The following article is a list of footballers past and present who have played for Bristol Rovers Football Club. In the club's early history the appearance record was held by goalkeeper

Arthur Cartlidge Arthur Cartlidge (12 June 1880 – 1922) was an English footballer who played in the Football League for Aston Villa and Stoke as well as spending seven years at Bristol Rovers. Career Cartlidge was born in Stoke-upon-Trent and played amateu ...

, who played in 258 Southern League games between 1901 and 1909. His record stood until it was broken by another goalkeeper,

Jesse Whatley Jesse Winter Whatley (20 January 1895 – 19 March 1982) was an association footballer who spent his entire professional career at Bristol Rovers. Known as "Gentleman Jess" through his footballing career, Whatley started playing competitive foo ...

, who played 14 times in the Southern League and a further 372 in The Football League, making a total of 386 overall. Following the Second World War the Bristol Rovers board introduced a no-buy/no-sell policy, which remained in force until the abolition of the maximum wage in football in 1961; as a result some players in that era had a high number of appearances for the club. Eight of the top nine most-used players played during this time, each making over 400 appearances. These eight were Bobby Jones (421 appearances),

Alfie Biggs Alfred George 'Alfie' Biggs (8 February 1936 – 20 April 2012) was an English professional footballer, who spent the vast majority of his career at Bristol Rovers. Biggs grew up as one of eight children in the Knowle West area of Bristol whe ...

(424),

Ray Warren Raymond Warren OAM (born 11 June 1943) is a retired Australian sports commentator, known for his coverage of televised professional rugby league matches on the Nine Network. He is known as the "Voice of Rugby League", and called 99 State of ...

(450),

Harold Jarman Harold James Jarman (born 4 May 1939) is an English former professional footballer and first-class cricketer. He spent the majority of his lengthy footballing career with Bristol Rovers, where he is the club's 3rd-highest goalscorer of all time ...

(452), George Petherbridge (457),

Geoff Bradford Geoffrey Reginald William Bradford (18 July 1927 – 30 December 1994) was an English professional footballer who spent his entire career at Bristol Rovers and won one international cap for England. Career Bradford was discovered by Rovers at ...

(462), Jack Pitt (466), and

Harry Bamford Henry Charles Bamford (8 February 1920 – 31 October 1958) was a professional footballer, who played for Bristol Rovers for his entire professional career. A local man, born and raised in St. Philip's Marsh, he played chiefly as a right-b ...

(486). The club's all-time leading appearance maker, Stuart Taylor, played in 546 League games between 1965 and 1980. The club's highest scorer by a wide margin is Geoff Bradford, who scored 242 times in The Football League, exceeding the next-highest scorer Alfie Biggs by 64 goals.

Players

The list of players below includes all team members who have played in at least 100 professional league games for Bristol Rovers, which includes games played in the Southern League (1899–1920), Football League (1920–2014 and 2015–) and Football Conference (2014–15), and also includes substitute appearances. Position key: GK –

Goalkeeper In many team sports which involve scoring goals, the goalkeeper (sometimes termed goaltender, netminder, GK, goalie or keeper) is a designated player charged with directly preventing the opposing team from scoring by blocking or intercepting o ...

; DF – Defender; MF –

Midfielder A midfielder is an outfield position in association football. Midfielders may play an exclusively defensive role, breaking up attacks, and are in that case known as defensive midfielders. As central midfielders often go across boundarie ...

; FW –

Forward Forward is a relative direction, the opposite of backward. Forward may also refer to: People * Forward (surname) Sports * Forward (association football) * Forward (basketball), including: ** Point forward ** Power forward (basketball) ** Sm ...

: :

Footnotes

* Unless otherwise stated, all international caps are taken from Byrne & Jay (2003). * A player's nationality is defined as the country they have represented at the international level if they have done so; otherwise it is their country of birth. * Playing positions are taken from Byrne & Jay (2003) unless otherwise stated. * Number of league appearances for Bristol Rovers * Number of league goals scored for Bristol Rovers * Unless otherwise stated, player statistics are taken from Byrne & Jay (2003).Byrne & Jay (2003), pp. 489–508 * Matt O'Mahoney was a dual Irish international, having played for both the FAI and

IFA IFA or Ifa may refer to: Organisations Economics * Independent financial adviser, a type of financial services professional in the UK * Index Fund Advisors * Institute and Faculty of Actuaries, representing actuaries in the UK * Institute of Ac ...

national teams.

References

Bibliography

* * * * * {{Lists of football players in England Bristol Rovers F.C. players

Bristol Rovers Bristol Rovers Football Club are a professional football club in Bristol, England. They compete in League One, the third tier of the English football league system. They play home matches at the Memorial Stadium in Horfield, they have been c ...

Bristol Rovers players Association football player non-biographical articles

Players

Footnotes

See also

References

Bibliography