using a cable is inefficient and expensive, although hdmi 2.0 cables can handle up to 18 Gbps of transfer bandwidth, you still have to come up with a matching circuit to use them which may involve modifying the cable itself. for me this kind of work seem to require special industrial grade equipment and not something you can do by yourself.
Currently there are adapters that use hdmi cables as a transmission lines, but keep in mind, those adapters connect to mpcie or expresscard slots, they carry much lower bandwidth than a pcie 3.0 x8 and you can still see even at lower pcie 2 x1.1 speeds, they suffer from performance losses, part of the losses imo due to the transmission medium.
I don't know about gerald's pcb design, but I guess he already took into consideration the correct width of pcb traces (strip lines).
Supporting the adapter can be done by placing a piece of card board or foam under it to take the physical stress from the motherboard.