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Mr Dennett, who served the Royal Navy with distinction and was part of the 7,000-strong fleet that took part the D-Day landings in 1944, formed Ashville Football Club with wife Joyce in 1949, naming it after the street where they lived.
A mural honouring his contribution to the community and his war career was created by renowned Wirral artist Paul Curtis and painted on the club building in 2023.
Paul recalled meeting Mr Dennett while putting the artwork together.
He said: “I only got to know John during the week I painted the mural, and he was a real gentleman.
“He seemed genuinely happy with the project and very proud of the football club and all who work and volunteer for Ashville FC.
“John was turning 99 at the time, but he was a young man inside. He had a positivity and sense of fun that projected a warmth around him.”
Paul told the Globe that he had tried to do the mural as a surprise, with a cover story being that he was just doing some maintenance/repairs to the wall.
He explained: “John lived in the flat above the clubhouse and we figured he would not see it from the inside.
“Unfortunately, he rumbled us as he saw it being reflected in the vehicles’ windscreens in the carpark, so we had to come clean”.
Mr Dennett, a gunner in the Royal Navy, was on a landing craft carrying tanks and lorries that landed on Sword Beach on D-Day – June 6, 1944.
The landings, also known as Operation Overlord, saw 156,000 Allied troops arrive for a combined naval, air and land assault on Nazi-occupied France.
Mr Dennett had signed up to serve against his mother’s wishes at the age of 17 in 1941 and was accepted without anyone seeing his birth certificate.
He served at every major Allied landing: North Africa, Italy and Normandy.
Following the war Mr Dennett devoted much of his free time to support veteran causes fundraising for the annual Poppy Appeal and becoming a founder member of the Royal British Legion City of Liverpool Branch.
He also worked for the Italy Star Association for decades and became its President in 2019.
He was awarded the British Empire Medal in 2022 for voluntary services to veterans and returned to Normandy for the commemorations nearly every year since the early 1990s.
Just before the D-Day landings, Mr Dennett’s ship docked in Birkenhead, and whilst ashore, he met his future wife Joyce.
Paying tribute Paul continued: “He was one of the last of the golden generation that did so much for our country by fighting against fascism to give us all the freedom we enjoy today.
“I read his biography and he truly is a hero.
“It was an honour for me to be the artist that painted his portrait.
“We must never forget the sacrifices he, and his generation, made for all of us”.
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