BOBBY MOORE

The story of how Bobby Moore overcame his flaws as a footballer and battled with life threatening cancer 18 months before the World Cup to become the greatest defender in the world.

On July 30th 1966 Bobby Moore led England to World Cup victory in Britain’s greatest sporting moment. This golden boy was immortalised as the icon of a new era. Yet England’s greatest ever captain, the best player of 66, was the unlikliest footballing hero. He never possessed the natural talent of his great contemporaries. His was a different kind of genius built on sheer will. As a youngster he struggled to master his flaws. His journey to brilliance was long and tortured. But ultimately his obsessive determination transformed him into the greatest thinking defender in the world. And more amazingly he was lucky to be alive at all that day. For eighteen months before the competition, he’d been battling the killer cancer.

We tell his life story from his birth in 1941 during an air raid to his untimely death aged just 51 from bowel cancer. As a young boy he dreamed of being England captain but was an unpromising footballer. He simply couldn’t play – he had a weak left foot, couldn’t head the ball, and was slow. But through iron determination instilled in him by his mum and a series of influential mentors he fashioned himself into one of the greatest players of all time. We chart his struggles on the path to greatness in an affectionate, humorous and epic portrait. 1 x 90 for BBC2