Arguably Liverpool's greatest ever manager, and certainly English football's most successful, Bob Paisley was certainly just as worthy of a knighthood as most of sports’ other winners of the honour. Yet, for reasons unknown, he never became a "Sir".
This man not only brought unprecedented success to the English game – he won three European Cups – he was also a war hero.
Now there's a glimmer of hope finally that he can be made a knight posthumously with the launch of a petition on the Downing Street e-petitions website.
It was launched by Liverpool supporter Ian Little, who says: ““Bob Paisley was England's best ever manager and won the European Cup three times while manager of Liverpool, yet he only ever received the OBE. He also won the domestic league title six of the nine years he was in charge. Alex Ferguson has only won the European Cup once, yet he received a knighthood.”
As Mr Little says: “This is not equitable.”
An aide to the prime-minister said that he will take this petition seriously if enough people sign it: “He treats this new innovation, e-petitions direct to his office, as people power in action, and if enough fans log on in sufficient numbers then he will consider it.”
Paisley’s Liverpool career began as a player in 1939, and he went on playing, with a break for the Second World War, until 1954. He later became a member of the “boot room” team under Shanks before being made manager himself in 1974.
As well as those three European Cups he of course won six of Liverpool’s 18 league titles, and added a UEFA Cup, three League cups, a European Super Cup and five Charity Shields to his massive haul.
It’s now ten years since he died, but that posthumous knighthood would mean a lot to his multitude of fans. You’ve got three weeks to sign it, at http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/SirBobPaisley, before the March 13th deadline.
At the time of writing there were just over 900 signatures already.