Lachlan Fitzgibbon (born 5 January 1994) is an Australian professional

rugby league Rugby league football, commonly known as just rugby league and sometimes football, footy, rugby or league, is a full-contact sport played by two teams of thirteen players on a rectangular field measuring 68 metres (75 yards) wide and 112 ...

footballer who plays as forward for the

Newcastle Knights The Newcastle Knights are an Australian professional rugby league club based in Newcastle, New South Wales. They compete in Australasia's premier rugby league competition, the National Rugby League (NRL) premiership. Playing in red and blue, th ...

in the

NRL The National Rugby League (NRL) is an Australasian rugby league club competition which contains clubs from New South Wales, Queensland, Victoria, the Australian Capital Territory and New Zealand. The NRL formed in 1998 as a joint partnership ...

Background

Fitzgibbon was born in

North Sydney, New South Wales North Sydney is a suburb and major commercial district on the Lower North Shore of Sydney, Australia. North Sydney is located 3 kilometres north of the Sydney central business district and is the administrative centre for the local government a ...

, Australia and moved to

Newcastle Newcastle usually refers to: *Newcastle upon Tyne, a city and metropolitan borough in Tyne and Wear, England *Newcastle-under-Lyme, a town in Staffordshire, England *Newcastle, New South Wales, a metropolitan area in Australia, named after Newcastle ...

at a young age. He played his junior rugby league for the South Newcastle Lions in the

Newcastle Rugby League The Newcastle Rugby League is a local rugby league football competition in Newcastle, Australia. It is one of the oldest rugby league competitions in Australia, founded in 1910. A Newcastle representative team was also assembled from players i ...

. He was then signed by the

. Fitzgibbon is the son of nib CEO Mark Fitzgibbon and nephew of

Australian Labor Party The Australian Labor Party (ALP), also simply known as Labor, is the major centre-left political party in Australia, one of two major parties in Australian politics, along with the centre-right Liberal Party of Australia. The party forms ...

Joel Fitzgibbon Joel Andrew Fitzgibbon (born 16 January 1962) is a retired Australian politician. He is a member of the Australian Labor Party (ALP) and has served in the House of Representatives from 1996 to 2022, representing the New South Wales seat of Hunt ...

. Lachlan's grandfather is

Eric Fitzgibbon Eric John Fitzgibbon (27 August 1936 – 24 January 2015) was an Australian politician representing the Australian Labor Party. Born in Taree, New South Wales, he attended the University of New England and became a teacher. He served on Cessn ...

who was an MP for the electorate of Hunter.

Playing career

Early career

In 2013 and 2014, Fitzgibbon played for the Newcastle Knights'

NYC New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...

team.

2015

In 2015, Fitzgibbon moved on to the Knights'

New South Wales Cup The NSW Cup, currently known as the Knock-On Effect NSW Cup for sponsorship reasons, is a rugby league competition for clubs in New South Wales. The competition has a history dating back to the NSWRFL's origins in 1908, starting off as a reserv ...

team. In round 21 of the

2015 NRL season The 2015 NRL season was the 108th season of professional rugby league in Australia and the 18th season of the National Rugby League in Australia and New Zealand. The season started in New Zealand with the annual Auckland Nines, which was followed ...

, he made his

debut for the Knights against the

St. George Illawarra Dragons The St. George Illawarra Dragons is an Australian professional rugby league football club, representing both the Illawarra and St George, Sydney, St George regions of New South Wales. The club has competed in the National Rugby League since NR ...

. This would be Fitzgibbon's only appearance for the first grade team in the

as the club finished last on the table. In August, Fitzgibbon re-signed with the Newcastle club on a two-year contract. On 27 September, he played in the Knights' 2015 New South Wales Cup Grand Final win over the

Wyong Roos The Wyong Rugby League Football Club are an Australian rugby league club based on the Central Coast of New South Wales. The club competed in the New South Wales Cup from 2013 to 2018 and still competes in the Central Coast Division Rugby Leagu ...

Parramatta Stadium Parramatta Stadium was a sports stadium in Parramatta, New South Wales, Australia, 23 kilometres west of Sydney's central business district. The stadium was the home ground of several western Sydney-based sports teams, at the time of closure ...

2016

Fitzgibbon made five appearances for Newcastle in the

2016 NRL season The 2016 NRL season was the 109th season of professional rugby league in Australia and the 19th season run by the National Rugby League. The season started in New Zealand with the annual Auckland Nines, and was followed by the All Stars Match, w ...

as the club finished last for a second consecutive year. He scored his first try in the top grade against

North Queensland North Queensland or the Northern Region is the northern part of the Australian state of Queensland that lies just south of Far North Queensland. Queensland is a massive state, larger than many countries, and its tropical northern part has been ...

in round 13 of the competition.

2017

Fitzgibbon made his first NRL appearance of the

2017 NRL season The 2017 NRL season was the 110th season of professional rugby league in Australia and the 20th season run by the National Rugby League. The season started in New Zealand with the annual Auckland Nines, and was followed by the All Stars Match, w ...

in round 10, going on to play in 14 matches and scoring 8 tries as the club finished last for a third straight season. In September, he re-signed with Newcastle on a two-year contract until the end of 2019.

2018

Fitzgibbon made 21 appearances and scored nine tries for Newcastle in the

2018 NRL season The 2018 NRL season was the 111th season of professional rugby league in Australia and the 21st season run by the National Rugby League. The main competition, known as the 2018 Telstra Premiership due to sponsorship from Telstra, featured 16 te ...

as the club finished 11th on the table.

2019

Fitzgibbon played 21 games and scored five tries for Newcastle in the

2019 NRL season The 2019 NRL season was the 112th season of professional rugby league in Australia and the 22nd season run by the National Rugby League. The Sydney Roosters became the first team to win back-to-back Premierships since the Brisbane Broncos in 1992 ...

as the club finished a disappointing 11th on the table. At the start of the year, many tipped Newcastle to reach the finals after the club recruited heavily in the off-season.

2020

He made 17 appearances for Newcastle in the

2020 NRL season The 2020 NRL season was the 113th season of professional rugby league in Australia and the 23rd season run by the National Rugby League. Teams The lineup of teams remained unchanged for the 14th consecutive year. ; Notes : : : Pre-season ...

including the club's first finals game since 2013 which was an elimination finals loss against South Sydney.

2021

Fitzgibbon only 10 games for Newcastle in the

2021 NRL season The 2021 NRL season was the 114th season of professional rugby league in Australia and the 24th season run by the National Rugby League. Teams The lineup of teams remained unchanged for the 15th consecutive year. Regular season Ladd ...

and did not play in the club's elimination finals loss against

Parramatta Parramatta () is a suburb and major Central business district, commercial centre in Greater Western Sydney, located in the state of New South Wales, Australia. It is located approximately west of the Sydney central business district on the ban ...

2022

Fitzgibbon was limited to only nine appearances for Newcastle in the

2022 NRL season The 2022 NRL season is the 115th season of professional rugby league in Australia and the 25th season run by the National Rugby League. Teams The lineup of teams remained unchanged for the 16th consecutive year. This became the second longest s ...

as the club finished 14th on the table.

References

External links

Newcastle Knights profile
{{DEFAULTSORT:Fitzgibbon, Lachlan 1994 births Living people Australian rugby league players Newcastle Knights players Rugby league players from Sydney Rugby league second-rows South Newcastle Lions players