Don Roper

Football

Roper was born in December 1922 at Botley, Hampshire. He was a prolific schoolboy footballer, who played for Hedge End at youth level and played his early league football for Bitterne Nomads in the Hampshire League. It was while playing for Bitterne Nomads what he was scouted by Toby Keleher, assistant manager to Tom Parker, and in July 1940 was persuaded to sign for his local club, Southampton, making his debut for them during wartime matches. During the war, he was employed in Southampton at the Supermarine factory, where he helped to manufacture the Spitfire. During the war, he was Southampton's leading goalscorer in wartime competitions, having formed a successful strike partnership with Ted Bates. Against Arsenal in 1944, his performance in a 4–2 victory was described as "remarkable", with then Arsenal manager George Allison monitoring his development as a player. By the resumption of competitive football in 1946, Roper had established himself as a "two-footed powerful (right) winger" in the Football League Second Division. After impressing in the Second Division in 1946–47, he was signed by Arsenal in the close season by Allison's successor Tom Whittaker (who had watched Roper at The Dell eleven times during that season) for £12,000, plus George Curtis and Tom Rudkin moving in the opposite direction, an estimated total fee of £24,000. His move to Arsenal was described as "one of the most drawn-out and delicate deals in the history of football…

After retiring from football, he settled in Southampton and worked as an engineer in the aviation industry, before working for a local engineering firm which went out of business in the 1980s, forcing him into an early retirement. In his latter years, he was afflicted by Parkinson's disease, succumbing to the disease at Southampton in June 2001, at the age of 78. He was survived by his wife, Joyce, and their two sons.

Arsenal

Football League First Division: 1947–48, 1952–53 FA Charity Shield: 1948, 1953 FA Cup runner-up: 1951–52