Sir Kenny Dalglish is one of the most talented footballers of my career.

I interviewed him many times for ITV, both as a wonderful player for Liverpool and as a Championship-winning manager at both Liverpool and Blackburn, plus for European matches when he was in charge of Newcastle United.

Now his talented daughter Kelly Cates has been signed by the BBC to be one of the three presenters of Match Of The Day next season in succession to Gary Lineker.

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Kelly, among the best in the business, is currently one of Sky Sports’ live football hosts. She will be difficult to replace.

Kenny was not always the easiest to interview, but was always accommodating and has been friendly for the whole time I have known him.

He also used to ring me between jobs for punditry spots on the ITV network and we were always pleased to have him on board.

He is still a valued ambassador at Anfield and attends their home matches.

While he was in charge of Liverpool, the tragic Hillsborough disaster happened on April 15, 1989. Liverpool were at the Sheffield Wednesday ground to play an FA Cup semi-final against Nottingham Forest.

Ninety-seven Liverpool fans died after a fatal crush at the Leppings Lane end. They were men, women and children. The match was halted after just six minutes.

Dalglish attended all the funerals of the victims, including four funerals in one day.

His presence in the aftermath of this terrible disaster has been described as ‘‘colossal and heroic’’.

The trauma of it all deeply affected Kenny.

He supported the families of these victims and, with his wife Marina, has raised well over £10 million for charity.

He was knighted in the 2018 Queen’s Birthday Honours for services to football, charity and the City of Liverpool. He received the honour from the then-Prince Charles at Buckingham Palace.

As a player, Sir Kenny won three European Cups in six years plus one runners-up medal. From 1979 to 1986, he won six old First Division titles, one FA Cup winner’s medal, four League Cups and a runners-up medal, plus other competitions.

His many individual honours included the PFA Players’ Player Of The Year in 1983 and the Football Writers’ Footballer Of The Year twice, in 1979 and 1983.

He picked up the BBC Sports Personality Of The Year Lifetime Achievement Award in 2023, he was named Scotland’s greatest international footballer in 2020 and came 22nd in the World Soccer Greatest Players Of The 20th Century.

I would need the whole of this column just to list Sir Kenny’s achievements as a player and manager. It underlines just how good he was at football on and off the pitch.

His all-round skills gave opposing defences nightmares. His passing and goals were just outstanding – the latter often a lovely shot curling into a top corner.

Working on the ITV production of the 1978 European Cup final at Wembley, I was on the touchline with a perfect view of Kenny scoring the only goal inside the penalty area, chipping over the goalkeeper from a pass by Graeme Souness in the second half. Liverpool beat Club Brugge 1-0.

It was Liverpool’s second European Cup win and their third European trophy in three years. They became the first British team to retain the European Cup.

Afterwards, a sponsor’s photographer took the picture in the Liverpool dressing room of Kenny and I with the European Cup.

He was one of Celtic’s greatest players as well as Liverpool’s.

He made 338 appearances for Celtic; scoring 173 goals while winning their top league four times – plus four Scottish FA Cups and one Scottish League Cup during his time at Parkhead from 1969 to 1977.

He was transferred to Liverpool when manager Bob Paisley paid a then record British transfer fee of £440,000 for him to replace Kevin Keegan. Sir Kenny made a massive contribution to one of the club’s greatest periods.

Kenny played 515 times for Liverpool and scored 172 goals, taking his senior playing career to 853 games and 345 goals.

He also made a record 102 appearances for Scotland from 1971 to 1986, scoring 30 goals.

He played in the 1974 and 1978 World Cups – starting all of Scotland’s matches.

Moving into the dug-out, he started briefly as player-manager of Liverpool in 1985 before accepting the position on a full-time basis. He was in charge until 1991 when he resigned. He went to Blackburn that year and stayed there until 1995.

He joined Newcastle in 1997 for a year. After a short spell as interim manager of Celtic in 2000, he had a final spell again at Liverpool in 2011 for a year.

Often, great players do not make very successful managers. There are exceptions and Dalglish is one.

He enjoyed high winning percentages in his first spell at Liverpool – 307 games, 187 wins, 78 draws and 42 defeats. He won 60.9 per cent.

At Blackburn, the figures were 196 played 103 won, 46 drawn and 47 lost... 52.6 winning percentage.

But of even more importance were the trophies won:

At Liverpool: Three old Football League Championship titles, two FA Cup wins (reaching the final on two other occasions) and one Football League Cup win (reaching the final on one other occasion).

At Blackburn: One Premier League title in 1994-95 season, and before that winning the Football League Second Division play-offs in 1992.

At Celtic: The Scottish League Cup in 2000.

There were no trophies at Newcastle but he did take them to the FA Cup final in 1998.

Now he can watch the current Liverpool side going great guns and see his daughter continue a fine TV presenting career.

I recall in my ITV days having a pre-European Cup match lunch in a restaurant with Sir Kenny’s wife, Marina, and Kelly and then later Sir Kenny trying to introduce me to Marina in La Manga only to be surprised that we knew each other. The Dalglish family are lovely – and extremely talented.

I return on Tuesday with my Sports comment column in association with Utilita Energy in both the Birmingham Mail and Coventry Telegraph plus online.