Leeds United, Illan Meslier, Paraag Marathe and staff gave family 'priceless' gift in darkest time

Minutes prior to the arrival of Daniel Farke for his pre-game press conference, the door to the media suite at Leeds' Thorp Arch training ground opened to reveal a tiny boy in a wheelchair. "Hello," he said. The youngster told the assembled members of the press to ask Farke if he could win the upcoming match and was wheeled back out, saying goodbye repeatedly and waving enthusiastically.

The little boy was Harrison. Well, actually, he wasn't. If you asked him, he was Bob.

Danielle and Ashley first noticed something not quite right with their two-year-old son towards the back end of 2020, mid-pandemic.

"Due to COVID restrictions it was quite difficult to pin anybody medical down to see him," Danielle told the YEP. "Obviously a lot of people worried that it was COVID. People were worrying that it was him being locked in for so long, because it just presented like behavioural some of it. He stopped eating his meals, he was getting a really bad temper. It was nothing really significant where you'd go 'oh that child's really poorly' until the January. We had quite a bit of snow and he slipped on the ice. We thought he'd maybe pulled a muscle in his leg, because he started significantly limping and not wanting to walk or play or anything.

"I tried getting him in the doctors because it just wasn't improving, and our doctor wouldn't see him at the time. I rang our health visitor and she actually was just laughing, and she was like: "It's just behavioural. I've told you he's absolutely fine, it's because the nursery is opening back up and he doesn't know how to respond to being outside."

But one day after nursery Danielle picked up her son and took him home where he lay on the sofa. His 'translucent' appearance and lethargy didn't sit right so she took a photo and once again made calls to medical professionals.

"They said to ring back in the morning if he hadn't improved," she said. "And when I got him out of bed the next day, he collapsed. He couldn't stand on his legs. I was seen by a different GP and within six hours of her taking bloods we were down at our local hospital as she thought he had leukemia. I wish he did. Unfortunately he didn't, he had neuroblastoma."

On January 29, 2021, exactly one month after his third birthday, the family were told that he only had a 50 per cent chance of surpassing the five-year mark and that neuroblastoma has extremely high relapse rates. But even with the diagnosis and the fight that began, life went on as best and as normal as it could until his September 2024 passing.

"We were really different with him," said Danielle. "A lot of children aren't sent to school with cancer, but it's something that was really important to him. He absolutely loved school. He loved socialising and going to school. So when we could make it happen, he went to school. He was at school the week before they broke up and he passed away on the first day of returning to school, within that six weeks. So he was going right up until he literally couldn't go anymore."

The school yard was where he played out his dream of becoming a goalkeeper for his dad's beloved Leeds United, having been given a FIFA video game by the hospital and become obsessed around the age of five.

"What was really funny is that he was really short, chemo really stunted his growth," said Danielle. "He was minute. He would have been seven in December but he was only wearing age three or four clothes, so everyone joked that he couldn't be a goalkeeper. He was adamant, he was going to be a goalkeeper for Leeds United and then England. The school used to pass themselves because he'd do it with the year sixes. He'd be in goal, this tiny little thing fighting cancer with year sixes kicking footballs at him."

This time last year the family were up in Glasgow for a treatment that had just come out of its trial phase. It involved a radioactive chamber. But after the all clear and a seven-month cancer-free period, scans revealed it had come back and, as Danielle puts it, 'this would be it.'

Word of mouth, passed from Danielle's uncle to a friend, reached Leeds United and set the wheels in motion for a truly beautiful encounter, or encounters. Bob was invited to be a mascot at Elland Road for the pre-season friendly against Valencia and in the tunnel was where it all began.

"Dominique [Grant, PR manager at Leeds United] was able to get our details and she's been absolutely phenomenal from that point onwards. He was mascot and they were absolutely amazing. They allowed us to come into the tunnel with him. And whilst we were in the tunnel, they allowed our daughter to come along and Dom came over and she was like, very last minute, 'Lola do you want to come out?' She went and quickly got Lola a strip so both children were able to walk out with Illan [Meslier].

"Bob was exhausted by the time it came to go out so Illan carried him out and then passed him to Ethan Ampadu to get his photo. They were amazing with both kids. You can see from the pictures Bob's just beaming. He beamed the whole way through. When we were watching the match, there were people behind not watching because they were laughing, watching him shouting and trying to climb out of his wheelchair to chant. He just thought it was amazing."

Ashley, as a lifelong Leeds fan, thought it was amazing too. The proudest moment of his life in fact and proof in his eyes that Leeds United is a family and not a 'product.' Meslier tried to find them after the game to gift his his signed gloves, but exhaustion had set in and they had taken Bob home. The club then extended an invitation to Thorp Arch for an experience that was filmed and went on to touch thousands of hearts when the club released the footage.

"He absolutely adored Thorp Arch, and they filmed the whole experience for us," said Danielle. "Just before you went into the press conference they allowed Bob in there and he was able to use the microphone, and they were letting him act like he was Daniel Farke. That's on the footage. Dom had him say hello to us, so we've got video footage of him saying, 'hello mummy, hi Lola, hi daddy,' and we've been able to record that on memory bears.

"When you're busy with them, you don't film a lot of it. I don't think people realise that, although they've got life-limiting diseases, you're not really free to film them because you're so busy. You're not just a parent anymore. You're the carer, and you're just so busy. We got sent nearly 10 minutes of footage of him, going round Thorp Arch and interacting with them all. There's part of it where he's telling Farke 'I do love you too.' It's just priceless. You couldn't put a price on that.

"They had already signed a strip for him when we went to Elland Road and he brought his own gloves with him and asked all the keepers to sign them but wouldn't let any of the other [outfield] players touch them. So now we have Illan's gloves and Bob's gloves framed together on our wall at home, which is amazing. And he actually gave him the shirt that he wore, signed, from that match as well."

The video footage gave a glimpse into the size of the personality contained within the small body.

"He was extremely loud," said Danielle. "As you witnessed, he was not shy. He was so unshy that the first time he met Illan, he told him that he was going to take his job, stood in the tunnel. His name is not Bob. His name was actually Harrison, and he just despised it. My husband wasn't a massive fan of it, and he used to shorten it when he was a baby, to Harrybob. And then it was Bob, just dropped the Harry off the front. He must have been about three and he was just like, stop calling me that. I think he associated the hospital with it because it was in his medical notes. I think he started associating that name with the cancer when he was little. He was really, really blunt about it. He would tell any adult 'no, my name's Bob, don't call me that.

"And he was very, very clever. I mean God he completed one of the Mario games in every language available on his Switch to prove he didn't even need to read to be able to play it."

Bob visited Thorp Arch on August 8 and passed away on September 5, seven weeks after relapsing. Just a week after his death the family made the decision to accept Leeds United's invitation to the game against Burnley, where fans would pay tribute by applauding through the sixth minute. As fate would have it, the ball arrived at Meslier's feet at precisely the right time. He trapped it, stood still and began to applaud. The referee and both sets of players did too and Elland Road rose to its feet.

"It was surreal," said Danielle. "We weren't sure whether we were going to go, but we thought how could we not go and honour him when so many people were going to? It was like time stood still. We have seen silences and minutes of applause before. But for the play to stop for his and everyone in the stadium to stand. I don't think there's really words for it to be honest."

Leeds' support for the family extended to Bob's sister, Lola too and has carried on. Chairman Paraag Marathe spoke with her at the Burnley game to offer advice having lost his own sister.

"He told her anything he does, he does in her name," said Danielle. "Lola came away with that. She was like, that's what I'm going to do. She wants to be a doctor and work with cancer children. We met Will Ferrell, and she got a photo with him and she was like 'oh my God, I've met Elf.' We sat near him for the match.

"They have not for any second left Lola out. For the four years nearly that he was fighting cancer, a lot of the time, she is forgotten about. The siblings are forgotten and left behind with other family members. And when charities give them things they don't always give two. Dom hasn't done that with her at all, and we've been back since. Lola was mascot again a few weeks ago. She walked out with Illan because he said he would like to do that because he wasn't able to make the funeral.

"Dominique and Sophie, from the mascot experience, both came to his funeral, which was absolutely mind blowing for us. Both kids' birthdays are in December. Lola on the 15th and Bob's would have been the 29th, so Illan has asked her to come again and walk out for their birthdays in December. The care has been phenomenal, for both children. But they made his dreams come true. It was his dream to meet them and to watch them. It made his little dreams come true. They never asked for anything back, they didn't ask for publicity."

Besides the memories and the cherished footage of their little boy, Leeds created a legacy for Bob. Few who met him, watched his Thorp Arch appearance or stood at Elland Road as Meslier stopped play will forget.

"Oh, it absolutely is [a legacy]," said Danielle. "Everything that Leeds have done, in probably what will always be the worst time of our life, they added some magic to it and created memories, and gave us videos of these memories. We're not quite there to be able to sit and watch it yet. But we'll be able to see him in his element, see him smile and hear his voice. They provided that for us. And the emotional support they provided afterwards. It wasn't like he passed away and they disappeared, if anything they were in touch more. We can't thank them enough. They've been amazing, absolutely amazing. They made his dreams come true."