Scott Gibbs
Encyclopedia
Scott Gibbs is a former rugby football
Rugby football
Rugby football is a style of football named after Rugby School in the United Kingdom. It is seen most prominently in two current sports, rugby league and rugby union.-History:...

er who represented Wales
Wales national rugby union team
The Wales national rugby union team represent Wales in international rugby union tournaments. They compete annually in the Six Nations Championship with England, France, Ireland, Italy and Scotland. Wales have won the Six Nations and its predecessors 24 times outright, second only to England with...

 and the Lions
British and Irish Lions
The British and Irish Lions is a rugby union team made up of players from England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales...

 in rugby union
Rugby union
Rugby union, often simply referred to as rugby, is a full contact team sport which originated in England in the early 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand...

 and Wales
Wales national rugby league team
The Wales national rugby league team represent Wales in international rugby league football matches. Currently the team is seventh in the RLIF World Rankings. The team were run under the auspices of the Rugby Football League, but an independent body, Wales Rugby League, now runs the team from...

 and Great Britain
Great Britain national rugby league team
The Great Britain national rugby league team represents the United Kingdom in rugby league football. Administered by the Rugby Football League , the team is nicknamed "The Lions" or "Great Britain Lions"....

 in rugby league
Rugby league
Rugby league football, usually called rugby league, is a full contact sport played by two teams of thirteen players on a rectangular grass field. One of the two codes of rugby football, it originated in England in 1895 by a split from Rugby Football Union over paying players...

. His most memorable feats were his performance in the 1997 British Lions tour to South Africa
1997 British Lions tour to South Africa
The 1997 British and Irish Lions tour to South Africa was a series of matches played by the British and Irish Lions rugby union team in South Africa.This tour followed the Lions' 1993 tour to New Zealand and preceded their 2001 tour to Australia....

 (in which he was named "Player of the Series") and the superb individual try he scored in the dying minutes of the last ever Five Nations
Six Nations Championship
The Six Nations Championship is an annual international rugby union competition involving six European sides: England, France, Ireland, Italy, Scotland and Wales....

 match in 1999 against England
England national rugby union team
The England national rugby union team represents England in rugby union. They compete in the annual Six Nations Championship with France, Ireland, Scotland, Italy, and Wales. They have won this championship on 26 occasions, 12 times winning the Grand Slam, making them the most successful team in...

.

Rugby union

Gibbs started his Rugby career at Pencoed RFC
Pencoed RFC
Pencoed Rugby Football Club is a Welsh rugby union team based in Pencoed. Today, Pencoed RFC plays in the Welsh Rugby Union, Division Two West League and is a feeder club for the Ospreys....

 at mini and youth level, his first class career started at Bridgend RFC
Bridgend RFC
Bridgend Ravens are a semi-professional rugby union club based in Bridgend, South Wales. They currently play in the Welsh Premier Division...

 during the 1990/91, followed by a short spell at Neath RFC
Neath RFC
Neath Rugby Football Club is a Welsh rugby union club which plays in the Welsh Premier Division. The club's home ground is The Gnoll, Neath. The first team is known as the Welsh All Blacks because of the team colours: black with only a white cross pattée as an emblem...

, before making his Welsh
Wales national rugby union team
The Wales national rugby union team represent Wales in international rugby union tournaments. They compete annually in the Six Nations Championship with England, France, Ireland, Italy and Scotland. Wales have won the Six Nations and its predecessors 24 times outright, second only to England with...

 debut in 1991 against England. However he moved to Swansea RFC
Swansea RFC
Swansea Rugby Football Club is a Welsh rugby union team which plays in the Welsh Premier Division. Its home ground is St Helens Rugby and Cricket Ground in Swansea. The team is sometimes known as The Whites because of the primary colour of the team strip...

 in January 1992, scoring a try on his debut in a Cup game against Oakdale. Gibbs also scored further tries that season in the cup against Neath RFC
Neath RFC
Neath Rugby Football Club is a Welsh rugby union club which plays in the Welsh Premier Division. The club's home ground is The Gnoll, Neath. The first team is known as the Welsh All Blacks because of the team colours: black with only a white cross pattée as an emblem...

 and Newport RFC to help Swansea reach the final where they lost to Llanelli RFC
Llanelli RFC
Llanelli Rugby Football Club is a Welsh rugby union club founded in 1875 and its senior team is one of the leading club sides in Wales. The club began the 2008-09 season at their historic home ground of Stradey Park in Llanelli, but moved in November 2008 to the new Parc y Scarlets in adjacent...

 at Cardiff Arms Park
Cardiff Arms Park
Cardiff Arms Park , also known as The Arms Park, is primarily known as a rugby union stadium, but it also has a bowling green, and is situated in the centre of Cardiff, Wales. The Arms Park was host to the British Empire and Commonwealth Games in 1958, and hosted four games in the 1991 Rugby World...

.

Despite being only 22, he was selected for the 1993 British Lions
British and Irish Lions
The British and Irish Lions is a rugby union team made up of players from England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales...

 tour to New Zealand
New Zealand
New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...

, where he impressed so much that he was selected for the second and third tests instead of then-England captain Will Carling
Will Carling
William David Charles Carling, OBE is a former Rugby union player for Harlequins, and a former captain of England from 1988 to 1996, winning 72 caps.-Early life:...

.

In 1994 Gibbs left union to join rugby league team St Helens.

Rugby league

Whilst playing league, Gibbs was selected to play for Wales in the 1995 World Cup
1995 Rugby League World Cup
The 1995 Rugby League World Cup was held during October in the United Kingdom. It was the eleventh staging of the Rugby League World Cup and was marketed as the Halifax Centenary World Cup, reflecting the tournament's sponsorship and the fact that 1995 marked the 100th birthday of the sport...

. He also won the Challenge Cup
Challenge Cup
The Challenge Cup is a knockout cup competition for rugby league clubs organised by the Rugby Football League. Originally it was contested only by British teams but in recent years has been expanded to allow teams from France and Russia to take part....

 and the inaugural Super League
Super League
Super League is the top-level professional rugby league football club competition in Europe. As a result of sponsorship from engage Mutual Assurance the competition is currently officially known as the engage Super League. The League features fourteen teams: thirteen from England and one from...

 title with St. Helens in 1996.

Return to union

On his return to union in 1996 it was sometimes joked that he was the fastest prop in world rugby, though in fact he was an inside centre. He became known as the world's hardest tackler (summed up by his nickname "Car-Crash") and this was exemplified by his performance in his second Lions tour.

In 1997 Gibbs was a key member of the victorious British and Irish Lions tour of South Africa
1997 British Lions tour to South Africa
The 1997 British and Irish Lions tour to South Africa was a series of matches played by the British and Irish Lions rugby union team in South Africa.This tour followed the Lions' 1993 tour to New Zealand and preceded their 2001 tour to Australia....

. The Springboks were at the time the world champions following the 1995 World Cup
1995 Rugby World Cup
The 1995 Rugby World Cup was the third Rugby World Cup. It was hosted and won by South Africa, and was the first Rugby World Cup in which every match was held in one country....

 and were expected to win the series. However, the Lions produced some memorable defensive performances with Gibbs at the centre of the action pulling off some devastating tackles.

In the defining moment of the series, Gibbs crashed through the Springboks' key player, 19-stone Os du Randt
Os du Randt
Jacobus Petrus du Randt, better known as Os du Randt , is a former South African rugby union loosehead prop who retired as the most-capped forward in the history of the Springboks...

 on one of his trademark bullocking runs. The Lions went on to win the series 2–1 and Gibbs was voted "Player of the Series".

In later years Gibbs was sometimes criticised for being too one-dimensional but he did show startling agility to claim the winning try in the last-ever Five Nations match in 1999. Wales were playing England at Wembley with England trying to complete the Grand Slam
Grand Slam (Rugby Union)
In rugby union, a Grand Slam occurs when one team in the Six Nations Championship manages to beat all the others during one year's competition...

. England led by 6 points with 3 minutes left to play and appeared to have won the game but in one of the last plays of the match, Gibbs received the ball in midfield 20m from the try line and proceeded to 'sidestep' one player for a one of the most celebrated tries in Welsh history. Following Neil Jenkins
Neil Jenkins
Neil Jenkins MBE is a former rugby union football player and current coach. He played fly-half, centre, or full back for Pontypridd, Cardiff, Celtic Warriors, Wales and the British and Irish Lions. Jenkins is Wales' highest ever points-scorer and is the third highest on the List of leading Rugby...

' conversion, Wales won the match 32–31 in what is agreed to be one of the best matches played in the competition and caused England not only to miss out on the Grand Slam, but handed the last ever Five Nations Championship to Scotland.

In 2001 Gibbs was called up as a replacement to the 2001 British Lions tour to Australia, though he did not play in any of the Tests.

Gibbs has now retired from rugby (with 53 caps for Wales) but can still be seen contributing to the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...

's rugby union coverage.

External links

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