Next season – 2025/26 – will be the 100th anniversary of the arrival of Herbert Chapman at Arsenal. In this series we are looking back at the surprise arrival of Chapman, and his time at Arsenal.
By Tony Attwood
Part 5: Arsenal advertise for a new manager
Previously in this series:
- 1: Taking over from failure
- 2: Approaching a 100th anniversary at Arsenal of mega-importance.
- 3: The Arsenal that Knighton left behind
- 4: Knighton is removed
According to Wikipedia “In the close season of 1925 [following the removal of Knighton as manager], Norris proceeded with wholesale changes at the club and advertised the role of manager in the Athletic News.”
That, I should clarify, was not the same Atheltic News as we have today. It was at the time the pre-eminent weekly newspaper covering football and the obvious place for such an advertisement to appear. It read…
Arsenal Football Club is open to receive applications for the position of TEAM MANAGER. He must be experienced and possess the highest qualifications for the post, both as to ability and personal character. Gentlemen whose sole ability to build up a good side depends on the payment of heavy and exhorbitant [sic] transfer fees need not apply.
Wiki then explains, “The notice caught the attention of Huddersfield Town manager Herbert Chapman, who according to journalist and former Arsenal player Bernard Joy wanted to manage a London club: Arsenal appealed to him because it was a struggling club, something he could work on and make a power in the land. He joined Arsenal in June 1925, and laid the foundations for the club’s first period of success.”
Now Bernard Joy’s commentary comes from his book, “Forward Arsenal” was published in 1952, five years after he left Arsenal and retired from football. He was famous as the last amateur player to appear for England and overall he played 86 games for Arsenal, although in what follows it is important to remember that he never played under Chapman. joining the club in 1935, Chapm,an having died in 1934.
Thus Bernard Joy – the man whose book is used as a prime source by many commentators of the era, never worked under either Chapman or Norris, and never interviewed either of them in his subsequent career as a journalist and writer. But his commentaries on Norris’ approach to football, became accepted once they had been published in Joy’s book “Forward Arsenal” written after both Chapman and Norris had passed away (and thus were unable to sue).
And sue Norris would have done, since Joy makes much in his book of what he calls “Norris’ edicts” – rules that it is alleged that Norris insisted that his manager should obey. No source is given for these “edicts” but they have oft since been quoted as fact ever since. The likely source however seems to have been Chapman’s predecessor Leslie Knighton.
Certainly if one reads Chapter 6 of “Forward Arsenal!” it is clear that Bernard Joy had no independent knowledge of, and had done no research about, Arsenal’s election to the First Division in 1919 when the league was expanded by two clubs. He writes with great authority and insistence about the “Bismarkian diplomacy” of Norris – a phrase used to suggest that Norris fraudulently engaged with everyone who had a vote, offering personal support for their private wishes for the future in return for a vote for Arsenal on the expansion of the league. Phrases such as “He canvased personally every member of the Committtee and most of the League clubs…” appear through the narrative without any supporting evidence.
What is also missing is any suggestion of what Norris could offer in return for votes, and it is difficult to see what he might have offered. Short of fixing matches (and even Joy doesn’t suggest this) Norris had nothing to offer save what he legitimately had: a large ground which meant more money for the away team, a by then very well-known large Arsenal travelling support, and a public reputation as the soldier’s team which would mean that Arsenal away games would continue to attract bigger than average crowds, as ex-soliders turned out to watch “their” team in the post-war years.
Such evidence as has survived suggests that Joy’s “facts” were in fact given to him by Knighton, as the ex-Arsenal man continued his work with lesser clubs, with whom he had ever declining success. That Knighton was a sublime manager hampered by short-sighted owners is certainly the essence of Knighton’s own autobiography published in 1946 when his managerial career had declined so much there really was nowhere else for it to go.
Just as certainly, the argument Joy reports Norris having made in favour of Arsenal returning to the top division after the war, (their length of service to the league) was nonsense. Joy suggests that the president of the league John McKenna made a speech in favour of Arsenal, noting the club’s long service to the League, while ignoring the fact that Wolverhampton and Birmingham City who each also wanted the additional 1st Division place, had been in the League longer and had ended up the final season before football was stopped for the war, higher than Arsenal. The minutes and other reports have no mention of any speeches, and the agenda allows for none.
In fact Arsenal had ended up higher than Birmingham on goal average, although somehow the league table presented to the meeting was “miscalculated” to show this the other way around. Interestingly while almost anything Norris was associated with has someway or another been reported as a fraud, this error is always reported as a “mistake”. Yet no other mistake in league positions has ever been noted, while this one was fundamental to the issue of who might take the final newly created slot in the 1st Division. Certainly how such an error could be made with a table of such consequence, has never been revealed, but the suspicion must be that there was some hanky-panky involved.
But aside from Arsenal actually coming fifth not sixth, the obvious point was first, that Arsenal had joined the Football League when Tottenham and other London clubs had joined the Southern League. The second key point was the club had been getting better crowds than most, third it was held in high regard as the team of the men who had won the War, fourth it took large numbers of fans to away games, and finally its chairman, Henry Norris was himself held in the highest regard.
Now this last point may sound strange to anyone who has read the work of Joy or Knighton, but the fact is that Norris was a progressive politician who had been an incredibly popular mayor and MP, who was respected for his views (such as pensions for injured soldiers and equality for women) and was recognised as a football man who had totally rescued Arsenal from oblivion when no one else would step in with financial assistance as the club slipped into bankruptcy
None of these issues are mentioned at all in “Forward, Arsenal!” by Bernard Joy, a book which suggests he was totally unaware of Norris and what he had actually done, but instead had an author who picked up a few scraps of information from the directors of the club who ousted Norris.
The fact is that in the pre- and post-war period football rules were often honoured in the breach as much as in the observance, and there is no doubt that some of the issues (such as paying players money beyond their salaries at a time of a rule about maximum wages for players) were broken. But in that regard, Arsenal were no different from everyone else – which is why the campaign against Norris was not based on such matters, but on the more fanciful affairs mentioned above.
The series continues as Norris brings Chapman to Arsenal.
