John becomes the fifth member of our 1959/60 Championship team to leave us, following on from Brian Miller, Tommy Cummings, Adam Blacklaw and Jimmy Adamson.
Connelly signed for Burnley in 1956 and went on to make his debut for the club in March of the following year at Elland Road against Leeds United. But it was the 1958/59 season by the time he established himself in the team and his timing was perfect as Burnley prepared for greatness.
In his second season we became champions of England but he was missing from the team in the run in and was in hospital recovering from knee surgery when the title was lifted at Maine Road with his deputy Trevor Meredith scoring the winning goal.
Connelly had more than played his part. He played 34 of the 42 games and scored, from the wing, a staggering 20 league goals.
Like many others, he was sold on, and his destination was Manchester United in 1964. By then he'd played a total of 265 league and cup games for Burnley scoring an incredible 105 goals. He went on to win another title at Manchester United before going on to play for both Blackburn, having turned down a chance to return to Burnley, and Bury.
He won a total of 20 England caps, 10 of them with Burnley. The last of those caps came in the opening game of the 1966 World Cup Finals against Uruguay at Wembley.
Only Bob Kelly, who won 11 of his 14 caps with Burnley (from 1920 to 1925) played more times for England whilst a Burnley player.
In more recent years, John Connelly will be remembered by many people locally having run Connelly's Plaice fish and chip shop in Brierfield up to his retirement.
Today's news is so very sad. Another of my early heroes has left us and again I shed a tear or two. My thoughts are with his wife Sandra, the Connelly family and their friends at this awful time.