Ronald George Wigg, born Great Dunmow, England, 18 May, 1949.
PART ONE
To understand Ron Wigg’s playing career, one must begin with his earliest steps at Leyton Orient, because this was the club that first opened its doors to the teenager eager to show he could thrive in professional football. However, Orient would not be the club where he made his first major impression, and accordingly, his next move would set him on a path that offered both opportunity and challenge in equal measure.
When Ipswich Town signed Wigg in April 1967, they were gathering together a group of promising young talents—players like Clive Woods, Mick Mills, Colin Viljoen, and Colin Harper—all of whom would soon become familiar names at Portman Road. Consequently, Wigg stepped into an environment brimming with ambition and hungry for a resurgence after a few years of drifting.
He was just 17 when Bill McGarry handed him his Football League debut, and the setting could hardly have been better: a home match at Portman Road on 30 September 1967, with Ipswich running out 3–1 winners over Carlisle United. Furthermore, that season became one of dramatic uplift for the club, because by the end of the 1967–68 campaign Ipswich had clinched promotion back to the First Division.
However, the winds of change soon arrived. In January 1969, Bobby Robson replaced McGarry, and although Robson would go on to become one of Ipswich Town’s greatest-ever managers, the shift in leadership correspondingly meant that some players found themselves less central to the club’s future.
Wigg, reading the direction of travel with the pragmatism that often defines the careers of hardworking forwards, realised that his time in Suffolk was nearing its end. As a result, in the summer of 1970, the young striker moved on, signing for Watford for a fee of £18,000.
Watford in 1970 were not a club standing still. They had secured promotion to the Second Division in the 1968–69 season and had reached the FA Cup semi-final for the first time in their history the following year, which meant the atmosphere at Vicarage Road carried the energy of a club pushing its limits. Moreover, they needed players capable of adding depth, versatility, and reliable work rate, and thus Ron Wigg became part of a squad striving to cement its place at a higher level.
Over the course of his spell with the Hornets, Wigg notched up 97 appearances—an impressive total that underlined his status as a dependable option in multiple phases of the team’s attacking play. He might not have been the kind of forward who scored in bunches every weekend, yet he contributed through hold-up play, pressing, and linking attacks, and in the sometimes unforgiving grind of lower league football, such qualities mattered as much as goals.
PART TWO
By the end of the 1972–73 campaign, a new opportunity emerged. South Yorkshire club Rotherham United were seeking reinforcements, and Ron Wigg, hungry for a fresh challenge, signed with the Millers during the closing stages of the season.
Rotherham, competing in the lower reaches of the Football League, offered Wigg the chance to play with greater regularity, and accordingly he seized the moment with enthusiasm. His first league goal for the side arrived in a 1–0 win over Bolton Wanderers at Millmoor on 31 March 1973—a match in which his decisive strike not only secured the points but also established him as a player capable of stepping up in key moments.
Furthermore, his time at Rotherham marked a period in which he developed greater consistency, and his 65 appearances for the club across two seasons reflected both trust from the management and a growing maturity in his overall game. Yet football careers rarely follow straight paths, and in 1974 Wigg once again prepared for a change of scenery, joining Grimsby Town in search of another chapter.
Compared to the excitement and upward thrust of Ipswich or the FA Cup buzz that still lingered around Watford, Wigg’s time at Grimsby Town represented a different sort of challenge. The Mariners were a club familiar with the ebbs and flows of lower-league football, and consequently they valued experience and reliability—qualities Wigg increasingly embodied. From 1974 to 1976, he made 63 appearances, contributing to a team that balanced ambition with the realities of tight budgets and tough competition.
After Grimsby came Barnsley, a club where he spent a shorter spell—18 appearances during the 1976–77 season—and although the statistics might not leap from the page, his influence came through his persistence and willingness to adapt. However, as is often the case for forwards working in the lower divisions, opportunities shifted quickly, and thus Wigg moved again, this time to Scunthorpe United in 1977.
At Scunthorpe, he enjoyed two seasons of steady involvement, racking up 50 appearances and offering the team a measure of experience in a league where younger squads sometimes struggled for composure. While these years did not produce sensational headlines, they nonetheless formed the backbone of a career characterised by commitment, modesty, and an appreciation for the rhythms of English football far away from the glamour and noise of the game’s wealthiest institutions.
PART THREE
By 1979, Ron Wigg had played more than a decade of professional football in England, and therefore when the American Soccer League came calling, he embraced the opportunity—one that promised both adventure and a new kind of responsibility.
The ASL was a league still trying to establish itself in the shadow of the more public-facing North American Soccer League, yet it offered English players something the lower leagues often did not: better financial security, a growing fan base, and a chance to help shape the sport in a country still learning to appreciate it.
Wigg signed for the Columbus Magic in 1979, and his impact was immediate. He scored thirteen goals in twenty-seven league matches, guiding the Magic all the way to the ASL championship game. However, despite his contributions, Columbus fell to the Sacramento Gold. Even so, Wigg’s arrival in the United States was a success, and his scoring record demonstrated that even in a new environment, with different styles and wider travel demands, he could still influence matches.
Later that year he also signed with the Cleveland Force of the Major Indoor Soccer League, transitioning into the high-paced, board-bounded world of indoor football—a sport that rewarded quick thinking, sharp movement, and constant energy. He played only ten matches for the Force but still recorded five goals, proving once more that he could adapt to almost any version of the game.
He finished his active career in 1980 with the Magic, closing the chapter on a professional journey that had spanned almost 15 years, thousands of miles, and seven English clubs before concluding in Ohio.
If Wigg’s footballing days unfolded across a variety of clubs, pitches, and expectations, then his coaching career in the United States was far more settled—and, in many ways, far more influential. After retiring from professional play, he remained in Ohio, taking up a range of coaching positions that allowed him to invest in youth development and local programmes.
Moreover, the longevity of his involvement speaks volumes: Wigg coached in the United States for seventeen years, shaping players who would go on to compete at various levels. He also became Director of Coaching and Soccer Education for the Ohio South Youth Soccer Association, a position that placed him at the very heart of regional player development.