AISA Arsenal History Society: preserving Arsenal's heritage
By Tony Attwood As you may have seen we are currently also updating our series Arsenal in the Summer – which now covers over 60 seasons, reflecting how football outside the season has changed over the years. There is a full index to all the articles in the series here We are currently …
Read More “When Arsenal were told – we need larger crowds to keep the club going”
The Arsenal in the Summer series looks at what has happened to the club during the summer months year on year. Over 60 seasons have been covered in this series, and there is a full index here. It is extraordinary how Arsenal’s summers have changed and evolved over time and I do hope you find …
Today is the anniversary of the moment in 1910 when Henry Norris took over Woolwich Arsenal FC. There were no other deals on offer at the time, and without Norris’ engagement with the club, it would have ceased trading and been wound up. Norris subsequently cleared Arsenal’s debts, moved the club to Highbury and made …
Read More “The day Arsenal just avoided going out of business”
The Arsenal in the Summer series looks at what has happened to the club during the summer months year on year. Over 60 seasons have been covered in this series, and there is a full index here. It is extraordinary how Arsenal’s summers have changed and evolved over time and I do hope you find …
Happy birthday Martin Keown indeed. Despite his occasional criticisms of Arsenal since his retirement, he is still remembered with great enthusiasm by many of us who watched his two spells at the club which resulted in 310 games for Arsenal across two spells. In all he played 585 first class games. And of course he …
Today we should remember the anniversary of the birth of Henry Norris – the man who ensured that Woolwich Arsenal survived in 1910 and ultimately became the “Bank of England club” in the 1930s. That title, reflecting Arsenal’s supreme ability to operate in the transfer market in the 1930s, came about because of Norris’ …
Read More “Why we should celebrate the life of Sir Henry Norris, founder of the modern Arsenal.”
Two issues leap out from today Arsenal anniversaries. First the transfer of Jon Sammels in 1971 – a player forced to leave because he was endlessly booed by the Arsenal crowd. And second the signing of Rob Holding in 2016. As the note below says, this signing was met with absolute derision by the media …
Read More “Selling Sammels, buying Holding: two affairs that show some Arsenal fans at their worst”
I am not sure how many Arsenal fans truly understood the extent of Arsenal’s rise to the top from 1930 onwards, and how it took in three full time and one temporary manager. Nor indeed how when it came to an end, we came upon The Big Sleep (as John Sowman’s wonderful book on 1953 …
Read More “10 trophies in 16 seasons – the start of Arsenal’s glory.”
On this day in 1998 Arsenal’s application to play Champions League games at Wembley was approved. Arsenal played three group stages matches at Wembley in 1998/9, and again in 1998/2000, and every match saw a crowd of over 70,000 in the ground – although the results were not that positive. But the experiment proved that …
Read More “How Arsenal test their level of support with six games at Wembley”
On 22 September 1996, Arsene Wenger was appointed manager of Arsenal, but although there were many rumours concerning his appointment before that, for a lot of the summer there was uncertainty as to what was going on at the club. Bruce Rioch was sacked on 12 August, and at the time no one knew who …
Read More “Why the first friendly of the season doesn’t really tell us much about what is to come”
How much harm can one man’s carelessness do to a club’s reputation? Quite a lot it seems, if we take a look at the writing of Bernard Joy. Joy had been an Arsenal player, an England international, and a famous journalist, so when he produced the book “Foreword Arsenal!” it became something of a footballing …
Read More “The Arsenal player and journalist for whom fact and fiction merged”
Many of these commentaries from recent years highlight the signing or sale of players by Arsenal who didn’t really make it in the team, either because of a lack of form, or injury, or simply not being able to settle in London. Such transfers can be easily criticised with comments about the amount of time …
Read More “The history of all clubs is a history of those who failed to make the grade”
by Tony Attwood As you can imagine, writing the Arsenal History files has been an education for me – I knew some of the facts I would be covering, but as it turns out, only a handful. The history of Arsenal’s pre-seasons for example was not something I knew about. I had over the years …
Read More “How Arsenal has changed its pre-season year by year, and the interesting case of 2005”
Looking at the anniversaries for today I particularly noticed John Hollins, who played 127 games for us in the late 1970s and early 1980s before moving on to Chelsea for one season. After playing he moved into management, and his record really does look rather poor – or maybe he was just unlucky. He obviously …
Read More “The curious life of John Hollins, once of Arsenal”
One of the interesting things about running the Arsenal History Files is the odd bits of information one picks up about players from the past. For example today is the anniversary of the signing of Manuel Almunia who played 109 games in goal for Arsenal. Today I learned that he has a deep interest …
Read More “Which Arsenal player had a particular interest in world war 2 battlefields?”
On this day in 1930 the first ever World Cup competition began in Uruguay. England felt themselves way above such silly matters and didn’t take part. 68 years later to the day the Daily Mirror ran the headline “Arsenal win the world cup” as France beat Brazil 3-0. In fact there was only one Arsenal …
Ray Kennedy played 158 games for Arsenal before being sold by Bertie Mee on this day in 1974 – one of a number of totally bonkers decisions that Mee made from this time onwards. John Radford said, “I couldn’t believe it when he left and felt it was a great shame to have broken up …
Read More “The insane sale of Ray Kennedy, and the willingness of a fan to help”
On 11 July 2003 Arsenal played Peterborough in a pre-season friendly, and lost. I remember the Peterborough fans getting rather excited, and doing a lot of arm waving and shouting about how rubbish Arsenal were. In the following match we drew with Barnet. And if you know your Arsenal history you will know …
Read More “What does pre-season tell us? Not always that much, it seems.”
It is always nice to think that there is something special about Arsenal which brings out the best in players, and that after they depart the club, they never quite get that old Arsenal form back again. Of course this can be a misleading thought since players may have played out their best years with …
Read More “When Arsenal players force a transfer for more money, it doesn’t always work out”
From 1959 to 1970 Terry Neill was an Arsenal player, and for some of that time Arsenal’s captain, playing 241 league games for the club. After that he moved to Hull City as player manager as well as being part time manager of Northern Ireland before moving on to be manager of Tottenham.# At Hull, …
By Tony Attwood Perhaps the most interesting part of running the anniversary files (especially during the summer) is looking at the arrivals and departures of Arsenal players and trying to find out where they are now and what they are doing. Of course many players take on media work, and a few make a living …
Read More “Which ex-Arsenal player was (deputy) manager of Trinidad and Tobago?”
That headline is what Arsene Wenger said about Laurent Koscielny, who completed his transfer to Arsenal on this day in 2010. At first many fans were unimpressed by Koscielny, forgetting perhaps how much adjustment is needed for a player moving from a small French club to a club the size of Arsenal, in a league …
Read More “The Best Value Arsenal Transfer of the past 10 years”
Finding Arsenal anniversaries in July is harder than finding them on 29 February, but we have three that are relevant to Arsenal’s history, and being a person who has lived for many years in Northamptonshire I am always interested in the history of David Bowen who played 146 games for Arsenal in the 1950s, and …
Read More “Remembering Dave Bowen who played for Arsenal and created miracles at Northampton”
By Tony Attwood In tracing the history of Arsenal FC I often find myself asking one simple question: “why?” Today’s anniversaries provide a perfect example of this, for on this day in 1939 the Football League voted to allow numbered shirts, having previously forbidden their use. You’ll find this change of mind mentioned in many …
Read More “Why were numbered shirts banned in English football (and other funny events).”
By Tony Attwood If you come across any stories of an Arsenal player wanting to leave the club this summer, it might be worth pausing for a moment and recalling the wild and frantic tales that surrounded Hector Bellerin who signed a new long term contract on this day in 2013. For two summers running …
Read More “The endless stories that were told about Bellerin leaving.”
