 1972–73 season. In the following nine seasons, Ipswich finished…

Robson was known for his man-management skills, his composed and demanding yet caring style as a coach, and for his ability to motivate his players and build positive relationships with them, making him a well-liked figure among fans and players alike. His profile on the website of the "National Football Museum Hall of Fame" describes him as "a tough taskmaster," who was "fiercely loyal to those who gave their all, and never failed to get the very best out of his players." Gary Lineker opined that Robson "wasn't the greatest tactician of world football," but that "he had a good understanding of the game," describing him with the following words: "He was fiercely loyal to the players who served him well, he understood the game and he had this magnetic enthusiasm, not just for football, but for everything in life. You just wanted to go out there and run yourself into the ground for him and the team." Mourinho, who initially served as an interpreter and later as an assistant coach under Robson at Barcelona, praised him for his leadership and for his methodology in the attacking phase of the game. His style also influenced Villas-Boas, who worked under him at Porto. Robson often used a 4–4–2 formation throughout his career. At Ipswich Town, however, he had used a 4–4–2 diamond, without wingers, and with a holding midfielder, and an attacking midfielder behind the strikers. During the 1990 World Cup, he also changed England's set-up and used a 3–5–2/5–3–2 formation with a sweeper.

Bobby Robson was born on 18 February 1933 in Sacriston, County Durham, the fourth of five sons of Philip and Lilian Robson (née Watt). When he was a few months old, Robson's family moved to the nearby village of Langley Park where his father was a coal miner. Their two-bedroom house had no bath and an outside toilet. As a boy, he was often taken by his father to watch Newcastle United play at St James' Park on Saturday afternoons, requiring a 34-mile round trip. Robson described Jackie Milburn and Len Shackleton as his childhood heroes. Both played for Newcastle in the inside-forward position, the position Robson would later assume during his playing career. Robson attended Langley Park Primary School and then Waterhouses secondary modern school, after failing his eleven-plus but the headmaster did not allow the school football team to join a league. Instead, he began to play for Langley Park Juniors on Saturday mornings at age 11, and by the time he was 15, he was representing the club at under-18 level. Robson played football whenever he possibly could but left school aged 15 to start work as an electrician's apprentice for the National Coal Board in the Langley Park colliery. In May 1950, Bill Dodgin, the manager of Fulham, made a personal visit to the Robson household to offer Bobby a professional contract. Despite being offered a contract by nearby Middlesbrough, the offer made by Dodgin was too attractive to turn down, so he signed for Fulham and moved to London,…