AISA Arsenal History Society: preserving Arsenal's heritage
By Tony Attwood Arsenal had finished September in third place in the league, in a frantic month which included seven league matches (following the one at the end of August) as well as two high profile friendlies. Following such a start to the season October represented calmer times with four league games all played on …
Read More “October 1934: Arsenal finally throw off the North London curse”
By Tony Attwood Arsenal opened their season as successive champions, and George Allison opened his managerial career, with an away game against Portsmouth on 25 August. The team was Moss Male Roberts John Hill Copping Hulme Bowden Drake James Bastin Arsenal had only won one of the last three openers, and the trend continued with a …
Read More “Arsenal in the 30s: August & September 1934. Allison as manager”
By Tony Attwood After the trauma of Chapman’s passing and the excitement of winning the league Arsenal played no end-of-season friendlies – and in keeping with the common approach at this time, had no pre-season games fixed up. In his autobiography George Allison comments that he had known Herbert Chapman for 25 years at the …
Read More “Arsenal in the summer 1934: Allison takes over and changes the team”
By Tony Attwood Looking at 1933/34 most commentators become understandably fixated by two issues – the sudden and unexpected death of Herbert Chapman, and the fact that Arsenal won the league for the third time – and the second time running. But there were many other issues – not least the sudden decline in the …
Read More “1933/34 League players, and how the goals declined but the crowds went up.”
This is part of a series of articles tracing the history of Arsenal through the 1930s. There is an index of all the articles in the series thus far at the end of this piece. By Tony Attwood The table, at the conclusion of March 1934 read: P W D L F A GA Pt …
Read More “Arsenal in the 30s: April 1934. Joe Shaw wins the league for Chapman”
By Tony Attwood As the football world got used to the fact that Herbert Chapman really wasn’t leading Arsenal any more, so a certain level of reflection built up on what was happening to the club following his tragically early passing. Including the last game in December (Chapman’s final match) Arsenal had played five games …
Read More “Arsenal in the 30s: March 1934. Chapman’s two teams fight for the title”
By Tony Attwood After one league defeat in 16, following the sudden death of Herbert Chapman Arsenal suffered two defeats and a draw in the league and had slipped to second. The extraordinary rise of Derby with one defeat and one draw in the 12 games up to and including the match on New …
Read More “Arsenal in the 30s – February 1934. Chapman is gone, but the club moves on.”
By Tony Attwood Arsenal had just won four games and drawn one in December and were sitting pretty at the top of the league at the start of 1934 when disaster struck. The league table at the start of the year looked like this… P W D L F A GAv Pts 1 Arsenal …
Read More “Arsenal in the 30s. January 1934: The death of Chapman”
By Tony Attwood At the start of December 1933 – tragically the last full month of being active in football for Herbert Chapman – Arsenal came to the games with a record of five wins and a draw in the last six – the best form in the league. They were also one point clear …
Read More “Arsenal in the 30s. December 1933: Chapman’s last month; Arsenal triumphant”
By Tony Attwood The month opened with Tottenham top of the league and Arsenal one point behind: P W D L F A GAv Pts 1 Tottenham Hotspur 12 7 3 2 22 10 2.20 17 2 Arsenal 12 6 4 2 25 13 1.92 16 3 Huddersfield Town 12 6 3 3 33 22 …
Read More “Arsenal in the 30s: November 1933, displacing Tottenham.”
By Tony Attwood 1933 was a very difficult time to live through with the economy in such a desperate state, and warnings growing about German military re-birth. And yet there were signs of progress on other fronts, not least by the bringing into law the 1933 Children and Young Persons Act. In essence this stated that …
Read More “Arsenal in the 30s – October 1933: a return to progress”
by Tony Attwood Arsenal finished the previous season as champions, taking Chapman’s trophies, and indeed Arsenal’s major trophies to three: two league titles and the FA Cup. During this spell Arsenal had also been runners up twice in each of the League and the FA Cup. For Arsenal fans this must have been a great …
By John Sowman Browsing through some old Arsenal programmes recently I came across one from the all-time classic encounter with Manchester United at Highbury on February 1st 1958. This of course was the epic 4-5 defeat to a team destined to be struck by tragedy at Munich airport less than a week later. Further …
Read More “David Herd. The first of a trio of Arsenal star No 9s to be lured to Old Trafford”
By Tony Attwood This is part of an occasional series in which we look at what happened between the end of one season and the start of the next. Around 50 seasons have been covered so far, and more are added from time to time. 1914 and 1938 – both dates on the eve of …
Read More “Arsenal in the summer: 1933 – champions and water shortages”
By Tony Attwood So far in this series I have covered the period leading up to Arsenal’s first trophy – the FA Cup in 1930, and then the three subsequent seasons: 1930/1 (league winners) 1931/2 (runnings up double), 1932/3 (league winners). Listed below you will find all the players who played in the League (the …
Read More “All the men who played in the league for Arsenal 1929/33”
By Tony Attwood I will come to the summary of games played, goals scored and the goal ratio in a moment but first I want to share the key insight into the way Chapman set out his teams that I have gained through writing these articles. To begin, the key change between 1931/2 (coming second) …
By Tony Attwood Coming into April Arsenal had won only one game in their last eight. Here was the record… Game Date Against Venue Result Pos Pts 28 04.02.1933 Everton away D1-1 1 42 29 11.02.1933 Blackpool home D1-1 1 43 30 22.02.1933 Derby County away D2-2 1 44 31 25.02.1933 Blackburn Rovers home W8-0 …
Read More “Arsenal in April/May 1933, Champions for the second time.”
By Tony Attwood Arsenal ended February top of the league by four points, although having played a game more than their rivals. But February had been a month of three draws and two wins and there were still worries about Villa and Wednesday catching up. It was time for Arsenal to show their strengths. P …
Read More “Arsenal in March 1933: top of the league but a month to forget.”
By Tony Attwood Arsenal came into February 1933 top of the league. P W D L F A GAv Pts 1 Arsenal 26 18 3 5 78 40 1.95 39 2 Aston Villa 25 15 6 4 64 38 1.68 36 3 Sheffield Wednesday 26 15 6 5 57 38 1.50 36 4 Newcastle United …
Read More “Arsenal in February 1933: new shirt design, awful weather, top of the league”
By Tony Attwood Here’s the first division league table for the end of 1932… P W D L F A GAv Pts 1 Arsenal 23 17 3 3 72 33 2.18 37 2 Aston Villa 23 13 6 4 58 36 1.61 32 3 Sheffield Wednesday 23 14 4 5 53 35 1.51 32 4 …
Read More “Arsenal in January 1933: Top of the league and defeated by Walsall.”
By Tony Attwood Arsenal had ended November at the top of the Football League… P W D L F A GA Pts 1 Arsenal 16 12 2 2 51 27 1.89 26 2 Aston Villa 16 10 4 2 42 23 1.83 24 3 Derby County 16 10 3 3 38 24 1.58 23 4 …
Read More “Arsenal in December 1932: Greatness and supremacy”
By Tony Attwood The month began with Arsenal top of the league… P W D L F A GAv Pts 1 Arsenal 12 9 2 1 36 19 1.90 20 2 Aston Villa 12 8 3 1 26 10 2.60 19 3 Derby County 12 7 3 2 27 15 1.80 17 4 West Bromwich …
Read More “Arsenal in November 1932: records fall, greatness beckons.”
By Tony Attwood By the end of September the League was starting to take shape, Arsenal having had four wins and a draw in the last five. Only unbeaten Villa looked to be a challenge at this stage. P W D L F A GAv Pts 1 Aston Villa 7 5 2 0 18 6 …
By Roger Stark Arsenal can be pretty unpredictable. They can win convincingly against some of the most powerful teams in the world, but they can also suffer a terrible defeat at the hands of a club that competes in the lower leagues. We all remember the great victory against Villa in the final of …
By Tony Attwood Arsenal had started the 1932/3 season in August with a win and a defeat – making some fans wonder if the League and Cup wins of 1930 and 1931 were to be one-offs. This view was emphasised by the fact that then as now few teams retained the league title. In fact …
Read More “September 1932: Arsenal’s first steps into immortality”
