Croot Fred Image 1 Leeds City 1908

Description

Little Harrowden, Northamptonshire born left winger Fred Croot started his football career with Rushden Town and joined Southern League club Wellingborough in 1904, from where he joined First Division club Sheffield United in 1905, making his Football League debut at Nottingham Forest in October the same year. It was his only appearance that season but he played 8 more matches for The Blades in 1906-07 before he signed for Second Division Leeds City in May 1907.

He was an ever present for The Peacocks in his first season and played sixty consecutive League matches before missing his first game, the only game he missed in his second season at Elland Road, quickly becoming a crowd favourite. He was a mainstay at City for the next six seasons rarely missing a match although in the final two seasons before the First World War he appeared less regularly, and his tally of 37 goals in 227 appearances for Leeds City included 16 from the penalty spot. He played his final match for Leeds in April 1915, and was City’s second highest all time goalscorer behind Billy McLeod.

During the First World War, already in his 30’s, he made 14 appearances for Leeds City in wartime competition, mostly in 1915-16, whereafter he moved to Scotland and in 1916 appeared for well known amateur club Stevenston United, going on loan to Glasgow Rangers the same year, where he scored once in 9 appearances between his debut against Partick Thistle in January 1917 and a win over Aberdeen at the beginning of March, before joining Clydebank later in 1917. Having moved to East Stirlingshire in February 1920, he didn’t make an appearance for The Shire and (appears to have) retired the same year.