‘Big G' Such A Wheely Great Cause

The NON-LEAGUE fraternity are rallying round north-west fans’ favourite George Melling after he was recently diagnosed with Motor Neurone Disease (MND) at the age of 36.

- Phil Brennan

The tough-tackling defender came through the youth systems at Blackpool and Morecambe before making a name for himself at Altrincham, coming through the reserves to make his first-team debut aged 20 in February 2005.

Moving on from Moss Lane, Big G, as he is affectionately known, played for a host of clubs across the north-west, including Ashton United, Clitheroe, Nelson, Northwich Victoria, and Longridge Town.

A steelworker by day at Global Engineering, Melling began noticing that he couldn’t carry out his everyday job without a struggle and eventually had to admit defeat to his worsening condition in September 2020.

“I first started with symptoms back in February 2020,” he told. “I started to struggle with pains in my arm, which was affecting my work but continued to fight through the pain before it got to the point where I had to admit that there was something really wrong.”

His partner Nicci takes up the story. “We had looked up George’s symptoms on the internet and over the next few months had been to see several doctors, all who said that it couldn’t be MND, before it was eventually confirmed that it is last week.”