Our regular summary of today’s anniversaries is below but first….
An audience with Mark Pougatch – live
Arsenal Independent Supporters Association (AISA), which I have mentioned many a time before as I am a member, is inviting all its members to an audience with Mark Pougatch.
Mark Pougatch, the TV and radio football broadcast journalist is also an Arsenal fan, and has agreed to join us for an on-line evening of chat and reflection.
The event is open to all AISA members and will take place at 7.30pm on Monday, June 15th just ahead of the PL season’s restart.
If you are an AISA member you will receive details of how to log into the Zoom event in your email on Monday afternoon so for now all you need do is set yourself a reminder on the calendar.
If you have questions that you would like put to Mark then please send them directly to AISA’s chair drewdgray17@gmail.com
And now, on with the show, and the moment Arsenal almost ceased to exist…
13 June 1910: Woolwich Arsenal came to within five minutes of extinction at the AGM of the Football League, as the League executive turned down the idea of Arsenal merging with Fulham and playing in the first division. See also here; and again here. For a detailed account of the month’s proceedings see here. In the end Norris paid off all Arsenal’s debts and agreed the club would stay in Plumstead for a year to see if support could be re-ignited. Ultimately Arsenal stayed until May 1913.
13 June 1917: Henry Norris attended Buckingham Palace to be knighted by King George V in the midst of the first ever daytime bombing raid over London.
13 June 1943: Real Madrid 11 Barcelona 1 (Cup semi-final) A team talk prior to the match by the director of state security to the Barcelona players reminding them that they were only playing because the regime had forgiven them their lack of patriotism did the trick. Real Mad lost the cup final 1-0 to Atletico Bilbao, themselves not averse to thoughts of separatism.
13 June 1966: Billy Wright finally resigned. He was the first Arsenal manager since Chapman who was appointed to the club without having had a previous link with Arsenal and was by and large a total and absolutely unmitigated disaster.
13 June 1980: Having signed the day before, Clive Allen at the age of 19 was now heralded as the most expensive teenager in Europe in joining Arsenal from Queens Park Rangers for £1,250,000.
13 June 1983: John Devine joined Norwich on a free transfer having been out of the side with a long-term injury. He had played 112 league games for Arsenal and continued playing for another eight years. He later worked for the Football Association of Ireland as a Tutor/Assessor and was last seen as Technical Director for Almaden Soccer in the Silicon Valley.
13 June 1985: Fifa’s ban on all English teams playing overseas was introduced following the Heysel riot by Liverpool supporters This was subsequently modified to allow friendly matches by English teams.
13 June 1988: Steve Bould signed for Arsenal for £390,000. He had played 183 games for Stoke City and nine on loan with Torquay. Both Arsenal and Everton made offers. He made the right choice.
13 June 2008: Aaron Ramsey signed from Cardiff. Both Man U and Arsenal bid for him, but he chose Arsenal undoubtedly in part because of the connection between Arsenal and Cardiff via Terry Burton. He finally left in the summer of 2019 as his contract came to an end.
13 June 2014: After rejecting the offer of a new contract Bacary Sagna moved to Manchester City on a free transfer. He had played 213 league games for Arsenal in a seven year spell, but made only a handful of appearances for Man C. He was last heard of playing for Montreal in Major League Soccer for the 2019 season.
13 June 2014: It was said in some sources that Arsenal sold Chelsea their rights to the re-signing of Cesc Fabregas to Chelsea for approx £5.6m. Arsene Wenger later reported that he had no contact with Fabregas at this time.
