And If You Think You Know Your History….

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…you’ve probably been taken for a ride.

“Compton and Smith played for England for the first time against Wales at Sunderland, Compton at thirty-eight becoming the oldest man to win his first cap for England.”

Bernard Joy – “Forward, Arsenal!”

“Two Arsenal players, Peter Connolly and Bobby Buist, played so well in that game [1891 FA Cup v Derby County] that John Goodall, the Derby captain and acting secretary-manager, offered them contracts.”

Phil Soar and Martin Tyler – “The Official Illustrated History of Arsenal”

Two statements from two esteemed tomes that have become ingrained in Arsenal’s history, written by three respected names in the game, printed in in black ink on white paper for all eternity. The only problem is that both statements have recently been proven to be wrong. Read More →

Arsenal’s Election to the Football League – Mythbusted

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mythbusters

Seeing isn’t always believing

During the summer of 1893 the members of the Football League voted to expand the size of the Second Division which had been formed the previous year. This expansion opened the door for Woolwich Arsenal to become the first Football League club based south of Birmingham. It also turned into a rather messy affair that has resulted in a number of assumptions being made by other historians that have become accepted as the true course of events.

Here, The Arsenal History, set out the actual story of that summer. Read More →

Arsenal’s Pre-season Preparations In The Good Old Days

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Despite it being only the middle of July, Arsenal’s pre-season preparations are well under way with a tournament in Singapore already completed and the Emirates Cup and Community Shield still to come before the very early start to the Premier League season.

Arsenal’s preparations for the season ahead haven’t always been this hectic. For many years it was a case of some running around the pitch to shake off the excesses of the Summer and a couple of kickabouts.

The earliest records of the team playing prior to the start of the season are in 1888, two years after the club was founded. Two games, advertised as the Probables v Improbables, were played on 1 September and a week later. Unfortunately no records of the outcome of these two games exists, nor of the players involved. However, with the club gaining a reputation as one of the leading clubs in London, it is likely that a fair number of trialists had put their names forward to the committee that ran the team. And don’t be fooled by the dates. In the early days of the game, the season started in September with cricket, still being the more senior sport, taking precedence.

Kentish Mercury 21 September 1888

Kentish Mercury 21 September 1888

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Arsenal Cricketers

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Arsenal players who were also Cricketers

As the cricket season has just begun we have compiled a list of cricketing Arsenal footballers.

As befits a club who were formed out of the Dial Square cricket team, Arsenal have had many dual code players. Also, at the time of founding in 1886, Woolwich was part of the county of Kent, a once great cricketing team particularly just prior to World War 1 and the during the 1970s.

David Danskin, the first Arsenal football captain, was a prominent member of the Dial Square cricket club, though the pitches they played on at Plumstead Common were a world away from the surface used by Arsenal’s best cricketer Denis Compton when he batted at Lords.

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Arsenal and the Archery Tournament That Wasn’t

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The Archery Tournament – Or Was It?

Those of you that have read an Arsenal history book will, more than likely, have noticed that the club organising an archery tournament in 1903 to raise funds. Arsenal handbooks throughout the 1970s included this statement within the club’s chronology:

Archery 1

Now, Edwardian England may seem a long time ago, but the medieval art of archery was very much in the decline, if not virtually non-existent at this time. On top of this, £1,200 was more than one fifth of Woolwich Arsenal’s turnover at the time. To put this into perspective, it is similar to a tournament bringing in £40 million today.

So, how was it that a tournament of this nature could greatly swell the club’s coffers? Read More →

Arsenal v Man Utd: The Spirit of Kelso

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For today’s game the manager and whole team must call upon the fighting spirit of Arsenal’s most pugnacious boss in its history. He stood up to the Manchester police as his team won away in 1906 to reach the Gunners first ever FA Cup semi-final.

Today Arsenal need the Phil Kelso spirit.

As you know we have been reproducing our programme work on the blog this season, well here is a match report in a slightly different format to those of this season, written for last season’s quarter-final programme against Everton. A prescient match up of the first FA cup tie between the two most successful teams in the competition’s history!

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Manchester United v Arsenal – FA Cup quarter-final 10 March 1906

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1904-05: Arsenal’s First Season in the Top Flight of English Football

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1904-05 Woolwich Arsenal in the Top Flight of English football

1904-05

A postcard of the team courtesy of @N5_1BU

The previous season had seen Woolwich Arsenal promoted, amidst ordnance supplied fireworks and a pitch invasion, after a draw in the final home match of the season which saw the top flight guaranteed for the very first time. The pitch invasion managed to break much of the fencing surrounding the pitch, and this was the cue to allow the club to embark upon a major upgrade of the Manor Ground, in part to accommodate the extra crowd expected to witness the club in the highest league.

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