The Arsenal Anniversary Files
Today’s headline anniversaries come from 1932 – which is itself a clue as to what happened.
Latest article published by the Arsenal History Society
Chapman at the Arsenal – the opening month. Chaos in the goalmouth!
Later today: The month that everything changed.
Below are the Arsenal (and for historical context, occasionally one or two non-Arsenal) anniversaries for today taken from the complete files of over 6000 Arsenal anniversaries which appear on the Arsenal History Society website. An index to the monthly Anniversary files can be found in the right column of this site under “Pages”
The current historical series on this site is Henry Norris at the Arsenal. An index of all our main series can be found on the home page.
27 August 1908: Newspaper talk shows Morrell very satisfied with his team’s progress as they prepared for the first game on 2 September. Unfortunately Arsenal lost 0-4 at home to Everton.
27 August 1913 Arsenal played a practice match at The Den as the development work continued at Highbury ready for the first home game on September 6.
27 August 1919: Joseph Toner joined from Belfast United for £200. He was an occasional player in each of the years under Knighton’s management, but was soon moved on after Chapman arrived.
27 August 1920: Death of Hugh MacDonald. He signed for Arsenal on three separate occasions (not a record but still remarkable) retiring from football finally in 1913.
27 August 1921: The Third Division North played its first matches. In the first minute on the first day of the first season ex Arsenal man Tommy Winship crossed for Darlington to score the first ever goal in the league.
27 August 1921: Arsenal opened the season with a 2-1 home defeat to Sheffield United. After the game four players were dropped for the second match – which Arsenal then lost to Preston North End.
27 August 1923: Samsen Haden made his Arsenal debut. He went on to play 88 games for the club all told.
27 August 1927: Not everything worked perfectly under Chapman. Bury 5 Arsenal 1 on the opening day of the first division campaign was one such failure. However Arsenal won the next two games 4-1 and 6-1 and went on to play in the FA Cup final for the first time.
27 August 1928: The Monday newspapers deemed the numbered shirts experiment “a success” and predicted wider use.
27 August 1932: The run of three consecutive league championships began with Birmingham 0 Arsenal 1. The first goal of this unique Arsenal run was scored by Reg Stockill in his first match. He only played four games in the season – but scored three.
27 August 1974: Ipswich Town 3 Arsenal 0, with 28,036 in attendance. The press could not stop praising Ipswich who went to the top of the league after 2 games with this win.
27 August 1938: Bryn Jones scored on his debut against Portsmouth. He scored three in his first four games, but then only scored one more during the whole season in which he played 30 games.
27 August 1988: Steve Bould league debut for Arsenal in 5-1 the away defeat of Wimbledon in the opening fixture of the campaign. Smith got 3 – the only hattrick all season.
27 August 1997: The definitive Bergkamp hat trick at Leicester in a 3-3 draw in the 4th league game of the 2nd Double Season It was the first hattrick under Arsène Wenger. The second double: part 1, part 2, part 3.
27 August 2002: Arsenal beat WBA 5-2, continuing the average of five or more goals every 20 games under Arsene Wenger. Cole, Lauren, Wiltord (2) and Aliadière scored. But it was the first 5 goals since Boxing Day 2000.
27 August 2003: Arsenal 2 Aston Villa 0. The 3rd league match of the unbeaten season and the third straight win. Campbell and Henry scored to make it 8 goals for 1 against.
27 August 2008: Arsenal qualified for the Champions League group stages. Samir Nasri made his debut, marked with a goal in 4-0 win over Twente. Gallas, Walcott and Bendtner scored the others to make it 6-0 overall.
27 August 2009: Jay Simpson loaned to QPR. He went on to play 39 times for them and scored 12 goals.
27 August 2013. Arsenal beat Fenerbahçe in the Champions League play off in front of 56,271 – the lowest crowd of the season.
27 August 2014: Alexis Sanchez scored his first goal for Arsenal as the club beat Besitkas 1-0 in the play off round of the Champions League.
27 August 2016: Arsenal beat Watford 3-1 away to secure their first win of the season. It was the first of six consecutive league wins, and the start of a run of 10 wins and three draws in 13 consecutive league games during which Arsenal scored 30 goals.
