Three Arsenal matches end 5-4 in two months. What are the chances?

What are the chances of Arsenal losing 4-5 twice in the space of two months, while also, between these games winning another league match 5-4? It is pretty rare and if you are a betting supporter you might want to try and find something a little more likely to bet on.  In which case of …

4th Place Finishes and the Context of Achievement

    If Arsenal win their next league game (1st April vs Newcastle), last season’s points tally will be matched with seven games to spare. You would imagine that the meetings between Unai Emery and the board last summer touched on some pragmatic goals – improve on last season’s finish, secure Champions League football. When …

Wenger the record breaker, from first to last

On this day in 2017 Arsenal achieved yet another record in their long history of records – more FA Cup semi-finals than any other club.   Of course the semi-final is not a trophy, but it was at this moment that the media finally realised that Mr Wenger was on the edge of becoming the …

How Tottenham’s actions inadvertently helped Arsenal into the first division

If you are a regular reader of this site you will probably have read how Arsenal helped Tottenham get elected to the Football League in 1908, after the League had turned them down.   We know why many clubs would not vote for Tottenham to join the League in 1908 – they had resigned from the …

How many times have Arsenal finished above Tottenham in the League?

And indeed come to that how many times have Tottenham finished above Arsenal in the League? There is a bit of an argument about this because quite often the clubs have not been in the same league, and so automatically Arsenal (being in Division 1) have been above Tottenham (Division 2 or the Southern League).  …

Maybe those who criticise Arsenal’s performance last night should remember the 1970s.

Today on 8 March 2019, the websites and blogs are full of criticisms of Arsenal, some of them running at a level which seems to suggest that the manager and the whole team should be dismissed and rebuilt.  And all for one defeat. One can only presume that those making these criticisms were not around …

Arsenal anniversaries through the ages for 6 March

6 March 1905: Thomas Fitchie and Robert Templeton represent Scotland – the first Arsenal players ever to do so. 6 March 1915:Arsenal played Lincoln away, and lost 1-0 – a sure sign that there was unlikely to be any late push to regain a promotion position in the latter part of the season.  It was …

Remembering the time when Gus Caesar was a bright prospect

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 …

Arsenal stadium move announced, and allowed, plus the new shirt

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, …

When “Boring Boring Arsenal” was written with no sense of irony

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 …

The thousands of players signed and who never play, and move on, forgotten

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?  …

When Tottenham learned not to bank on getting into a cup final, before the SF was done

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 …