Bobby Robson

Bobby Robson (born February 18, 1933, Sacriston, Durham county, England—died July 31, 2009, Durham county) was a British football (soccer) player and manager who was one of England’s most respected players and managers. At the height of his professional career, Robson played 20 matches with the national team, including appearances in the 1958 and 1962 World Cup finals; later, serving as the England manager (1982–90), he steered the national team to two World Cup finals tournaments (1986, 1990).

Robson was the son of a coal miner and was training as an apprentice electrician when he got his chance in 1950 to play football with Fulham. He spent most of his career on the field with Fulham (1950–56, 1962–67), where he scored a total of 77 goals in 345 games, and West Bromwich Albion (1956–62), scoring 56 goals in 239 games. He coached for one brief season (1967–68) in North America with the Vancouver Royals before returning home as Fulham’s manager (1968). The next season he took charge of Ipswich Town.

After leading the previously little-known Ipswich club to the FA Cup (1978) and the Union des Associations Européennes de Football (UEFA) Cup (1981) titles, Robson was appointed (1982) England’s manager. Four years later he guided England to the World Cup finals in Mexico, where the team lost to Argentina in a highly controversial quarterfinal match noted for Diego Maradona’s “Hand of God” goal. In 1990, despite having been notified that his contract was unlikely to be renewed, Robson took England to the World Cup finals in Italy, where the side lost to West Germany in its semifinal match.

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Robson left England to manage PSV Eindhoven (1991–92), leading that club to the Dutch league championship for two straight years. Thereafter he worked in Portugal at Sporting Lisbon (1992–93) and FC Porto (1994–96), where he secured the Portuguese Cup (1994) and league (1995, 1996) championships, and in Barcelona (1996–98), where in 1997 the club captured both the Spanish Cup and the UEFA Cup Winners’ Cup. After a brief stint (1998) back with PSV Eindhoven, he returned to England in 1999 to manage Newcastle United; he was forced to retire in 2004.

Robson was first diagnosed with cancer in 1992. He struggled for 17 years with recurring bouts of cancer, and in March 2008, after malignant tumours had been found in his lungs the previous year, he launched the Sir Bobby Robson Foundation for cancer research. He also wrote several books, including Time on the Grass (1982), My Autobiography: An Englishman Abroad (1998), and Farewell but Not Goodbye (2005). Robson was knighted in 2002 and was inducted into the English Football Hall of Fame in 2003.