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John Roberts 1941-2026: ‘A real gentleman’ and one of the best-informed of all sports reporters

John Roberts, who has died aged 84, enjoyed a long and illustrious career in sports journalism, starting at the Stockport Express; here, SJA member and former Independent sports editor Paul Newman – who succeeded John as the Indy’s tennis correspondent – reflects on his life and achievements…

John Roberts
There was no more popular figure in tennis press rooms than John Roberts, writes Paul Newman

BY PAUL NEWMAN

John Roberts retired as tennis correspondent of The Independent in 2006, but for years afterwards, he would spend one day every summer back at Wimbledon.

However, on those return trips to the All England Club, he would not spend much time watching backhands and forehands. Instead, most of his day would be spent talking to the dozens of former colleagues and acquaintances who wanted to catch up with him.

John, who has died at the age of 84, was a hugely popular figure in media centres and press boxes around the world during his 44-year career working for the Daily Express, The Guardian, the Daily Mail and The Independent, covering mostly football and tennis.

He was one of the best-connected and best-informed reporters and was always happy to share his knowledge with colleagues.

A great wordsmith, he came up with many memorable lines. He once wrote that Kevin Keegan was “not fit to lace George Best’s drinks” and when Paul Gascoigne was troubled by regular injuries, he referred to the midfielder as the “abdominal showman”.

Having worked for many years on the Express and Mail, John brought hard-nosed qualities to his work on the broadsheets, never losing his eye for a story. As Matthew Engel once wrote: “I suspect posh-paper sports writing changed forever the day John Roberts left the Daily Express to join The Guardian in the late 1970s, was handed a piece of routine agency copy and picked up a telephone to start asking questions.”

Born in Stockport in 1941, John grew up loving sport. As a boy, he used to draw cigarette-card pictures of footballers. He sent one of them to Tom Finney, who signed it and sent it back to him.

After leaving school, John joined the Stockport Express. The first story he recalled writing for the newspaper was about a cemetery that had been left in a state of disrepair. The story prompted the local council to take action. Sport, however, was his great love and at the age of 19, he became the paper’s sports editor.

At 21, John was recruited by the Daily Express in Manchester on the recommendation of one of the newspaper’s journalists, Derek Hodgson, who would become a close friend and would subsequently work alongside John at The Independent.

Guy Hodgson, Derek’s son and another future colleague at The Independent, recalled: “John was incredibly keen (when was he not?) and pestered my dad with queries on how to get a job on a national newspaper.

“Eventually, my father asked the desk at the Daily Express, where he worked, to give John a chance – as much as anything to stem the number of calls! It proved an inspired request because John soon proved to be a brilliant writer and commentator on a number of sports.”

When John was 24, the newspaper posted him for three years to report from Belfast, where he met his future wife, Phyllis. They married two years later.

One of John’s jobs at the Express was to ghost-write columns for Best. John later wrote that he had undertaken this task during Best’s “alarming transition from being the best thing since sliced bread to becoming sliced bread dunked in vodka”. He added: “Working with George could also be a curse. He sent me the wrong way more often than he dummied defenders.”

John spent many years reporting on Merseyside football, where he earned the trust of, among others, Bill Shankly. John worked with the Liverpool manager on his autobiography, ghost-wrote Keegan’s first book and wrote the official centenary history of Everton.

He also wrote a much-acclaimed book about the Busby Babes (“The team that wouldn’t die”) and another about Best’s final years at Manchester United (“Sod this, I’m off to Marbella”).

John eventually left the Express to join The Guardian and then the Mail, where he first covered Wimbledon. When The Independent launched in 1986, he was recruited as tennis correspondent and joined a formidable team that included the likes of Martin Johnson, Ken Jones and Patrick Barclay.

Apart from a brief spell as football correspondent following Barclay’s departure in 1990, John remained The Independent’s tennis correspondent until his retirement in 2006.

For two decades, he was a fixture on the tennis circuit. He wrote beautifully about the sport and was often ahead of the game. In 2003, he broke the news that Wimbledon was planning to build a retractable roof over Centre Court.

John Roberts
John Roberts at Wimbledon

With his warm smile, infectious laugh, keen wit and readiness to help anyone who sought his assistance, there was no more popular figure in the press room. “John was among the first tennis writers I met early in my career,” said Howard Fendrich, tennis correspondent of the Associated Press.

“He was friendly, witty, warm, welcoming and armed with a terrific laugh. A real gentleman. And on top of it all, a terrific reporter and writer.”

While John loved sport, it always felt that what he loved even more was the people he came to know through his work. Charlie Burgess, John’s first sports editor at The Independent, recalled: “In the days of landlines paid by the minute, he had the largest bill of anyone on the Sports Desk. He loved a chat.”

John was a creature of habit. On the tennis circuit, he tended to stay in the same hotels and eat at the same restaurants year after year.

Nick Harris, who worked alongside him at Wimbledon for many years as part of The Independent’s team, said: “We’d often eat in the same few places, either in East Sheen, or in Richmond near the same hotel where he stayed every year. John would invariably order Dover sole, off the bone, with chips and salad, bread and butter, and a cup of tea. If he really wanted to throw off the shackles, he would occasionally have a glass of white wine.”

John is survived by Phyllis, his wife of 58 years, their children Chris, Leanne and Gerard, son-in-law Jason, daughters-in-law Svenja and Jo, and grandchildren Jack, Noah, Mai and Hassie.

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