Francis Joseph Bruce Smallman (1869–1941) Access individual season statistics via Season Stats dropdown menu. was an English professional

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby le ...

who scored 23 goals from 58 appearances in

the Football League The English Football League (EFL) is a league of professional football clubs from England and Wales. Founded in 1888 as the Football League, the league is the oldest such competition in the world. It was the top-level football league in Engla ...

playing as an

outside right Forwards (also known as attackers) are Glossary of association football terms#O, outfield positions in an association football team who play the furthest up the pitch and are therefore most responsible for scoring Goal (sport)#Association footbal ...

for Lincoln City.

Football career

Smallman was born in

Willingham by Stow Willingham by Stow is a rural village in the West Lindsey district of Lincolnshire, England. The population of the civil parish (known as Willingham) at the 2011 census was 488. It is situated on the B1241, south-east from Gainsborough and ...

Lincolnshire Lincolnshire (abbreviated Lincs.) is a county in the East Midlands of England, with a long coastline on the North Sea to the east. It borders Norfolk to the south-east, Cambridgeshire to the south, Rutland to the south-west, Leicestershire ...

, in 1869. He made his debut for Lincoln City on 7 September 1889 in the

Midland League The Midland Football League is an English football league that was founded in 2014 by the merger of the former Midland Alliance and Midland Combination. The league has four divisions that sit at levels 9–12 of the football pyramid. History Th ...

, and was the club's leading scorer for that season with 17 goals in senior competitions. Smallman played for the club until the end of the 1892–93 season, their first in

. He was ever-present during that season, and was the club's leading scorer with 19 goals in senior competitions, 17 in the League. He spent the 1893–94 season with

Burton Wanderers Burton Wanderers Football Club was a football club based in Burton upon Trent, Staffordshire, England. The club were members of the Football League for three seasons in the mid 1890s. In 1901 they merged with Burton Swifts to form Burton Unite ...

in the Midland League before returning to Lincoln City for two more years. Smallman's last game for their first team came in the

Football League Second Division The Football League Second Division was the second level division in the English football league system between 1892 and 1992. Following the foundation of the FA Premier League, the Football League divisions were renumbered and the third ti ...

, a 4–1 defeat to former club Burton Wanderers on 4 April 1896. Over both spells with Lincoln, he scored 53 goals from 120 senior appearances. Smallman died in

Lincoln Lincoln most commonly refers to: * Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865), the sixteenth president of the United States * Lincoln, England, cathedral city and county town of Lincolnshire, England * Lincoln, Nebraska, the capital of Nebraska, U.S. * Lincoln ...

in 1941 at the age of 72.

References

1869 births 1941 deaths Men's association football forwards Lincoln City F.C. players Burton Wanderers F.C. players English Football League players English men's footballers People from Willingham by Stow Footballers from Lincolnshire {{England-footy-forward-1860s-stub