Ronnie Freebury will be flying the flag for the golden oldies again this season – literally.

The 77-year-old is polishing his boots in readiness for another season of touch judging for Cheltenham North and he can’t wait for the new campaign to start.

“I love it,” he said. “I travel with the North’s first team home and away. I think I only missed a couple of games last season and that was when I got tickets to watch England.”

As nearly 80-somethings go, Ronnie must be right up there with the very fittest.

Rugby people will tell you that running the line in their sport is much tougher than in football because they have to cover the full length of the pitch, as opposed to the assistant refs in the round ball game who only run to the halfway line and back.

“And we have to go under the posts,” added Ronnie with a laugh.

So where does Ronnie get all this fitness from?

“I exercise a lot,” he said. “I do a lot of walking, I do a lot of cycling and I’ve got a cross trainer in the spare room which I use a lot.”

Ronnie, of course, was a decent rugby player back in the day although any talk of cross trainers in those days would, one assume, mean that the coach wasn’t happy with something he’d seen on the pitch!

After leaving Cheltenham Grammar School, Ronnie spent a season with Old Patesians before being encouraged by Froggy Jones to switch his allegiance to the North.

It was a move the diminutive scrum-half has never regretted.

“I captained every team from the firsts to the fifths,” he said with pride. “I played for the firsts for many years and we had some great times.

“I was also captain of the Cheltenham Combination for a couple of seasons.”

So what were his strengths as a player?

“I could pass and I had a good kick, it was my kicking mostly,” he said.

And who was the best fly-half he played with?

“Denis Hargreaves,” he said without a moment’s hesitation. “I played with some good players but he was a magnificent player. He had everything.”

Like so many players from yesteryear, Ronnie loved playing rugby and when it became obvious that the final whistle was being blown on his time on the pitch he was determined to stay involved in the sport he loved.

“I started refereeing two months short of my 50th birthday,” he said. “I had to do something because I couldn’t get a game for the North even though I was the team secretary!”

In those days referees needed to have been refereeing for two years before they were allowed to take charge of matches involving their own club.

“I never lost touch with the North,” said Ronnie, who also served on the club’s committee for 30 years. “I was still a supporter. And I wore my North socks every time I refereed!”

Ronnie continued reffing until the age of 63 when what he thought was a troublesome knee forced him to hang up his whistle.

He touch judged for a couple of years before discovering that the pain he was experiencing was nothing to do with a dodgy knee at all.

“It was my hips,” he said, “and they both needed replacing. I had one done one year and the other done the next.”

It meant his touch judging days were put on hold for several seasons but, typical of Ronnie, he wanted to stay involved with the North in some capacity.

“I became the fastest water carrier in the west,” he laughed. “I had to do something. I can’t just watch a game, I have to be involved.”

Paul Balmer, the North’s current chairman, took up the touch judging duties while Ronnie was recuperating from his hip ops, but Ronnie has been running the line for the best part of a decade since returning to full fitness.

Rugby remains a big part of the Freebury family’s life.

Ronnie’s son Ross played for Cheltenham and still has the occasional game for Cheltenham Saracens vets.

“He played as a loosehead for the the county under-16s and three years later was playing openside for the under-19s,” said Ronnie.

And Ronnie’s grandsons – Jack and Oliver – are also showing plenty of interest in the oval ball game although whisper it quietly because they are part of the junior set-up at the North’s big rivals Old Pats!

Although rugby was his first love, it wasn’t the only sport that Ronnie played. He was also a very keen cricketer, playing for Alstonians and then Naunton Park until the mid-1990s.

The joke while he was at Naunton Park was that he was the only slow bowler who never turned a ball – “Yes, you can print that,” he laughed – but he could also get a few runs as well.

“I got a fair few 50s,” he said, “but I never got a hundred. The closest I got was 89 not out at Withington and my brother Alan Mourton declared!”