After the death of England legend Nobby Stiles on Friday, John Giles joined Off The Ball to talk about his relationship with his brother-in-law.

Stiles passed away on Friday, after suffering from dementia for a number of years. The World Cup winner was 78.

Giles first met Stiles when they were both in the Manchester United youth teams, with the Republic of Ireland legend being two years older than Stiles.

“He came into the youth team, when the youth team used to be a big deal there,” Giles said.

“Nobby was a schoolboy international, and there was a lot of publicity in Manchester before [he came] to United.

“So, I didn’t know him until he came, but we became friends very, very quickly.”

Giles was in the team when Stiles made his senior debut for United, which the Red Devils drew to Bolton Wanderers.

From the beginning, the two men became fast friends.

“Nobby was just friendly with everybody,” Giles said.

“We got very friendly with each other, and I was coming back to Dublin during the holidays, Nobby was still on the ground staff, so I invited him to Dublin to spend a couple of weeks with me.

“He loved Dublin.”

(L-R) England's Alan Ball and Nobby Stiles celebrate victory as teammate Ray Wilson waves to the crowd.

Their friendship grew even further, to the point where Giles moved in with his future brother-in-law and his parents in Manchester.

“[That] was brilliant to me, because digs wasn’t the best place to be at any time,” Giles said.

“I lived with Nobby for a couple of years, and he then came back to Dublin, and then he met Kay.

“When I was living with him, I saw the letters coming from Dublin, and I remember saying, ‘where are these letters coming from Nobby?’

“It was Kay writing to him and I didn’t know that he was going out with Kay.”

While Stiles was falling in love with Giles’ sister, Giles himself was going out with his future wife, Anne.

The two of them would often go on double dates, dancing the night away.

“I was hopeless; my wife is a good dancer,” Giles said.

“It was the old Rock n Roll at that time… so, I think they enjoyed the dances more than I did. I have two left feet.”

Although it took a while for Giles to find out that his teammate was dating his sister, their relationship was something special to the Leeds United legend.

“He was mad about Kay,” Giles said.

“Kay was the boss, when they were married, in a nice way; he idolised Kay.”

Nobby Stiles, Manchester United

No clashes with Stiles

Despite the fact that both Stiles and Giles played in similar positions when they were in the same team, there was never a rivalry between the two.

“I was living with Nobby at that time, with his mother and his father in Manchester,” Giles said.

“It could have been a bit tricky, but it never was; there was never any competition between Nobby and myself.

“I played outside right in the final in ’63; Nobby would have never have been playing outside right, but he could have been playing inside right, with [Albert] Quixall moving to outside right.

“So, we weren’t direct rivals… [and] that never came between us at all.”

After Giles had left United for Leeds, the two men found themselves on opposing sides on a number of occasions.

Giles suggested that it was his sister, Kay, that kept the two from going at one another on the pitch.

“If he had kicked me, my sister Kay would have killed him!” Giles said.

“When I was at Leeds I was playing on the right wing, and Nobby was playing really at the back.

“So, we never clashed in that way.”

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