It’s funny how things come round.

Morrisons directors confounded the City and journalists when they unveiled the Bradford-based supermarket group’s new boss.

Not many had heard of 41-year-old Dalton Philips, who is set to become the supermarket group’s new chief executive next month in succession to Marc Bolland, who has left to run Marks & Spencer for squillions of pounds.

The hot money was on finance director Richard Pennycook taking the top job after he played a crucial supporting role in Morrison’s spectacular transformation in recent years.

Neither would many be aware of the firm that Mr Philips is leaving to run Morrisons.

Since January 2007, he has been chief operating officer of Loblaw Companies Ltd, Canada’s largest food distributor with more than 1,000 stores and a turnover of £18 billion.

But there is an uncanny link between Morrisons and Loblaw – which could have provided the inspiration for the former Bradford market stall business becoming one of the UK’s top retailers.

Twenty years ago, a former occupant of this seat interviewed the late Ken Blundell on his retirement as deputy chairman of Morrisons.

Mr Blundell, who was married to Sir Ken Morrison’s sister and whose son Chris is still a senior executive at the group, recalled a visit to Canada while in the RAF in the early 1950s.

He remembered seeing Loblaw’s Groceteria, a self-service store the likes of which did not exist in these parts at the time.

In 1958, with Mr Blundell on board, Morrisons introduced self-service to its new James Street store. It was the start of the shopping revolution that was to make Morrisons what it is today– the UK’s fourth-largest supermarket with 422 stores employing more than 120,000 staff.

Then, in 1962, the company converted the former Victoria cinema at Girlington into its first supermarket.

It was officially opened by Coronation Street actress the late Pat Phoenix, alias Elsie Tanner, who learned her trade in rep with the Harry Hanson Court Players at the old Prince’s Theatre in Bradford. Her appearance stopped the traffic on Thornton Road.

So, given his former firm’s subliminal influence on Morrison’s fortunes, young Dalton should feel at home in Bradford.