Town’s 1961/62 First Division championship winners Andy Nelson and Ray Crawford unveiled a plaque in honour of their legendary manager Sir Alf Ramsey prior to Saturday’s game against Birmingham, along with their boss’s former secretary Pat Godbold.
The plaque under the Sir Alf Ramsey Stand marks 1966 World Cup-winning manager Ramsey being added to the National Football Museum’s Walk of Fame, marking his contribution to the Blues and England.
Also joining Nelson, the only Town captain to hold the First Division championship trophy aloft, and all-time top scorer Crawford and Godbold, the secretary to all Blues managers from Ramsey to George Burley, was the plaque’s designer, the artist Paul Trevillion, famous for the You Are The Ref! cartoon strip, and club secretary Sally Webb.
Nelson, 81, who was making a rare return to Portman Road, said Sir Alf was not a typical player or boss.
"He was always a very, very quiet man, unusually quiet for a footballer or a football manager,” he told BBC Radio Suffolk’s Life’s a Pitch.
"He didn’t let a lot on, but all of us were really conscious of knowing that he knew exactly what he wanted, how to get it and, of course, he had the people who could supply it for him.”
Crawford, 80, added: "He laid down the rules and regulations and if you didn’t do what he wanted you to do you would not be in the side.
"He would wander around on the Thursday after you’d played the previous Saturday and he’d go around every player and he’d go through that game.
"‘You did this Ray, you did that, don’t you think you should have done that?’. Whether he said that to the other players I don’t know but I always took on board what he said.
"He made me. He used to tell me what to do and what not to do. He was the main man, he just laid the law down and if you didn’t adhere to it then you’d be out.”
Nelson believes too little is - and was - made of Ramsey’s achievements in the game: "Without doubt, he’s the most successful England manager.
"To take this club from the third division to the second, from the second to the first, then to win the first, then to win the World Cup [was remarkable] and then not to be able to get a job after that.”
You can hear Nelson and Crawford talking at length about their time at Town under Sir Alf on Life’s a Pitch here from 10mins 40secs.