Bobby Moore was spotted getting off a train at Euston Station. 

He wasn’t in his red England shirt, and wasn’t holding the golden World Cup above his head, but was spotted never the less. 

It was probably an adult who saw him first, certainly not Frank or his group of twelve year old trainspotters over on platform ten. 

Busy travellers stopped and wanted to shake hands with Bobby Moore, and then as the group of well-wishers grew, more and more inquisitively craned their necks to see what was going on. 

Two platforms away, Frank was suddenly swept along by his classmates as they all sprinted over to the crowd. He first thought it was probably a Deltic pulling in, one of less than twenty left in service. 

The kids surrounded Bobby Moore as the adults went on their way. And because the trainspotters all conveniently had pencils and notepads, Bobby Moore found himself starting a round of multiple autographs, while still hemmed in by his open carriage door. Frank was pushed forward, towards his turn to get the precious signature. Before he knew it, Bobby Moore had taken his pencil and signed his name in a blank page in Frank’s notepad. Then just as quickly, he was onto the next. 

Frank turned and pushed his way out through the boys behind him, into space to get a clear view of the prize. ‘Wow’ he said, ‘I can’t believe we got Bobby Moore’s autograph.’ 

‘Yeah!’ said one of the other boys - ‘Who is he?’ 

Frank was pleased someone else asked that. And just as pleased one of the other boys knew the answer: 

‘England Captain. Won the World Cup.’ 

Won the World Cup, thought Frank. Wow. 

Back home, around the table with his family at tea-time, Frank shared the day’s stories of riding trains to London and back with his friends. 

‘Oh, and I got Bobby Moore’s autograph,’ he added. 

Dad’s mouth fell open, and he dropped his fork and sausage back to the plate. 

‘No?…are you sure?’ 

Frank produced the notepad, and proudly displayed the pencilled signature. 

‘Who’s Bobby Moore?’ asked Frank’s sister. 

Dad took the notepad for closer inspection. 

‘West Ham and England,’ he said in a hushed reverence, ‘Lifted the World Cup for England’. Frank noticed his Dad was very impressed. 

Dad went on, keen to share his knowledge and love for the man that helped win the world cup, just over a decade before. 

‘We won four two,‘ he explained to his tea-time audience. ‘Beat the Germans in extra time. And Geoff Hurst scored a hat-trick’ 

‘What’s a hat-trick?’ sister asked again. 

‘Three goals, silly’ said Frank and his little brother together. Even they knew that. 

Frank slipped upstairs after tea. Dad’s reaction meant he valued Bobby Moore’s autograph more than ever. It was probably the most valuable thing he owned. 

So how could he store it safely? Somewhere it wouldn’t get smudged or written on. Well first of all, that meant it had to come out of the notepad. There’s no way he could keep it safe there. It needed to go on the wall or something. In a frame. 

Frank carefully grabbed one side of the page and pulled down from the top to tear it out, the way he’d seen Mum rip out those coupons. But it wouldn’t budge, so he pulled harder to try to get it started. Still nothing. 

He remembered Dad usually folds paper first, to tear it when he builds paper airplanes, so Frank folded the page close to the spine, and tried again. But did it need one big pull? or lots of little ones? He wasn’t sure. 

Suddenly, it all came about very quickly. The tear went straight down the page and left him holding a blank sheet of paper in his outstretched hand. But where did the tear go? 

Carefully he turned it over to inspect the valuable name, and sighed in relief as he saw it had torn right along Frank’s crease, just as he had intended. 

He now had a perfect Bobby Moore autograph in the middle of a single piece of paper. 

Neat. Now he just needed to put it in a frame. But would everyone know who he was? This was Bobby Moore, and his autograph was really precious. But some people might still need to read who he is, so Frank doesn’t have to explain to everyone all the time. 

So, Frank got his school biro, and after wiping the clotted ink off the ballpoint first, and as carefully as he could, he started to title the piece. Nice, neat, block capitals, in a straight line, closely underneath the pencilled autograph. 

No getting it wrong now, no spelling mistakes. Slow and steady, Frank. 

And so ever so slowly, and ever so steadily, Frank scribed: 

“Bobby Moore. Scored a hat trick in the World Cup Final. 1966”