When Aston Villa won the FA Cup in 1957 by beating Manchester United’s much fancied Busby Babes 2-1, it was widely seen as a triumph for sweat and stamina over the decorative arts and crafts of football. But this was only partially true. The Villa team was capable of its own moments of flair and creativity, and many of them came from Johnny Dixon, their captain and inside forward.

Dixon was a figure of quiet authority and inspiration, but for the majority of his 16 seasons at Villa Park the club was marooned in mid-table anonymity. All that changed in 1956-57 when Villa briefly rekindled the winning formula that had made the club the most famous and garlanded in the game until the emergence of Arsenal in the 1930s.

At Wembley, United, already league champions and seeking to become the first team to win the league and Cup double in the 20th century, were expected to win comfortably. But the balance of power shifted as early as the sixth minute when Peter McParland, the Villa winger, charged into Ray Wood, the opposing goalkeeper, and the United man had to be carried off. In the days before substitutes, United were down to ten men, and even when Wood returned later in the first half he was not fit enough to return to goal.

Nevertheless, Villa were the superior team, and Dixon had a hand in creating their goals, both scored by McParland in the second half. With the final seconds ticking away and United destined not to equalise, Dixon could not resist a glance up to the Royal Box where the Queen was waiting to present him with the most famous trophy in sport. Whenever he spoke about it in later years, Dixon admitted that he had come close to tears at that moment.

Johnny Dixon was born in Hebburn, in the football hothouse of the North East. He played a few games in wartime football for Newcastle United before moving to Birmingham in 1945. Although it took him a while to establish himself in a Villa team that was a curious mixture of ageing prewar stars and younger talent, once he did, at the dawn of a new decade, he was rarely out of the first-choice XI.

Before the development of the modern-day midfield player, inside forwards such as Dixon were expected to provide most of the creativity for a team, and to form close working relationships with the more defensively minded wing halves and the wingers who hogged the touchlines — often the only place where any grass remained on the playing surface. They were expected to weigh in with their fair share of goals, and Dixon obliged by being the club’s leading scorer in three successive seasons in 1951-53.

Unassuming, genial and a non-smoking teetotaller, he was a model professional whose patience was only tested by those colleagues who did not share his innate modesty. Danny Blanchflower and Trevor Ford were two celebrated team-mates whom he refused to discuss in interviews.

In all Dixon made 430 appearances for Villa to place him eighth on the club’s all-time list and scored 144 goals, the sixth highest. He was released — prematurely he felt — at the end of 1960-61 but was given a rousing send off with a stellar performance — and a goal — in the final game of the season against Sheffield Wednesday.

In retirement he coached the club’s youngsters during the 1960s and then opened an ironmonger’s shop in the Sutton Coldfield area. Always proud of his fitness, he continued to play in charity matches for the Aston Villa Old Stars until well into his sixties. Like many players of that era — and indeed several of his Cup-winning team-mates from 1957 — he suffered in later years from Alzheimer’s disease.

Johnny Dixon, footballer, was born on December 10, 1923. He died on January 20, 2009, aged 85