AISA Arsenal History Society: preserving Arsenal's heritage
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.”
Today is the anniversary of Edu joining Arsenal as a player. He was supposed to sign in 2000, but was found to have a fake passport – which has always seemed strange to me since he was fully entitled to have an Italian passport as his father was Italian – enough to qualify Edu to …
Read More “Remembering the times of Edu, and welcoming him back to Arsenal”
On this day in 2009 Ivan Gazidis, then of Arsenal, proposed a salary cap in the PL – just one of a number of attempts by clubs, the PL and Uefa to get club spending under control. As yet none of these has shown much sign of having any real impact, although the issue of …
Read More “From the proposal of a salary cap in the Premier League to a mother’s expletives”
For many years 1 July was the first day of the summer transfer window, but this was changed when clubs decided to end the transfer period as the new season started. Previously it ended at the end of August – after several games had been played. As a result it is also the day that …
Read More “From Arsenal’s Highbury debt to a 3% ticket price hike. Arsenal on 1 July in history”
