AISA Arsenal History Society: preserving Arsenal's heritage
If you were around in the days of Arsenal losing a league cup final at Wembley in 1988, you might remember the name of Gus Caesar and shudder. And you may be surprised to learn that he was a player who gained a lot of praise early on making 44 league appearances. But his star …
Read More “Remembering the time when Gus Caesar was a bright prospect”
By Tony Attwood I am not sure anyone particularly noticed at the time but 4 March was both the day that Henry Norris confirmed Arsenal were moving to Gillespie Road from Plumstead, and the day one year later that London County Council gave permission for the ground to be built. That doesn’t sound too odd, …
Read More “Arsenal stadium move announced, and allowed, plus the new shirt”
1979 was indeed a time of boring boring Arsenal, with defeat to Southampton on this day that year being just one of a run of three wins in 16 league games. Yet despite this the club ended up 7th, thanks to an excellent run from September 16 to December 23 1978, ending with the 5-0 …
Read More “When “Boring Boring Arsenal” was written with no sense of irony”
by Tony Attwood In compiling these anniversary files I find time and again myself looking at the details of a player who has signed for Arsenal, sometimes with a little bit of a fanfare, but who never make it, moving on to play in non-league football if at all. Why don’t they make it? …
Read More “The thousands of players signed and who never play, and move on, forgotten”
Not counting chickens before they are hatched has always been a good adage, and it is one that Tottenham Hotspur’s PA announcer of the late 1980s might always remember as he spent half time in a match in 1987 on this day telling Tottenham supporters how they could apply for tickets for the League Cup …
Read More “When Tottenham learned not to bank on getting into a cup final, before the SF was done”
Clubs can turn themselves around very quickly, and indeed I am not sure that many achieved such a turn round in one season as Arsenal did after Knighton’s last campaign in 1924/5. On this day in 1925 we see Arsenal’s eighth consecutive defeat. The following season we came second. And then five years on we …
Read More “From near relegation to 32 league goals in 7 games in just five seasons”
“One of the most appalling” the headline says, and it was only “one of”, of course, because beside the assault on Ramsey which happened on this day in 2010, we also recall the assault on Diaby that ultimately cost him his career. Ramsey was ultimately lucky – he recovered from the assault, although not only …
One of the interesting effects in gathering together all the Arsenal anniversaries for a single day is the contrasts it can offer up. In 1977 under Terry Neill’s management Arsenal had seven consecutive league defeats – the all time club record. But also during this run Arsenal lost (on this day in the FA …
Read More “7 league defeats in a row plus exit from the cup. And beating Tottenham 5-2”
After their match at Newcastle on 24 February 1934 at Newcastle rumours started to spread that the Arsenal train returning to London had crashed killing two players. This story was completely untrue although a “special” carrying Arsenal supporters had had a very minor accident. The reporting of the incident shows the complete lack of checking …
Read More “Rumour of two Arsenal players killed in rail crash dismissed as untrue”
Arsene Wenger is remembered for turning Arsenal around in his first season, despite one of the most appalling campaigns of all time by the media which tried to accuse him of child moelstation while in Japan, without any evidence to back up their disgraceful claims. And indeed he did give Arsenal new impetus, with the …
Read More “When Wenger’s Arsenal was beaten by Wimbledon, and couldn’t score a goal”
The man in question was Laurie Brown and it happened on this day in 1964, by which time it was clear to everyone except the Arsenal board that Billy Wright was a terrible manager and needed to go. Sadly they kept him for one more season, and the Highbury crowds plummeted to their lowest ever …
Read More “Arsenal man signs for Tottenham, plays for them next day, and scores”
In February 1970 there was considerable disgruntlement in the air at Arsenal as the club did indeed make it 10 in a row without a win. Just one year on and the first notions that Arsenal might not only win the league but also do the double were perhaps only whispered by those drunk …
Read More “From 10 league games without a win, to the Double. How quickly things change”
Leslie Knighton surely is the most notorious, devious and underhand of all the Arsenal managers in history. All managers write and say things to bolster their own position and excuse their own failures, but surely there has never been one who issued so many absolute downright lies in his own defence as Knighton, who managed …
Read More “When a bitter ex-Arsenal manager twists the truth for his own purposes”
For many Arsenal fans the 1970s are remembered as a time of great triumph – the first European trophy, the first double… and indeed into this day in 1972 there was hope of an unbelievable double double – winning the double two years running. But as today’s anniversaries show the reality was not like this. …
Arsenal moved from the south bank of the Thames to north London in 1913; something that caused some protests from Tottenham Hotspur and Clapton Orient who feared their crowd numbers would suffer. In fact the increased local rivalry meant that crowd numbers for all three clubs increased. What is often ignored in this discussion is …
Read More “When North and South London clubs moved in opposite directions”
The movie, “The Arsenal Stadium Mystery” was released on this day in 1940, giving tens of thousands the chance to hear the phrase ‘1-0 to the Arsenal’ for the first time. Here is the full list of anniversaries for this day. 17 February 1902: 1000 spectators saw Arsenal beat QPR in the London League Premier …
Read More “The origins of the phrase “One nil to the Arsenal” on this day”
Looking back at the Arsenal anniversaries for 16 February we are inevitably drawn to the case of Eduardo – who returned to action on this day just a few days under one year after being crippled by a tackle so terrible that really the player who undertook it, should never have played again. On 23 …
Read More “There are some fouls that are so awful that a mere sending off is nowhere near enough”
To be fair, I can’t say that the 1910 criticism of the referee in a cartoon in the Woolwich Gazette was the first such suggestion of referee corruption but there were not too many such comments around in the early days. As for Arsenal at Buckingham Palace, this was certainly the first time a squad …
The stated reason for changing the offside rule in 1925 was to stop the decline in the number of people attending games, which itself was deemed to be because of the decline in the number of goals scored. The change in the rule, which meant that only two men had to be between an …
Read More “Tinkering with the off side rule and its strange consequences”
From the off, newspapers could be as fascinated by the crowd as they were by the games – and indeed this is not surprising given that crowd activities were easier to describe and tended to get a bigger response from the readership. 13 February 1892: The first ever recorded incident of a club song being …
Read More “The first ever Arsenal song that has survived through history”
While the first Arsenal double in 1971 is of course remembered as a core part of the club’s history, what happened thereafter is rarely mentioned. Bertie Mee stayed in office and attempted to introduce a military style approach to managing footballers – footballers who now were immortalised and feted after their achievements. Tension was …
Below are the anniversaries of Arsenal, along with a few non-Arsenal events of note for today. Our lead story from 9 February 2003 relates to how Bobby Robson the ex-England manager, outrageously accused Bergkamp without the slightest piece of evidence of deliberately getting Laurent Robert sent off in 1-1 draw with Newcastle. The rule among journalists …
Here are the Arsenal anniversaries for 8 February. 8 February 1902: First game for Thomas Tindal Fitchie – the man who signed five times for Arsenal. Known as the prince of dribblers he signed for clubs seventeen times in his career as he combined being a travelling salesman with being a footballer. 8 February 1905: …
Here are the anniversaries for 7 February throughout Arsenal’s history. 7 February 1872: Stanley Briggs, a centre half, was born in Stamford Hill, on this date and was signed by Arsenal on 23 October 1893 as an amateur from Tottenham, to whom he later returned. 7 February 1903: The biggest crowd yet at the Manor …
Read More “When the Times newspaper said, “it is a privilege to watch new Arsenal””
Here are the anniversaries of Arsenal FC for 6 February. 6 February 1892: Royal Arsenal 2 Cambridge University 1; a friendly in the final season for the club before it became Woolwich Arsenal. 6 February 1894: Ly Burrows debut for Woolwich Arsenal v Rotherham. As an amateur he was able to swap between Arsenal and …
Read More “Merson sacked, Wenger cleared of assault, Norway’s loss.”
