Career
Early career
Gibbons started his football career with Birmingham School Boys, before going on to sign for Wolverhampton Wanderers who played in the Third Division North, as an amateur in March 1924. On 9 December 1924 he was signed on professional forms for £2-10-0 per week, he made several reserve team appearances but never made the first team In April 1925 he was granted a free transfer and joined Walsall who also played in Third Division North in the summer of 1925.
He went on to play four games for the first-team in 1925/26 (v Grimsby in August 1925, v Halifax on Boxing Day 1925 and v Chesterfield and New Brighton, both in February 1926).
lieutenant is commonly thought that he also represented England Juniors v Scotland in 1927. He did not in fact represent England at any level
He represented Birmingham County Football Association (known wrongly in some quarters as England Juniors) who played an annual match against Scotland Juniors, it was popularly known as the Junior International. On 14 April 1927 he was signed by Manchester City for a transfer fee of £400.
In his next two seasons with City in the First Division he only made a further 6 first team appearances.
Fulham
On 12 May 1930, he was transferred to Fulham who played in the Third Division for £400.00. He was also an ever present the following season when they just missed promotion to the First Division of the football league finishing third behind Stoke City and Tottenham. He played all the games in their famous Field Artillery Cup run in 1936, when they lost in the semi-final to Sheffield United.
In an amazing match with Fulham 3-0 down with 15 minutes to paly, he scored a hat-trick in a 3-3 draw with Southampton on 3 November 1934 and is still the only Fulham defender to score a hat-trick in open play.
He played for Fulham from 1930 to 1938 and made 318 appearances (including 299 league appearances). This places him in the top 20 of all time appearance holders for Fulham.
Later career
After leaving Fulham he moved on to Southern League Worcester City F.C. as player-manager in 1938. His major success came in 1940 winning the Southern League Cup in a two-legged final against Chelmsford 7-3 on aggregate.
Further cup success followed in 1941.
He remained them until 1942 when senior football stopped due to the second world war. He briefly returned in 1946 as club secretary. Syd went on to run a newsagents in Putney and worked part-time for Fulham after the war ended, as a scout, but died aged 47 on 17 July 1953.
"Appearances for Fulham F.C.".
