Before we had football, we had superheroes and before those footballers became our heroes, Stan Lee showed us the values our role models should live by.

It’s been said this week that Stan Lee drew his heroes in a way that we understood the man behind the mask. We understood their worries, their burdens and their doubts, and what motivated them to drop those and take up the fight for good.

After Spiderman, Iron Man, Hulk and Thor, we found our own heroes in life. To many of us, those heroes were footballers and after that, if we were fortunate enough, we recognised grown-ups around us who lifted us up, helped us along and lived by those values we saw in Stan Lee’s characters.

As well as the talent to tell a tale and inspire the young, Stanley Martin Lieber fought for equality, diversity and for access to education and literacy. Lee was an early voice against racism and showed us examples of how we all have the ability to follow our own path and develop your own powers for good.

When football and football supporters are at their best, we follow those same values.

So for Stan Lee, who taught us all so much about heroism so that when we saw it, we knew it, Sartorial Soccer would like to salute you wherever you are now, in the only way we know how; with a nod to Atletico Madrid’s Spiderman 2 shirts.

On behalf of any boy or girl who saw a little of themselves in Peter Parker or Bruce Banner; Stan Lee, we salute you!

Excelsior!