Arsenal 101 E-Book

Rab MacWilliam

• Herausgeber: Polaris
• Kategorie: Lebensstil
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Seitenzahl: 171

Beschreibung

Arsenal 101 is an entertaining compendium of Arsenal's fascinating history, facts, games, stories, personalities, legends and footballing adventures. Rab MacWilliam has revisited the club's history from its early years as Woolwich Arsenal at the end of the nineteenth century to its status as one of the leading European teams of the present day. Rab has distilled Arsenal's history into 101 facts, moments and stories, examining many of the key characters, matches, controversies, innovations, and dazzling instances of brilliance that have illuminated the proud history of this great, if occasionally erratic, club. Funny, irreverent, fascinating and insightful, Arsenal 101 is the ideal handbook for Gunners fans of all ages.

Leseprobe

ARSENAL101

A POCKET GUIDE IN 101 MOMENTS,FACTS, CHARACTERS AND GAMES

RAB MACWILLIAM

This edition first published in 2021 by

POLARIS PUBLISHING LTD

c/o Aberdein Considine2nd Floor, Elder HouseMultrees WalkEdinburgh, EH1 3DX

Distributed byBirlinn Limited

www.polarispublishing.com

Text copyright © Rab MacWilliam, 2021

ISBN: 9781913538453

eBook ISBN: 9781913538460

THIS IS AN UNOFFICIAL PRODUCT

The right of Rab MacWilliam to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form, or by any means electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the express written permission of the publisher.

The views expressed in this book do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions or policies of Polaris Publishing Ltd (Company No. SC401508) (Polaris), nor those of any persons, organisations or commercial partners connected with the same (Connected Persons). Any opinions, advice, statements, services, offers, or other information or content expressed by third parties are not those of Polaris or any Connected Persons but those of the third parties. For the avoidance of doubt, neither Polaris nor any Connected Persons assume any responsibility or duty of care whether contractual, delictual or on any other basis towards any person in respect of any such matter and accept no liability for any loss or damage caused by any such matter in this book.

Every effort has been made to trace copyright holders and obtain their permission for the use of copyright material. The publisher apologises for any errors or omissions and would be grateful if notified of any corrections that should be incorporated in future reprints or editions of this book.

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available on request from the British Library.

Designed and typeset by Polaris Publishing, Edinburgh

Printed in Great Britain by MBM Print SCS Limited, East Kilbride

Contents

Introduction

1 Where it all kicked off

2 Plumstead welcomes royalty

3 On the road again

4 London’s first professional club

5 Arsenal join the Football League

6 Life in the Second Division

7 Arsenal’s first international player

8 Bradshaw’s boys done well

9 Mixed fortunes

10 Mr Norris changes . . . everything

11 Why Highbury?

12 First game at Highbury

13 How did Norris manage it?

14 Norris calls on Knighton

15 ‘A flock of lively lions’

16 A footballing revolution begins

17 Chapman takes over

18 ‘Offside already?’

19 Chapman’s opening seasons

20 ‘Wembley, Wembley . . .’

21 Something in the air . . .

22 Buchan retires: who’ll replace him?

23 Chapman’s team comes together

24 Arsenal secure their first trophy

25 The WM formation

26 The first great season . . .

27 . . . and the first great team

28 ‘The best laid plans o’ mice an’ men . . .

29 Meanwhile, off the pitch . . .

30 Back on the pitch

31 Chapman dies

32 A hard man to follow

33 ‘Too much rough play by visitors’

34 Another FA Cup in the boardroom

35 Drake hits a perfect seven

36 Gunners again capture title

37 The Arsenal Stadium Mystery

38 World War Two at White Hart Lane

39 ‘Passovotchka’ at Highbury

40 Tom Whittaker takes over

41 ‘To Arsenal, the glory’

42 Floodlights at Highbury

43 A long wait until the next one

44 What is to be done?

45 ‘Busby Babes’ entertain Highbury

46 Swindin becomes manager

47 And now . . . Billy Wright

48 The Fairs Cup

49 It gets worse . . .

50 ‘Use the ’ammer, ’Enry’

51 Moving on up

52 Savaged by Swindon

53 At last, an Arsenal trophy

54 The Double season: preamble

55 Season 1970/71: one to remember

56 A punch-up with Lazio

57 Exit from Fairs Cup

58 But there’s still the FA Cup . . .

59 Not Stoke again . . .

60 The League title: Leeds or Arsenal?

61 Mullery awarded Crown Jewels

62 And now for the Scousers . . .

63 Arsenal: 1970/71 Double Heroes

64 What goes up must come down

65 The slide begins

66 McLintock and Graham exit Highbury

67 Highbury: a brief personal digression

68 Welcome to the hot seat, Tel

69 Two seasons and four Finals

70 A bum rap for Sammy

71 ‘The Five-Minute Final’

72 . . . and two more Finals to go

73 Four Finals . . . and one trophy

74 George Graham arrives back

75 A trophy, after eight years

76 George has another go

77 ‘It’s up for grabs now . . .’

78 Getting over it all

79 Time to get moving again

80 ‘Sit down, Dalglish . . .’

81 ‘Ian Wright, Wright, Wright . . .’

82 The Premier League

83 Watch out, George

84 George, you’ve been caught

85 Bruce Rioch comes and goes

86 Who is this French guy, anyway?

87 What can follow the Double?

88 ‘Leave the ball, Kanu’

89 A brief absence of silverware

90 Another Double for Gunners?

91 Arsene knows

92 The Invincibles

93 Last season at Highbury

94 Early years at the Emirates

95 Gunners knock out AC Milan

96 Three trophies in four years

97 Au revoir, Arsene

98 Zorte on*, Unai *(Basque for ‘Good Luck’)

99 An ex-captain returns

100 ‘Arsenal fall short . . .’

101 ‘Legacy Fans 1, Billionaires 0’

INTRODUCTION

As you gaze idly eastward out the window of your train passing through suburban north London on its way to King’s Cross St Pancras, it’s difficult to miss what appears to be a large amphitheatre towering over the area.

This imposing structure, stretching over 17 acres of prime inner-city land, is the Emirates Stadium, which since 2006 has been home to one of the world’s most famous sporting institutions: Arsenal Football Club.

The stadium rises imperiously over this busy part of north London which includes Finsbury Park, Holloway, Islington and other neighbouring areas. This new complex also overlooks, only a few hundred yards from its entrance, the site of the old Highbury Stadium, Arsenal’s home from 1913 until its move to the grander premises.

Prior to Highbury, the club based itself in Woolwich, ten miles to the south across the River Thames, and that is where this book begins the fascinating story of Arsenal Football Club.

*

The club was founded in 1886 by a group of football-loving workmen at Woolwich Arsenal. Its nomadic early existence – from Plumstead Common, via Manor Ground, Invicta Ground, back to Manor Ground and, in 1913, to Highbury – was mirrored in its change of name from Dial Square, Royal Arsenal, Woolwich Arsenal, The Arsenal and finally Arsenal, the name on which it settled after it reached Highbury.

Arsenal’s first legendary period was during the 1930s when, under the formative, charismatic leadership of manager Herbert Chapman, they won five League titles and two FA Cups. After World War Two, Arsenal’s status in English football became less dominant, but from the mid-1960s under manager Bertie Mee and trainer Don Howe, the club captured the Inter-Cities Fairs Cup, followed by, in 1970/71, the double of League title and FA Cup.

Arsenal again won the FA Cup in 1979 with manager Terry Neill, but it was the return as manager in 1986 of ex-player George Graham which began to revitalise the club. When Graham departed in 1995, he had managed Arsenal to two League titles, two League Cups, an FA Cup and the European Cup-Winners’ Cup.

The arrival in 1996 of Arsene Wenger, however, initiated a profound change in the club’s culture, and Wenger oversaw Arsenal’s second legendary period. During his 22 years in charge, Arsenal won two more Doubles, dominated English football with the ‘Invincibles’, moved to the Emirates, gained a further League title and five more FA Cups, and reached the Final of the Champions League. He left the club in 2018, and new manager Mikel Arteta, who took over after the brief tenure of Unai Emery, won the FA Cup in 2019/20, his first year in the role.

The Covid-19 pandemic played havoc with football clubs, crowd attendances and League fixtures worldwide in 2020/21, and Arsenal were no exception to the pandemic’s impact. They endured an unhappy season, finishing in mid-table and defeated by Villarreal in the semi-final of the European League. But, as ever with Arsenal, they will soon be back and competing at the highest levels of the game.

*

This short description obviously does not reveal anything like the full story of Arsenal (including, for instance, that they are the only club in English football history never to have been relegated from the top division).

In the pages of this book, I hope that you, as an Arsenal supporter, a general football fan or an interested reader – perhaps all three – will discover much about the history of Arsenal which will inform, surprise and entertain you.

In keeping with the other titles in this series, I have selected, on a largely chronological basis, 101 aspects of the major events in this occasionally frustrating but always engaging and intriguing football club. Arsenal 101 considers the club’s history, from the early days on the Isle of Dogs where Arsenal played its first-ever game in 1886, to the close of the 2020/21 season at the Emirates.

The relative brevity of the book is deliberately designed to eliminate unnecessary detail and to concentrate on the essence of the story. Arsenal 101 captures Arsenal’s important, interesting and most memorable moments, games, competitions and remarkable incidents; it covers the entertaining and amusing events, origins of nicknames (‘Gooners’) and chants, people of influence, Arsenal fans, special events at Highbury, and relations with other English (particularly Spurs) and European clubs; and the changing impact on Arsenal of the younger players and the benefits (and otherwise) of the transfer market.

Last, but certainly by no means least, it discusses the managers and the special players – from Alex James and Cliff Bastin to Dennis Bergkamp and Cesc Fabregas – as well as the perhaps less gifted team members, all of whom have excelled in their attempts to ensure that Arsenal has been and remains an unpredictable but special and much-loved football club.

Rab MacWilliam

May 2021

1

Where it all kicked off

At the end of the 19th century, Woolwich was a fairly nondescript town in Kent lying to the south-east of London on the south bank of the River Thames.

Despite, or perhaps because of, the town’s relative anonymity, it was home to Woolwich Arsenal, one of the country’s largest suppliers of military weaponry and munitions to the soldiery and artillery of the far-flung British Empire.

As that century drew to a close, in the south-east of the country the ‘gentlemen’s sports’ of cricket and rugby were the prevailing leisure activities, but the relatively new game of association football was quickly catching up. In the Midlands, northern England and Scotland the game was also rapidly gaining in popularity. Woolwich Arsenal hired workers from across the country.

In 1886 two artisans named Fred Beardsley and Morris Bates, from the ordnance works at Nottingham, arrived at Woolwich and met with Kirkcaldy-born David Danskin. Both newcomers had played for one of the leading clubs of the period, Nottingham Forest, while Danskin and several of his co-workers shared their fascination for the game and had been considering the idea of setting up a football club at the Arsenal.

Danskin organised a 15-man whip-round, bought a ball from the proceeds, and the fledgling players, needing a name for the team, settled on Dial Square, one of the Arsenal workshops. Dial Square had been established in 1717 as the Arsenal’s main canonry workshop (a fact which contributed to the club’s later nickname of ‘the Gunners’).

Left-back and team captain Danskin was the first but certainly not the last Scotsman to influence the club’s history. Along with fellow workmate Jack Humble, he organised the team’s first game, which was played on marshy ground – lacking crossbars and pitch markings, and located alongside an open sewer – across the Thames on the Isle of Dogs, better known today as the location of Canary Wharf.

On 11 December 1886, these Dial Square players crossed the river on the long-established Woolwich Ferry, made their way to the Island, and defeated Eastern Wanderers 6-0. Enthused by their victory, the players met again two weeks later on Christmas Day at the Royal Oak public house in Plumstead, near to the Arsenal, and began to make plans.

2

Plumstead welcomes royalty

The players decided on a new name for the team and, combining a mention for their local pub with a rather ambitious flourish, they opted for Royal Arsenal. As they needed their own home pitch, they chose the run-down but adjacent Plumstead Common. Finally, in the interests of team cohesion, they required a unified strip. Beardsley contacted his old club, and Nottingham Forest obliged with the loan of all-red shirts (the white sleeves were adopted in the early 1930s) and a ball. ‘The Reds’, as they soon became known, then wasted little time in demonstrating their footballing credentials.

The team’s first game as Royal Arsenal was a 6-1 victory over local rivals Erith on 8 January 1887 at Plumstead Common. The Reds won seven matches that season, losing two. The following season Royal Arsenal played 24 games and won 14. One of their defeats, by a 2-1 margin, was on north London’s Tottenham Marshes on 19 November 1887 against Tottenham Hotspur, the first encounter in what was to become an enduring rivalry.

By season 1889/90 Royal Arsenal’s prowess on the pitch had earned them the soubriquet of ‘Football Champions of the South’, having established their supremacy over such London clubs as Tottenham, Millwall, Fulham, QPR and Clapton Orient.

That season the Reds won three cups which included the London Charity Cup at The Oval, beating Old Westminsters 3-1 in the Final, a game which was watched by over 10,000 spectators. They were, however, defeated 5-1 at home by the Swifts, one of the oldest and most experienced southern clubs, in the fourth and final preliminary round of the FA Cup, a national knock-out competition organised almost 20 years previously.

The Royal Arsenal team for the 1888/89 season. Alamy

3

On the road again

By now Royal Arsenal had outgrown the limitations of Plumstead Common. In 1888 they moved to the Manor Ground, where military wagons acted as grandstands, and by 1890 the club’s home was the Invicta Ground (‘Invicta’ being Kent’s motto), still close to the Arsenal but with a significantly increased capacity.

The club remained at Invicta for the following two seasons, where they attracted a crowd of over 12,000 for a friendly against Scottish champions Hearts and where they were building a sizeable local support: the Guardian noted that ‘the Royal Arsenal was not without a considerable and confident following’.

The club’s early success prompted the Invicta ground’s owner to suggest a substantial rent increase, but this was rejected by the Reds. So, the start of season 1893/94 found the club back at the Manor Ground, opposite Plumstead station, where they were to remain for the following 20 years.

4

London’s first professional club

The club’s 1891 AGM at the Windsor Castle Music Hall was critical to the club’s future. Professionalism had grudgingly been legalised by the FA in 1885, and the Football League, with associated professionalism, came into being from season 1888/89. The League, however, was entirely composed of northern clubs as the London FA abhorred the very idea of being paid to play football.

Royal Arsenal were becoming increasingly wary of northern clubs’ incursions into their territory in order to nab their top players. At this meeting, therefore, it was decided that the club had to turn professional to prevent these attempted seductions and to gain financial viability.

Predictably, the London FA were furious at such ungentlemanly conduct, banned the club from all their competitions and expelled Royal Arsenal. For the following two seasons, Arsenal’s on-pitch opposition consisted either of friendlies against non-London-based teams or of competing in the FA Cup, where they were routinely eliminated in the qualifying rounds.

The club’s attempt in 1892 to establish a southern version of the Football League was welcomed by many of London’s other clubs, but the proposal crumbled in the face of the London FA’s obdurate refusal to agree. Nevertheless, Royal Arsenal pressed ahead with their expansionist plans, forming in 1893 a limited company to secure funding for the purchase of the Manor Ground. ‘Royal’ seemed an inappropriate, and perhaps impertinent, title for the club’s new financial status, and the club’s name was changed to Woolwich Arsenal.

That same year – 1893 – saw a potentially momentous upturn in the club’s footballing and financial projections, the source for this unexpected reversal of fortune being the Football League.

5

Arsenal join the Football League

The English Football League was inspired by (yes, another) Scotsman, a director of Aston Villa, William McGregor. The League contained 12 professional clubs from the north and Midlands, and played its opening season in 1888/89.

From the start of season 1893/94 the League increased its Second Division from 12 to 15 clubs. Two First Division clubs haughtily refused relegation and quit, while two others were promoted, leaving space for five new entrants. Arsenal applied, were accepted and became the first southern club to join the League. Indeed, the potential for this move had been one of the main factors underlying the club’s recent financial activities.

The first game in their so-far brief but rapidly escalating career was at the revamped Manor Ground on 2 September 1893 against Newcastle United. With 10,000 spectators present, Woolwich Arsenal drew 2-2, with William Shaw scoring the club’s first-ever League goal, an encouraging result for the London side on this historic occasion.

6

Life in the Second Division

As the only southern club in the League, Woolwich Arsenal faced unreliable travel and substandard accommodation problems during their 11-year run in the lower division. As the club remained financially shaky, they also suffered from other League clubs enticing away several of their better players.

Nonetheless, they normally finished in or around mid-table at season’s end, with most of their victories at home and their arduous away trips ending in defeat. Season 1896/97 was their worst season, when they crashed to a record 8-0 League defeat at Loughborough Town, were eliminated from the FA Cup by lowly Southern League Millwall and finished tenth in the League.

Manager-less until now, they appointed two managers in quick succession and this helped their performances on the pitch (including a 12-0 revenge defeat of Loughborough Town, a result which still today remains their record score). However, from 1900/01 a new manager was to make a significant difference.

7

Arsenal’s first international player

At the start of the 1895/96 season, Woolwich Arsenal were joined by a quality centre-half, a position which, in those days, was a midfield one. Caesar Llewellyn Jenkyns was born in Wales (well, where else?) and looked every inch the aristocrat, from his proud demeanour to his luxuriant, waxed moustache.

He arrived from Small Heath, today’s Birmingham City, but his record belied his physical impression, as he had been sent off on at least four occasions, at a time when marching orders were extremely rare in the game, and he had assaulted remonstrating spectators. This tough and clearly determined player stayed with the club for only one season, during which, on 21 March 1896, he became the first Arsenal player to achieve international recognition when he was capped for his country in a game against Scotland.

He left at the season’s end for Newton Heath (Manchester United) and eventually retired to join the police force, a not inappropriate career decision, but his name endures in Arsenal’s history.

8

Bradshaw’s boys done well

The appointment in 1900 of Harry Bradshaw (again, a Scotsman) as manager gave renewed impetus to the club, who were losing players to the Boer War effort and who remained financially troubled.

Under Bradshaw’s stewardship, Woolwich Arsenal strengthened their defence while also adopting speedy movement and inventive, quick passing, due mainly to the majority of the team being Scottish. This ‘passing game’ was Scotland’s contribution to football, and Bradshaw’s astute selection and man-management skills encouraged its full deployment on the pitch. An early indication of the manager’s methods was that, in his first season of 1900/01, his team beat Blackburn Rovers in the FA Cup, thereby reaching the second round of the competition and also defeating a First Division side, both for the first time.