AISA Arsenal History Society: preserving Arsenal's heritage
Six years ago on this day, the Hill-Wood dynasty at Arsenal came to an end. It was Sir Samuel Hill Wood who ousted Sir Henry Norris 5 March 1920: Sir Henry Norris was very active in Parliament working to stop bent bookmakers using football as a way of offering ludicrous odds to the detriment of punters. …
Read More “On this day Arsenal’s longest dynasty came to an end…”
Our regular summary of today’s anniversaries is below but first…. An audience with Mark Pougatch – live Arsenal Independent Supporters Association (AISA), which I have mentioned many a time before as I am a member, is inviting all its members to an audience with Mark Pougatch. Mark Pougatch, the TV and radio football broadcast journalist …
Read More “When Arsenal were within five minutes of going bust; one man saved them.”
The event Normally I drop straight into a review of the anniversaries, but something a little different today as the Arsenal Independent Supporters Association (AISA) is inviting all its members to an audience with Mark Pougatch. Mark Pougatch, the TV and radio football broadcast journalist is also an Arsenal fan, and has agreed to join …
Read More “An audience with Mark Pougatch – live, plus today’s anniversaries”
It is interesting that 100 years ago today the British House of Commons gave the third reading to a law to control gambling on football matches – a law introduced by Arsenal chairman and MP for Fulham, Sir Henry Norris. And yet here we are exactly 100 years later with there still being much gnashing …
Read More “100 years ago to the day the Arsenal chairman moved to stop gambling on football”
Last night Arsenal Independent Supporters’ Association (AISA) had one of its regular “pub quiz” nights, held on line. (Our new website will open very shortly, and I’ll give you the link to that when it happens). There were six rounds of five questions each, with a splendid time had by all. Here are the five …
Read More “The Arsenal History quiz questions from last night’s Zoom quiz, plus the anniversaries”
Today 9 June the Arsenal Independent Supporters Association, of which the Arsenal History Society is part, is holding one of its regular on line quizzes for members. If you are a member you should have received an invite to tonight’s event – and as ever the quiz will kick off with a history quiz. We’ll …
Read More “Martin Keown comings and goings, and the day’s anniversaries”
The story of Carl Jenkinson’s terrible injury problems are well known, and in 2018/19 he saw out the end of his contract with Arsenal. Under Unai Emery, Jenkinson made eight appearances across all competitions. On 27 February 2019 he started his first Premier League match for Arsenal in 830 days, playing the full 90 minutes …
The Football League did not come out of the match fixing scandals of the early 20th century very well. They had initially refused to accept the possibility that match fixing could be taking place and threatened anyone who mentioned the possibility of a lifetime ban from football. And then when they were finally forced to …
Read More “How the League refused to acknowledge that directors could be involved in match fixing”
It was the research that was undertaken for the writing of the book “Woolwich Arsenal, the club that changed football” that revealed the previously lost story of Royal Arsenal splitting in two, over a dispute as to who should run the club and whether players should be paid. From its earliest days the club had …
That first Emery signing was not an event to rouse excitement among supporters or the media – it was Stephan Lichtsteiner. He left Arsenal after one year having played 14 times for the club, and moved on to Augsburg, where he has since played 17 games. This is also the anniversary of an event which …
Read More “The anniversary of Unai Emery’s first Arsenal signing”
Back in 2013 I wrote an article on this web site with the title “The very strange story of Alex Manninger“. I think of that today as it was on this day in 1997 that the goal keeper joined Arsenal. You can read the “very strange story” via the link above, but what happened to …
As we are now in a time when football is rarely played (2020 being an exception as the Premier League prepares to restart) we find the anniversary files dominated by administrative changes and international matches. Penalties were created on this day in 1891 to stop rugby style pushing at free kicks awarded close to the …
Read More “When English referees decided only they knew how to handle a match”
On this day in 1953 the great Alex James – the genius creative midfielder of the great Arsenal teams of the 1930s – passed away. But apart from his magnificence on the football pitch, Alex was also known for being mentioned in a 1934 popular song by Stanley Holloway, “With her head tucked underneath her …
Read More “When Alex James was celebrated in a music hall song… (recording included)”
In 1930 Arsenal came 14th in Division One, their final poor league season before going on a run that saw them come first five times, 2nd, 3rd, 5th and 6th once each in the next nine seasons before the outbreak of war. Quite what would have happened to the club if the second world war …
Read More “Two league titles and an FA Cup: Arsenal’s forgotten manager.”
It was quickly forgotten, as all such nonsense stories are, but Arsenal’s preparations for the Uefa Europa League final against Chelsea in Baku were reported in some of the media before the game to have been disrupted by an approach by Barcelona to recruit Unai Emery as the replacement of Ernesto Valverde as head coach. …
Read More “How the underlying desire of anti-Arsenal media always remains the same”
Today is Andrey Arshavin’s birthday – the Arsenal History Society wish him many happy returns. He’s now 39. After leaving Arsenal Andrey went to Zenit, first on loan then permanently, playing 66 games, scoring nine goals in the Russian Premier League. Then he moved to Kuban Krasnodar for a season before, for his final gig, …
On this day Jo Shaw, who had taken Arsenal to the 1934 title, resigned from his post in order to return to his job of managing the reserves. He had in fact been made manager upon the death of Herbert Chapman as a temporary measure. The club wanted George Allison to be manager but he …
Read More “The Arsenal managers who resigned after winning the league, and promotion.”
Gervinho whose birthday it is today, played for Arsenal across two seasons from 2011 to 2013, playing 46 games in all and scoring nine goals in the league. He then moved on to Roma, Hebei China Fortune and finally in 2018, Parma where he is still playing He was one of those players who got …
When we think of the names of great Arsenal managers we naturally think of Chapman, Graham and Wenger. If we are being generous we might include Bertie Mee who won three trophies, but then we would have to ignore the awful decline of the team under him, and his vision of reducing the size of …
Read More “The two great Arsenal managers who are mostly forgotten”
Catenaccio was one of the many deaths that football suffered across the years. Man for man marking with a sweeper behind and having bored everyone in the ground senseless using the counter attack to get a 1-0 win. Inter Milan were the masters of the approach in the 1960s, and their winning of the European …
Read More “Creative football wins, as well as Xhaka’s determination”
On this day in 1912 and again on this day in 1919 Arsenal played Tottenham in friendly games. At the time of the first match Arsenal were playing in Woolwich, by the time of the second game Arsenal were at Highbury. What is interesting is that much has been made of Tottenham’s objection to Arsenal …
Read More “How Arsenal v Tottenham games show the animosity was limited early on”
Arsenal has, for much of its existence, been a club which others have sought to damage, both from within and without. The earliest split came with the move to pay the players in 1891, which in turn led to a battle for control of the club. At that time the …
Jeff Reine-Adelaide transferred from Lens for around £3m along with Yassin Fortune on this day in 2015. Due to injuries he never played a League game for Arsenal but played six cup games in the 2016/17 season Adélaïde joined Angers in France for the second half of the 2017/18 season and on 26 July 2018 …
Our “Whatever happened to…” series preceding the day’s Arsenal anniversary files normally covers a player that we haven’t heard of for some time, but for a change (and because increasingly I’m finding we’ve already covered the players that might be remembered and thus whose life beyond Arsenal might be of interest), I thought I’d try …
One player does not make a team. Never has that been more true of Liam Brady, a stunningly brilliant player who came to Arsenal at exactly the wrong time, and played under exactly the wrong managers. If only the club had been as willing to get rid of managers in Brady’s day as they have …
Read More “One player does not make a team: the tragedy of Brady”
