Rainy autographs, ‘our Neil’ and living with Jack Charlton: ‘The other Mellor’ and Sheffield Wednesday

Anyone who has an overachieving sibling will know exactly the sort of thing Simon Mellor is describing in his thick Mancunian accent during a breezy hour-long Zoom conversation, though probably not quite to the same extent.

In actual fact, Sheffield Wednesday icon Ian Mellor has four children; Simon, Louise and twins Neil and Laura. A little cruelly, it is only Neil, who himself went on to play for the Owls, who gets an internet mention.

But dressed in a Wednesday shirt with a photograph of his beloved Hillsborough acting as a background, Simon doesn’t show a glimmer of resentment or jealousy.

Grinning ear to ear as he reels off anecdotes of his family’s role in blue and white history, the emotion expressed by Simon is one of pure, undiluted pride. Because after moving to Sheffield following his dad’s transfer from Chester when he was five, Sheffield Wednesday has always been part of the family.

Simon, now head of PE at a secondary school in Oldham, was too young to remember the exact heroics of his day on December 26 1979 but remembers the buzz of the day in his family home and has vivid recollections of his dad’s three-year stint at Hillsborough.

“I remember going to the Christmas party and Jack Charlton dressing up as Father Christmas and giving us presents,” he smiled.

“When we moved to Sheffield our house wasn’t ready so we lived with Jack and his family for a week. There’s a picture of me on the first day at my new school and it was taken outside Jack Charlton’s house.

“We ended up living next door to a family of Blades in Chapeltown. Terry Curran came round to see my dad one day, walked straight into the house, sat in the front room and said ‘Where’s Spider?’ He’d walked into the wrong house. They nearly lynched him I think!”

The children of footballers often tell stories of how odd it was to realise their dad was a bit different. There’s a clear curiosity to the notion that a schoolmate might want your dad’s autograph, Simon said.

Asked if he remembered the first time he realised his dad was Ian Mellor, he said: “There’s a very vivid memory I have of a very dark, cold December game. I think it was Oldham they were playing.

“It was well over an hour after the game had finished and when we got outside there were still people waiting there to speak to my dad and shake his hand. They all knew him by his name and I remember thinking my dad was maybe a bit different.

“I remember looking at these people waiting all that time out in the rain just to get a little autograph from my dad and his mates.

“My dad was by no means a big-hitter but to them he was.

“The kids at school always used to think I was rich because dad was a footballer but that wasn’t the case those days. Keith Hackett lived at the top of our road and he had an electric garage; now that was rich!”

Mellor Snr moved on to Bradford City in 1982 but Simon has remained a passionate Wednesdayite.

Having played for Rotherham United’s School of Excellence alongside the likes of Ian Breckin and Paul Hurst, Simon played semi-professionally for the likes of Curzon Ashton and Ramsbottom, played in New Zealand and even played in the Intertoto Cup for Welsh side Aberystwyth Town.

But unlike those in his family, a professional career was never likely.

“It was all I ever wanted to do, I wanted to be a footballer like my dad,” he said. “My dad always says if I had an extra yard of pace I could have made it.

“I was a completely different player to the other two; dad was a skinny winger, Neil was a bustling centre-forward and I was more an aggressive box-to-box. The only thing we had in common the three of us is that none of us could head the ball!”

Though he revelled in his dad’s tales and childhood memories of charging round the changing rooms and skipping between the legs of Mel Sterland, Bob Bolder and co, it wasn’t until 28 years later that Simon was able to fully appreciate the feeling of one of his own representing his club, when his kid brother Neil signed on loan from Preston.

“I was in America doing some coaching when he signed,” he remembered. “Watching Neil play for Wednesday was a dream come true. I used to go watch with my in the 1980s and I remember his first ever game, my dad took him up the Leppings Lane end. He’s always had a soft spot for Wednesday.

“I just wish he’d stayed longer and that he’d played against the Blades. There was never a derby while he was there.

“I remember one time we were away at Charlton and Neil missed a chance. The woman in front looked at her mate and said ‘Well, he’s not as good as his dad.’ That sort of thing used to make me smile. There’s not many people who can be in that position.”

On watching large sections of his 20-goal season and in particular an EFL Cup hattrick against Hartlepool, he paused for a moment, smiled and said: “It was incredible, you’re just so proud.

“You get a lump in your throat thinking back on it really, almost close to tears. Every time he played for Wednesday was brilliant for me.

“You think it’s going to last forever. I was gardening for that MK Dons game when he scored a hattrick. Stupid really. You’d do anything for another go.”

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