It was more of a surprise when The Cat wasn’t playing. I’d meet the others from school, noon on Saturday, on the bridge linking the platforms at Wimbledon.

Up the now-redundant stairs at Fulham Broadway, we’d push through the boys’ turnstile to stand as close to the nasty bit of The Shed as we dared.

The dot in the distance, Peter Bonetti, who has died at 78. A shrimp next to goalkeeping monsters like Joe Corrigan, he loped, paced… and sprang.

He’d got a trial after his mum wrote in, asking Chelsea to give him a job! Between the sticks for the Blues’ first Youth Cup triumph, he went on to be the inaugural Player of the Year.

The Putney boy’s first-team chance came when both No1 and No2 keepers were injured, and his original ‘Zouma and Rudiger’ in central defence were the Sillett brothers.

In 1970, he was a hero of the FA Cup replay triumph, despite being cynically crocked early on by Leeds henchman Mick Jones, and having to limp through most of the match.

His 729-game total as Chelsea keeper is unlikely to be bettered, yet for years he endured chants of ‘Bonetti lost the World Cup’ from fans of rival teams, after West Germany gained revenge on England for their 1966 defeat.

That killed off his brief career as Gordon Banks’ understudy. But if Banks kept Bonetti out of the national team, spare a thought for keepers John Phillips and Steve Sherwood, who rarely got a look-in at the Bridge.

A shy ambassador for Chelsea in later years, The Cat was beloved for his cross-catching, in-flight adjustments and quiet reliability.