John Arthur Gibson OAM (born 1929 –2008), nicknamed 'Supercoach' was an Australian rugby league coach, player, and commentator.
He was born in Kiama, New South Wales of Scottish descent. Gibson's family relocated to Sydney in his youth. He played third-grade rugby league at St George in 1950 before joining a social side in the Eastern Suburbs A-grade competition called Taylor's Celebrity Club. Gibson worked as a bouncer for Joe Taylor at the sly drinking and gambling outlet Thommo's Two-Up School, as well as other Sydney nightclubs that Taylor owned. Gibson also fought as an amateur for the NSW boxing title.
Gibson was graded with Eastern Suburbs in 1953. He debuted in first grade and represented for New South Wales that same year. In 1954, he also represented for Sydney but spent the second half of the season in the country at Grenfell, New South Wales following some work troubles. He returned to St George Dragons in 1957, and played in the third grade grand final.
Returning to Easts in 1955 Gibson went on to play 152 first grade games for the club primarily at prop or second-row. He made a further Sydney representative appearance in 1958 and captained the Roosters in the 1960 Grand final loss to St George. He left Easts at the end of 1961.
Gibson spent the 1962 season with Newtown and was set for retirement until the club put him on open contract at the end of 1962. He was snapped up by Wests, playing out his career in the 1963 and 1964 seasons, including their 1963 Grand Final loss.
Wests 1963 Grand Final loss to St George was perceived as controversial thanks to some perceived biased refereeing by Darcy Lawler. Prior to the game, one Wests player (later named to be Gibson by team captain Arthur Summons) entered the change room at the Sydney Cricket Ground and promptly told his teammates that if they had backed themselves to win they had better lay off their bets because he had been informed by his own SP Bookie that "The ref has backed St George".
During the game, played on an extremely muddy ground thanks to heavy rain and lower grade games that had churned up the cricket pitch area, Lawler had made some questionable decisions against Wests. Just before half time, Wests had a try disallowed. With St George leading 5–3, centre Gil MacDougall had a chance to give Wests the lead when he won a race to the ball and looked to have grounded it for a try, but Lawler ruled that he did not ground it.
Later with 15 minutes to go and the score still favouring Saints 5–3, St George winger Johnny King scored a match winning try with Wests players claiming that King had been tackled and that they believed Lawler had called him to play the ball, only for King to get up and continue his run to the try line with Lawler then awarding the try giving St George an 8–3 win and their third straight Grand Final win over Wests. Both decisions fuelled the debate about Lawler's impartiality on the day. Lawler, who awarded St George the penalties 18–7, retired after the match.
Gibson also played first-grade cricket for the Waverley club in Sydney, taking 92 wickets as a fast bowler.
Jack Gibson began his first-grade New South Wales Rugby League coaching career at Eastern Suburbs in 1967. In 1966, Gibson took them to the semi-finals that first year. In 1968, the team finished with a defensive record second only to eventual premiers South Sydney and made the semi-finals, then were knocked out in week one by St George.
Gibson then left Easts to join St George, taking all three grades at the club to the 1971 Grand Final. On leaving the Dragons he linked up with Newtown where he enjoyed immediate success, taking out the Wills Cup pre-season tournament, helping the foundation club to its only club championship and a berth in the preliminary final where they were knocked out by Cronulla. Tellingly, the following year after Gibson had left, the Jets slipped back and finished the season in seventh place.
In the 1973 the high-rolling Eastern Suburbs Leagues Club at Bondi Junction announced a $600,000 profit. The club set about to regain premiership honours that they hadn't seen since 1945, and bought Souths Test hooker Elwyn Walters to add to their experienced forwards in Arthur Beetson and Ron Coote, and made a buy in rugby union international Russell Fairfax to add to their backline. Securing former club-captain and coach Gibson put all the pieces in place.
Easts dominated the 1974 season winning 19 of 22 matches to finish eight points ahead of their nearest rivals. When they were beaten by Canterbury in the major semi-final, Gibson launched a scathing attack on referee Keith Page claiming "if Page has the final I may as well not send a team out." Over the next ten years, Gibson would turn the coaching technique of blaming the referee for his side's losses into an art form.
In the grand final, Eastern Suburbs defeated Canterbury 19-4, giving Gibson his first premiership as a coach and the Roosters their first in 29 years.
In Season 1975, after losing the matches in rounds 2 and 3, the Roosters juggernaut rolled on and they posted 19 consecutive wins to close out the regular season; a streak that ran from round 4 to round 22 and remains the equal record for the most consecutive wins in premiership history with the 2021 Melbourne Storm team. The Roosters dominated St. George on Grand Final day with a punishing seven try haul in the second half and an emphatic 38–0 victory. In addition to the back-to-back premiership titles, Gibson also steered the club that season to victory in the mid-week Amco Cup and to a rightful claim as the best club team in the world in defeating English champions, St Helens R.F.C. in the inaugural World Club Challenge.
By 1976 a number of other clubs, Parramatta and Manly had caught up with the high standards that Gibson had fostered at Easts; the club's dominance ended and he moved to South Sydney. Gibson endured the leanest spell of his career there, failing to get as far as the semi-finals in his two seasons with the club of 1978 and 1979.
Gibson then linked with Parramatta, leading them to the most successful era in their history taking out three consecutive premierships from 1981 to 1983.
In club Chief-Executive Denis Fitzgerald Gibson found an ally in his remorseless approach to sledging referees and applying pressure via the media. On 5 April 1981, Gibson dared the Referees Appointments Board to give Greg Hartley another Eels match after they lost 12–8 to Canterbury. The following week Gibson sent a personal letter to Kevin Roberts complimenting him for his handling of the Parramatta-Souths match which the Eels won 39–5. Come finals time, Gibson continued to apply pressure when he publicly criticised the appointment of Hartley to control the Eels major semi-final clash with Eastern Suburbs.