The day Paul Merson successfully predicted the Unbeaten Season – before it happened!

Here are the Anniversaries from 11 August – part of our regular daily look at Arsenal’s history.

Details of the whole list of 5000 Arsenal anniversaries and other activities undertaken by the Arsenal History Society are at the end of today’s list.

 


11 August 1947: Don Roper signed from Southampton  (See background article here).  He had played 40 games for Southampton who did not want to let him go.  He went on to play 297 league games for Arsenal.

11 August 1953.  Danny Clapton signed by Tom Whittaker as an amateur, having previously played for Leytonstone.  His first game was on Christmas Day 1954, a 1-0 win over Chelsea.

11 August 1977: Jimmy Rimmer sold to Villa.  He had been displaced in goal at Arsenal by Pat Jennings and stayed at Aston Villa until 1983 playing 229 games, and winning the league in 1981 and European Cup in 1982.

11 August 1979: Arsenal lost 3-1 to Liverpool in Charity Shield.  The crowd of 92,000 was Arsenal’s highest ever for a charity shield game.  It was also Arsenal’s first appearance in the Shield since 12 October 1953.

11 August 1982:  A tribunal forced Arsenal to pay £500,000 for Lee Chapman after offering £100,000 for the player.  It was widely reported that Arsenal were totally shocked by the adjudication, and by the fact they were not able to appeal.

11 August 1993Colin Pates transferred to Brighton after a loan move, having made just 16 league starts for Arsenal.

11 August 1997: Arsenal 2 Coventry 0.  2nd league game of the 2nd Double Season, and part of the 12 match opening unbeaten run.  Wright and Garde scored the goals leaving Ian Wright one short of Bastin’s goalscoring record.  The second double: part 1, part 2, part 3.

11 August 2002: 23 years to the day after Arsenal played Liverpool in the Charity Shield, Gilberto Silva played his first competitive match for Arsenal (after the usual pre-season tour) against  v Liverpool in Community Shield.  Gilberto scored the only goal.  For context see here.

11 August 2003: Ahead of the Unbeaten Season, Paul Merson on BBC TV said Arsenal were favourites because they had the “best players … If they all remain fit week-in week-out then they will not be beaten.”  In those days it seems he knew something about football.

11 August 2005: Alex Song came to Arsenal on loan from Bastia for whom he had played 32 games.  He played five goals during the loan spell, and then signed for the club later leaving for Barcelona in 2012.

11 August 2015: Goalkeeper Emiliano Martínez loaned to Wolverhampton Wanderers for the season.  He played 13 league games for the club in this, his fourth loan.

 


Also on this day

One of the greatest of 20th century artists, Jackson Pollock, died in a car crash aged 44.  While his work is seen as nothing more than paint splashes by many, many others (including, I must, admit myself) find his work to be awe-inspiring.  He wrote, “Abstract painting… confronts you.  There was a reviewer a while back who wrote that my pictures didn’t have any beginning or any end.  He didn’t mean it as a compliment, but it was.  It was a fine compliment.”                                    Tony Attwood

 


The current series from the Arsenal History Series being developed on this site is Henry Norris at the Arsenal, covering all aspects off the life and work of the man who rescued Arsenal from extinction, secured the club’s future by moving it to Highbury, and then brought in Herbert Chapman as manager.

The most recent article is The players who launched Arsenal’s rebirth and Arsenal’s games in October 1913.

The previously untold tale of how it was that Norris came to choose Highbury as the suitable location for Arsenal’s new ground.

The series is being worked on daily, and the articles thus far are here.

Among the many other series we have run are…

There are details of many other series covered by this site on our home page.

One Reply to “The day Paul Merson successfully predicted the Unbeaten Season – before it happened!”

  1. Regarding this date 20 years ago – Wright scored both goals.
    Garde never scored a single goal for The Arsenal.

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