“He was amazing, it was like the ball was stuck to his feet, it was just immense. I’ve seen him in recent years and he’s still as fit as ever but you’d think his knees must be completely shot because he was twisting and turning, how his cartilages didn’t ping out I just don’t know!”

Despite it being a season of development and transition, the Blues finished sixth, after an unbeaten run of 11 at the end of the campaign which included eight wins, and secured a place in Europe, a common outcome in that era.

“We got in the UEFA Cup, that was maintaining the status quo because we always seemed to do that in the seventies and eighties, we always seemed to be up there in a UEFA Cup spot and if not, which the team wasn’t in 1978, it won the FA Cup and went in to the Cup Winners’ Cup,” Butcher said.

“I think we had a really good run. We didn’t have a great start in 1978 but we then had a really good run at the end.”

Butcher is now back at Town having taken on a role coaching with the Town academy in February after leaving his previous job as defensive coach at Guangzhou R&F at the conclusion of the Chinese season in early December just prior to the first outbreaks of coronavirus in Wuhan.

“Wuhan, I’ve been there, so I know where it started,” he said. “It was just over two hours’ flight from us, Wuhan’s right in the middle, Hubei province, we were down towards the south-east towards Shenzhen and Hong Kong. That was badly hit as well.

“You feel sorry for all the families that have suffered and will continue to suffer, and for the NHS staff. You feel so sorry for them and you just hope and pray that it will come to a swift end, but I don’t think it will at the moment. I’m not being pessimistic, it’s just the way it’s shaping up, we’re in it for the long haul.”

The former centre-half believes that the 2019/20 season should be played to a conclusion once football finally does return.

“I still do, you’ve just got to know when and how it’s going to finish,” he said. “The players have got to get fit, which is sometimes difficult for players because they have no end in sight, they have no finite time when you’ve got a pre-season or you’ve got to come back or you’ve got to play. There’s nothing in the future.

“Normally you’d have your fixture list now and you’d say you’re going to play in August when the season starts so you work five weeks back to pre-season and then you’re looking at pre-season games and all that sort of thing, that’s the normal schedule.

“Now we just haven’t got that and it’s very difficult. As a player, you try and keep fit and try and keep sharp but at the end of the day you must be thinking why at the moment - why do I need to keep fit because I haven’t anything [to target], I can always get fit again.

“Teams, Ipswich especially, they’re going to have to get players back and give them a mini-pre-season, that’s what it’s going to be.”

He expects matches to be played behind closed doors: “I think that might have to happen, inevitably I think that may have to happen. They’re talking about horse racing behind closed doors and all that sort of thing as well. I think they may have to do that.

“What you don’t want to do is rush it back too early and all of a sudden it can kick off again, which is the last thing you want. It’s got to be right.

“You just can’t see any light at the end of the tunnel at the moment. I know they’re talking a little bit about the figures and that sort of thing but that’s just being optimistic, but with sport it doesn’t really matter at the end of the day. Something I never thought I’d say but it doesn’t really matter because you’re thinking about your day to day life and all your living at the moment is day to day, which in football terms you don’t do.

“You’ve got fixtures, you’ve got plans, you’ve got promotion, relegation etc. You’re always looking to the future, you’re always thinking about repercussions and what’s going to happen. But this is day to day now.”

Butcher believes it was wrong for Premier League players to have been scapegoated for criticism regarding their wages.

“I think the players have got to help with their own clubs and just see what their own clubs need or whatever they want to do with other staff and help the staff and the club,” he said.

“If they’re going to help anybody, help the staff and the club and then look to possibly help the NHS, something like that.

“It’s up to the players but the clubs should tell the players what their budgets are and be transparent. The PFA were asking for that, the clubs to say ‘Right, this is our budget, this is the figure that we need to run’.

“And if the players help out with that, which I’m sure they can do and would like to do, that would be fine, so that safeguards jobs within the club and looks after the club.

“But I can see both sides of the argument, I really can. It’s very difficult to judge. I do understand where they’re coming from when they say why haven’t other people that are in sport, in business or in entertainment been singled out like they were singled out. I think that was utterly wrong.

“Footballers pay a fair amount of tax and many of them have also got foundations and regularly give their time for charity.”

During the lockdown, with Playford Road closed and BBC Radio Suffolk’s Life’s a Pitch, on which he is the legend-in-residence, not broadcasting, like many people Butcher is spending his time on domestic duties.

“Bit of decorating, spending time in the garden especially,” he said. “I think so many people’s gardens are going to be immaculate this year, you might have to have a competition for the best garden and it would be a tough contest because everybody who is lucky enough to have a garden, I’m sure they’re all going to be immaculate now.”

Photo: Action Images

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