AISA Arsenal History Society: preserving Arsenal's heritage
1st round. Jan 12th. Grimsby Town (away). Drew 1-1 Crowd 10,000 Grimsby Town was formed in 1878 – strange how the date of founding a club has no relevance to subsequent success. This was a typical story: members of the cricket club wanted to form a football club to occupy the empty winter. Here’s one …
Read More “Woolwich Arsenal in the Cup 1906/7. Semis again!”
Arsenal on Twitter @UntoldArsenal Untold Arsenal on Facebook here 1905/6 1st round. Jan 13th. West Ham United (home). Drew 1-1 Crowd 18,000 This was the first ever first team meeting with West Ham United. West Ham started as Thames Ironworks in 1895 which itself was formed out of Old Castle Swifts F.C. The Ironworks was …
Untold Arsenal on Facebook here Ticket available for Wednesday night’s Euro match – see below 1904/5 1st round. Feb 4. Bristol City (home). Drew 0-0 Crowd 25,000 Having played Bristol Rovers in the previous season, and having been now permanently excused the preliminary rounds, Woolwich Arsenal got Bristol City at home in the first round …
Arsenal on Twitter @UntoldArsenal Untold Arsenal on Facebook here 1903/4 Final Supplementary round. Dec 12. Bristol Rovers (away). Drew 1-1 Crowd 14,000 By this season what I am calling the Final Supplementary Round was called in some quarters the sixth round. The teams entering at this stage were Manchester United, Bristol City, Preston North End, …
Read More “Woolwich Arsenal in the cup 1903/4. Arsenal and Norris meet for the first time.”
1902/3 Final Supplementary round. Dec 13. Brentford (away). Drew 1-1 Crowd 7,000 Brentford Football Club was founded in 1889 as an offshoot of the local rowing club, although they took a while to work out if it was Association or Rugby football they were playing. They played the first association game on 23rd November 1889, …
Read More “Woolwich Arsenal in the Cup 1902/3: one of the great shocks”
Arsenal on Twitter @UntoldArsenal Untold Arsenal on Facebook here After finally getting into the second round proper of the FA Cup in 1901 Arsenal never again had to play in a game before the Final Supplementary Round, held normally in mid-December. They made heavy weather of that round, but did manage to progress each year, …
Read More “Were Luton a pro football team before Arsenal? Woolwich Arsenal in the FA Cup 1901/2”
Arsenal on Twitter @UntoldArsenal Untold Arsenal on Facebook here 1898/9 1st round proper. Jan 28. Derby County (home). Lost 0-6 Crowd 20,000 Another attempt at breaking past the first round barrier without success. We were excused the preliminary rounds, presumably on the basis of sauntering through once again last year, but came down with a …
By Tony Attwood 1897/98 Having failed to make progress from the qualifying rounds in 1896/7 it is not surprising that Woolwich Arsenal were told to qualify again in 1897/8. This time the rounds avoided the “Final Supplementary Round” and Arsenal entered in the 3rd qualifying round, knowing that three victories would get them through. 3rd …
By Tony Attwood After the successful run from the first preliminary round to the first round proper in 1893/4, Woolwich Arsenal, now established in the league and having secured a decent mid-table position in their first league season, were given a bye in 1894/5, and so entered in the first round proper. There were 32 …
Read More “Woolwich Arsenal in the FA Cup 2: 1894/5 to 1896/7”
By Tony Attwood I do this with great trepidation, knowing that I am going to be shown up to be quite wrong, on all sorts of details. But without writing it up, I will never know. I am starting with Woolwich Arsenal’s first season in the Cup, although Royal Arsenal played in the Cup from …
Read More “Woolwich Arsenal in the FA Cup: an attempted summary – 1893/4”
By Tony Attwood Woolwich Arsenal are often called London’s first professional team. Technically at the start they were Kent’s first pro-team, but people linked Woolwich Arsenal with London and they were the first professional team in the south. But after joining the Football League for the 1893/4 season, other teams decided to try and …
Arsenal on Twitter @UntoldArsenal This article was amended (by one word!) on 5 December 2013) By Tony Attwood On Untold Arsenal today 22 November 2010, a very irate fan (following the defeat to Tottenham) posted a whole series of comments which basically said that he had been supporting Arsenal for a very long time and …
Read More “Arsenal doing well, or going downhill? Sometimes it is hard to decide”
ESPN up their anti-Arsenal propaganda By Tony Attwood ESPN’s distaste for Arsenal was chronicled on Untold Arsenal last year when the station got the rights to show Everton v Arsenal. They packed the studio and gantry with Everton supporters and then, as Arsenal sauntered to their 1-6 victory, spent much of the match showing pictures …
Read More “ESPN up their anti-Arsenal propaganda, but add a few more quotes”
Arsenal on Twitter @UntoldArsenal Untold Arsenal on Facebook here By Tony Attwood This is a momentous season for Tottenham Hotspur and as we approach the home game with our nearest rivals, and as such it is only right that we should give space to the celebrations that will now follow. For this is a big …
Read More “Tottenham fans prepare to celebrate major anniversary at Arsenal this week”
By Tony Attwood Having completed my short analysis of Woolwich Arsenal’s league results in the last article, I began to wonder what Tottenham’s results were like over the same period. No particular reason – I just thought it would be interesting. In fact it turned out to be more than interesting. Here’s the chart. After …
Read More “Did Tottenham Hotspur bribe their way into the Football League?”
Woolwich Arsenal Year by Year – the record Notes: The year is the second year of the season, thus 1894 is 1893/4 The red figures in the position column reflect the best ever for the club. Points, 2 for a win, 1 for a draw. Woolwich Arsenal became The Arsenal towards the end of the …
Arsenal on Twitter @UntoldArsenal Untold Arsenal on Facebook here By Tony Attwood The allegation that Arsenal is a franchised club is one that has been thrown around by our noisy neighbours ever since we moved to Highbury in 1913 – although to be fair I don’t think the word “franchise” was used until much later. …
Arsenal History on Twitter @UntoldArsenal Untold Arsenal on Facebook here By Tony Attwood If you are a regular reader you will have got used to the fact that I write a piece about some aspect of Arsenal’s history, and then Andy comes up with the facts, which, if I am very lucky, suggest I am …
Read More “The decline, fall and re-birth of Woolwich Arsenal FC”
Arsenal History on Twitter @UntoldArsenal Untold Arsenal on Facebook here By Tony Attwood Just how big a club was Woolwich Arsenal? As we know, Woolwich Arsenal did not win anything. The club got promotion from the first divsion by coming second, and got to two FA Cup semi-finals, but nothing more. So, was Woolwich Arsenal …
Read More “100 years ago Arsenal went bust. But it wasn’t because of small crowds.”
Untold Arsenal on Facebook here Arsenal History on Twitter @UntoldArsenal ————————– By Tony Attwood Donald Slade is the final member of the team that played the last ever game under the name Woolwich Arsenal FC. Slade is one of those few players whose lives at other clubs is well documented but whose time at Arsenal …
Read More “Arsenal’s Donald Slade: More questions than answers where Norris is involved!”
By Tony Attwood John Patrick “Pat” Flanagan was born in 1891 in Preston, Lancashire. In football Pat Flanagan is a man who has had his name besmirched by the placing on the internet of a wholly false story about him which suggests that in the relegation year of 1912/13 he scored only two goals and …
Read More “John “Pat” Flanagan: a name besmirched by a false story”
By Tony Attwood This is part of a series of articles about the players who played in the very last Woolwich Arsenal FC game in 1913 at Highbury. A full list of the team is at the end. Alex Graham was born in Hurlford, Ayrshire on 11 July 1890 and started playing for local his …
Read More “Alex Graham: a hero of the early years at Highbury”
By Tony Attwood Robert William Benson, known as “Bob” was born in Whitehaven in Cumbria on 9 February 1883. His first club is recorded as Shankhouse of the Northern Alliance, and then Shalwell (a district near Newcastle – but I can find no record of the club), and Wikipedia suggests that at the same time …
Read More “Bob Benson, Arsenal player with a great sense of humour, who died playing for the club.”
by Tony Attwood I am breaking off from the series of articles on the very last Woolwich Arsenal match because I have received really interesting information from the Norwich supporters site “Sing Up The River End!” run by Andrew Harrison. If you are an avid follower, you will know that we’ve determined that the name …
By Tony Attwood Joe Lievesley was born Staveley, (although which Staveley I am not sure) on 25 July 1883 and died on 18 October 1941. He played in goal for Poolsbrook United, Sheffield United, and Woolwich Arsenal One of the first records we have of him playing was in an FA Cup first round replay …
Read More “Joseph Lievesley: the keeper for the first season at Highbury”
