In May 1946, as the Saints wound down the final “war-time” season with a friendly at Bournemouth, their recently-installed manager, Bill Dodgin, introduced Bill Ellerington, his 22 year-old right-back, to the left-back who would be guesting in that fixture, prior to signing full-time in the summer: Bill Rochford, coming 33. Rochford, who had moved, as a child, from the north-east to West Sussex, had played for Portsmouth when they won the FA Cup in 1939 and had been part of the Pompey contingent at Folland Aircraft, along with Dodgin and Ted Bates, during the War. So, never mind that Ellerington thought his new partner was “getting on a bit,” Dodgin knew what he was doing when he brought in “Rocky” and made him captain.

That judgment was roundly acclaimed, not only by a pleasantly-surprised Ellerington but by many another member of the side that Rocky captained from the start of the 1946-47 season until half-way through the 1949-50 season. Alf Ramsey, who would compete with Ellerington, during most of that time, for the right-back position, described Rocky, in his autobiography, not only as

“a ‘fairy godfather’ and one of the greatest friends and tacticians I have ever met in football,” but as “the perfect mentor”.

Interviewees for Ted Bates’s biography lined up to endorse those sentiments – and more. Ellerington had “never seen anybody – anybody ever – who could read a game” the way Rochford could. And he “played the offside trap like no-one who’s ever existed or ever will do.” Rochford thus compensated for his lack of pace – and when Ellerington raised with him the problem of stopping a nippy winger, Rochford reassured him: “look, son, if all fast wingers had brains, we’d be out of business.” Even so, Rochford still required help from his left-winger, tackling back. Ernie Jones’s resentment of that has been noted in his profile; and Stan Clements recalled how Wilf Grant suffered similarly.

But the captain was overwhelmingly acclaimed by his team-mates – including future managers, George Curtis and Eric Webber – for his ability to lead.

Curtis found Rochford commanding – “once he’d said anything that was it” – while Webber appreciated his breadth of knowledge: “he knew the game inside out and not only his position.” And Ian Black, surveying the side’s formation from his goalmouth, admired the way in which Rocky “could alter things during a game, if things weren’t going too well.”

All of which explains the wide-spread assumption that, when Dodgin left in 1949, Rochford would succeed him. But the job went to another internal candidate, Sid Cann, with Rocky appointed player-coach. Black reckoned that Bill “was overlooked because he was a bit too forthright in his outlook,” while Clements felt that he lacked the “educated” manner that Joe Mallett had to handle matters off the field. Whatever the Board’s reasoning, they now had a less than happy player-coach on their hands.

He soon finished playing in January 1950 and acquired talent-spotting duties. It was perhaps predictable that, when he brought a teenage Bobby Robson for a trial – a story told in detail in Joe Mallett’s profile – the lad would be widely admired by the players but rejected by Cann. Robson recalled, in his 1982 autobiography, that Rochford had been “upset at the way Southampton had treated me.”It was time for Rocky to go, to Colchester, newly-elected to the Football League, under Jimmy Allen, who had been a team-mate at Portsmouth in Bill’s younger days and at Follands during the War. Bill played only twice, before his leadership skills were lost to football. He returned to his roots, to farm near Gateshead. Ted Bates proved more receptive than Cann to his old team-mate’s eye for young talent, when he followed up his lead to Ken Wimshurst.