Simon Charlton’s father, Wilf, had played for Huddersfield Town, Southport and Tranmere Rovers, and Simon himself had clocked up well over 100 League appearances for his home-town club when then third-tier Huddersfield sold him to Premiership Southampton. Making his debut in the opening game of 1993-94, Simon made the No.3 shirt his own, succeeding Micky Adams, for the second half of that season. He would survive four managers, always being good for 20 to 30 League games a season, although that meant wearing a few different shirt numbers.

Essentially a no-nonsense left-back, capable of overlapping and crossing,

he was out of favour when his fifth manager, David Jones, brought along Lee Todd from Stockport and then recalled Franny Benali. Simon reasons that he was having back problems when Jones arrived so that the incoming manager never saw the best of him. Having played his last game for Southampton on his 26th birthday, he was loaned to Birmingham City, whose physio sorted out the tight muscles in his back with simple stretching exercises. Simon was happy to sign permanently.

Things were going well until Trevor Francis sold Chris Marsden to Southampton. Simon reckons that Chris and he had had an almost telepathic understanding at Huddersfield, which “clicked in again, within minutes,” when they were reunited at Birmingham. He moved on to Bolton in time to be part of the Wanderers’ promotion side in 2001. He then had three seasons in the Premiership with them, often at centre-back, and was voted their Player-of-the-Season in 2001-02. Having played in Bolton’s 2004 League Cup Final defeat, he left for a final Premiership season with Norwich – until they were relegated, along with the Saints, in 2005.

He wound down his career at third-tier Oldham, where he chalked up his 500th League game. After a stint back at Norwich, as a youth coach, he went into management in the Eastern Counties League. But he found that gaining his UEFA “A” license, in 2011, did not guarantee him the kind of managerial/coaching job he was looking for. In the meantime, he had helped to establish the Global Soccer Network, a Norfolk-based talent-spotting-and-development venture, of which he was a director. It organized coaching camps, world-wide, and looks after the interests of several UK-based African players. In November 2019, however, he was Head of Academy of Go Pro Sports based in Dubai.