On this day: pre-season friendly from 2007 – the video

Welcome to the AISA Arsenal History Society.    The anniversaries for today are below… but first aour anniversary video of today

There are now 295 videos we have gathered commemorating Arsenal events on individual days are to be found via this link.   In addition to those 295 we have now added Wolverhampton to the video collection series in which we are gathering together the best videos we have against each club we have played in recent years.   Here is the list of clubs covered so far…

Today’s Arsenal anniversaries…

19 July 1915:  The FA and Football League held their AGMs. The League voted in favour of paying footballers during wartime, the FA against it, resulting in chaos.  Eventually the League conceded. The FA then met the League and the Southern League and agreed there would be no FA Cup, but there could be regional leagues in the north west and midlands.  This left the south and the north east without any football.   Scotland had already voted to continue with professional football.

19 July 1919: Peace celebrations break out at the end of the 1st world war.

19 July 1954: Joe Haverty signed from St Patrick’s Athletic, and although only 18 immediately made his debut for Arsenal.  He stayed until 1961 when he moved to Blackburn.

19 July 1966: North Korea beat Italy 1-0 in the World Cup finals, and so knocked them out of the tournament, at a time when Italy were odds-on favourites.

19 July 1995: Alan Smith announced his retirement.  Between 1987 and 1995 he played 264 league games for Arsenal, scoring 86 goals.  He went on to have a career as a commentator and reporter.

19 July 1996: A 0-6 away win to St Albans City on this day, with a team including much of the first team regulars like Dixon, Merson, Stephen Hughes etc, did not prepare supporters for four subsequent defeats and a draw in the rest of the pre-season.  Fortunately a new manager was ready to step in.

19 July 2003: Arsenal drew with Barnet 0-0 after losing to Peterborough.  Yaya Toure played as a trialist but Arsène Wenger saw him as “completely average” and did not follow up the option of signing the player. 

19 July 2004: Manuel Almunia signed from Celta Vigo 

19 July 2007: Gençlerbirliği 0 Arsenal 3 (Van Persie 2, Walcott).  The seven match pre-season run saw the introduction of Bacary Sagna and Eduardo into the squad.

19 July 2008: Barnet 1 Arsenal 2 (Simpson, Barazite) The start of a 9 match preseason run in which Arsenal were unbeaten, including a 1-0 win over Real Madrid  

19 July 2014: Arsenal began their pre-season games with a 0-2 away victory over Borehamwood, Olson and Afobe getting the goals.  Arsenal’s team included many younger players hoping to make an impact including Coquelin and Bellerin.

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