It was when Gascoigne was on the verge of completing his dream move to Italian giants Lazio ? despite his cruciate knee ligament injury playing for Tottenham in the 1991 FA Cup final – where Roeder stepped up to the plate again.
He was about to retire from football after an impressive career in which he captained QPR and Newcastle but Roeder still felt duty bound to help his mate along the way, especially as Gazza was taking such a big step into the unknown; he couldn't let him down now?
“In August 1991, I went to Rome to meet the Lazio management and be officially introduced to the club.
“My dad and some of the family came, along with Glenn Roeder, my old team-mate from Newcastle. He was planning his retirement from football and was looking to go into coaching.
“Although he's ten years older than me, I'd always got on well with him and he had been great to me since I'd come south to Spurs, sheltering me when I was in trouble, giving me helpful advice and showing me real kindness.
“It had been decided that he and his wife Faith and his family would come and live in Rome while I was there to keep an eye on me.
“He would be my football friend and companion and stop me from doing anything too daft. It was also an opportunity for him to look at Italian coaching methods, to see how they did things, which he thought would be useful to him in his future career.”
But with the Roeder family looking to settle in Italy for the foreseeable future, things suddenly took a turn for the worse, and it was a familiar old story that proved to be Gascoigne's downfall.
Whilst on a short visit back to the North-East, he was enjoying a night out with some old friends when disaster struck.
In a Newcastle nightclub, he was suddenly a target for assault and in a completely unprovoked attack, was punched in the face. Whilst falling to the floor, his knee gave way ? undoing all the surgeon's good work from that earth-shattering Cup final injury.
I'll let Gazza take up the story?
“When Glenn heard what had happened, he said, 'that's it.' He didn't even want to hear my explanation. It had not been my fault but Glenn said I'd promised myself never to get into scrapes like that, and not put myself in any situation where it could happen.
“I argued this wasn't fair. It could have happened anywhere. But he wouldn't listen. He said that was the end, that I'd had my last chance. And he cancelled all his arrangements for Rome.”