100 consecutive seasons in the first division: An Arsenal and a football record

 

 

• Herbert Chapman at Arsenal. How his arrival affected the crowds
• AISA’s Chapman Celebration Day: the personal reflections and pictures
• The celebration of Chapman in his resting place: a wonderful, wonderful day

By Tony Attwood

If you follow such things, you may have noticed that we have made a bit of a fuss about the forthcoming 2025/26 season being 100 years since Herbert Chapman joined Arsenal.  Indeed, you may have seen some of the articles on the issue (there are links above) following our visit to the church in south London where Herbert Chapman is buried.

However there is also another 100th anniversary that Arsenal are reaching this season: 100 consecutive seasons in the top division.   Our nearest rival is Everton, they are on a mere 72 seasons.

Arsenal returned to the First Division in 1919 when the league was expanded by two extra clubs being elected from the Second Division in a ballot of all the league clubs at the time.

In the final season prior to the First World War, Arsenal had come fifth in the league, although some publications wrongly published a table showing Arsenal as sixth (it appears some people were not very good at long division).   Some of them did later admit their error, but not everyone – such is the way of football – although these days people do tend to get it right.  Arsenal were fifth.

To understand what happened next, it is important both to see how the league ended in the season prior to its abandonment follwoing the outbreak of war, and what the league clubs wanted to achieve.

First, here is the bottom of the league table for 1914/15, the final season before the abandonment of football for the duration, this implying Chelsea and Tottenham should go down to the second division. (At the time there were two points for a win and one for a draw and where clubs were equal on points, positions were decided by goal average, that is goals for, divided by goals against, rather than goal difference as today).

Division One

		P	W	D	L	F	A	Pts
16	Notts County	38	9	13	16	41	57	31
17	Bolton Wanderers	38	11	8	19	68	84	30
18	Manchester United	38	9	12	17	46	62	30
19	Chelsea	38	8	13	17	51	65	29
20	Tottenham Hotspur	38	8	12	18	57	90	28

 

The top of the second division (and there were only two divisions at the time) read…

		P	W	D	L	F	A	Pts
1	Derby County	38	23	7	8	71	33	53
2	Preston NE	38	20	10	8	61	42	50
3	Barnsley	38	22	3	13	51	51	47
4	Wolverhampton Wanderers	38	19	7	12	77	52	45
5	Arsenal	38	19	5	14	69	41	43

 

After the war most clubs were in financial difficulty – some grounds had been damaged and of course many regular spectators had been lost in the fighting.   So to help rebalance the financial side of football the League voted to expand by divisions by two extra clubs – and as in previous expansions, the relegated clubs were retained in the top division while the top two Second Division sides were promoted as would have happened anyway.

However, this time, although the top two from the second division were promoted and Chelsea, who had finished 19th that First Division season, were re-elected there was hesitation in following the traditional method.  For there was another factor that influenced the League members – the fact that in January 1919 “The Athletic” (ie six months before the planned resumption of league football) – the dominant football weekly newspaper, made public what most supporters and players had known since 1915, that match fixing in the 1914/15 season had seriously affected the final league table.

In particular, Catton’s argument, which was widely supported, was that Chelsea had only been relegated because of match fixing in the Liverpool / Manchester United game.   The story is told in our coverage here.

With the evidence of match fixing both overwhelming and widely accepted throughout and beyond football, it was widely accepted that Chelsea had only been relegated due to the match-fixing by the northern clubs. Catton then considered the argument that Tottenham, who had also been relegated with Chelsea, should likewise be reinstated, but here he noted there was nothing to link Tottenham’s relegation with anything amiss – they were not affected by the result of the fixed game.

We have covered this previously in depth but if you want someone else’s account, there is the article, 1915 British football betting scandal.    And so to jump to the result, the League accepted that there had been match fixing and something had to be done to give the game back some of its credibility.  Given that by the time the League considered the issue, the First World War had taken place and some of the accused had served their country valiantly, while others had perished in the service of their homeland, there was no desire to punish players, so instead it was decided to hold an election among the clubs in the league, as to which other team should be promoted to the expanded League.

Arsenal, who had finished 5th place won the vote.    Several factors helped Arsenal gain votes, including the fact that while other teams such as Tottenham Hotspur had allied themselves for many years with the Southern League which as noted were seen as a serious rival to the Football League, Woolwich Arsenal from the start had been a Football League club – carrying the flag for the professional league to the south of the country.

There was also emotional support for Arsenal as although its team were now professional footballers, it was still seen as being the club of the armed services: the men who had fought and won the war with Germany.

Indeed so clear was this feeling, it was not until a quarter of a century later that any suggestion was made that somehow the vote was rigged or that Arsenal offered inducements to get votes.  This story first occurred after the publication of the autobiography of the Arsenal manager from 1919 to 1925, Leslie Knighton.  Obviously he was not involved with the club during the period in question his tenure as manager of the club started in 1919.   But it is noteworthy that his tenure resulted in Arsenal missing relegation by just one place in 1924/5 – after which he was unceremoniously (and quite rightly given the results of his last two seasons in charge, sacked.  And of course, by the time the memoir was published, Sir Henry Norris (who was not only the chair of Arsenal but also the government minister in charge of conscription during the war and demobilisation after the war) had passed away – dying in 1934, in the same year as Herbert Chapman.

Further, there was among football clubs generally considerable support for Arsenal’s move to north London from Plumstead, as this made it easier for northern clubs to reach the ground via a train into north London, and then the underground to Highbury Hill station.  This again helped establish the Football League in London and the south, and hold its position against the challenge from the Southern League as supported by Tottenham Hotspur and other clubs in the south.

It has also been alleged that Arsenal Chairman Sir Henry Norris bribed or in some way unduly influenced the voting members of the Football League, in particular, Football League President John McKenna at the League’s AGM and that McKenna made a speech recommending Arsenal’s promotion ahead of Tottenham’s application, thanks to the formers’ longer spell in the League (Arsenal joined in 1893, Tottenham in 1908).

However, detailed reports of the meeting in The Sportsman, Athletic News, Daily Mirror and The Times the following day made no mention of this or any other allegations. They did report that Football League Management Committee member C.E. Sutcliffe made a speech stating that the expansion would give them an opportunity to do right by Chelsea, who were the innocent party in all of this.

Thus, it would seem strange if such a speech had in fact been made by the League’s President and somehow all the media failed to report it.  With no evidence at all to counter the reported situation, it would also seem strange to accept a rumour that was started it seems, a quarter of a century later, by the man who lost his job at Arsenal, thanks to him taking the club to its lowest positions in the first division ever.

Meanwhile, in the Second Division, Port Vale took over from Leeds City after 4 October 1919, when Leeds City who had been managed by Herbert Chapman, were forcibly disbanded by order of the FA following alleged irregular financial practices overseen by the board.  The directors of the club were banned from football for life – as was Herbert Chapman, although he appealed against this upon being offered the job as assistant manager at Huddersfield Town.  His appeal was immediately granted.