Anniversaries 09: September

September Anniversaries.  Last major update 1 September 2023

Note: The anniversary file pages have over time been split and split again as they have grown.  Please use the links at the foot of the page to find the month you want.  Source details appear there also.


 

1 September 1888: The first recorded pre-season friendly involving just Arsenal, in which Arsenal first team (The Probables) played the reserves (The Improbables).  A second match was arranged one week later, after which the matches against other clubs began.

1 September 1893: Kentish Mercury reported Jack Humble, the Woolwich Arsenal chairman, had presented the new Manor Ground to the press, along with an updated list of Division II fixtures.

1 September 1894: John Caldwell debut in the 5-2 defeat to Lincoln, after joining Arsenal from Hibs.  He played in all 30 league games in his debut season, and in the club’s FA Cup match.

1 September 1896: Woolwich Arsenal played their first ever pre-season friendly as a league club and beat Rossendale 4-0.

1 September 1897: First match for Fergus Hunt (who became the top scorer, getting fifteen goals in each of the 1897-98 and 1898-99  seasons) and for Roger Ord who went on to play 99 league and cup games.  Both players had been with Middlesbrough Ironopolis during their one and only season in the league.

1 September 1897: Andy Kennedy who gained two caps for Ireland, born.  He was signed by Leslie Knighton for Arsenal in 1922 having played originally for Glentoran.

1 September 1902: Roddy McEachrane’s first game.  Preston 2 Arsenal 2.  McEachrane played in 28 of the games in the season as Arsenal came third.  The following season both Preston and Arsenal were promoted.

1 September 1904: First game for Archibald Gray and Charlie Satterthwaite in a pre-season friendly.

1 September 1906:  Arsenal beat Manchester City away 1-4.  It was the last victory on the opening day of the season until 1913, in the first match at Highbury.

1 September 1909: First match for Frank Heppinstall. Aston Villa 5 Arsenal 1.  He had transferred from Swindon Town and went on to play 18 league games this season.  See also here

1 September 1910: Arsenal opened a new season with a 1-2 home defeat to eventual champions Man U in front of a crowd of 15,000   It was Alf Common’s first game.  See here for review of the team  Willis Rippon scored in his first match.  George Allison (later to be Arsenal manager – see 1934 below) edited (and indeed wrote) the programme.

1 September 1914: FA agreed that football for the 1914/15 season should continue despite Britain having declared war on 4 August 1914.

1 September 1914: Arsenal opened the season (v Glossop) as The Arsenal, having changed their name between 20-23 April.  There was a home league game on 23 April, and it is possible the new name was in the programme, but until we can get hold of a programme, it’s not clear if they changed the masthead for this match.  I suspect not.  Arsenal won 3-0 in front of a crowd of 7,000 – way down on last season because of the declaration of war.  It was the first  game for Frank Bradshaw  Christopher Buckley and Harry King who scored two goals.

1 September 1919: Daniel Burgess signed from Goldenhill Wanderers and made his league debut in a match against Liverpool.

1 September 1921: The  Borough Council of Poplar in London refused to collect part of its rates in protest against the way rates were calculated: an unprecedented form of rebellion by those representing a poor working class area.  30 councillors were sent to prison 

1 September 1923: Arsenal’s third match of the season (v Newcastle) and they lost – as they did all four opening games. Throughout the referee repeatedly lectured players on their behaviour.  After the day’s games Arsenal were bottom.

1 September 1934: First home match for George Allison as manager. Arsenal 8 Liverpool 1.  Ted Drake and Ray Bowden each score hattricks in front of 54,062.  Having won the league for the last two seasons expectations were very high despite Chapman’s death.   It was Jack Crayston’s first game.

1 September 1939: Germany invaded Poland, having been warned that such an action would be taken as an act of war against Britain.   “Operation Pied Piper” was announced: the evacuation of children began.  The army was mobilised and the blackout imposed.  BBC TV shut down but the Football League continued on the ground that war had not actually been declared.

1 September 1945, 21 days after the cessation of final hostilities, the FA Cup resumed.  The Football League reorganised yet again, this time into the Football League North and Football League South.  Although there was opposition to the move, thishad been approved on 25 July 1945.

1 September 1953: Ted Platt sold to Portsmouth.  Ted never made it as the first choice keeper, playing only when Swindin was injured until, in 1952, with Swindin out for much of the season, Ted Platt played in the first three games.  After letting in five goals in that short sequence was replaced by Jack Kelsey.

1 September 1970: Arsenal 0 Leeds 0. This was one of only three draws at home that season – every other home league match was won.  But after six games played Arsenal were still just sixth.

1 September 1983: Jose Antonio Reyes born.  Reyes joined Sevilla FC at the age of 10. and went on to play 86 games for Sevilla before moving to Arsenal.  He died in a car crash on 1 June 2019 aged just 35.

1 September 2001: Greg Lincoln signed for Stevenage Borough.  He was a Premier Youth League winner in 1998 but never played for the first team.  He had trials with a number of clubs before moving to Stevenage, but he only got one game with them. 

1 September 2003: Francis Jeffers loaned to Everton for season.  After that he moved to Charlton and continued moving from club to club until reaching Accrington Stanley in 2013.

1 September 2008: Kieran Gibbs signed a new contract with Arsenal after a loan period with Norwich.  By the start of the 2015/16 season he had played 111 league games for Arsenal.  He was eventually sold in 2017.

1 September 2009:  Uefa banned Eduardo for two games for “deceiving the referee” in Arsenal’s play-off match against Celtic after a furore by the media.  This totally overturned the standard view that the referee’s view was final.  He was subsequently found not guilty and pardoned.  No one from the media apologised for the wild accusations they had wrongly made.

1 September 2014: Ignasi Miquel sold to Norwich for £1.5m.  He played five times for Arsenal and seven times for Leicester on loan before his departure.

1 September 2014: Ryo Miyaichi loaned to Twente for the season.  But after eight games in the first team he was moved across to the reserve team and played 14 times for them.  By 2017 he was playing for the reserves of a 2nd division German team.

1 September 2020 Gabriel signed from Lille for £23.14m

1 September 2020: Henrickh Mkhitaryan was transferred to Roma on a free.

1 September 2022 Ainsley Maitland Niles joined Southampton on a one year loan.  Hector Bellerin joined Barcelona.

2 September 1666: Outbreak of the Great Fire of London.

2 September 1893: Woolwich Arsenal 2 Newcastle Utd 2.  This was the first ever league match of the club, with the goals coming from Shaw and Elliott.  Also see this report   And the original reports in the press.  Not one of  the Arsenal players this day played in the first match the following season.

2 September 1899: First league match under Harry Bradshaw.  It was also the first game for James Jackson who went on to play 183 league games for the club, and James Tennant who played 51 across two seasons before moving on to Middlesbrough. 

2 September 1901: First appearance for Thomas Briercliffe, Arsenal 2 Barnsley 1.  He played in all 34 league games that season and scored 11 goals.

2 September 1905: First appearance for James Sharp who had transferred from Fulham and for Jimmy Blair who had been transferred from Kilmarnock.  The season marked the first serious drive towards promotion by Woolwich Arsenal.

2 September 1908: First game under George Morrell: Arsenal 0 Everton 4.  Although Arsenal lost four of their first five games under Morrell, they recovered to end a very creditable sixth in Division 1.

2 September 1912: Start of final season at Plumstead: Arsenal 0 Manchester United 0.  The crowd was 8724 for this match, played in the monday evening twilight.

2 September 1916: Debut for Arthur Hutchins in a wartime friendly.  He had played for Croydon Common, who were the only Southern League club that failed to return after the first world war – Hutchin’s registration passing to Arsenal.

2 September 1916: saw one piece of uplifting war news as William Leefe-Robinson  became the first pilot to shoot down a German airship over Britain.  It was indeed the first sign that British forces could retaliate in the skies.

2 September 1920: Belgium 2 Czechoslovakia 0.  The Czech team walked off the pitch on 39 minutes complaining about the referee.  Such complaints are, of course, no longer allowed.

2 September 1933: Ralph Birkett, who was one of Chapman’s last signings, made his debut  against Sheffield Wednesday at Hillsborough.  In all he played 15 times in the side that won the second of the three titles in a row, sharing the number 7 position with Hulme and Beasley.

2 September 1939: Arsenal 5 Sunderland 2 (Dark 4, Drury).  This was the final match before World War II, the season then being abandoned after 3 games.  The crowd was 17,141.  A barrage balloon rose from behind the ground at the final whistle.

2 September 1958: Stan Charlton’s last game: Burnley 3 Arsenal 1.  He had made 110 league appearances, scoring three goals.  In December he moved to Leyton Orient and helped them gain promotion to the first division where their first match was against…. Arsenal.

2 September 1958: Cliff Holton’s last game.  He moved on to Watford, and then to Northampton where he became the club’s highest ever scorer in a single season.  He then moved on to Palace, Charlton, Watford (again) and Orient.

2 September 1961: Chris Whyte born in Islington.  He played 90 games for Arsenal including playing alongside David O’Leary in the early 1980s.  He played for Arsenal from 1978 to 1986.

2 September 1964: Johnny MacLeod sold to Aston Villa after 130 league games for Arsenal.  He continued playing until 1975 although the last three years were on a part-time basis.

2 September 1972:  With Charlie George unsettled he was dropped  to the bench for  the home game against Chelsea in a 1-1 draw at Highbury in front of 46,675.  Charlie came on as with 75 minutes gone, and seven minutes later  was booked for the second time in a week  One more would mean a ban under the new regulations.  Mee, perhaps in the first sign he was losing control of the squad, declined to talk to reporters.

2 September 1976: Eddie Kelly sold to QPR.  He had played 222 times for Arsenal including 175 in the first division and stayed one year at QPR before being signed by Frank McLintock at Leicester, leaving after three seasons as they were first relegated and then promoted as champions.  

2 September 1978:  Against QPR Arsenal played a front line of Sunderland, Walford, Stapleton, Rix with Brady and Price feeding the balls through to them.  And it worked a dream, the result being Arsenal 5 QPR 1 with 33,883 at Highbury and the goals coming from Stapleton (2), Rix (2) and Brady.

2 September 2009: Bendtner signed a new long term contract.  He was at Arsenal from 2005 to 2014, and his longevity at the club drew much criticism both for his lack of goals (24 in 108 league games), his perceived arrogance and eccentric lifestyle.

2 September 2009: Denilson signed a new long term contract.  There was hope for some time that he might become a replacement for Gilberto Silva, as a defensive midfielder, but although his positioning was excellent, his passing out lacked much of Gilberto’s simplicity and accuracy.

2 September 2012: Arsenal played their third league match after two without scoring and perhaps surprisingly beat Liverpool away 2-0.

2 September 2013: Arsenal announced that they had signed Mesut Ozil from Real Madrid for £42m.  It was by some margin Arsenal’s record signing thus far.

2 September 2014: Arsenal confirmed the signing of Danny Welbeck from Man U.for about £16m in the last few hours of the transfer window.  It was a transfer that surprised and to some degree split the fanbase.  He left Arsenal in the summer of 2019 on a free transfer.

2 September 2019: Arsenal loaned Mohamed Elneny to Turkish club Beşiktaş and Henrikh Mkhitaryan to Roma. Elneny was widely thought to have finished his time at Arsenal but returned to play in the 2020 Charity Shield match.

3 September 1898 John Dick played his first league game for Arsenal – a 1-0 away victory over Luton Town.  He was an ever present that season, playing in every league and cup match.

3 September 1904: First game in the first division; and the first under Phil Kelso as manager.  As with Arsenal’s first game in the second division the match was against Newcastle away, and Arsenal lost 0-3; Newcastle went on to win the league.  This was also the first game for James Henry Bigden a stalwart of West Ham, and Archi Gray who came from Hibernian.

3 September 1904:  Jock Rutherford scored the first goal that Woolwich Arsenal conceded as a First Division team.  But at the start of 1913/14 he was in dispute with Newcastle over wages and was sold to Woolwich Arsenal.  He was still playing for Arsenal in Chapman’s first season in 1925/6. 

3 September 1905: Jimmy Dunne born. He started with Shamrock Rovers, and then moved to New Brighton scoring six goals in his first eight league games. Then it was Sheffield United, who signed him in February 1926 – which is when he became a star. 

3 September 1906: Final game for Jimmy Blair, a 4-1 away defeat to Bury.  He played 13 league games and scored three goals for Arsenal.

3 September 1910: Bury 1 Arsenal 1. It may seem strange to think of Bury in the first division, but they were – and indeed they won the FA Cup in 1900 and 1903, recording the highest score in a Cup Final.  It was the first game for Harry Logan.

3 September 1910: Duncan McDonald’s last game for Arsenal.  He transferred from Arsenal in the summer of 1911 reportedly to West Hartlepool – but that seems very unlikely and it was probably Hartlepools United.

3 September 1914: The FA attempted to head off some of the negative publicity gained through the continuation of professional football during the 1914/15 season, by encouraging younger footballers to join up. However Charles Buchan wrote in his memoirs that when he told his employers at Sunderland FC of his intention to join up, they responded by threatening to sue him for breach of contract; so he didn’t volunteer until the summer of 1915.

3 September 1921.  Sheffield Utd 4 Arsenal 1 as Arsenal made it three defeats in succession at the start of the season for only the second time (the previous being 1894). Arsenal included 5 players who had not played the opening game one week before.

3 September 1932.  Arsenal 6 Sunderland 1 (Hulme 3, Coleman, Jack, Bastin) as Arsenal started an amazing 18 match run in which they won 15, drew 2 and suffered just one defeat scoring 66 goals in the process (3.66 a game)

3 September 1936: George Swindin played his first game for Arsenal as Arsenal lost 2-0 to Brentford.  He was signed by Allison after playing for Bradford City for two years.

3 September 1977: Ritchie Powling’s last game.  Arsenal 3 Nottingham Forest 0.  He had played 55 league games in all and scored three goals before moving on to QPR.

3 September 1988: “Never take too much notice of the first home game” was etched in the minds of supporters as Arsenal lost the first home game of the season: Arsenal 2 (Marwood, Smith) Aston Villa 3.  After five games and two defeats Arsenal were 7th.  We did however ultimately win the league.

3 September 1994: Billy Wright died aged 70 of stomach cancer.  After his utterly disastrous spell as manager of Arsenal, he became a television pundit and Head of Sport for ATV and Central Television, before joining the board of directors at Wolverhampton Wanderers. 

4 September 1891: Fred Pagnam born.  He was one of those rare men who while playing for Liverpool refused to be involved in the match fixing scandal of 1915 and testified against Liverpool at the subsequent hearing.  Not surprisingly Liverpool sold him as football resumed in 1919.

4 September 1893: First game for Frederick Davis – a friendly against Doncaster Rovers.  He went on to play 137 league games for Arsenal – the only league club he ever appeared for.

4 September 1915: Arsenal played their first ever wartime game in the London Combination – against Tottenham, winning 2-0 at Highbury in front of 14,819 fans.  Beale, of Man U played in goal as a guest player, allowable under the wartime rules.

4 September 1922: Ernie Williamson played in the 1-4 defeat to Burnley.  He kept his place for the next game – a 1-4 defeat to Cardiff, and that was his last match for Arsenal.

4 September 1923 Jock Rutherford – the oldest man ever to play for Arsenal, joined the club for the second time, after a short period managing Stoke.  Even after leaving Arsenal aged 41 he went on to play for Clapton Orient.

4 September 1926: Jimmy Dunne played his first game for Sheffield Utd… a 4–0 win against Arsenal. It would have been the first time that Chapman saw the man who became his last big money signing.

4 September 1937 – Arsenal beat Wolverhampton 5-0 to give a dream start of three straight wins and 12 goals, but then it started to go wrong with just one win in the next five.  Arsenal recovered however and went top on 19 February 1938, and then on to win the league.

4 September 1946: The Football League resumed at Highbury after the war although this match (Arsenal 1 Wolverhampton 6) showed that Arsenal were not the powerhouse they had been before the war.  Fortunately it only took one season for them to rebuild. 

4 September 1948: First game for Doug Lishman.  He had served in the Royal Marine Commandos during the Second World War and took part in the Walcheren Island landing in Holland.  He signed as a professional for Walsall after the second world war in August 1946 and in May 1948 moved to Arsenal for £10,500.

4 September 1956: Final match for Don Roper. He got two league winner’s medals, and played as a regular for Arsenal until 3 December 1955 – his final match being a 1-2 home defeat to Preston on 4 September 1956.   He played 321 matches for Arsenal in total, scoring 95 goals.

4 September 1963: WBA 4 Arsenal 0.  This made it three defeats in the opening four games with a goal record of scored six, conceded 16.  The result left Arsenal 21st out of 22 – with the 22nd team having a game in hand!

4 September 1965: Arsenal had played four, drawn two and lost one but worse was to come with a 22 match sequence with only two wins in the second half of the season, incorporating the infamous 0-3 defeat to Leeds in front of 4,554 spectators on May 5.   But everyone knew, long before that, that Wright’s days were over.

4 September 1968: Jim Furnell sold for £8,000 to Rotherham United having played 167 league and cup matches for Arsenal. He moved to Plymouth Argyle in 1970, retiring from playing in 1976.   In 2003, Jim Furnell was named as goalkeeper in Plymouth’s greatest all-time team, by the club supporters.

4 September 1971: West Bromwich Albion 0 Arsenal 1 in front of 29,922.   The pre-match talk in the press was about there being bad-feeling between Don Howe, now managing West Brom, and his former team-mates, but after the game that was forgotten amidst the relief that Roberts had scored his first ever goal for Arsenal.

4 September 1975:  Walley Barnes died aged 55.  Towards the end of his playing career he was also manager of Wales, and then moved on to work for the BBC, and was a commentator on the very first edition of Match of the Day in 1964.  

4 September 1979: Arsenal’s biggest league cup win beating Leeds 7-0 after a 1-1 draw at Elland Rd.  Alan Sunderland got a hat trick and Liam Brady scored two penalties, Nelson and Stapleton were the other scorers.

4 September 1984: Newcastle, who had had a perfect start to the season, lost 2-0 to Arsenal, a result which led onto that of 8 September when Arsenal went top Division One for the first time since February 1973, after a  3-1 win over Liverpool.

4 September 1986: Perry Groves signed from Colchester whom he had joined in 1981.  He played 142 league games for them and scored 26 goals before moving for  £50,000: the first Arsenal signing of George Graham. 

4 September 2000: Igors Stepanovs signed from Skonto Riga for £1.35m as cover for the injured Tony Adams.  He had played 129 times for the team.  He retired in 2011 having played 100 times for Latvia and became manager of the national under 17 squad.l 

4 September 2009 Johan Djourou underwent surgery on his left knee cartilage after 2011.  He was last spotted playing for SPAL in the Italian first division in 2018/19.

4 September 2020: Dani Ceballos arrived on loan from Real Madrid

4 September 2022: After a five game run of straight wins at the start of the season which utterly confounded the mass media (who had predicted Arsenal would end up 5th or 6th), Arsenal lost to Manchester United.  Arsenal had a goal disallowed which was later reported to be one of a series of VAR errors during the early part of the season.

5 September 1882:  Hotspur Football Club formed.   While Arsenal (four years later) was very much the working men’s club made up of men from the munitions factories, Hotspur was formed by grammar-school boys from the Bible class at a local church.  

5 September 1891:  Gavin Crawford’s debut for Royal Arsenal; he is reputed to have been the first professional signed by the club.   He played 83 senior games scoring 49 goals for Royal Arsenal 1891 to 1893  and went on to make 138 league appearances becoming the first man to reach 100 games for Arsenal.

5 September 1891:  The first round of league matches in which penalties could be awarded, we played, after a change in the laws of the game.  But neither here nor on the following weekend was any penalty given.  65 goals were scored in the 15 games – an average of 4.33 goals a game before the first penalty was awarded on 14 September.

5 September 1896: Roston Bourke’s XI played against Reading in Reading’s first game at their new ground in Elm Park.  Bourke was a referee with his own team who went on to write the Norseman column in the Islington Gazette after Arsenal moved to Highbury.

5 September 1903: Percy Sands’ first League game: Arsenal 3 Blackpool 0.  He was a south Londoner, who trained as a teacher, signing for Arsenal from Cheltenham Town.

5 September 1908: Notts C 2 Arsenal 1.  First game for David Greenaway. At the age of 19 he came south to London looking for work, and became one of George Morrell’s first recruits for the side. 

5 September 1914: From the start of the season there was huge opposition to continuing the league in wartime, and the crowd of 8000 at Highbury for the second match of  the campaign suggested the football going public were not impressed.   Arsenal lost 0-1 to Wolverhampton Wanderers.  

5 September 1921: After three straight defeats at the opening of the season, Arsenal won their first game, beating Preston 1-0.  What made it rather extraordinary was that Preston were unbeaten in their three games up to that point. 

5 September 1931:  Arsenal, the champions last season with a record number of points, drew 2-2 with Birmingham City meaning after 3 games Arsenal still did not have a win. Lambert and Hulme got the goals.  The following day the Chancellor Philip Snowden announced salary cuts for all government staff, and reductions to unemployment benefit.

5 September 1934: Arsenal beat Blackburn 4-0. Drake got another two, Bowden and Bastin the others.  It meant that in three games Arsenal had scored 15 goals

5 September 1964: The season had opened with two defeats, a draw and a win.  But then on September 5 the result was Wolverhampton 0 Arsenal 1.  This was followed by a draw and three more wins. 

5 September 1970.  Arsenal 2 Tottenham 0 to make it 3 wins 3 draws and a defeat.  League match 7 of the first Double season.  Armstrong got both goals.  The return match was played on the last day of the season and won Arsenal the league. 

5 September 1972: With Arsenal top of the league they turned to the League Cup, taking on Everton at Highbury and winning… 1-0.  The low scores were getting to be a habit.

5 September 1977: Richard Wright born.  He joined Ipswich Town as a trainee, and played more than 200 times for them between 1995 and 2001 before moving to Arsenal.

5 September 1991: With Steve Morrow loaned to Watford and Alan Miller loaned to WBA, Andy Cole went on loan to Fulham on this day.  We were wondering if someone was going to come in… and then we found out….

5 September 1992: Wimbledon 3 Arsenal 2, the 3rd defeat in the first seven league games.  Ian Wright got both Arsenal goals in a game played in front of 12,906 fans.

5 September 2001: Bukayo Saka born.

6 September 1620: The Mayflower set sail from Plymouth.  The debate continues as to whether that was a good idea. 

6 September 1890: Royal Arsenal played their first match at the Invicta ground – a friendly against the 3rd Highlanders, and drew 1-1 in front of a crowd of 7,000. 

6 September 1902: League debut for Tim Coleman against Preston North End.  He had joined after periods with Kettering and Northampton Town.

6 September 1905: Morris Bates died from TB aged 41.  He was the captain when Royal Arsenal won their first two trophies and played 73 first team games for Royal Arsenal between 1896 and 1890.

6 September 1913 First match at Highbury.  Arsenal beat Leicester Fosse 2-1 in what was the first opening day victory since 1906.  20,000 present.  George Jobey scored the first Arsenal goal at the ground but was later taken off injured.  See also George Jobey,  The Day it Began and Season Ticket Prices.

6 September 1913: Arsenal released a picture of the players in maroon shirts as their justification for the shirt colour change for the final season at Highbury, saying it was taken on this date, but at least three players in the picture were not at the club in September 1913.  In fact the club did not play in those colours through the first Highbury season and the research suggests this was probably in an away game.

6 September 1919: Newcastle beat Arsenal for a second time 3-1 in front of 45,000.  Curiously, after three games not one team had a 100% record, and only one of the teams that had played their first two games at home had won both of them (Sheffield United).  Everyone, it seemed, was having trouble settling down in this first post-war season.

6 September 1923:  Jock Rutherford returned from being manager of Stoke for a few weeks and to get fit turned out for Arsenal reserves who were the reigning Football combination champions.  Arsenal reserves however lost against Brighton and Hove Albion.

6 September 1924: Arsenal beat Liverpool 2-0, Woods getting both goals in front of 45,000.    This was the first time in the club’s history that they had won the opening three league games of a season in the first division and they had done it without conceding a goal!

6 September 1926: Bolton 2 Arsenal 2.   As Chapman got into his second season he responded to a 0-4 defeat to Sheffield United in the third game of the season by giving debuts for Wally Hardinge, Joe Lievesley. Jack Lambert and Jack Lee 

6 September 1933:  Arsenal played their third game – home to WBA.   West Brom had come fourth last season, but in their openers this time had won one and lost one, and Arsenal seemed to have little difficulty brushing them aside, 3-1.

6 September 1934: The BBC’s most powerful long-wave transmitter, Droitwich Transmitting Station, started transmitting at 200 kilohertz (1500m).  This transmitter took over the National Programme on which Saturday afternoon football commentaries were broadcast – and which until this season had often featured George Allison as commentator.  Allison however was now otherwise engaged having been made Arsenal manager.

6 September 1958.  Arsenal beat Everton 6-1 away.  Looking back it seemed like a freak result, (until 15 August 2009 when it happened again).  Herd scored four, Groves and Bloomfield the others.  Amazingly three days later Arsenal beat Bolton by the same score – the only time this has happened in Arsenal’s history.

6 September 1969: Eddie Kelly made his debut against Sheffield Wednesday. Eddie said at an AISA meeting that he had a nightmare game but was told by Bertie Mee that he would play the next ten games to see how things went.

6 September 1975: Arsenal had another home game ending Arsenal 1 Leicester City 1.  The attendance was again poor; just 22,005.  Stapleton played his second game for the club, in the place of the injured Radford, and showed great promise.  But aside from that Arsenal had little coherence and looked like a club in transition.

6 September 1986: Last game for Stewart Robson before moving on to West Ham and then Coventry City.  In five years he played 150 times for Arsenal in the league scoring 16 goals.

6 September 1995: The Colombian goalkeeper Rene Higuita save a cross from Redknapp in a match at Wembley by performing a scorpion kick – the first such save seen in an international match – probably in any match.

6 September 2000: Chelsea 2 Arsenal 2.  This was the last time Arsenal played on this date as from here on Uefa designated early September as a time for (often pointless and meaningless) international matches.  Silvinho and Henry scored in what was part of a 15 match unbeaten run.

7 September 1896 Arsenal 3 Rushden Town 2.  The first ever United League match for Woolwich Arsenal.  The club entered its first team into the 8 team league with the matches arranged to bring some income in addition to that of Football League games.

7 September 1889: Charlie Booth’s first league game for Wolverhampton prior to moving to Arsenal.   In total he played 73 games and scored 10 goals before moving to Woolwich Arsenal in 1892 – the year before the club joined the League, and played in Arsenal’s first ever league match.

7 September 1901:  Arsenal beat Leicester Fosse 2-0   It was the first time ever that Arsenal had won their first two matches of the season!  Tommy Briercliffe scored his first goal for the club.

7 September 1912:  Having drawn their opening game, Woolwich Arsenal travelled to Liverpool for their next fixture having never won at Anfield, drawing two and losing seven, with Liverpool winning the corresponding fixture 4-1 the previous season.  This year Arsenal lost 0-3.

7 September 1918: The start of the fourth and last wartime league of the era.  On this day Arsenal were away to QPR but with victory on the battlefield edging closer there was already talk of how football would be reformed once peace was restored.

7 September 1925:  This was the season when the offside rule was changed to increase goal scoring, but the result Leicester City 0 Arsenal 1 meant Arsenal had scored four goals in four games, and the explosion of goals was (as yet) not happening on a regular basis – at least not for Arsenal.

7 September 1945: Peter Storey born.  He was a member of the Arsenal youth team in 1961/2 and then moved into the first team making his debut in 1965 and going on to play 391 league games for Arsenal. 

7 September 1949  WBA 1 Arsenal 2.  Freddie Cox’s first match with the goals scored by Lewis and Barnes.  Freddie went on to play 32 of the remaining games of the season.

7 September 1974: After five games Arsenal were 14th with just two wins and three defeats from the opening games.  And on this day it got worse with the result: Arsenal 0 Burnley 1.  Only 23,586 showed up and by now everyone knew Arsenal were in real trouble.

7 September 1991: Arsenal 1 Coventry 2.  Lee Dixon, ten yards out from his own goal near the touch line, punted the ball back to Seaman but it went beyond his grasping hand and into the net.  It caused Arsenal’s first home defeat in a year and a half.

7 September 1996: Final match of Stewart Houston’s reign as temporary manager; 2-2 draw with Aston Villa.  He had managed six games while waiting for Arsène Wenger to arrive, but won just two of them.

7 September 2007: Arsène Wenger signed a contract extension rumoured to be costing the club £4m a year – a figure on a par with many of the players in his teams.

7 September 2012: Chuks Aneke loaned to Crewe Alexandra for whom over two seasons he played 70 games scoring 20 goals.  In 2014, he signed permanently for Zulte Waregem. After 2 years there he returned to play for MK Dons and in 2019 signed for Charlton Athletic.

8 September 1869: Arthur George Worrall born.  He played centre forward starting with Goldthorne Villa, and then followed spells with Wolverhampton Wanderers, Burton Swifts, and Leicester Fosse, before joining Woolwich Arsenal

8 September 1888: The first Football League games were played – although without complete agreement on how the League table would be constructed.  The first ever League goal was an own goal by Aston Villa defender Gershom Cox.  Jerry Cooper was a member of Wolverhampton team vs Aston Villa and he joined Arsenal in 1893.

8 September 1894: Henry Boyd scored his first goal.  Of all the players who played 30+ games for the club he had the highest goals to games ratio scoring 32 goals in 41 league games between September 1894 and December 1896. 

8 September 1915: The 177th (Fulham) Royal Field Artillery Brigade which was raised and paid for by Henry Norris and the 182nd (ditto) marched through the streets of Fulham for the first time as they waited to be amalgamated into a regiment.

8 September 1915: Arsenal beat Glossop North End winning 4-0 away with King getting another two goals.  For the third match running the crowd was small – again just 7000.  But Arsenal had scored seven goals in the first three games: not a bad start.

8 September 1919:  Tottenham, who had been beaten to a place in Division 1 by Arsenal in the summer were already top of the 2nd Division, having won all three games scoring 13 and conceding one, seeming to justify their claim for a place in the first division.  But Arsenal beat Liverpool 1-0 on this day to help establish their credentials in the 1st division.

8 September 1923: Jock Rutherford returned to Arsenal after a very brief period as manager of Stoke

8 September 1925: The fact that Bromley Council wanted changes to the plans for buildings proposed by Sir Henry Norris’ company suggests that Sir Henry was handing over more and more of his affairs to his staff in his building business as well as at Arsenal. Requests for changes never happened when he was personally overseeing the applications.

8 September 1934:  Arsenal were away to Leeds who had already suffered two defeats, and gained a draw and one win.   The game ended 1-1 with Drake getting the goal.   The result left the league with a top four of  Sunderland, Sheffield W, Preston  and Arsenal.

8 September 1936:  Welsh nationalists set fire to RAF Penrhos bombing school, thus creating the Tân yn Llŷn (Fire in Llŷn) protests.  The UK government had been thwarted by local pressure for the site to be in Northumberland and Dorset, but then pushed through the development in Wales against enormous opposition.

8 September 1938: Arsenal were away to Brentford who last season had looked for a while as if they might become champions.  The 0-1 defeat for Arsenal was a disappointment as the club had been able to play the same line-up for the third league match running.  It was not a promising start to the season.

8 September 1954: The first of just two games for goalkeeper Ralph Guthrie.  A 2-1 away defeat to Manchester City.  He signed from Tow Law Town but after two seasons moved on to Hartlepools Utd.

8 September 1970.  Arsenal offered £125,000 for WBA midfielder Bobby Hope but the deal came to nothing and Hope stayed at Albion until 1972, when he moved to Birmingham City.

8 September 1971: Arsenal 1 Barnsley 0 in front of 27,294 in the league cup.  Marinello and Roberts made their first starts of the season.   Arsenal took an early lead through Kennedy and then played as if the whole game was a bit of a bore for such high calibre players forced to face third division opposition.

8 September 1979: A mere 16,429 bothering to pay to see Arsenal lose 2-3 to Derby who had previously only scored one goal in the season.  Meanwhile the national transfer record was broken for the second time in four days when Wolverhampton Wanderers paid Aston Villa £1.5m for Andy Gray.  Arsenal had made no big purchase to replace Macdonald, and still they made no move.

8 September 1984: Arsenal topped the league for the first time in 12 years after beating Liverpool 3-1 at Highbury in front of 50,006.  Arsenal had won three, drawn one and lost one – but sadly slipped in the next match – a 2-1 defeat to Ipswich.

8 September 2001: Chelsea 1 Arsenal 1.  League match 4 of the third Double season.  Henry scored, and after four games Arsenal had two wins one defeat and one draw.  But perhaps more interestingly, Arsenal had scored 10 and conceded 3.

8 September 2016: Crystal Palace signed Matt Flamini who had been released at the end of the 2015/16 season.  He thus continued his run of transfers without once having been the subject of a transfer fee.  After leaving Palace he played for Getafe in La Liga – moving there again without a fee.

8 September 2022: Arsenal mae it 7 wins out of 8 by beating Zurich in the opening Europa League game.  Marquinhos and Turner made their club debuts.  At half-time, the death of Queen Elizabeth II was announced and Arsenal’s players returned wearing black armbands.

9 September 1893: Arsenal’s first defeat in the league: Notts County 3 Woolwich Arsenal 2.  Elliott and Shaw scored Arsenal’s goals making it one draw and one defeat in the opening two matches. Billy Heath (the man who scored football’s first penalty in the league) made his Arsenal debut.  In the next game he scored Arsenal’s first ever hattrick.  

9 September 1911: First game for George Grant.  His career incorporated Woolwich Arsenal, The Arsenal and Arsenal, ending with the cessation of football for the first world war.   In all he made 57 league appearances  and scored four goals.

9 September 1916: Arsenal played Tottenham at Highbury, in front of an impressive crowd of 10,000 for a match in the wartime league.  It ended as a 1-1 draw. 

9 September 1921: Charlie Chaplin returned to his home in London and was welcomed by huge crowds.

9 September 1922.  Tim Williamson dropped as goalkeeper after a series of poor performances, with Arsenal having lost all four opening games conceding 10, scoring one.  It was the first time Arsenal had failed to get a single point in the opening four matches.  However Arsenal’s first eight games were against last season’s top four!

9 September 1925: Newcastle United 1 Blackburn Rovers 7.  It was a game that forced Newcastle to rethink their defence in the light of the offside rule changes.  They did that and on 3 October beat Arsenal 7-0.

9 September 1931: Games were overshadowed by the death of John Thomson, the Celtic goalkeeper who died in hospital after fracturing his skull in a collision with Rangers forward Sam English in the match at Ibrox.  On this day Arsenal played Birmingham City away, and still could not get their first win – the game ending in a 2-2 draw, Lambert and Hulme getting the goals

9 September 1933: Arsenal were home to Manchester City who had missed relegation by four points the previous season.  The team included Jack Lambert for his third match in a row but the following month he was transferred to Fulham having played 143 league games for Arsenal and scored an amazing 98 league goals plus 11 in 16 Cup games.

9 September 1936: Arsenal played out a 1-1 draw with Brentford, making it four games and one win, and although the newspapers did not publish league tables this early in the season had they done so they would have found Arsenal sitting in 13th.  It was Jackie Milne’s first match.

9 September 1969.  Arsenal 3 Glentoran 0.  Fairs Cup 1st round 1st leg.  The start of the journey to the first Euro trophy.  Graham got two of the goals and Gould the third, but only 24,292 turned up at Highbury.

9 September 1972: Newcastle 2 Arsenal 1 with a disappointing attendance of 23,849 perhaps fans realising how dull these teams had become – it took 20 minutes for a shot to get anywhere near the target and Arsenal played their off-side game.  Just over a year after the double it was boring boring Arsenal

9 September 1976: Pat Howard signed   Arsenal were using O’Leary and Simpson as their central defenders for the season, but with both out injured emergency cover was sought and Howard arrived from Newcastle.

9 September 1978: Arsenal lost 2-1 away to Nottm Forest after Brady had got matters going on six minutes with a 30 yard free kick to Stapleton who volleyed home.  The game also marked the third and final league appearance of Jimmy Harvey.  He moved on to Hereford in March 1980.

9 September 1981: Steve Gatting sold to Brighton and Hove Albion.  Having only played 58 league games for Arsenal he went on to play 316 times for Brighton in the league, before ending his playing career with Charlton.

9 September 1981: Norway 2 England 1 in the World Cup stunned the nation, leading Norwegian journalist Bjørge Lillelien to say, “Your boys took a hell of a beating” which became internationally famous.  Sadly Bjørge died in 1987 aged 60 from cancer.

9 September 1987: Alexandre Dimitri Song Billong was born in Cameroon.  One of 28 children, at 16 he moved to France and signed for Bastia becoming part of the team after one season, and was selected for France Under 16s. In 2018 he moved to Swiss team Sion.

10 September 1894:  First match for Patrick O’Brien in the second match of the second league season, Patrick playing inside left – it was a 1-3 home defeat to Grimsby, meaning Arsenal had lost both opening games.

10 September 1904: Arsenal’s first home match in the First Division.  Arsenal 0 Preston North End  0.  It took Arsenal four games to get a win, but ultimately they finished a creditable 10th out of 18 in the top league.

10 September 1910: Woolwich Arsenal 0 Sheffield United 0.  The crowd was 14,000 and the result left Arsenal with two draws and a defeat from the first three games.  At least having already lost three key players in the first two games there were no more injuries.  Arsenal were 12th out of 20, and just one point above the bottom placed club. See also here.

10 September 1921:  Arsenal was, for the first time in the season, able to field the same XI for two games running in the match v Manchester City.  It didn’t help matters much however as Arsenal lost 0-2 to the club that Knighton claimed had offered him the job as manager prior to the start of the season.

10 September 1923: Arsenal 4 West Ham 1.  The game is significant because Arsenal’s manager Knighton wrote in his autobiography that he gave drugs to his players one year later when facing West Ham because they were such a fearsome, frightening team.  He obviously forgot he had “hammered” them just one year before!

10 September 1930: The Daily Mirror published its picture of the clock with a 45 minute face, installed at the Laundry End of Highbury, a picture which thus helped Arsenal History Society correct an error in the long-told but erroneous story about the origins of the Arsenal clock.  See also here.

10 September 1931: Jimmy Brain sold to Tottenham for £2,500.  He had scored 125 goals in 204 league games but with his form failing and Jack Lambert, David Jack and Dave Halliday in the squad he was given a transfer.  He played 45 times for Tottenham in the league and scored 10.

10 September 1932: Manchester City 2 Arsenal 3 which took Arsenal up to 5th.   But the best news was the team was now settled – the line up was exactly the same as for the previous game, and Chapman teams were at their best when settled.  Jack got the first goal, Coleman the other two.

10 September 1938: Everton were top of the league having won all three of their opening fixtures.  They had won the league in 1932, but for the last three seasons ended each season below half way.  Now however they were looking like their old selves, and with Arsenal looking increasingly uncertain Everton won 1-2 at Highbury.  It was the last game for Eddie Carr.

10 September 1947.  Arsenal beat Bolton 2-0 to complete six straight wins at the start of the season for the first time ever.  Arsenal were not beaten until game 18 on November 29.

10 September 1958.  David Jack died, aged 60.  After retiring from playing, he became manager of Southend United, Middlesbrough and Shelbourne Utd, retiring from football in 1955.  

10 September 1962: David Court’s league debut in Aston Villa 3 Arsenal 1.  Joe Baker scored.  The result left Arsenal with five defeats and a draw in the last six games.

10 September 1968: Pat Rice’s international debut.  Between 1968 and 1979 he played 49 times for Northern Ireland.

10 September 1974: In 1973 Arsenal had lost in the League Cup to Tranmere.  This season it was Arsenal 1 Leicester City 1 (Kidd scored) but we lost the replay 1-2.

10 September 1980: Graham Rix full international debut.  He had played seven times for England’s under 21s and went on to play 17 times for the first team but without scoring.  See also here

10 September 1988: Tottenham 2 Arsenal 3.  The press called it a “surreal free for all” as all five goals came in 12 minutes in the first half.

10 September 1994: Second consecutive 0-0 for Arsenal, and fourth goalless game in a row,  It was part of a run in which Arsenal won only two in the first eight games of the season.

10 September 1995: Last appearance of Eddie McGoldrick.  Man City 0 Arsenal 1.  After five games Rioch got his first win as Arsenal manager with Wright’s third goal of the season.

10 September 2002: Arsenal 2 Manchester City 1.  Arsenal went top after this 5th game unbeaten.  It was also the first of five consecutive wins.  Wiltord and Henry scored.

10 September 2005: Arsenal lost 2-1 away to Middlesbrough, a team we were used to beating easily.  Previously Chelsea beat Arsenal for the first time in the league for just on 10 years.

10 September 2008: Theo Walcott became the youngest player to score hat-trick for England in a 4-1 win over Croatia played in Zagreb.

10 September 2011: After a strange transfer deadline day, plus two defeats and a goalless draw, Arsenal got their first win of the season, 1-0 against Swansea with Arshavin scoring.  It was an important win since in the previous match before the international break, Arsenal had lost 8-2 to Manchester United.

10 September 2016: Following one win, one draw and one defeat Arsenal beat Southampton with a goal from Cazorla in the fourth minute of added time.  Southampton had five players booked, four of them in the last eight minutes of the match.

10 September 2021: Olowu joined Doncaster Rovers on loan.

11 September 1893.  The first ever league win.  Woolwich Arsenal 4 Walsall Town Swifts 0; John Heath scored the first ever Arsenal hat-trick in the Football League. See also here.

11 September 1900: Jimmy Brain born.   He played for Ton Pentre having worked previously as a coal miner and at the age of 23 he was sold to Arsenal.  

11 September 1913: Rather curiously Arsenal played an away friendly with QPR on this day, using mostly a reserve team, which Arsenal won 2-0.  This was probably part payment for the use of QPR’s ground for a practice match while Highbury was being completed.

11 September 1915: The “Group and Canvas” army recruitment scheme closed with Fulham council reporting 6210 volunteers – a far bigger number than in other council areas where the scheme had been far less effectively administered. As a result of this Henry Norris, the chairman of Arsenal, came to the notice of the wartime authorities as an administrator, which led to his being sent to Woking to sort out their recruitment, and eventually his rise to Colonel in the War Office.

11 September 1915: Arsenal’s second wartime league game – a 3-1 away defeat to Crystal Palace. on 11 September.  Only 4000 people turned up – a sign that the wartime league would struggle to bring in the crowds.

11 September 1920: Arsenal beat Manchester City, with a very acceptable crowd of 42,000.  The reports of the game noticed a general improvement in Arsenal’s play, although much of the commentary was on the fine late summer weather. 

11 September 1922: Arsenal’s annual reports showed a huge drop in the amount of money owed by the club.  The debt to Humphreys Ltd (the builders involved in developing Highbury) was now down to £317 from £16,000 in 1919. It was a real sign that Arsenal could become a debt free self-financing club within a year. The aim was to transfer ownership to the fans.

11 September 1929: Arsenal 3 Manchester City 2.  Leonard Thompson played in this and three other games at the start of the season.  Arsenal won the first three but after losing 5-2 to Aston Villa he was dropped and played just five more games before leaving the club.

11 September 1935: With Hapgood, James and Bastin missing there were worries about the day’s game but Arsenal beat Grimsby 6-0.   Milne scored a hattrick, Beasley, Bowden and Drake getting the others. 

11 September 1943: Alf Kirchen’s final match, played in the wartime league.   In the war he joined the RAF as a physical training instructor, and played 116 wartime games for Arsenal scoring 81 goals but was injured in this game which meant he was unable to return to playing professionally after the war.

11 September 1946: John Roberts born in Abercynon, Rhondda Cynon Taff and played initially for Abercynon Athletic while also working as a railway fireman.  He moved to Swansea Town in 1963, turned pro in 1964, gradually moving from being a forward to a centre half (number 5).

11 September 1971: Arsenal 2 Leeds 0. After three successive league defeats and one win, during which Arsenal scored just two goals, this was the match that mattered against a club that had become as big a rival to Arsenal as Tottenham.

11 September 1973: After 3 defeats and a draw, with Arsenal scoring 2 and conceding 10, Arsenal finally beat Sheffield Utd 1-0 on 11 September.  The crowd was 29,434, with Kennedy getting the goal.

11 September 1976: Arsenal 2 West Ham 0.  First game for Pat Howard having been signed two days before from Newcastle to cover for O’Leary and Simpson, both of whom were injured.  Ross and Stapleton scored. See also here.

11 September 1979: Paul Davis’ first appearance for Arsenal, in Ted Drake’s testimonial against Fulham.  It ended 2-2.  See also here.

11 September 1998: Fredrik Ljungberg  joined Arsenal  from Halmstads BK. It was said that Arsène Wenger had never seen him play when he signed him.  It seems unlikely but Ljungberg repaid the faith (if it was so) by scoring within seconds of coming on against Manchester United in his debut on 20 September 1998.

11 September 2003: 16 year old Cesc Fabregas joined Arsenal from FC Barcelona (for whom he had signed aged 10).    It is said that his first coach, Señor Blai, reportedly did not select Fàbregas for matches against Real Madrid in an attempt to hide him from their scouts.  The same story is told word for word about Bellerin.

11 September 2004: Arsenal won their 5th consecutive game of the season beating Fulham 3-0 away.  In these five opening games Arsenal scored 3 or more each time, and scored a total of 18 goals.  

11 September 2010: Arsenal continued their perfect home form beating Bolton 4-1 and making it 10 goals in two home games.  Koscielny, Chamakh, Song, Vela scored.

11 September 2021: Following a co-ordinated campaign of attack upon Arsenal by the media in commentating Arsenal losing the first three games of the season, Arsenal won their fourth match.  In fact, although not reported in any newspaper or by any broadcaster a league table constructed from match 4 (on this day) onward, showed Arsenal 3rd by the end of the season, showing how far the club recovered from the opening games.

11 September 2021: David Luiz joins Brazilian club Flamengo.

12 September 1878: Jimmy Ashcroft, Woolwich Arsenal’s first England player, born.  He played for Wilbyn’s United, Garston Copperworks, Everton and Gravesend United, before reaching Woolwich Arsenal.   He is recorded as being an amateur for Everton, and so presumably was also of the same status for the clubs listed before that. 

12 September 1891: Penalties had been introduced for the first time this season, but thus far after two saturdays, none was awarded.  However there was an average of 4.33 goals a game, so maybe none was needed.

12 September 1903: Gainsborough Trinity 0 Arsenal 2 (attendance 3000).  This was Arsenal’s 4th match of the season (two in the FL two in the London League) and Arsenal had won all four, including beating Tottenham away.  It was by far the best start thus far and went on to be the best start ever.

12 September 1912: Leslie Compton born in Woodford.  Like his brother he played cricket for Middlesex, but it was at football that he excelled.   He came to Arsenal straight from Middlesex Schools, and played as an amateur in 1930.

12 September 1914: With the club now renamed “The Arsenal,” the victory over Fulham 3-0 on this day meant they had three wins and one defeat thus far, scoring 10 conceding one.

12 September 1919: First league game for Arthur Hutchins; a 1-1 away draw with Sunderland

12 September 1925: Sammy Haden’s cross shot is going in, but Buchan touches it at the last second, and costs Sir Henry Norris personally,  £100.  It was Buchan’s first goal for Arsenal, and as a result of the transfer deal, Sir Henry paid £100 per goal (approx £5700 in 2019). The media got very excited.  See also here.

12 September 1925: With Arsenal now managed by Chapman and having a good start to the season, Tottenham had gone one better with four straight wins taking them to the top of the league but with Everton 1 Tottenham 1 on this day started to lose their way.

12 September 1929: Sidney Hoar sold to Clapton Orient for £1000.  In all, he played 117 matches for Arsenal and scored 18 goals, before playing at Orient for one season before retiring in the summer of 1930 at the age of 35.

12 September 1931: Arsenal played Sunderland at Highbury and finally, in front of a very disappointing crowd of 22,926, got the win they wanted.  It was Arsenal’s second worst home crowd of the season.  David Jack was out through injury but Parkin proved an admirable substitute at inside right.  

12 September 1934: Arsenal v Rangers was the third in the series of games instituted by Chapman resulted in a 1-1 draw.  Reserve players Sidey, Marshall, Dunne and Dougall (all of whom made appearances in the league during the season) played.  Bastin got the goal in front of 53,000, showing just how intrigued the fans had become with such games.

12 September 1953: Arsenal lost 7-1 away to Sunderland.  It was the 8th game of the season and Arsenal were left bottom of the table with two draws and six defeats.  They scored six and let in 18 in these games.  

12 September 1953: Final appearance for George Swindin.  He had played 271 league games and 23 Cup games and was granted a free transfer to become player manager of non-league Peterborough the following spring.

12 September 1958: Billy McCullough signed from Portadown in N Ireland, one of George Swindin’s first signings.  He was initially deputy to Dennis Evans, but eventually took over at left back.

12 September 1966: Alan Skirton sold to Blackpool for £65,000.  He played 144 league games for Arsenal as a winger and scored 53 goals.  After Blackpool he moved on to Bristol City and Torquay.

12 September 1970: Burnley 1 Arsenal 2 in front of just 12,675.  League match 8 of the first Double season.   Kennedy and Radford scored to make it four wins, three draws and one defeat thus far.

12 September 1974:  After 44 days in charge of Leeds United and with the players seemingly rather upset by the way they were being managed, Brian Clough was relieved of his duties.  

12 September 1987: Nottingham Forest 0 Arsenal 1, as Arsenal started a series of 10 straight wins (ending November 14).  Alan Smith scored and it was also the start of five games without conceding a goal.

12 September 1996: Pat Rice took over from Stewart Houston as manager, Houston leaving after it became clear that he was not in line to take over from Bruce Rioch.  Pat managed three games, winning all three, with Arsenal scoring eight conceding one, before Arsene Wenger arrived and made Pat his deputy.

12 September 1998: Arsène Wenger announced that he was looking for a new striker to replace Ian Wright, and would like to sign Emile Heskey.  He didn’t but instead used Anelka and Kanu, along with Bergkamp, as the main source of goals until Thierry Henry arrived. 

12 September 2009: Tomáš Rosický came on after 51 minutes v Manchester City, marking his return with a goal and an assist.  However Arsenal lost 4-2 to make it two wins and two defeats in the first four matches, scoring 13 conceding 8!

12 September 2020: Arsenal started the new season (much delayed due to coronavirus) as FA Cup holders, and began with a 0-3 away win against Fulham.

13 September 1890: H. Simmons played for Royal Arsenal Reserves at centre forward for the first time, despite having only one arm.

13 September 1909: Ray Bowden born in Cornwall.  He started out as a solicitor’s clerk but his goal scoring with Looe (in one match he scored ten) led to him being spotted by Plymouth Argyle with whom he won a Division Three (South) title in 1929/30 moving to Arsenal in March 1933 for £4,500.

13 September 1913: The second game of the first season as a north London club and a second win – this time 1-2 away at Wolverhampton.  Things were going well.

13 September 1919: Arsenal drew away from home 1-1 with Sunderland.  There were signs that now back in the 1st Division Arsenal were holding their own.  But interestingly, there was no sighting of Sir Henry Norris at any of the games; the first sign that he felt another phase of his work with Arsenal was done. 

13 September 1930: Arsenal were away to Sunderland who had drawn the first three games and then lost the fourth of the season.  Arsenal had no problem going back to their opening form, winning 4-1.  Lambert got three and Hulme the other.   It meant that in five games Lambert had scored eight.

13 September 1930: Bill Johnstone’s last game for Arsenal, a 4-1 away win against Sunderland. Having played seven games in his first season but only two in his second (all at centre forward or inside left) he was transferred to Oldham Athletic for £2,130 in January 1931 as Arsenal headed for their first ever league title, and with Oldham played 68 scored 28.  Finally he headed back to Scotland and played for Clyde.

13 September 1932: Birth of Ralph Guthrie.  He started out with Tow Law Town and was transferred to Arsenal in December 1952, at a time when the club already had Swindin and Kelsey on its books as keepers. 

13 September 1933: John (Jack) Lambert’s last appearance.  The following month he was transferred to Fulham.  He had played 143 league games and scored an amazing 98 league goals plus 11 in 16 Cup games, and still some of the crowd booed him.

13 September 1938: Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain met the German Chancellor Adolf Hitler in an attempt to negotiate an end to German expansionist policies.

13 September 1949: Freddie Cox signed from Tottenham for £12,000.  Freddie served as a fighter pilot for the RAF during the war, and was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross.

13 September 1958: Arsenal beat Tottenham 3-1, with 65,565 inside Highbury.  Nutt and Herd (2) scored.  That made it 25 goals in the first seven games with five of the seven games won.   

13 September 1966: Arsenal’s first ever League Cup match – at home against Gillingham.  It ended in a 1-1 draw with 13,029 present.  20,566 turned up for the replay, another 1-1 draw, before Arsenal won the third game 5-0.  Baldwin scored in all three games, getting two in the final game, but Arsenal went out in the next round.

13 September 1975: Aston Villa 2 Arsenal 0 with a Villa Park crowd of 34,474.  Arsenal were beaten by a very average team who won simply through muscle and work rate.

13 September 1977: George Armstrong sold to Leicester.  He played in both the League Cup finals under Bertie Mee that led up to the three triumphs, and was one of the three all-match players in the Double season.  He set up the winner in the final game of the league season against Tottenham. 

13 September 1978: Steve Gatting’s first appearance for Arsenal versus Lokomotiv Leipzig; Arsenal won 3-0.  He then retained his place throughout much of 1978-79 but did not appear in the cup final against Manchester United.  See also here.

13 September 1986: Perry Groves first game for Arsenal – Luton 0 Arsenal 0.  It was the second of four matches in which Arsenal failed to score, the first three being 0-0, the fourth a 0-1 defeat.

13 September 1997: Ian Wright broke Cliff Bastin’s record with a hattrick against Bolton (the second of which actually broke the record, although Wright revealed his celebratory t-shirt after the first goal).  

13 September 1998: The Guardian reported that Chelsea had just failed to hi-jack Arsenal’s bid for Ljungberg.  The notion of clubs attempting to “hi-jack” bids has  continued ever since.  It was however a journalistic invention to explain the journalists’ lack of knowledge of what players clubs are actually following. 

13 September 2003: Arsenal 1 Portsmouth 1.  The 5th league match of the unbeaten season.  Arsenal were hampered by a yellow card for Campbell on just 10 minutes and another for Toure on 40.  Henry scored to equalise an earlier goal from Sheringham.

13 September 2006: Tomas Rosicky scored his first goal for Arsenal in Hamburg 1 Arsenal 2 in the Champions League.  Gilberto Silva got the other goal.  Arsenal won the group, losing just one match, to CSKA Moscow away 1-0.

13 September 2008: At 16 years, 8 months, 4 days Jack Wilshere became Arsenal’s youngest player replacing Robin Van Persie on 81 minutes in the game against Blackburn.  Arsenal won 4-0

13 September 2009: Eduardo’s disgraceful trial by media came to an end after his two-match ban for diving was thrown out in a hearing lasting a couple of minutes. “The U-turn will be widely regarded as a blow to attempts to crack down on diving” shouted the Guardian, presuming guilt even after the player had been found innocent.  It was not the paper’s best moment, having declared the player guilty before he was charged.

13 September 2011: Henri Lansbury signed a contract extension with Arsenal.  He had joined in 2007 and from 2009 took a series of loans to Scunthorpe, Watford, Norwich and West Ham before signing for Nottingham Forest in 2012, for whom he played over 100 games.

13 September 2016: Arsenal drew 1-1 with PSG launching a Champions League campaign in which, in the group stages, Arsenal won four and drew the two against PSG to win the group.  In this game both sides had a player sent off in the third minute of added time.

14 September 1891: Billy Heath took the first ever penalty in a league game, scoring for Wolverhampton against Accrington as Wolverhampton won 5-0. In 1893 he joined Arsenal,  and scored a hattrick against Walsall Town Swifts on 11 September – Arsenal’s first ever hattrick and Heath’s first goals for the club.

14 September 1901: Alex James born in Lanarkshire.  He joined Raith Rovers in 1922 and played almost 100 league games for them before joining Preston NE in 1925.

14 September 1903: Arsenal 4 West Ham 1 (London League – attendance 2000).  The 5th straight win at the start of the season with many more to come.

14 September 1918:  William Hall and Sir Henry Norris went to Highbury together to see Arsenal beat Millwall Athletic 4-0.  The crowd for this second match of the season was only 5,000, but the presence of the directors showed things were getting back to normal in terms of planning for the future. 

14 September 1925: Arsenal’s most local derby ever v. London Caledonians in the London FA Challenge Cup; a 3-2 win in front of 5000.  London Cally played in Caledonian Park, just one mile from Highbury.  What’s more, both clubs were formed in 1886.  London Caledonians won the Amateur Cup in 1923, and in 1924/5 they won the Isthmian League for the sixth time.  

14 September 1923: Doug Lisham born in Birmingham.  Having served in the Royal Marine Commandos during the Second World War and taking part in the Walcheren Island landing in Holland he signed as a professional for Walsall in the run up to the return of football after the second world war in August 1946 and in May 1948 moved to Arsenal for £10,500.

14 September 1929: J.J. Williams signed from Stoke City (according to a report in the Arsenal handbook for 1930/1) 

14 September 1935: Arsenal had won the league for the last 3 seasons but were struggling to keep up that form.  On this day it was Arsenal 2 Sheffield Wednesday 2 with 59,492 in the crowd.  Arsenal were 5th.  

14 September 1938: Arsenal 1 Derby 2 – third match for Gordon Bremner, a tremendous talent who was tragically, like so many others, lost to the war.  It was the only defeat in his first 10 games for the club  There were 8 victories and 1 draw.

14 September 1949: Freddie Cox’ Arsenal home debut having signed from Tottenham: – Arsenal 4 WBA 1.  Lewis, Goring, Roper and Barnes scored.  Freddie went on to play 79 games for Arsenal in the league, scoring nine goals.

14 September 1968: Arsenal 1 Stoke 0 completed seven wins and two draws in the opening nine games.  The table made encouraging reading with Arsenal top two points ahead of Leeds.

14 September 1974:  34,596 saw Chelsea 0 Arsenal 0 billed as a “bottom of the table clash”.  The press focussed on hooliganism and the campaign by players for freedom on contract.  The end of football as we know it was predicted, especially by those journalists liking an easy story without having to leave the office (or the pub).

14 September 1982: Spartak Moscow beat Arsenal 2-3 in Russia, which looked like a score Arsenal could turn around.  However on 29 September Arsenal lost 2-5 at home and Arsenal were out in the first round.

14 September 1991: Crystal Palace 1 Arsenal 4.  The start of a run of four successive wins in which Arsenal scored 20 goals, after just 10 in the first seven matches.  

14 September 1996: Tony Adams admitted he was an alcoholic.  He recovered however to become the first player ever to captain a league winning team in three different decades – and to do enormous good with his “Sporting Chance” charity.

14 September 1999: Fiorentina 0 Arsenal 0.  It was the start of the second season of playing Champions League games at Wembley.  Arsenal won only one of the games, and the experiment came to an end, although it showed Arsenal could get crowds of over 70,000 when space was available.

14 September 2002: Arsenal beat Charlton 0-3 to continue the unbeaten start to the season.  As Double winners the previous season Arsène Wenger said, “We know we can win the league. We know we can be stronger. At this stage last season we were not as good as we are now.”  Arsenal did win the cup but came second in the league.

14 September 2004: Arsenal 1 PSV Eindhoven 0 in the first match of the Champions League group stage. Arsenal then drew the next four matches but following a 5-0 win in the final game, topped the group.

14 September 2005: Arsenal’s lowest attendance of the season against Thun in Champions League.  Capacity at the Emirates was always reduced for Champions League games due to the demands of Uefa.

14 September 2009: Eduardo’s two match ban for “deceiving the referee” was formally annulled after it was not established that the referee had been deceived.  But the precedent of challenging the referee’s decision under media pressure was thus set – although only for use against Arsenal. 

14 September 2013: Arsenal went top of the league after a 3-1 away win to Sunderland.  Game 9 in the sequence of the all-time record of away wins.  Giroud and Ramsey (2) got the goals.

15 September 1890: Arthur Hutchins born.  He played for Croydon Common of the Southern League before the 1st world war, a club that Henry Norris was possibly associated with.   Hutchins then played as a guest for Arsenal during the war, over 100 times, after Croydon Common failed to return in 1919. 

15 September 1894: Burton Swifts 3 Arsenal 0 with 3000 in the crowd.  It meant Arsenal had played three, won one and lost two in the League.

15 September 1900.  James Ashcroft played on this day against Burton Swifts and in every subsequent match for four years thus creating a record in terms of the sequence of time, but not in terms of the number of games.

15 September 1913: Back in the second division Arsenal played their third game of the season, and secured their third win – beating Notts County 3-0.

15 September 1917: Arsenal played their third game of the season, and gained their third victory, this time 4-0 over the old rivals Millwall Athletic.  As always there was a comparatively high crowd for this match – 11,000.  And this for a wartime game.

15 September 1918: There were real signs of an end to the war as the Austrian Government sent a note to President Wilson suggesting an “unofficial” peace conference and the German  Government made a peace offer to Belgium.

15 September 1922: John Elvey signed from Bolton Wanderers.  He went on to play one game in the season – it was his only game for Arsenal.  

15 September 1923:  Arsenal 1 WBA 0; the second goal in two games for Voysey.  After four straight defeats at the start of the season it was Arsenal’s second win in a 3-in-a-row run. 

15 September 1930: The government announced that 90 railway stations would be closed to passengers because of the decline in the use of the railways.  I imagine Sir Henry Norris was apoplectic on hearing the news – he was for years a lone advocate of the notion of subsidized train services to help the economy and encourage men to travel to find work.

15 September 1931: The Royal Navy went on strike in protest at its salary cuts.

15 September 1934: Arsenal played West Brom who in the previous five games had gained three wins, one draw and one defeat.  The result was a 4-3 win to Arsenal.  With Sheffield Wednesday losing and Preston and Sunderland both drawing the win helped Arsenal edge up the table to 4th.

15 September 1953: Chelsea 0 Arsenal 2.  Having won the league the previous season Arsenal had to wait until this, the 9th match of the campaign for their first win, by which time they were bottom of the league.  Both goals came from Lishman.

15 September 1971: Arsenal’s first European Cup game: Stromsgodset IF 1 Arsenal 3.  Simpson, Marinello and Kelly scored in Norway in front of 23,000.

15 September 1973: A 0-4 against Norwich was the biggest away win of the season in a campaign in which there was nothing much else to celebrate.

15 September 1979: Arsenal beat Middlesbrough 2-0 at Highbury, in front of 30,341. Brady was in the mood to be brilliant, while Sunderland and Stapleton looked as if they had been playing together as strikers for ever.  

15 September 1993: Odense 1 Arsenal 2 in the Cup Winners’ Cup as Arsenal progressed towards victory in the competition.  Wright and Merson scored with Keown conceding an own goal.  This is one of the games which it was reported Osama bin Laden attended at the Clock End.  There are reports of him buying a replica shirt for one of his sons in the club shop at Highbury.

15 September 1994:  Omoria (Nicosia) 1 Arsenal 3 at start of CWC campaign towards the second consecutive final and the start of the Ian Wright scoring run of 12 consecutive games.  Merson got the other two goals.

15 September 1997: Paul Shaw transferred to Millwall after 12 league games and 2 goals over six years, including loan spells with Burnley, Cardiff and Peterborough.  He continued playing until 2011, amassing over 400 league games and scoring 106 goals.

15 September 2001: Arsenal beat Fulham away 3-1 to go top of the league.  League match 5 of the third Double season.  Ljungberg, Henry and Bergkamp scored to make it three wins, one draw and one defeat thus far.

15 September 2002: Arsène Wenger proclaimed, “We know we can win the league. We know we can be stronger. At this stage last season we were not as good as we are now.”

15 September 2007: A 3-1 win at Tottenham made it four wins and one draw in the first five games.  Adebayor (2) and Fabregas scored, in a run of seven consecutive games in London, all of which were won.

15 September 2010: Arsenal beat Braga 6-0, launching a new season in the Champions League.  Fabregas (2), Arshavin, Chamakh, and Vela (2) scored.

15 September 2010: Vladimir Petrović was named the new head coach of Serbia.  In June 2009, Vladimir Petrović who had played for Arsenal in 1982/3 returned to Red Star Belgrade as manager but was sacked a year later and became manager of Romanian club FC Politehnica Timişoara.   Now he moved on again.  In all he managed 14 clubs and one country (China) before seeming to retire in 2015.

15 September 2012: After two goalless draws and a 2-0 win at Liverpool Arsenal beat Southampton 6-1.  Podolski, Gervinho (2), Walcott and two own goals.

16 September 1893: Although Arsenal were now playing in the League they also continued to play a regular set of friendly games.  On this day the game was Arsenal 5 Chatham 0 (Shaw, Elliot, Heath 3).12,000 turned up – larger than for any of the league games thus far – largely because Chatham (in Kent) were considered local rivals.

16 September 1912: Arsenal lost 0-3 at home to Villa, their fourth consecutive defeat from the start of the season.   With the word spreading that after waiting for three years to find local buyers from the club, Henry Norris was moving Arsenal north,  it was not surprising that the crowd was just 6805, although that was not the lowest during this first and only relegation season in the club’s history.

16 September 1916: Arsenal lost 0-1 to Crystal Palace in the wartime league – and indeed failed to win any of their five games in the month.

16 September 1918: The USA rejected the Austrian peace offer as details began to emerge of new states being formed in Europe such as Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia.  At home the mood changed.  There was victory in the offing, and with it came demands for justice for the working men and those who had served overseas. 

16 September 1922: After two 4-1 defeats in a row Arsenal beat Cardiff  2-1 with a very decent crowd of 40,000 inside Highbury.  Of note was the return of Dr Paterson at outside left for his first game of the campaign.

16 September 1931: Having sunk to 15th in the league Arsenal were now climbing back.  After two draws and a win, Arsenal now beat Portsmouth 3-0, Bastin getting two and Parkin the other.

16 September 1937: Arsenal v Arsenal Reserves was the first live game ever on TV.  Interestingly although no TV match had been broadcast before, Arsenal had built a camera gantry into the East Stand opened one year before.  Only 15 minutes of the game was shown.  The first full match to be shown was England v Scotland in April 1938.

16 September 1953: Paul Barron born in Woolwich, near Arsenal’s original ground in Plumstead, and as per Bob Wilson, qualified as a teacher before becoming a professional footballer.   He played non-league football for Welling United, Wycombe Wanderers and Slough Town, before turning pro and signing for Plymouth Argyle in July 1976

16 September 1966: Colin Addison signed from Nottingham Forest by Bertie Mee in his first season for £45,000, but he was hampered by injury and was sold on in 1967.  He played in a variety of positions wearing the number 8, 10 and 11 shirt, playing 17 leagues in the first season and 10 in the second.

16 September 1969: Debut for goalkeeper Malcolm Webster against Tottenham following an injury to Bob Wilson.  Arsenal lost 3-2 and Webster was dropped in favour of Geoff Barnett, after conceding eight in three matches.  He later played over 250 games for Cambridge United, before becoming a goalkeeping coach.

16 September 1970: Lazio 2 Arsenal 2.  (Radford 2).  After the match the two teams were to have a meal together but a fight broke out, into which most of the players joined.  In 2016 at an AISA meeting Bob Wilson said much of the problem came from the fact that the Lazio team were given a banquet and the Arsenal players simply had scraps.   Arsenal won the return leg 2-0.

16 September 1972: Arsenal 0 Liverpool 0.  Jimmy Hill who was part of the TV team filming the game, took over after one of the linesmen was injured during the match.

16 September 1978:  A 1-0 win over Bolton Wanderers at Highbury.  One Bolton player was a forward, the rest were the defence marshalled in two rows.  Brady was pulled, pushed, kicked and even on occasion punched – leading to Brady and Rix swapping their positions, if nothing else to try to confuse the thugs and reduce their chances of a serious injury.

16 September 1981 saw first appearance and first goal for Raphael Meade in the opening match of the Uefa Cup in which Arsenal safely moved through against Panathinaikos 3-0 on aggregate.    The club was however knocked out in the second round by Winterslag of Belgium on 3 November.

16 September 1996:  The first game for Patrick Vieira coming on as a substitute as Arsenal beat Sheffield 4-1,  Wright scored three, to go to the 100 goals mark. He scored three more in the next three games.  Vieira was made Chevalier of the Légion d’honneur in 1998.

16 September 1996: Pat Rice became the manager of Arsenal while awaiting the arrival of Arsène Wenger from Japan.  Upon the sacking of Rioch, Stewart Houston was put in temporary charge, but he then resigned to take over QPR, and Pat Rice stepped in.   

16 September 1997: First European game under Arsène Wenger.  Paok Salonika 1 Arsenal 0.

16 September 1998: Arsenal’s first match in Champions League away to Lens. A 1-1 draw.  Arsenal finish third in the league section.

16 September 1981: First appearance and first goal for Raphael Meade against Panathinaikos.  He had joined the club in 1977 as a schoolboy but after leaving Arsenal in 1985 he played for a variety of clubs without ever making a major impact.  His final years as a player saw him with Sussex County League club Southwick] and Southern League clubs Crawley Town, Sittingbourne, after which we lose sight of him

16 September 2009: Following defeats to both Manchester City and United Arsenal beat Standard Liege away 3-2 in the Champions League with goals from Vermaelen, Eduardo and Bendtner.  

16 September 2014: Due to injuries to Mathieu Debuchy, Calum Chambers and Nacho Monreal, Bellerín made his Champions League debut for Arsenal against Borussia Dortmund.  He soon became established as a regular first teamer.  Arsenal lost 2-0 making it just one win in the last six.

16 September 2020: Emiliano Martinez transferred to Aston Villa for £20m

17 September 1894: Arsenal 0 WBA 1.  In 17 days at the start of the season Arsenal played six games, three of them friendlies as was this one.  Arsenal won two of the friendlies but lost all of the league games.  2500 were in the crowd on this day.

17 September 1896: Andrew Young born.  He played originally for Blyth Spartans and then Aston Villa before Leslie Knighton paid £2,000 for him – twice the maximum that manager Knighton claimed he was restricted to spend by Henry Norris.  See also here.

17 September 1910: Aston Villa 3 Arsenal 0.  It was the fourth match of the season and part of a run of three defeats and four draws from the opening game.  Arsenal scored just two goals in this run, but won the 8th match 4-1 with only a slightly changed side. See also here

17 September 1910: Last match for Frank Heppinstall.   In total he made 23 league appearances becoming a regular fixture in the latter half of his first season and the start of his second and final season.  He moved to Stalybridge Celtic and finally Hamilton Academical.

17 September 1919: At a time of a huge housing crisis, Arsenal chairman, Sir Henry Norris chaired a discussion of the Fulham Council in which he stated he was thinking of buying part of the Hurlingham Club’s large property in Fulham, for its working-class housing programme.  The press were excluded because of their antipathy to providing houses for the working classes on the grounds it would make them less likely to turn up for work..

17 September 1924: After Knighton’s best ever start to a season which took Arsenal to 2nd with a game in hand, Arsenal went into free fall with six defeats in ten games between this day and 8 November. 

17 September 1932: Arsenal beat Bolton 3-2.  Bolton were 10th before the game – and the result took Arsenal up to 4th.  There was one change in the team as Roberts came back at centre half after four games out through injury.

17 September 1934: Arsenal were away to Blackburn who had won just one match up to this point, and scored just five goals.  Arsenal had already beaten them 4-0 in the third match of the season.  It looked like an away banker but Arsenal lost 0-2.

17 September 1934: James Marshall, claimed by the media to be the “next Alex James” played his first match for Arsenal.  He only managed three more.

17 September 1938: Reg Cumner’s first league appearance for Arsenal: Wolverhampton 0 Arsenal 1 – Arsenal’s goal being scored by…. Reg Cumner.    He was one of the players who came through the Margate academy to play for Arsenal  See also here.

17 September 1943: Wally Barnes joined Arsenal to play for them in the wartime league.  The story is that  Portsmouth’s scout in 1937 was on a cycling trip, stopped for a rest, saw a game going on in a local field and decided to have a look and so noticed Wally.  After the game he asked the player if he wanted to turn pro but Wally turned him down.  See also 17 Sep 1955 below.

17 September 1955: Wally Barnes last appearance on the anniversary of the club approaching him to join.  He played 267 league games, winning both the League and the FA Cup with Arsenal.

17 September 1960.  League debut for Geoff Strong: Arsenal 5 Newcastle 0.  Goals from Herd (3), Strong and Clapton.  Geoff played 19 games in his first season and scored 10.  See also here  The game was selected by ITV to be televised as part of its new live match series “The Big Game” but the Arsenal board refused to let the cameras in.

 17 September 1966: Colin Addison made his Arsenal debut in Arsenal 1 Blackpool 1.  It was Bertie Mee’s first season and was Arsenal’s third consecutive 1-1 draw and the fifth game without a win, after winning the first three of the season.

17 September 1977: Arsenal 2 Leicester City 1 with a modest 27,371 in Highbury. The Sunday Times in their report suggested that Rix was about to overtake Brady in terms of vision and skill.

17 September 1988.  Arsenal 2 Southampton 2.  Paul Davis suffered trial by TV and was banned for nine matches for hitting Cockerill of Southampton who had dished out racial abuse in the 9 April game between the sides.

17 September 1996: The Guardian announced, “Arsenal get Wenger on £2m deal”.  The media had made Johan Cruyff the favourite to take over, but it was Wenger who got the job on 30 September 1996. He officially assumed the role on 1 October

17 September 2000: Nigel Winterburn joined West Ham.  He had played 440 league games for Arsenal and scored eight goals and went on to play 82 more for WHU, making an incredible career league total of 687 games.

17 September 2003: Arsenal lost 0-3 to Inter Milan in the Champions League, despite suffering no defeats in the league all season.

17 September 2006: For the fourth league match in a row Arsenal scored zero or one goal – in this game beating Man U 0-1 for their first win of the season.  Adebayor was the scorer.  Henry and Gilberto had got the other two thus far this season.

17 September 2011: Arsenal lost to Blackburn 4-3 making it three defeats in five opening league games.   Gervinho, Arteta, Chamakh all scored.  See also the review from the ground.

17 September 2016: Arsenal beat Hull City away 4-1with goals from Xhaka, Alexis (2) and Walcott.  It meant that after losing the first match of the season to Liverpool, Arsenal had started their unbeaten run which continued for 19 games.

18 September 1915: Arsenal played their second wartime game at Highbury this against QPR, and as with the first against Tottenham in the first match, won by 2-1.  Sands, Wallace, Hardinge and King all returned for Arsenal but the crowd was just 4,000 – over 10,000 down on that first wartime game two weeks before.  Hopes that the crowds would take to the London Combination were dashed.

18 September 1926:  After a run of six games in seven, in which Arsenal did not win a single match, Jack Lee was dropped on this date for the match against Liverpool.  Arsenal won 2-0 and Jack Lee only played one more game for the club.

18 September 1930: William Harper returned for a second spell with Arsenal having previously left Arsenal to play in the American Soccer League.  He replaced Keyser in goal, and played 19 games in the season, to win himself a league winners’ medal. See also here.

18 September 1953: Tommy Lawton signed from Brentford.  He played 38 games and scored 15 times before retiring but Tom Whittaker admitted in his autobiography that the signing was one of desperation on his part, and not a success.

18 September 1971: Arsenal lost 2-1 away to Everton; Kennedy scored, but it meant we had now lost four games in the course of the first eight league matches in the season.  Arsenal were not showing the form of last season’s double champions.

18 September 1974: For the second year running, Arsenal were knocked out of the league cup in the second round, the replay on this day ending Leicester City 2 Arsenal 1, in front of a mere 17,303.  See also here

18 September 1976: Stephen Hughes born. He started his football career at Arsenal, where he played in 76 league games, 40 of them as a sub , scoring 7 goals.  He was a member of the 1997-98 league winning side.

18 September 1976: Arsenal 3 Everton 1 with Macdonald restored to the team and 34,076 in the crowd.    Everton took the lead and then played the “what we have we hold” game, until the fouling and niggling approach got so bad that when Brady was kicked to the ground once too often, virtually every player was involved in a melee.  The referee let them get on with it until they all looked around wondering where he was.  He then suggested the game might restart and it did. An interesting approach!

18 September 1994:  Arsenal’s fifth game in a row without a win ended Arsenal 2 Newcastle 3.  But after four games without scoring Arsenal did at least get one from Adams and one from Wright.

18 September 1999: Thierry Henry who came on as a sub scored his first goal for Arsenal to beat Southampton 1-0. He received the ball from Adams, with his back to goal, 20 yards out, turned and shot.  Henry said, “My goal today was very important for me. I have missed at least 14 or 15 chances for Arsenal and my confidence was low.”  It was Arsenal’s last appearance at the Dell.  However Henry didn’t score again until 28 November when he got both goals in a 2-1 defeat of Derby.

18 September 2012: Montpellier 1 Arsenal 2 (Gervinho and Podolski) in the Champions League.  After opening the season with two goalless draws against awful Sunderland and Stoke teams Arsenal had five more games without defeat including not just this match but also 6-1 wins against Southampton and Coventry.

18 September 2013: Arsenal beat Marseille 2-1 to make it 10 away wins in a row in all competitions – a club record.  Ramsey and Walcott scored in the Champions League campaign in which 3 teams ended up with 12 points.

18 September 2022: Before Brentford v Arsenal there was a minute’s silence for the late Queen Elizabeth II, Ethan Nwaneri aged 15 years and 181 days, came on near the end to become the youngest player ever in the top division.  Arsenal’s previous youngest player was Cesc Fabregas aged 16 years 177 days, in 2003.  Vieira’s goal in this game was voted goal of the month.  Eddie Nketiah made his 100th appearance for Arsenal.

19 September 1903: Woolwich Arsenal 8 Burton Utd 0.  It was the third win in a row in a sequence of eight straight wins, and the first of two that ended 8-0.  Briercliffe (3), Coleman (2), Gooing, Shanks and Linward scored as Arsenal headed for promotion.

19 September 1910: Ronnie Westcott born.  He signed for Arsenal on 5 November 1935 but only played two league games for the club.

19 September 1914: Stockport 1 Arsenal 1.  Harry King made it seven goals in five games.   Only 6000 saw the game, but that was still not the lowest crowd of the season.

19 September 1925: Having lost 1-7 at home to Blackburn, Newcastle gained a victory after a draw and another defeat, as they gradually tried to alter the way they used the new offside law.   By 9 October they had got it right and beat Arsenal 7-0 which caused Arsenal to go down  the same route and make the same adjustments.  See also below.

19 September 1925: Under the new offside rule the number of goals scored per 1st division club ranged from 4 to 20 after 5 games.  In defence the range was 1 to 17 goals conceded.   Every club was now trying to work out how to play the system. Not all were getting it right.

19 September 1929: Cliff Bastin’s first game. He signed for Arsenal for £2,000 on 27 April 1929 after 17 games in the Third Division South for Exeter.  Arsenal beat Huddersfield 2-0 with Lambert and John scoring.  

19 September 1936: Arsenal played away to Wolverhampton.  Their home record was one win and one defeat thus far, but they beat the Arsenal 2-0.  There were 53,097 in the crowd, not bad for a club whose average crowd was 23,787

19 September 1937: Geoff Strong was born in Kirkheaton, Northumberland and being a talented schoolboy sprinter and top athlete seemed destined from the start to make his living from sport.  He trained as a machine-tool fitter while playing for Stanley United, until he joined Arsenal in a £100 deal in November 1957.

19 September 1951: Many publications claim this match against Hapoel Tel-Aviv was Arsenal’s first floodlit game.  But that was actually at Canning Town where Arsenal played Thames Ironworks on 16 March 1896.  This was the first of the modern era with modern style floodlighting. See also here

19 September 1963: David Seaman born.  He began his career at Leeds United but player manager Eddie Gray turned him down, so he joined Peterborough then in the 4th division.  In 1984 he went to Birmingham for £100,000 and in August 1986 he moved to QPR for £225,000.   His goalkeeper coach was… Bob Wilson

19 September 1970: Arsenal 6 WBA 2.  The Arsenal programme published a powerful letter criticising Evening Standard’s reporting of the club’s performances.  This was League match 9 of the first Double season and it was Arsenal’s highest score of the season.  Arsenal scored 4 goals in three successive games, otherwise it was three or fewer goals per game.

19 September 1979: The press suddenly remembered that Arsenal were in the Cup Winners’ Cup (something they failed to mention in the buildup to the match) with Arsenal beating Fenerbahce 2-0.  Young and Sunderland of course got the other.

19 September 1993: After losing the first game 3-0 at home Arsenal made it 5 wins and 1 draw but then lost on this day 1-0 to Man U

19 September 1996: George Hunt died.  He had been the first ever player to move from Tottenham to Arsenal, and played 21 games in the amazing 1937/38 title winning season scoring three goals

19 September 2001: Stathis Tavlaridis joined Arsenal from Iraklis Thessaloniki for £1m.  He only played one league game for Arsenal, and after two loan spells joined Lille where he played 77 games.

19 September 2005: Arsenal beat Everton 2-0 as the sequence of winning only every other game continued.  The sequence ran across 11 games ending on 5 November.  It was also Alex Song’s debut.

19 September 2007: Arsenal beat Sevilla 3-0 in the Champions League.  Fabregas, van Persie and Eduardo scored.  It was the fourth game in a row Arsenal scored three.  In the next game they got five.  It was part of a 21 game unbeaten run from the start of the season.

19 September 2009: After two consecutive defeats Arsenal started a run of six wins and a draw with 4-0 victory over Wigan.  Vermaelen got two, Eboue and Fabregas the other two.

19 September 2019: Eintracht Frankfurt 0 Arsenal 3.  Goals from Willock, Saka and Aubameyang.

20 September 1913: First use of “Victoria Concordia Crescit” – Victory through Harmony – in the club’s programme.  It was used by Henry Norris (although it may have been suggested by George Allison) to symbolise the hard work and dedication that had taken Arsenal to Highbury, and was only later taken on as the club’s motto

20 September 1919:  Arsenal beat Sunderland 3-2 having been 1-2 down at half time.  There were 42,000 in the ground, the largest attendance so far at the stadium.

20 September 1923: Sir Henry Norris was at Highbury for Arsenal Reserves 2 Reading Reserves 2.  When it came onto rain, Norris gave instructions to the ground staff to let people standing in the wet go under the cover in the grandstand; even though they hadn’t paid to.  A tiny gesture, but interesting in the context of the oft given views of Sir Henry.

20 September 1933: Rangers 2 Arsenal 0.  It was the first of a long series of games against Rangers titled the “Game of Champions” set up by Herbert Chapman and his friend Bill Struth of Rangers.  The games went on until the war, and were re-established through the 1950s and 1960s with occasional matches thereafter.

20 September 1952: George Wood born in Douglas in Lanarkshire; he played as a goalkeeper for Arsenal between 1980 and 1983.  The story is that at Lanark Grammar he was an outfield player but his PE teacher converted him to goalkeeping duties.  He went on to play for Lanark United and Forth Wanderers before joining East Stirlingshire.

20 September 1975: Arsenal 2 Everton 2, with another poor Highbury crowd of 24,864.   “Same old Arsenal,” said the Express in reporting this game, their point being that no matter what happens to them, Arsenal, seem to be incapable of changing.  

20 September 1962: Danny Clapton transferred to Luton.  He had played 207 league matches plus 18 cup games, scoring 25 goals (all in the league), and later went on to play for Corinthians of Sydney.

20 September 1980: George Wood debut on his birthday.  The plan was that he would eventually replace Pat Jennings, but Jennings played on until he was 40, and Wood moved on to Crystal Palace in 1983.

20 September 1996: Eddie McGoldrick sold to Man City for £300,000.  He had played 57 league games for Arsenal and was a substitute in the Cup Winners’ Cup final.

20 September 1998: Ljungberg scored within seconds of coming on for his debut against Manchester United.  “Fergie shell-shocked by awesome Gunners” wrote Henry Winter as Arsenal won 3-0 with other goals also from Anelka and Adams.  It was Arsenal’s first win after four draws.

20 September 2002:  Arsène Wenger pronounced that, “Arsenal can go unbeaten all season” to huge derision from the media.  “It’s not impossible as Milan once did it but I can’t see why it’s so shocking to say it. Do you think Manchester United, Liverpool or Chelsea don’t dream that as well? They’re exactly the same. They just don’t say it because they’re scared to look ridiculous, but nobody is ridiculous in this job as we know anything can happen.”  Not one journalist ever apologised for the derisory remarks they made after Wenger’s initial comment.

20 September 2008: Arsenal made it 10 goals to 1 across three victories by beating Bolton.  Eboue, Bendtner and Denilson scored, adding to three from Adebayor and three from Van Persie, plus another from Denilson in the previous two games.

20 September 2011: One of the lowest ever Emirates attendances up to this point 46,539 saw Arsenal 3 Shrewsbury Town 1 in the League Cup.  Shrewsbury took the lead but Gibbs, Oxlade-Chamberlain and Benayoun gave Arsenal the win.  Chuks Aneke made his only appearance for Arsenal as a 90th minute sub.

20 September 2016: Arsenal beat Nottingham Forest 0-4 in the League Cup.  Forest included Bendtner and Lansbury, both of whom were booked, and Arsenal scored through Xhaka, Holding, Lucas and the Ox.  One year later the Ox was playing for Liverpool as they were knocked out in the 3rd round of… the League Cup.

20 September 2017: Arsenal 1 Doncaster 0 (league cup).  That result sounds rather modest, but it becomes downright weird when one looks at the team Arsenal put out: Ospina, Holding, Mertesacker, Chambers, Elneny, Nelson, Wilshere, Maitland-Niles, Alexis, Walcott, Giroud 

20 September 2018: Arsenal 4 Vorskla Poltava 2.  The first of Europa League game of the season, which ended with Arsenal reaching the final.  Aubameyang (2), Welbeck and Ozil got the goals.  It was one of a sequence of 12 consecutive wins in league and cup.

21 September 1889: Arsenal beat Tottenham 10-1 in the opening game of the season.  Arsenal played six games between this date and the end of November and scored 50 goals, letting in five.

21 September 1894: Bob Buchanan signed for Arsenal from Burnley.    He played for two seasons playing in 42 league games and scoring 16 goals.

21 September 1912: A 3-1 victory at Sheffield United on this day, followed by draws with Newcastle and Oldham, had suggested that Arsenal was steadying and could start moving up the league.  But then suddenly McKinnon, Greenaway and Common all missed the home game with Chelsea on 12 October as Arsenal started its most disastrous run of all time: 23 games without a win.  A run, combined with some match fixing in the north west that ultimately relegated the club for the one and only time.

21 September 1914: The Arsenal beat Tufnell Park 6-0 in the London FA Challenge Cup, and this was at the time the closest derby game of all time (being closer than Tottenham), but the record was broken in 1925 with the match against London Caledonians.

21 September 1915: Cecil Chubb acquired Stonehenge at an auction for £6000 – about half a million pounds in today’s money.  He had started out as the village saddler but went on to become a very successful lawyer, wherein he made his fortune.   At the end of the war he donated Stonehenge to the government on the condition that the public were given free access to the stones thereafter.  In return he was made a baronet.  The “free access” bequest was however later ignored and it is now by far the most expensive ancient sites in the UK to visit.

21 September 1918: As there was growing talk of the four years of war coming to an end the football continued: on this day Arsenal played Fulham away, and continued their winning streak with a 2-1 victory in front of 6000.  That was three wins in a row.

21 September 1925: Herbert Chapman finally saw Arsenal win at home on the seventh league game of the season as Arsenal beat West Ham 3-2.  Buchan got two and Neil the third.  See also here

21 September 1927: Last game for Samson Haden – a 0-4 defeat against Corinthians.  He joined Notts County for whom he played 289 league games, and then became player manager and later manager of Peterborough until retiring in 1946.  See also here.

21 September 1946: Arsenal lost 0-1 at home to Derby in front of 60,643.  For the first time in the first seven games of the season Reg Lewis didn’t score.  In the previous six games he had scored nine – the only other person to score being O’Flanagan who got one in the previous match. 

21 September 1954:  First game for David Herd in a friendly.  He played his first league game in February and made three appearances this season. In the final game of 1950/51 he and his father both played in a league match for Stockport – only the second time this had happened.

21 September 1965: Arsenal beat Corinthian Casual 5-2 at Highbury to win the Sheriff of London Shield.  It was physically the largest football trophy ever competed for in England.

21 September 1970:  Emmanuel Petit born.  He was signed by Arsène Wenger for Monaco at the age of 18 and soon became a regular player in the midfield.  By 1996/7 he was captain of the side that won the French League.

21 September 1974: Arsenal 2 Luton Town 2.  21,629 hard core fans made it to the game.   The Daily Express headline was “Arsenal are confused” and Bobby Campbell said as much, suggesting that this Arsenal team defended when they should attack and attacked when they should defend.  But for those of us there even that seemed too organised a notion.

21 September 1990: Brian Marwood transferred to Sheffield Utd having played 52 league games and scored 16 goals.  He made one appearance for England in 1989.

21 September 1997: Nigel Winterburn scored from 30 yards against Chelsea to win the game 3-2 in the 7th league game of the 2nd Double Season.  Bergkamp got the other two goals to bring his total thus far to seven.  The second double: part 1, part 2, part 3.

21 September 2003:  After a 0-0 draw at Manchester United, Arsenal players were fined by FA for their part in a “mass brawl” after the match.  The 6th league match of the unbeaten season.

21 September 2006: Ashley Cole published the autobiography which destroyed any small reputation for integrity he may have had as he described himself as having been physically sick on hearing Arsenal’s new contract offer.

21 September 2010: Arsenal beat Tottenham 4-1 away in the League Cup in extra time.  Tottenham had three players booked in the first half, as Lansbury put Arsenal in the lead.  Nasri scored two penalties and Arshavin the final goal in extra time..

21 September 2012: Conor Henderson loaned to Coventry City.  He never played for Arsenal, and eventually moved to Hull, for whom he also never played, finally finding  a club that he could play for in 2014 with Crawley Town.  In 2017 he moved to Pirin Blagoevgrad in Bulgaria.

21 September 2020 Arsenal signed the Icelandic international goalkeeper Runar Alex Ruarsson from Dijon for £1.8m.  In 2021 he moved on loan to OH Leuven.

 

22 September 1894: The first significant league run ever – seven games without defeat starting this day by beating Bury 4-2 at the start of Arsenal’s second league season.

22 September 1891: Charlie Buchan born in Plumstead.  He signed for Arsenal in 1909, but an argument with George Morrell relating to his expenses while he was training to be a teacher caused him to decline a professional contract, and he moved on to Northfleet United and then Leyton in the Southern League before being offered a contract by Sunderland    Buchan’s first signing for Arsenal is here.

22 September 1897: Woolwich Arsenal were playing Loughborough in a United League game when the game was abandoned with 8½ minutes remaining – probably due to failing light.  It was agreed that the remaining minutes be played on 18 December 1897 following the Football League fixture between the two clubs. Ten of the eleven players that played in the first fixture played in the second fixture, with Paddy Farrell playing in place of Frank McAvoy making Farrell Arsenal’s first substitute in a league match!

22 September 1917: Arsenal were “away” to Tottenham but because Tottenham played their home matches at Highbury during the war Tottenham chose to play this game at Clapton’s ground.  10,000 turned up and Arsenal won 2-1, making it four wins in a row.

22 September 1919: Arsenal played in the first round of the London FA Challenge Cup, against amateur side Dulwich Hamlet.  Dulwich lost 2-0 but this season won the Isthmian League for the first time and also won the highly regarded Amateur Cup.  On this occasion however they lost 2-0, with just 2000 inside Highbury.

22 September 1923: After four defeats in the opening four games Arsenal made it three wins in a row, winning 1-2 away to Birmingham City.  Tom Whittaker got a rare chance to play and Billy Blythe, came in for his first game of this campaign at inside left.   He was the 20th player to be used in seven league games.

22 September 1954: Dave Bowen made his international debut.  He played 19 times for Wales and managed the principality from 1964 to 1974.

22 September 1970: Manu Petit born.  He began playing football at ES Arques-la-Bataille before being signed by Arsène Wenger for Monaco at the age of 18. He went on to play 222 league games for Monaco.

22 September 1978: Chris Whyte given new contract.  He played 90 league games between 1978 and 1986 plus 13 on loan to Crystal Palace.  He was sold to New York Express, one of four US indoor football teams that Chris played for before ending his playing career in Finland in 2000.

22 September 1992: Cup Match 1 of Arsenal’s Cup Double season.  Arsenal 1 Millwall 1 in the League Cup.

22 September 1999: For only the ninth time Arsenal played a home match in front of 70,000+.  The match, at Wembley, was against AEK Athens and Arsenal won 3-1.  Ljungberg, Henry and Suker scored.

22 September 2001: League match 6 of the third Double season.  Arsenal 1 Bolton 1, with Jeffers scoring.  That made it three wins, two draws and one defeat, and left Arsenal in second place in the league.

22 September 2007: Adebayor scored three as Arsenal beat Derby 5-0 during a run of seven consecutive wins.  Arsenal repeated the trouncing by winning 6-2 against  the same club in the return match on April 28. See also here.

22 September 2008: Johan Djourou signed a new contract with Arsenal.  In all he stayed ten years at Arsenal playing 86 league matches before moving to Hanover.

22 September 2012: Park became the first Korean to score in the Spanish league, but despite scoring 25 goals in 91 games for Monaco he never attained such scoring ability again.

22 September 2013: Arsenal 3 Stoke City 1.  Arsenal had lost the first match of the season 1-3 to Aston Villa in highly controversial circumstances, but this was the seventh match in a row subsequent to the Villa game that Arsenal won.  Arsenal ended the season 3rd and Villa 17th showing the first game doesn’t always mean that much.

22 September 2019: Arsenal become just the ninth side in Premier League history to win a match despite trailing by both a man and a goal at any point of the match.  Arsenal beat Aston Villa 3-2.  The result meant Arsenal had scored seven in the last three games, but only won one of  them.

22 September 2021: Amidst a growing crisis in crowd management at Arsenal security measures were finally changed for the league cup 3rd round game against AFC Wimbledon.  Although some reported continuing problems on getting into the ground the chaos of recent weeks seemed to have eased.  Arsenal won 3-0.

23 September 1905: Tom Arnold made his league debut for Arsenal, having been signed in May 1905.  He only made one other appearance before moving on to Coventry City in 1907.

23 September 1912: After five games Arsenal won their first match of the season – a 3-1 away win against Sheffield Utd who were reduced to 10 men through injury early on.  It took Arsenal to 13th in the league, while Tottenham remained bottom with 0 points.

23 September 1919:  Sir Henry Norris appeared at Marlborough Street magistrate’s court as a character witness in a criminal case in which the Fulham Councillor, Mr James Littleboy, who was the Mayor of Fulham before Sir Henry Norris, and who “was accused of wilfully interfering with and annoying persons in Hyde Park.”   

23 September 1921: So dramatic was Arsenal’s fall from grace thus far this season that the Islington Daily Gazette set out its policy of not printing critical letters from fans and instead published just one highly critical letter from a fan who called himself “Well Wisher”.  

23 September 1922: Tottenham 1 Arsenal 2.  After the match the FA held an enquiry. Smith of Tottenham was found guilty of using bad language and suspended for a month. Graham was censured for retaliation.  Tottenham were warned about the behaviour of their crowd, and were warned of ground closure if further trouble ensued. 

23 September 1922: One of Arsenal’s missing men from last year – Graham – returned.  He had played 21 times at centre half in the previous season but this season made way for Voysey in that position and replaced Tom Whittaker at left half.  Blyth returned at outside left.  40,482 at White Hart Lane saw Arsenal win 2-1.

23 September 1932: Dennis Compton signed as an amateur.  He started his football career at Nunhead in 1934/5 before moving to Arsenal, where he made his début in 1936.  He also played for England in wartime matches.

23 September 1933: Everton 3 Arsenal 1 making it four games without a win.    For once the team was the same for two league games running – but that didn’t help.  Bowden again scored but the fact was that Everton were currently 14th in the league.

23 September 1936: Dennis Compton’s senior debut in friendly v Rangers.  As a cricketer he played in 78 Test Matches as a slow left arm bowler, and was one of England’s most remarkable batsmen scoring 123 centuries in first-class cricket.   A stand at Lord’s was named in his honour.  See also here

23 September 1936: George Eastham born.  He started out with Ards before moving to Newcastle United in 1956. 

23 September 1953: Danny Clapton debut in a friendly against South Africa some 15 months before his first league game after which he went on to become the club’s regular outside right.

23 September 1955: Gordon Nutt signed from Cardiff after a game between Cardiff reserves and Arsenal reserves.  He made his début within a couple of hours of signing on 24 September 1955 in a 3-1 away defeat at Sunderland.  Mike Tiddy was also signed from Cardiff at the same time.

23 September 1970: Arsenal played the second leg of the 1st round of the Uefa Cup against Lazio, and Arsenal won 2-0 with goals from Radford and Armstrong.  There was no collective meal afterwards.

23 September 1972: Ex Arsenal man Terry Anderson scored twice against Arsenal for Norwich.  It concluded a run of one win in seven league games.  Storey and Radford scored in a 2-3 defeat.  See also here 

23 September 1976: Terry Mancini was granted a free transfer to Aldershot.  His transfer from QPR had come as a surprise but he had helped shore up the team that was experiencing its roughest time since before Chapman.  See also here.

23 September 1995: Dennis Bergkamp scored his first two goals for Arsenal in the 4-2 defeat of Southampton at Highbury.  Adams and Wright scored the other goals to make it seven unbeaten.

23 September 2000: A 1-1 draw with Ipswich (with a goal from Bergkamp) made it 3 draws and 3 victories in the last six.  Arsenal then went on to win the next five.

23 September 2006: The third home match at the Emirates gave Arsenal their first victory there: 3-0 over Sheffield Utd.  Before that point they had won only one, drawn two and lost one, and there was talk of the curse of the stadium move.

23 September 2008: Arsenal put out a youth team and beat Sheffield U 6-0 in the League Cup.  Fabianski, Hoyte, Djourou, Song, Gibbs, Randall, Ramsey, Merida, Wilshere, Bendtner, Vela.  Among the substitutes was Francis Coquelin.

23 September 2015: Tottenham H 1 Arsenal 2 in the League cup.  Flamini got both the Arsenal goals.

23 September 2018: Arsenal 2 Everton 0 (Lacazette and Aubameyang).  It was Arsenal’s fifth consecutive win in league and cup competitions, in a run that went on for 12 games and took the club through 21 games unbeaten.

23 September 2020: Arsenal continued their perfect start to the season beating Leicester away 0-2 in the league cup.  This followed winning the opening two games of the season and the community shield game against Liverpool on penalties.

24 September 1894: While today games through the season are mostly league or cup matches, in the 1890s many were friendlies.  The result on this day, Arsenal 6 Renton 1 was Arsenal’s 4th friendly of September.  Meanwhile they had also played four league games.

24 September 1904: Arsenal 2 Wolverhampton 0. Charlie Satterthwaite scored Arsenal’s first ever goal in the first division, after three goalless games.

24 September 1908: Eddie Hapgood born in Bristol, the ninth of the ten children. He left school at 14, and worked in his brother’s milk round business while playing for St Philip’s Adult School Juniors, in Bristol.   He was then spotted by a director of Bristol Rovers and given a trial but not liking the contract he opted for Kettering Town.   See also here

24 September 1910: At a moment when Arsenal desperately needed something to help them out of their financial crisis the score was 0-0 in a home draw with Sunderland, meaning Arsenal had played five, won none and scored two goals.  It was not going well.

24 September 1930: The first performance of Noël Coward’s comedy Private Lives featuring Coward, Gertrude Lawrence and Laurence Olivier in the cast. The play has been revived regularly ever since.

24 September 1932: Arsenal met Everton, last season’s surprise champions, and beat them 2-1.  The result took Arsenal up to second and left Everton, 11th 

24 September 1938:  Arsenal drew 0-0 with Aston Villa to make it two wins, three defeats and two draws in the opening seven games with five goals scored.  Arsenal were 15th and in every way, Arsenal’s domination of football in the 30s was coming to an end.

24 September 1955: Signing of, and first game for Gordon Nutt.  Gordon made his début within a couple of hours of signing in a 3-1 away defeat at Sunderland.  It concluded a seven match run without a victory.

24 September 1965: Anders Limpar born.  He started out with IF Brommapojkarna, followed by Örgryte, and then Young Boys Bern.

24 September 1977:  Steve Walford first game; Norwich 1 Arsenal 0.  He had signed from Tottenham, for whom he had played two games, and went on to play 77 league games for Arsenal.

24 September 1996: Borussia Monchengladbach 3 Arsenal 2. Arsenal went out of the Uefa cup in the 1st round having lost by the same score at Highbury.  Bergkamp was injured early on; Wright and Merson scored for Arsenal.

24 September 1997: Arsenal beat WHU 4-0 to make it 3 wins and 3 draws thus far.  The Independent wrote, “Brilliant Bergkamp humbles Hammers.”  8th league game of the 2nd Double Season   The second double: part 1, part 2, part 3.

24 September 1995: Steven Burtenshaw fined £10,000 for his part in the George Graham bung scandal.  He stayed at the club until 1996 when Bruce Rioch took over.

24 September 1999: Stuart Taylor loaned to Bristol Rovers for whom he played four games.  He had further loans to Crystal Palace, Peterborough and Leicester City.

24 September 2003: Six Arsenal players were charged by FA after a 0-0 at Man U, (quite probably with “failing to allow Man U to win despite the refs best efforts”).   Lauren, Keown, Vieira and Parlour were banned.

24 September 2010: Arsenal suffered their first league defeat of the season after six games – a 2-3 home loss against WBA.  Nasri got both goals.  Arsenal then lost their next game 2-0 away to Chelsea.

24 September 2011: A 3-0 defeat of Bolton (with Van Persie (2) and Song getting the goals).  It was only Arsenal’s second win in six during which they had scored 11 and conceded 12.  The next game was a defeat to Tottenham.  

24 September 2016: Arsenal beat Chelsea 3-0 to make it four wins in a row and seven goals in the last two games.  Alexis, Walcott and Ozil scored all in the first half while two Chelsea players were shown yellows but no Arsenal player was carded.  No one could remember when such a card total had happened previously. 

24 September 2019: Arsenal beat Nottingham Forest 5-0 in the League Cup.  Martinelli made his debut and scored two.  In the next round Arsenal again scored five in a 5-5 draw with Liverpool but went out 5-4 on penalties.  Revenge was taken however in the Charity Shield match at the start of the 2020/1 season when Arsenal beat Liverpool 5-4 on penalties.

25 September 1893: John Storrs made his debut in the 4th match of the season – a 3-1 win against Grimsby, taking over from Jeffrey at left back (Jeffrey moving to playing in goal following the injury to Williams) and continued until the return match with Grimsby on Boxing Day.

25 September 1909: Arsenal’s keeper Hugh MacDonald was injured in 3-2 victory over Chelsea.  Despite the fact that the injury left him seriously immobile he played in the next game, and conceded 7.  Both this and the event on this day in 1893 show that the club at Plumstead did not have a full-time backup keeper, not least because there was no reserve matches for them to play in.  See also here.

25 September 1915: British forces took the French town of Loos using poison gas for the first time.  Back home Arsenal lost to Fulham away 3-4, in front of 9000 fans.  

25 September 1920: Arsenal drew with Middlesbrough 2-2.  The programme announced that Arsenal was appealing against its rating assessment accusing the Borough of Islington of trying to “crush us out of existence.”  The antagonism went back to 1913 when the council had worked with the notorious Highbury Defence Committee to stop Arsenal moving to the area.

25 September 1929: Joey Williams made his Arsenal debut in the 5–2 defeat by Aston Villa.   He left Arsenal in March 1932 having played 26 league games for Arsenal, scoring five goals, and signed for Middlesbrough for whom he played for four seasons, finally putting in one season with Carlisle Utd.

25 September 1935: Bernard Joy’s first game in a friendly against Rangers.  He played throughout his career as an amateur, playing his first league game in April 1936.  See also here

25 September 1963: Arsenal beat Staevnet 7-1 in the Fairs Cup, with Joe Baker and  and Geoff Strong each scoring three.  It was Arsenal’s first competitive away game in Europe.

25 September 1971: Arsenal 3 Leicester City 0.  The crowd was 40,201 but there was little style in evidence here, and little sign of insightful tactics.  Arsenal won simply because Leicester were awful.

25 September 1979: Arsenal had a 2-1 win over Southampton in the league cup due to the genius of Liam Brady who collected a throw in from Rice, by-passed a defender, swivelled, and sent in a low drive from the edge of the penalty area.  Not only did the “One Liam Brady” chant go up, it continued and could be heard in the streets as fans queued for the tube.

25 September 1991: Ian Wright’s first game: Leicester 1 Arsenal 1 in the league cup.  He scored, naturally.  Arsenal won the second leg 2-0, with Wright scoring again.

25 September 1995: Dave Bowen died.  After managing Wales he re-joined Northampton between 1969 and 1972 as general manager, and later secretary, while also working in journalism (as a reporter for the People) and bookmaking, before finally retiring.  A stand at Northampton’s Sixfields Stadium is named after him.

25 September 2004:  The 0-1 away defeat of Man City made it 6 wins and 1 draw in the league. Cole scored the goal.  This was also the final match of the longest unbeaten away sequence in league football: 27 games from 5 April 2003.

25 September 2008: Untold Arsenal predicted that Arsenal would sign a midfielder for £40m.  On 2 September 2013 Arsenal signed Mesut Ozil.  We were just ahead of  the times.  By five years.

25 September 2013: Arsenal beat WBA in the league cup 5-4 on penalties after a 1-1 draw during a run of ten successive wins.  Eisfeld got the goal during the game; all five nominated players scored in the shoot-out while two of WBA’s players missed.

25 September 2017: Four years to the day after beating WBA in the league cup, during a fine winning run, Arsenal beat WBA 2-0 in the Premier League in a sequence of 11 wins and one draw in 12 games.  Lacazette got both goals.

26 September 1891: Having turned professional Arsenal upped the number of games they played in a season to 57 including on this date Arsenal 1 WBA 1 in front of 6000.

26 September 1914: Arsenal beat Hull City 2-1, to make it won four, drawn one, lost one thus far in the league this season, with a very satisfactory crowd of 20,000 at the game.

26 September 1919: In an event of supreme importance in relation to what happened in the future, Leeds City were summoned to a meeting with the League and ordered to hand over their accounts, but refused to do so on the grounds that the Commission had no legal right to demand them.  The League then removed Leeds City from its membership, and banned five officials for life, including Herbert Chapman.

26 September 1925: Arsenal 4 Leeds Utd 1 and WHU 1 Newcastle 0.  These scores are important in seeking to explain how Arsenal let in six goals against Newcastle in the first half of their next match – a match that supposedly led to the invention of WM.

26 September 1932: Debut for FR “Tiger” Hill in friendly v St Johnstone.  Aberdeen alleged that five of their players were involved in a betting scandal, but no charges were made either by the club or the authorities, although the players never played for the club again.  The match fixing scandals before the 1st world war had worked against Arsenal, but this one benefitted the club as Chapman moved quickly and signed Tiger Hill.  See also here

26 September 1938: Ted Drake scored both goals as Arsenal won the FA Charity Shield v PNE, 2-1.  As was the tradition at the time, the game was played not at Wembley but at one of the participants’ ground: in this case Highbury

26 September 1952 George Wood was born in Douglas, Lanarkshire and played as a goal keeper for Arsenal between 1980 and 1983.

26 September 1958.  Kenny Sansom born.  He started playing for Crystal Palace youth teams while at school, and made his first team debut aged 16. He captained Crystal Palace to win the FA Youth Cup and the England Youth team playing 172 for Palace before joining Arsenal.

26 September 1970.  Stoke City 5 Arsenal 0.  League match 10 of the first Double season.  Arsenal were 4th, but the away record read won 1 drawn 2 lost 2, five goals for, 10 against.  Arsenal were unbeaten in the next 14.  See also here.

26 September 1972: After losing their first ever league match Arsenal played against Norwich, Arsenal recovered  beating Birmingham 2-0 in front of 32,273 at Highbury (Storey and George scoring).

26 September 1979: John Devine’s first cap with Ireland, against Czechoslovakia.   The last cap was on 17 October 1984 against Norway.

26 September 1981: John Hawley made his debut for Arsenal in a 0-0 draw with Manchester United at Highbury.  He scored in his second game – a 1-2 away defeat to Notts County

26 September 1986: Albert Humpish died in Chester aged 84.   He was one of eight players to make his debut for Arsenal in the 1929/30 season, but only played three games and moved on to Bristol City in December 1930 for £450 

26 September 1991: Joe Hulme died.  He worked in the second world war as a policeman, was manager of Tottenham from 1945 to 1949 and was the manager who founded the side that won the league in 1951.  He then moved into journalism where he became highly established and recognised as a writer.  

26 September 1998: Sheffield Wednesday 1 Arsenal 0 – the champions’ first defeat of the season.  This was the game in which De Canio was sent off and then pushed the referee to the ground and was heavily criticised in the press for his lack of remorse.

26 September 2002: Arsenal beat Leeds away 4–1 to create the record for scoring in 47 consecutive games, and for 22 away league games without defeat.

26 September 2003: After consecutive draws Arsenal beat Newcastle 3-2 with two from Henry and one from Gilberto Silva.  The 7th league match of the unbeaten season.

26 September 2010: The day it became clear that there was something seriously wrong with the official versions of Arsenal’s history as it was revealed that the story of Bobby Buist causing Arsenal to become professional could not possibly have happened.   As the Arsenal History Society began unravelling the truth it was also discovered that huge amounts of other information about Arsenal’s past was also wrong.  So began the hunt for the truth which led to several books and ultimately these anniversary files.

26 September 2012: Arsenal beat Coventry 6-1 in the League Cup with goals from Giroud, Oxlade-Chamberlain, Arshavin, Walcott (2), and Miquel 

26 September 2015: Leicester 2 Arsenal 5 was Leicester’s worst defeat and Arsenal’s best win of the season.  An Alexis hattrick plus goals from Walcott and Giroud gave Arsenal the win.

26 September 2019: Arsenal beat Brentford 3-1 in the league cup.  Welbeck got two and Lacazette the third.  They finally went out in the fifth round losing at home to Tottenham

26 September 2021: After losing the first three games of the season, Arsenal made it three wins in a row by beating Tottenham 3-1.

27 September 1919: A rail strike began but the northern based Football League insisted that all fixtures be completed irrespective of transport difficulties – which effectively meant great hardship for London teams.  Arsenal travelled to Blackburn by coach – a journey of 15 hours each way over non-tarmacadam roads.  

27 September 1919: The last British troops left Archangel in Russia, leaving the Russians to sort out their own affairs.  The final leftovers of the first world war were being wrapped up.

27 September 1919:  Daniel Burgess played against Blackburn (away), but after the return match the following week he dropped out of the team.  He had played seven games in a row, and scored one goal, and then was seen no more. See also here.

27 September 1924: From 30 August to this date (when Arsenal lost to West Ham) Arsenal had seven league matches.  The Islington Gazette was particularly exercised about the team selection by Knighton suggesting that Paterson was available.  Paterson however did not play at all this season, and as an amateur he could make himself available as and when he wished.  In his autobiography Knighton was very dismissive of Paterson, but upon taking over the team Chapman went out of his way to get Paterson to play again.

27 September 1933: Peter Dougall had a trial at Arsenal, signing as a professional on 23 October.  He made his first team debut on 10 February 1934, away to Middlesbrough. 

27 September 1934: , Having played the first match in the Rangers v Arsenal series one week before, the return match was on this day.  Arsenal lost once again, but the series continued regularly until 1967.

27 September 1938: The RMS Queen Elizabeth was launched at Clydebank; and heralded as the largest ship in the world. 

27 September 1957: Ted Platt’s last game.  Ted then moved to Portsmouth  where he played 31 games before moving on to Aldershot with whom he played 16.  His final club was either Worcester City or Ashford (Kent) according to which source one opts for. 

27 September 1975: Arsenal 0 Tottenham 0 with a crowd of just 37,092.  The national press mostly failed to report the match in any detail and considered the negotiations relating to players’ freedom of contract far more worthy of consideration than a north London derby. 

27 September 1978: Arsenal got their biggest two leg Uefa Cup winning margin beating Lokomotiv Leipzig 4-1 away.  Brady, two from Stapleton and then Sunderland, were the goalscorers.   It was also the first game for Paul Vaessen

27 September 1997: Everton 2 Arsenal 2 with goals from Wright and Overmars.   It was the 9th league game of the 2nd Double Season, with Arsenal still undefeated.  The second double: part 1, part 2, part 3.

27 September 2004: Gilberto Silva’s scan revealed that he had life-threatening back problems.  However he later recovered and played with Arsenal until 2008.

27 September 2008: After three wins in which Arsenal had scored a total of ten goals, Arsenal were unbelievably beaten 1-2 by Hull for their second defeat in the Emirates.  The Arsenal goal came from McShane who turned it into his own net.

27 September 2012: Craig Eastmond loaned to Colchester Utd.  He later transferred to Colchester for whom he played 61 league games before moving on to Yeovil in 2015.

27 September 2012: Sanchez Watt also loaned to Colchester Utd.  It was the last of six loan spells for Sanchez, before he signed for Colchester, playing 50 games before leaving in 2015. By 2019 he was reported as playing for Wealdstone.

27 September 2014: Arsenal drew 1-1 with Tottenham in the PL.  Six Tottenham players received yellow cards.  Arsenal’s goal came from Oxlade Chamberlain.  Santi Cazorla replaced Aaron Ramsey in the first minute of added time in the first half.

28 September 1907: Preston 3 Woolwich Arsenal 0.  First league game for Joe Shaw.  He started out with first division Bury, his home town club, and then moved on to non-league Accrington Stanley, before reaching Plumstead in 1907. The result made it four defeats in the first six games.  He later became Arsenal’s manager upon the death of Chapman.  See also here

28 September 1908: Arsenal’s first match in the London FA Challenge Cup  –a 1-0 away victory over Fulham.  The club’s final match was on November 12 1973 in the semi-final, played away to Tottenham in which Arsenal lost 0-3.   Arsenal reached the final on 16 occasions, winning the competition eleven times. 

28 September 1924: Death of Arsenal’s first successful manager Harry Bradshaw who utterly transformed Arsenal, taking them to the First Division for the first time.  After leaving Arsenal he was Fulham’s first professional manager, won the Southern League twice in succession and their election to the Football League. He then went on to become secretary of the Southern League, where he stayed until his retirement in 1921. 

28 September 1946: Final appearance for the utterly unbelievably amazing Cliff Bastin.  After retiring from football he ran a cafe, wrote for the Sunday Pictorial and went on to be a publican, and died aged 79 back in his home county of Devon. He effectively lost the last five years of his career to the war.  What records he would have broken, had he been able to play on.

28 September 1946 International debut for Laurie Scott.  In all he played 17 times for England and four times for England B while at Arsenal.

28 September 1963: Having been 21st in the league after four games Burnley 0 Arsenal 3 made it five consecutive wins, lifting the club to sixth.  During the run Strong got four and Baker six goals.

28 September 1965: Alan Skirton became Arsenal’s first substitute of the modern era in a 1-1 draw with Northampton

28 September 1966: Tommy Baldwin’s final appearance. He then became part of the deal that brought George Graham to Arsenal.  After falling out with the Chelsea management over his social life he was loaned out before playing for Gravesend, Seattle Sounders and Brentford.

28 September 1974: Birmingham City 3 Arsenal 1, (25,584 present) left Arsenal 20th in the league just over three years after completing the double. George got a fine goal on 69 minutes, but it was Trevor Francis in the Birmingham side that really took Arsenal apart.  

28 September 1976: For the Arsenal v Blackpool match the visitors introduced the concept of an 11 man defence and got a goalless draw in front of 27,195 bored spectators.  After the game Terry Neill said Arsenal had just broken the world record for crosses and shots.  None of them however broke the two lines of five in front of the keeper.

28 September 1985: David Rocastle’s debut in 0-0 draw with Newcastle.  He went on to make 13 starts in his first season.  See also here

28 September 1991.  Southampton 0 Arsenal 4.  Ian Wright scored both his first league goal and his first hat trick for Arsenal and went on to score 24 goals in 30 games in his first Arsenal season.

28 September 1992.  Arsenal 1 Manchester City 0, the first win after 2 draws and 2 defeats.  Ian Wright scored in front of just 21,504.

28 September 1996: Arsenal 2 Sunderland 0 made it three wins out of three for Arsène Wenger, six undefeated for Arsenal.  Hartson and Parlour got the goals in the second of a sequence of six in which Arsenal did not concede a single goal.

28 September 2002:  Leeds 1 Arsenal 4.   Arsenal beat Nottm Forest’s record of 22 away games without defeat.  Olivier Dacourt of Leeds commented on the team,”We’re all fighting for second place now. It was demoralising. They just pass and move, pass and move. You find yourself working for nothing.”    Arsène Wenger called the performance as “edging nearer to perfection… We are playing great, Total Football.   Danger comes from everywhere.” Leeds manager Terry Venables said: “Manchester United have been exceptional for 10 years – but I’ve not seen anything as good as that.”   Arsenal also beat Chesterfield’s 72 year old record of scoring in 47 consecutive league games set between December 1929 and December 1930 in the Third Division north in which Arsenal player Jack Lee, who was transferred to Chesterfield in 1928, was very much part of Chesterfield’s run.  

28 September 2007: Despite a period of privation as Arsenal worked to pay off the debt arising from building the stadium, Arsène Wenger said if he was handed £100m transfer fund he’d hand it back.

28 September 2013: Arsenal made it a record breaking 12 consecutive away wins beating Swansea 2-1, as they also equalled the all time record of 8 consecutive away PL wins, set by Arsenal on 11 May 2002.

28 September 2016: Arsenal beat FC Basel 2-0 in a run of 19 games without defeat.

28 September 2017: Arsenal beat BATE Borisov 2-4 away in a run which yielded seven wins and one defeat in eight games.

28 September 2020: Arsenal finished the first month of the delayed 2020/1 season having recorded 2 wins and a defeat, in 5th position.  The one defeat was on this day to Liverpool.

29 September 1894: First game for Roy Buchanan, a 4-2 win over Manchester City.   This was in a period in which Arsenal, having lost the first three games of the season, scoring 3 and conceding 11, then went on to three consecutive wins, scoring 13 and conceding six.  See also here.

29 September 1900: League debut for Frederick Coles, in a 1-0 win over Chesterfield.  His previous teams are listed as Nottingham Post Office, Notts County, and finally Nottingham Forest

29 September 1911: Bernard Joy was born in Fulham.  He played university football and then went on to play for the amateur side Casuals and won the FA Amateur Cup in 1936 plus ten caps for England amateurs.   He was captain of the 1936 GB Olympics team. 

29 September 1917:  Sir Henry Norris spotted at Highbury for the 0-1 home reverse to Chelsea – his first visit for a long time, due to his ever rising commitments in organising conscription at the War Office for which he was made Lt Colonel

29 September 1919: First senior game for John (“Jack”) Butler.  He had played for Fulham Thursday (known in some reports as Fulham Thursdays), Dartford and Fulham although different sources disagree on the order in which he played for those clubs.  He signed for Arsenal as a reserve in 1914.

29 September 1919: Arsenal played Tottenham in a friendly – Tottenham won, 1-0 with 10,000 in the ground. Although relations between the two had been strained because of Tottenham’s protests at Arsenal’s move north, Tottenham’s crowds had subsequently risen because of  the new rivalry, and Tottenham had played their wartime games at Highbury.

29 September 1922:  The first of two articles by Sir Henry Norris (Arsenal chairman) was published saying that he was withdrawing completely from public life in Fulham because of the demands of the local party, and the fact that he had received threats against his life as a result of his promotion of the Ready Money Football Betting Bill which had passed into law.

29 September 1924 (or shortly after) Arsenal made an offer to Preston North End of £4500 plus Bob Turnbull, (who had been transmuted from a full back to a centre forward), in return for Preston’s and England’s forward Tom Roberts.  He had scored 118 goals in 199 games.  It was an example of how the manager was not limited to a maximum fee of £1500 per player (as stated in his autobiography).

29 September 1934: Jimmy Dunne transferred to Arsenal.  He played the next day in the 6-0 win over Middlesbrough, despite forgetting to take his boots with him. 

29 September 1948: First game for Arthur Shaw after a transfer from Brentford.  He also played for England Amateurs, and won the league with Arsenal in 1952/3. 

29 September 1951: Arsenal 1 Tottenham 1.  The game is noteworthy because of the variation in crowds reported.  Ollier has 68,164 while Newkey-Burden in “Gunners Lists” (a book which acknowledges Ollier as a source) has 72,164.  That figure would make this the third highest crowd to see a home league match for Arsenal.

29 September 1952: Leslie Compton’s final game.  All Stars 4 Arsenal 2.  The benefit match for Arsenal goalkeeper Alex Wilson.  Lishman and Logie (with a penalty) scored for Arsenal.

29 September 1962: Birmingham 2 Arsenal 2 (both goals from Geoff Strong).  Final game for Gerry Ward.  He left Arsenal in July 1963 and went to Leyton Orient having played 84 times and scored 10 goals.  He had one season at Orient where he was an almost ever present but left Orient and played instead first for Cambridge City and then Barnet as well as being Barnet’s manager in 1973.

29 September 1969: Ray Kennedy’s first appearance.  As an apprentice he was rejected by Sir Stanley Matthews at Port Vale, returned to the north-east, played amateur football and worked in a sweet factory before being spotted two years later by an Arsenal scout.  The game ended Glentoran 1 Arsenal 0 (13000).

29 September 1973:  Everton 1 Arsenal 0, 31,359 in the crowd. Alan Ball claimed that this was the worst game he had ever played in, and that he had a stiff neck from watching the ball pass through the clouds for much of the game, as Everton experimented with an early version of the approach that later made Wimbledon famous.

29 September 1982:  Having lost to Spartak Moscow 2-3 Arsenal hoped to turn the score around in the second leg.  However on this day Arsenal lost 2-5 and Arsenal were out in the first round.

29 September 1993: Arsenal 1 Odense 1 as Arsenal headed to the CWC final.  Campbell scored the goal, with the Odense equaliser coming in the 86th minute, but Arsenal held on to go through 3-2 on aggregate.

29 September 1994: Arsenal 3 Omonia 0 as Arsenal got through the 1st round of the CWC.  Wright got two and Schwarz the third to give Arsenal a 6-1 victory over the side from Cyprus.

29 September 2001: Richard Wright debut in a 2-0 away win against Derby.  He had just one season with Arsenal but made just enough appearances to qualify for a league winners’ medal.  This made it just one defeat in first seven of the season; League match 7 of the third Double season.

29 September 2002: Arsène Wenger in an interview described his side’s approach as “Total Football”.  Arsenal had just beaten Leeds away 1-4, in a run of the first nine games of the season in which they won seven and scored 24 goals.

29 September 2004: Rosenborg 1 Arsenal 1 (Ljungberg).  Arsenal had already beaten PSV Eindhoven and looked set fair for the next stage. They made it but not with the victory that they might have hoped for.

29 September 2007:  Top of the table Arsenal made it a perfect September beating WHU 1-0.   The discussion in the build-up to the game concerned a revelation that the late Danny Fiszman had asked Arsène Wenger what he’d do if the club gave him £100 million to spend on players.  The manager said he would hand it back.

29 September 2009: Arsenal beat Olympiakos 2-0 at home in the Champions League.  It was one of seven consecutive wins and 13 games unbeaten in league and cup.

29 September 2015: In a complete surprise Arsenal lost 2-3 at home to Olympiakos, having just beaten Leicester 2-5 away.  However in the return game Arsenal won 3-0.

29 September 2018: After losing the first two games of the season and talk in the media of Arsenal fighting relegation, a 2-0 win over Watford on this day made it five consecutive league wins, with 12 goals scored. And the highest scores of the season were yet to come. In this game Bernd Leno made his League debut as a substitute after Petr Čech came off injured. Arsenal ended the month in fifth, having been 17th after two games. 

29 September 2022: Having previously been booed off the pitch when substituted, Granit Xhaka was voted player of the month.

30 September 1892: “Redshirt” who wrote Woolwich Football Notes in the Woolwich Gazette complained about his lot as a football journalist just one year into the job proclaiming, “No matter what you say, someone condemns you for a fool.”

30 September 1893: Arsenal let in six for the first time, in a defeat at Newcastle.  It was particularly disappointing after two fine wins in which the club scored seven and let in one.  But then in October Arsenal also  lost 1-4 to Small Heath and 0-5 to Liverpool.

30 September 1912: Arsenal played Chelsea in a one-off match for the London Professional Footballers’ Association Charity Fund. The professional London clubs played one such game each year from 1908 to 1913 and the gate receipts, after deduction of expenses, were distributed to various institutions throughout London.

30 September 1913:  The Woolwich Gazette reported that the whole North Grandstand was gutted by fire which started at the refreshment bar, at the junction with the western end of the stand. It was apparently witnessed by more people than had seen the team play for much of the previous season!

30 September 1916: Arsenal lost away to Chelsea 3-0 in front of a crowd of 12,000.   That meant the club had won nil, drawn two and lost three of the opening games of the new season, scoring two goals and conceding seven.

30 September 1919: Arsenal owner Sir Henry Norris chaired a meeting of the London Borough of Fulham to elect the members of its Profiteering Committee following the passing of the Profiteering Act in Parliament. 

30 September 1922: One week after Arsenal beat Tottenham at WHL in a game that led to a major enquiry by the League into crowd behaviour, the return match was played in front of 55,000 – a new record crowd for Highbury.  Tottenham won 2-0 and Arsenal sank to 19th in the league.

30 September 1933:  Jimmy Dunne signed for Arsenal and immediately played in a 6-0 win over Middlesbrough.  He was Chapman’s last big name signing and went on to score nine goals in 21 games that season. 

30 September 1946: Arsenal’s Dr Kevin O’Flanagan and his brother played for Ireland against England.  He played for Ireland at both football and rugby, was also a sprint champion, scored for Ireland in a 1938 world cup qualifier against Norway and played both for Northern Ireland and for the Irish Free State.

30 September 1964: Archibald Devine, who played in the last game in Plumstead, died. He had 14 transfers; 11 clubs, 1 cap, 1 cup winner’s medal.  After his football career he worked as a miner and a docker.

30 September 1966: George Graham signed from Chelsea, while Tommy Baldwin was sold to Chelsea who also received £50,000 from Arsenal.  George Graham had played 72 league games for Chelsea scoring 35 goals and won the League Cup, in 1965.

30 September 1996: Arsène Wenger appointed as Arsenal manager (although some sources quote 28th and others 29th).

30 September 1995: Chelsea 1 Arsenal 0.  This was the first defeat for Bruce Rioch as Arsenal manager in the eighth league game.  The club recovered however and won the next two without conceding.

30 September 1997: Arsenal 1 PAOK 1.  Arsenal exited the Uefa cup in the first round losing 2-1 on aggregate.  However in the long term the defeat was forgotten as Arsenal went on to the semi-final of the League Cup, and to win the FA Cup and League Double for the second time.

30 September 1998: Arsenal beat Panathinaikos in front of the second highest Arsenal home crowd ever as part of the experiment of playing Champions League games at Wembley.  Arsenal won 2-1.

30 September 1998: Laurie Brown died aged just 61.  He is remembered for signing for Tottenham from Arsenal and then playing for Tottenham against Arsenal the next day.  After leaving Tottenham he worked with several clubs as a player manager, and then manager in non-league football.

30 September 2005: Graham Stack cleared of rape after long running court case.  He transferred to Reading, but continued a long series of loans before holding down a regular goalkeeping position with Hibs and then Barnet

30 September 2006: On his 10th anniversary Arsène Wenger led Arsenal to a 2-1 victory over Charlton and a third consecutive victory and one of five wins in a row.  Van Persie got both goals

30 September 2008: Arsenal beat Porto 4-0, a welcome recovery after an unexpected home defeat to Hull City three days earlier.  There were two goals from van Persie and two from Adebayor.

30 September 2011: Almunia loaned to West Ham.  In 2012 he moved to Watford, for whom he played 76 games before retiring on medical advice, after a rare heart condition was picked up during a medical with Serie A side Cagliari Calcio.

30 September 2011: Arsenal chairman Stan Kroenke reported as saying “Arsène Wenger is one of the greats – he will be in charge for as long as he wants.”

30 September 2018: Alexandre Lacazette won Arsenal’s player of the month vote.  He also won goal of the month for his goal against Everton in a 2-0 home victory.

30 September 2019: Matteo Guendouzi named Arsenal player of the month.  Within a year he was an outcast and not picked at all in the squad.  On this day Arsenal drew 1-1 with Man U, to make it just one defeat in the opening ten games of the season.

30 September 2021: Despite Arsenal losing their first three games of the season and being pilloried in the press, Arsenal’s manager Mikel Arteta was awarded the manager of the month award as Arsenal had won the 4th, 5th and 6th games of the season.

30 September 2021: Takehiro Tomiyasu named Arsenal’s player of the month while Martin Ødegaard  was given the goal of the month award and Mikel Arteta was given Premier League Manager of the Month award.


The Anniversary files now have over 6000 entries, and are now divided into monthly sections.

The Arsenal History Society anniversaries files are the biggest database of Arsenal events ever produced.  However in trying to build it I always openly acknowledge that some of the details recorded here will be  wrong, and facts will be inaccurate and will need correcting, not least because information may be taken from inaccurate sources, or (in my specialist way) I may have made copying and typing errors.

So far over 250 people have contributed to the articles that make up the anniversary files, and if you can help us improve the data, please do either comment on an article (and I’ll correct the file itself), or write a new article for us. A correction and a citation of sources would be good however, rather than just saying “you’re wrong”.   A special mention as always must go to Andy Kelly and Mark Andrews, who helped with the early development of this site.   But whether you can add original research or corrections with the right data, or articles on people we have not yet covered, that will be very welcome indeed.

The dates in this file are being added to all the time, and come from a whole variety of sources including the internet and a variety of printed volumes.  If you notice an error please write to Tony@schools.co.uk – ideally with a correction and a note of your source.

I would particularly like to mention Richard Lerman and David Brown, and their wonderful (but now tragically out of print) volume The Gunners: Day to Day Life at Highbury”, which is a mine of information.     Also to “Arsenal On This Day” by Paul Donnelley (Pitch Publishing).  Also where would any of us be without “Arsenal a complete record” by Fred Ollier (Breedon Books), and “Arsenal the football facts” by Dean Hayes (John Blake), and “Arsenal Fact File” by Bruce Smith.  If I have missed another sourcebook, please do let me know and I will correct this at once.

If you know of any anniversary dates not yet listed, please do write in and add them.   Not only are new dates being added at the rate of about half a dozen a day, but so are links being added to articles on this site.  It is intended to produce a book based on this site in due course – but the date gets put back as I find more and more info.

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