Ronnie Clayton will always be regarded as one of the greatest players to pull on a Blackburn Rovers shirt. During a gittering career, he captained both club and country

Football legend Sir Tom Finney remembers one particularly crunching tackle in a Preston v Blackburn derby at Deepdale.

The Preston Plumber was sent cartwheeling into the air before thudding onto the ground with blood pouring from his leg and face after Ronnie Clayton tackled him.

“Fizzin’ ‘eck!” wailed Sir Tom as he gingerly picked himself up off the turf with blood dripping from his leg and face.

“Wash your mouth out Finney,” replied Ronnie Clayton with a grin on his face.

Rovers were in charge against their rivals.

The great Sir Tom Finney was Ronnie Clayton’s favourite player – and the pair were friends off the field despite that crunching moment in the heat of a Lancashire derby.

It was football from a different era, and Ronnie was a giant in that different era – but then again, Ronnie would be a giant now and a giant in any era.

To put the death of Ronnie into perspective, the town of Blackburn and the game of football lost one of its true legends in October 2010.

In the modern game, the word ‘great’ is over-used in relation to the modern footballer – the likes of Wayne Rooney, Steven Gerrard and David Beckham get that tag – they really don’t deserve it.

On the other hand, true greats like Ronnie more than deserved the title, and deserved it delivering with a capital G.

The terribly sad news of Ronnie’s death at the age of 76 sent waves of emotion across East Lancashire as fans of all generations fondly remembered one of the true legends of English football, a man who had the respect and admiration of supporters of all clubs.

Footballing rivalries must be laid to one side on those saddest of days because Clayton was a man the like you simply don’t see in any sport in the modern day, a time when players live in their own celebrity bubbles, miles and miles away from the people who pay their wages.

Clayton was from an era when the fans used to mix with the players in the pub and in the shops, he and his colleagues were the real local heroes.

He played more than 600 first team game for his beloved Rovers – and in that era of hard tackling and almost primitive medical care, that was some major achievement.

But it was more than that. Ronnie Clayton was part and parcel of Blackburn Rovers and will always be remembered as a true legend. No, it is more than that.

Ronnie WAS Blackburn Rovers and because of that, news of his death was particularly poignant at a time when the game is becoming overtaken by money talk and unsavoury behaviour from the so-called modern day stars.

Clayton’s career took him from kicking a ball around in the back streets of Preston to the very peak of the game and captaining his country – but he never ever forgot his roots and never deserted the area that adored him.

You could almost describe him as the father of the town; a town that revolves around the football club; a town that respects its legends.

And those legends respect the town.

Once Clayton turned up to present trophies at Wilpshire Wanderers junior football club, a club he was honorary president of.

Tucked into a carrier bag were his 35 England caps for the children to try on. You can only imagine the thrill on those little faces.

Somehow you can’t imagine that sort of gesture from many of the modern day players.

You also can’t really envisage a modern player running a newsagent’s shop in Darwen’s Blackburn Road while turning out for one of the country’s biggest football clubs and playing as the captain of England.

The story goes that his team-mates used to gently rib the hero, who captained Rovers in the 1960 FA Cup final, because he was often running late for training, making sure the newspapers – of which he was often making the headlines in – were all sorted first.

But when you are as good as Ronnie Clayton was, no-one could complain about little details like that.

After all, this was a man who played alongside Bobby Moore, his great friend Bryan Douglas and Tom Finney and played against the likes of Stanley Matthews, Jimmy Greaves and Pele, who he marked in front of 187,000 fans in Rio de Janeiro.

You would take that on your CV in a flash.

Ronnie Clayton’s debut for Rovers came in 1951, a couple of years after he had arrived at Ewood Park from those Preston back street football grounds with his older brother Ken.

The people who watched that 2-1 Ewood Park win over QPR would not have realised it at the time but they were witnessing the beginning of a legend, a legend that will never ever be forgotten.

By the time he left Ewood Park in 1969, Ronnie had played a quite staggering - and then record - 581 games for his only Football League club, a club that he loved right up until the sad day when he died and weill now love from his seat in the grandstand in the sky.

In 1969 and at the age of 35 Ronnie’s professional career was over.

But he wasn’t finished with football as he dipped his toes into player-management with Morecambe, then of the Lancashire Combination.

After a couple of years, though, Ronnie was back in East Lancashire and turned out briefly for Great Harwood Town.

That was quite simply the biggest moment in Harwood’s history.

And it says much about the man that one of his proudest moments was helping the Showground side along their best FA Cup run, when they reached the first round proper before bravely bowing out to Rotherham United.

Like all young men in the early 50s Ronnie had to forgo his football career for a couple of years because of National Service.

Again, if you suggested that to one of the current crop of millionaires they would assume you had just landed on earth from a totally different universe.

But the game then was from a different universe - and people like Ronnie Clayton were masters of that universe.

The great man will never be forgotten.

Lancashire Telegraph