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Sir Bobby was like my father, says Terry Butcher

Ben ParkerSuffolk
Getty Images Terry Butcher on the left is wearing a suit. He has a bandage around his head and a wound on his eyebrow. Sir Bobby Robson is wearing a suit and tie. They are both smiling.Getty Images
Terry Butcher played under Sir Bobby Robson for 14 years

Ex-footballer Terry Butcher has recalled Sir Bobby Robson being like a father to him.

The former defender spoke to the BBC ahead of the publication of a new book about his former Ipswich and England manager.

Almost Immortal looks at Sir Bobby's eight years in charge of the national team and features Butcher – who captained England at the 1990 World Cup – as the main narrator.

"When you're led by someone like that, you have great memories all throughout your career... I felt like he was my father," said the 67-year-old.

"The players loved him, they really loved him.

"He kept getting their names wrong but he loved the players. He was very loyal. He was very honest with them and he got them – he knew which buttons to press."

Getty Images Terry Butcher in football kit and a football training jacket, walks on a football pitch, towards the camera, with his arm around the neck of Paul Gascoigne, who is on his left. Gascoigne wears a white England shirt, with the Three Lions' crest, and he is crying.Getty Images
Butcher (left, alongside Paul Gascoigne) said the World Cup semi-final in 1990 was the highlight of his career

Sir Bobby gave Butcher his first professional contract at Ipswich in the 1970s and helped improve him as a player.

England lost to West Germany on penalties in that 1990 semi-final, and Sir Bobby left his England role when the Football Association decided not to extend his contract.

"I've had a career where I've always felt like a fraud, like an imposter... [But] I actually got to the [World Cup] semi-final and I thought, 'Yeah, I do deserve to be here'," he said.

Press Association A bronze statue of Sir Bobby Robson, who is depicted pointing and smiling. The statue is pictured from the ground looking up at it. There is a blue Ipswich Town scarf draped round his neck. The sky is blue above.Press Association
Sir Bobby Robson, who won the Uefa Cup as Ipswich manager in 1981, is immortalised with a statue outside the ground

Almost Immortal is written with Town fan Neil Prentice, who has worked on books with fellow club legends John Wark and George Burley.

Prentice said the relationship between Sir Bobby and Butcher was not always as "cosy and perfect" as people might think.

"It was quite tense at times," he explained.

Butcher agreed: "He used to have a go at me sometimes, when things weren't going well.

"[It was] because he knew he could have a go at me and I wouldn't bite back. I wouldn't take it as a personal affront because I knew what Bobby meant. I knew what he was doing."

The defender played 77 times for England and made 271 appearances for Ipswich, which was his childhood club while he was growing up in Lowestoft.

He said one of Sir Bobby's greatest talents as a manager was putting players at ease.

"He instilled a sort of camaraderie within the team. He built that spirit where you could sit at any table at any time with any player, not like the cliques they've had before and the cliques they had afterwards," he said.

"It was a great group, and he wanted that group to succeed. He was desperate for England to do well.

"He was just a wonderful guy, and we really, really miss him."

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