AISA Arsenal History Society: preserving Arsenal's heritage
Untold Video Updates: We’re continuing to experiment with our video commentaries: do take a peek at Untold GoonerNews Today marks the anniversary of one of the games played as Arsenal moved to its first ever trophy – winning the Kent Junior Cup – in this case “junior” meaning for less established teams, rather than …
Today is Alexis Shachez’ birthday. There was huge excitement when he arrived at Arsenal from Barcelona in 2014, and the 72 goals he scored across the next three seasons was by far the most productive part of his entire career and was an absolute triumphant signing by Arsene Wenger. But it seemed greed or poor …
Read More “Happy birthday Alexis Sanchez – how’s it going these days?”
By Tony Attwood If we had a complete sense of Arsenal history in our club, today would be marked as a solemn occasion, being as it is the anniversary of the passing of Jack Humble. And if you have never heard the name you can be forgiven, because the club has seemingly forgotten him too. …
There is a saying that one should never go back – and in football that means not going back to a club that you have played for, or managed before. Brian McDermott did not heed this advice, for not only did he return to Reading to be manager for a second time, after previously managing …
Read More “4-0 down, and then we won 5-7 with our ex-player as their manager”
On this day in 1983 Terry Neill was sacked as Arsenal manager. He had taken Arsenal to three successive cup finals, of which just one was won, and had never looked like winning the title. His win percentage of 44.95% was only a little worse that George Allison (46.24%), Tom Whittaker (47.21%) and George Graham …
Read More “The percentage success rates of long term Arsenal managers”
By Tony Attwood On this day in 1995 the European Court ruled the system of clubs retaining the right to play a player until they released him was illegal under EC rules. As a result when Mr Wenger came to Arsenal the following year he was able to bring in players from across the EU …
Read More “When “a Bosman” became a type of transfer and football was changed.”
Latest news: We are developing our own video channel. It’s still at the experimental stage but you can get a feel here… Untold Gooner News Phil Brown, the football manager, seemed something of a curious fellow when he was managing in England. On 17 March 2009 as Hull City’s manager he claimed that he had …
Read More “When the Hull manager complained Arsenal’s man was improperly dressed on the pitch”
by Tony Attwood Untold Gooner News video: A lesson in how to silence the critics Leslie Knighton, Arsenal’s manager from 1919 to 1925 would hardly be commented upon at all 100 years on, were it not for the fact that in his retirement over 20 years after leaving Arsenal he wrote an autobiography of …
Read More “The Arsenal drugs scandal: where does the truth lie?”
Latest development: We are developing our own video channel. It’s still at the experimental stage but you can get a feel here… Untold Gooner News Micky Thomas going to Liverpool in 1991 having scored the goal that gave Arsenal the league title and stopped Liverpool from winning it again, always strikes me as odd. Not …
Latest news: Our companion website Untold Arsenal is developing its own video channel commenting on both contemporary and historic events. It’s still at the experimental stage but you can get a feel here… Untold Gooner News And today is of course a very historic day, being the day on which in 1886 the first …
Read More “The anniversary of the very start of Arsenal, and how we proved it happened.”
One of the extraordinary things about the media coverage of football is how often the media get things wrong, but then ignore that reality, continuing as if nothing had happened. So it was on this day in 1911, when the media told anyone silly enough to listen that Roose was going to Fulham, when in …
Read More “The crazy things players and the pressmen say about football”
Latest news: We are developing our own video channel. It’s still at the experimental stage but you can get a feel here… Untold Gooner News Obviously a lot of football that took place in the past is lost – all we have are newspaper results and the reports, if that, and we know how biased …
Read More “Beating Tottenham away in 1972 – the film of the match.”
Arsenal finished the 2012/13 season in fourth place to secure champions league status once again. But at the start of this day in 2012 Arsenal were looking anything but a champions league side being in 10th position in the league after just two wins in nine. But this seemingly ordinary win amidst such a poor …
Read More “Being 10th in the league on 8 December does not always spell disaster”
Latest news: We are developing our own video channel. It’s still at the experimental stage but you can get a feel here… Untold Gooner News Today marks the anniversary of the death in 1940 of Arsenal’s greatest ever goalscorer in 1940: Jack Lambert. He struggled at first to make his mark on the Arsenal …
Read More “Remembering Arsenal’s greatest goalscorer of all time.”
Latest news: We are developing our own video channel. It’s still at the experimental stage but you can get a feel here… Untold Gooner News Although we tend to think that fake news is a modern concept, there are signs it existed as early as 1926. Arsenal’s Tom Whittaker, who later went on to …
Read More “How the FA tried to cheat an Arsenal player out of compensation for an injury”
Latest news: We are developing our own video channel. It’s still at the experimental stage but you can get a feel here… Untold Gooner News Historians can’t just accept what is passed down as the truth across the generations – they need some evidence. But the reality is that most people who write about …
Read More “Finding the elusive Eastern Wanderers, Arsenal’s first opponents”
Latest news: We are developing our own video channel. It’s still at the experimental stage but you can get a feel here… Untold Gooner News Can you imagine Arsenal openly criticising the FA in its match day programme? Indeed can you imagine any newspaper, TV programme or radio show openly criticising the FA? …
If one wants to take a single day to provide evidence of the constancy and depth of the media’s antagonism against Arsenal then 3 December is as good as any. On this day in 1923 Sir Henry Norris obtained a writ against the Fulham Chronicle for their personal attack on him, which contained within it, …
Read More “How the media makes up Arsenal tales. One day: two stories”
In both the world wars the Football League was rearranged as a regional affair, with clubs permitted to use loan players where their own players were unable to play for their own club. In the season 1944/45 Arsenal played in the Football League South and on 12 occasions in that season used Stan Mortensen of …
Read More “The man who scored 18 goals for Arsenal in just 12 games”
One of the great bits of fun in considering the history of any organisation is the strange coincidences that turn up. As with the fact that some 33 years apart there were two key events in the Arsenal of history that happened somewhere between 1st and 5th December. And the fact that in neither case …
Read More “Chapman banned, Norris banned and a coincidence of dates”
On 30 November 1997 the league table looked like this Pos Team P W D L F A GD Pts 1 Manchester United 16 10 4 2 40 12 28 34 2 Chelsea 16 10 1 5 35 17 18 31 3 Blackburn Rovers 16 8 6 2 27 17 10 30 4 Leeds United …
Read More “Home defeat, 2 wins in last 8, 5 in 6 without a goal. Sack the manager!”
On this day in 1918 Sir Henry Norris, chair of Arsenal and a director of Fulham FC, began his campaign to become an MP – during the course of which one of his opponents put out a leaflet that criticised Sir Henry saying that while Sir Henry had claimed to be in favour of the …
Read More “Freedom of contract and limits on transfer fees: a court discussion in 1918.”
In 1991 Arsenal won the league by seven clear points, and were in fact 14 points ahead of the club in third place. They also went on a 17 match unbeaten run which was suddenly stopped by a 2-6 home defeat to Manchester United in the league cup. And yet this season also saw the …
Read More “Arsenal docked 2 points, a 2-6 home defeat, Adams in prison; a perfect season.”
These days we are used to League Cup games being charged at £10 and £20 a ticket, with discounts for juniors and seniors, but it was not always so. In fact it was the low crowd on this day in 2001 for the league cup match which convinced the club that it needed radical action. …
Read More “When the idea came to Arsenal: let’s cut ticket prices.”
As you may know, Arsenal are celebrating 100 years in the top division of the League this year, and as part of that the Arsenal Independent Supporters Association (AISA) recently ran a 100 Years event at Islington Town Hall. Our guests of honour were Bob Wilson and Alan Smith, along with two directors from Arsenal …
