Mick McCarthy says he has fond memories of legendary Blues boss Sir Bobby Robson. The FA are honouring the man who brought the FA and UEFA Cups to Portman Road by naming today the Sir Bobby Robson National Football Day.
McCarthy said: "He is an iconic figure in football and certainly at this football club but also in football around the world because he’s had success around the world.
"I always found him to be a lovely man. I’d like to be able to say I was a friend of his. I got on very well with him and just respected him.
"I saw more of him when I played in his golf day and I saw what a wonderful man he was when he was struggling with illness and having difficulty.
"But he was at every function, he was there at 9am in the morning and he was still there at one o’clock in the evening, still with a smile on his face and a word for everybody. So that’s him as a person, and as a football man he was fantastic.”
He says Robson’s enthusiasm for the game still remained: "He’d talk about football, footballers, old games, new games, things that are going on. He wasn’t just living in the past, he was still innovative, thinking about going forward as well.
"I think that’s always a sign of somebody that’s enthused by football, they’re not just stuck in the past, they’re actually looking at what can be done to change it, to improve it.
"Still looking at ways of beating teams. That was him. He was a really lovely man and a gentlemen whenever I came across him.”
He added: "He was just a really fair and honest man, and a sporting man. I don’t know anybody who’s got a bad word for him.
"One of his best buddies, Charlie Woods, is just around the corner. He was at Newcastle when I was at Sunderland, so we saw quite a bit of him then.
"I don’t know anybody that’s got a bad word for him and anybody that has, it would be their problem, there’ll be something wrong with them, not Bobby.”
McCarthy dismisses suggestions that Town’s history under Robson and Sir Alf Ramsey, who took over at Portman Road 58 years ago this week, has been a millstone for him and the other managers who have succeeded them.
"I don’t get involved in all that,” he said. "Why would I bother getting involved in all that? It’s like at Wolves with all the history there. Did that bother me? No.
"It was the same at Sunderland, having won the cup with Bob Stokoe. So what? All you can do is do what you can do.
"We won the league at Sunderland and we won it at Wolves. That’s not suggesting for one minute that we’re going to do that here. I respect the history and I respect the people who have been here, but no.
"I always remember at Celtic they were reeling off the names, Billy McNeill and all these, Bobby Lennox.
"I said ‘Well, bring them in, we’ll play them!’. And they said ‘But they’re 60 now!’. I said, ‘Well shut up then!’ and somebody else said ‘They still might beat you!’.
"That was the conversation, I sort of put them in their place and they put me in my place when they said they still might beat us at 60!
"I respected that Celtic had won the European Cup and all that, but I wasn’t living in that era. I just feel privileged that I’m at a club where Bobby had such great success, genuinely.”