Sir Bobby Robson launched his Foundation to help find more effective ways to detect and treat cancer, after a request for help from his oncologist Professor Ruth Plummer. She was treating Sir Bobby as he faced cancer for the fifth and what he knew would be the final time.

She needed to raise £500,000 to equip a new cancer drug trials centre at the Northern Centre for Cancer Care in Newcastle upon Tyne and asked him if he knew anyone who might like to donate.

Sir Bobby responded by launching a charity to get the money she needed. He described it as like being at the helm of a team again. What he called his last and greatest team.