We’ve seen in the first article how the tinies got really worked up about Arsenal moving to north London, while they were stuck over the border in Middlesex, and how they turned the events of 1919 on their head to pretend that somehow they should have stayed in the first division, while Arsenal should have [...]]]> Tony Attwood

We’ve seen in the first article how the tinies got really worked up about Arsenal moving to north London, while they were stuck over the border in Middlesex, and how they turned the events of 1919 on their head to pretend that somehow they should have stayed in the first division, while Arsenal should have not been there at all.

Now the question arises – why didn’t they just let it go. In their first season after the 1919 promotion issue, the Tiny Totts, back in their spiritual home of the 2nd division, won the league, losing just four games and scoring 102 goals.

So they were back in the top division, alongside Arsenal.

Even more to the point in 1920/1 with the top side of London and Middlesex both in the top league the Tiny Totts ended up above Arsenal, coming sixth to The Arsenal’s 9th, having gained three points more than Arsenal.  Tottenham also won the cup.  You’d think by then they’d let the old bitterness go.

In 1921/22 they did even better coming 2nd to Arsenal’s lowly 17th.  Surely by now they should have been forgetting the events of the move of 1913 and the promotion of 1919.  They knew they were wrong in both cases – wasn’t it time just to focus on winning the league?  Middlesex was beating London hands down.

In 1922/3 Arsenal pipped Tottenham on goal average (they were 11th and 12th), but the following season Tottenham were on top again (15th against The Arsenal in 19th).  Same again in 1924/5 it was Tottenham in 12th The Arsenal one place (although 7 points) away from relegation in 20th.

And then the corner was turned. From 1925/6 on, it was Arsenal’s turn to dominate, coming above the tinies each year, until the little fellas went down in 1928.  When Arsenal won the cup for the first time in 1930, the Tinies were 12th in the second division – but still historically better than Arsenal having won the cup twice to Arsenal’s once.

But what made it all turn nasty was 1930/1 – Arsenal won the league, while the Totts just missed promotion coming third in the second division.  This was, I believe, what made the Middlesex club so utterly inward looking, focussing only on getting their own back on Arsenal.  It wasn’t until 1933 (with Arsenal winning the league again, having come second the year before) that the Totts managed to clamber out of the second division.

By 1934-5 Tottenham H had an inferiority complex the size of a planet, and that league table is one we ought to have up on the wall…

• First, Arsenal 58 points, four points clear of Sunderland in second
• Bottom, Tottenham, 30 points, four points away from safety.

We were winning the league and cup and they were sinking fast.  Even when we had a duff year (sixth in 1935/6), we still won the Cup, and Tottenham could only manage 5th in the second division.

By the time football finished for the second world war, Arsenal were the gold standard of football, having won the league 5 times and the cup twice.

Of course we hadn’t played in the Wellingboro and District Cup Final, which the Tinies official web site still boasts about, but we had equalled their cup record, and outstripped them five to nil in terms of league wins.

During the war years Tottenham had time to mull over matters, to contemplate how Arsenal had outstripped them, and how we would start the post-war season in the first, while they were stuck in the second (they had come 8th in the second division in 1939).

But did they?  Not at all.  They kept on calling Arsenal “Woolwich Arsenal” and kept on moaning that way back in 1919 Arsenal had fixed a promotion.  By then they had said it so much they believed it was true, and of course in this they were encouraged by Manchester United and Liverpool, the match fixing teams who most certainly did not want the truth of the 1914/15 season coming out.

As we’ll see in the next article, they did eventually get themselves together for one little spell of glory, but not before Arsenal had notched up yet another league championship and another FA Cup win.

In fact it was the reality of their achieving a moment’s success before slipping back that reinforced their desire to get Arsenal.  If they couldn’t do it on the football pitch, they’d find another way.

Tottenham from 1891 to the first world war – including the move to Highbury and the promotion of 1919.

1910: when Arsenal almost lost it, but started the long journey back

Untold Arsenal – all the news today

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It all started in [...]]]> This article repeats a little of the article on Henry Norris and the Southern League.  I have included the info about the start of the Southern League again, so you don’t have to keep zipping backwards and forwards.  If you know about the Southern League bit, just skim down the page.

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It all started in 1891.

In 1891 Woolwich Arsenal was formed as a professional club.  The FA then told everyone not to play them, because of the professional issues, and Arsenal were reduced to playing friendlies against northern teams.

So in 1891 Arsenal called a meeting to discuss the idea of a southern league 26 clubs attended, the new league was agreed and 12 clubs elected:

• Chatham,
• Luton Town,
• Millwall Athletic,
• Marlow,
• Swindon Town,
• Reading,
• West Herts,
• Ilford,
• Woolwich Arsenal,
• Chiswick Park,
• Old St Marks
• Crouch End.

Crouch End then withdrew.  One of the unsuccessful applicants was Tottenham H who got one vote (their own).

There were several more attempts to form the Southern League and in 1894 the  Southern League, proposed by Millwall Athletic (which became Millwall) finally got going with two divisions.

Division 1

• Chatham
• Clapton
• Ilford
• Luton Town
• Millwall Athletic
• Reading
• Royal Ordnance Factories
• Southampton St Mary
• Swindon Town

Division 2

• Bromley
• Chesham
• Maidenhead
• New Brompton
• Old St Stephen’s
• Sheppy United
• Uxbridge

You will note there was no Tottenham H.  What they were up to can be best quoted (so there is no argument of bias) from their official Tiny Totts web site

1895
Spurs adopt professionalism.

1896
A record crowd of 6,000 spectators watch the friendly match with Aston Villa. Spurs elected to the Southern League Division One. Club colours changed to chocolate and gold.

1897
We reach our first Cup Final, losing 0-2 to hosts Wellingborough in the local Charity Cup competition.

1898
The Club becomes a limited company and a match against Woolwich Arsenal attracts a record crowd of 14,000 spectators.

[end of quote from the Tinies web site]

So the key point is this, Woolwich Arsenal were professionals before Tottenham, and entered the mainstream Football League (there being no Southern League).  Tottenham (as is there wont) trotted along later, having been rejected very clearly in the original meetings.  They became pros in 1895, and joined the Southern League a year later.

But why did Tottenham get just one vote initially? And why did they fail to get in, in 1894?  Of course it was because they were a little amateur club whose only claim to fame is that they played a local cup final against  the sixth eldest football club in the country and who claim to be the first ever club to play under floodlights in 1879 when they played Bedford.

What’s more, there was already a football team in their area – Leyton Orient formed in 1881.

When Tottenham played Woolwich Arsenal in 1898 they were playing a solid middle of the table second division team in the Football League – no wonder the crowds turned up.

In 1908 Tottenham joined the second division (by which time Arsenal were in the first).  Now skip forward five years and in 1913 Woolwich Arsenal moved to Highbury.  Tottenham Hotspur led the objections to Arsenal’s move – even though as the League and FA had both said time and again before, there is nothing in the rule books that allows them to dictate where a club plays.  Besides which if anyone ought to have an objection it was Orient.  The Os are the second oldest Football League club in London behind Fulham.

Besides, the argument against location was old and discredited, as Norris knew full well. Fulham had done much the same in objecting when Chelsea opened up in their quadrant of the city in 1905, and if anything the Chelsea issue was much more of a scandal – there was no club, no support, no team, no history, no background.  Just an old athletics stadium that was about to be turned into a coal dumping yard for the railways.

So the Tottenham protestation was all show and no substance.  They must have known there was not a single rule for them to object to.But they made a lot of it, not least to cover the fact that despite all their protestations, there was no way that they were not even a London team.  They were in Middlesex.  The Arsenal however was now in London – and Tottenham did not like that.

What’s more Tottenham had only been in the league for a mere five years - they could hardly claim the territory as theirs in just five years, even if there was a rule to allow them to.

The matter got worse when football resumed in 1919 after the war.  Tottenham had had one of their regular dreadful seasons in 1914-15 – the final season prior to war, and had ended up bottom, going down with Chelsea.

But after the war the league decided to extend the first division from 20 to 22 clubs.  They demanded their regular reward for failure, and expected to be kept in the league.   The clubs were required to vote – as they always were.

The Arsenal objected on the grounds that the deal proposed by Tottenham H hushed up the big issue of the 1914/15 season – the match fixing by Manchester United and Liverpool (Man U had fixed a game with Liverpool, and so ended up one point above Chelsea, and thus safe from relegation).

The Arsenal demanded that Manchester United and Liverpool be relegated to the second division, along with the two bottom clubs.  Tottenham fought the proposal, but eventually lost.   There were some behind the scenes deals and ultimately, in return for dropping the demand that Liverpool and Man U go down Arsenal got Liverpool’s vote and Man U’s vote, the league got its way, and Arsenal were voted into the first division.

Tottenham got annoyed.

For the record, Tottenham H went down and Arsenal, Preston and Derby went up, along with Chelsea who retained their position.  This was done through a secret ballot.

The reason Tottenham had once again got virtually no support was simple – they were a johnny-come-lately who were trying to make up rules to suit themselves.  It had always been the case that when clubs were ejected from the league, or the league was expanded, there should be a secret ballot.  For years and years this is how clubs came into the football league from non-league football until 1987.

So Tottenham’s argument against a secret vote (which ultimately resulted in them going out of the first division and Arsenal coming in) was ludicrous – expansion, and removal from the league was always sorted out like this, and would be for another 68 years.   This was the most outrageous piece of special pleading ever.

And yet somehow Tottenham have managed to write this period in history as if somehow Arsenal “stole” their place in the league.  It beggars all belief.

Worse – they have continued to do this.  And worse again through their friends in the media and elsewhere they have continued to be successful in undermining the good name of Arsenal.

I’ll explain how in the next article.

More on Woolwich Arsenal

Read the story of how Arsenal went bust, and rose from the ashes, 100 years ago, in the most amazing football book ever: “Making the Arsenal”

I raised the issue the other day that there should be a statue of Herbert Chapman somewhere at the stadium that we can all see and enjoy.

As we established in the subsequent correspondence there is not just one bust of the great man, but three busts spread around, but nothing on display so that your [...]]]> Tony Attwood

I raised the issue the other day that there should be a statue of Herbert Chapman somewhere at the stadium that we can all see and enjoy.

As we established in the subsequent correspondence there is not just one bust of the great man, but three busts spread around, but nothing on display so that your average supporter turning up on the day of the match could actually see one.

There’s a lot of space around the stadium, but that is not to say there is an obvious point to put a statue – that would have to be decided by the club and the planning authorities.

In passing I mentioned the Arsenal Wall, which has a picture of every Arsenal player who ever played at Highbury – a great achievement and a site well worth a visit.  I think that was a tremendous piece of Arsenalisation – and it is interesting to find in correspondence since the first article that there are many supporters who have been to the Ems but who did not know that the Wall was there.

Clearly what we need to do is direct people to the Wall, and add some other attractions.

One suggestion that has been made is that if we have Chapman we should also have Henry Norris recognised.

This is a much more controversial idea, since Norris ended his career banned from football for life – although the club made it clear to Norris that he would be welcome back in the board room any time he wanted (an offer Norris never took up).

As I think I am just about the only person ever to have written a book about Norris (“Making the Arsenal”) I have a fair amount of knowledge concerning the man, and just to give a quick summary, the key points are…

He took over Woolwich Arsenal in 1910 when the club was bust and liable to go out of business.

He saved the club, and then three years later moved the club to Highbury, a ground that he built entirely with his own money.

Norris was knighted for his services to the state during the first world war and then took us back into the first division in 1919.  This act has been vilified by Tottenham supporters who have managed to grab our history and re-write it for their own ends.  However as the Woolwich Arsenal analysis of the events show, Arsenal were far from being the villains of the piece.  You can read the whole story here.

Norris then brought in Herbert Chapman, gave him free reign and allowed him to create the Arsenal side that swept all before him in the 1930s.

So what’s there to argue against a statue of Norris?

First, Tottenham supporters have been remorseless in their attack on Norris and although we can show that they have simply made up a tale to suit themselves the fact is that they have taken their pals in the media with them, and the story that Norris bought Arsenal a promotion is so well established that it is unlikely that Norris would get a fair hearing.

Second, Norris’ original plan on rescuing Arsenal was either to merge Arsenal with Fulham or take us to Craven Cottage to play there on the same Saturdays as Chelsea were at home at Stamford Bridge.   These early drives were not those of a man with Arsenal at heart.

Third, there are many stories that suggest that Norris was a bully and generally not a nice man.  He could be immensely generous too – including to local people who had voted him in as a councillor, and then as Mayor of Fulham, but the stories about his personality have a force that suggest ulterior motives were often not far from the surface.

Fourth, there is no escaping the fact that Norris did break the rules when he took some money out of the club in the late 1920s.   Now we might well say, the rules were stupid because he had put so many tens of thousands of pounds into the club over time – but the rules were broken in a way that suggests he simply thought he could get away with it.

It was the Daily Mail that broke the story about Norris’ money, and Norris then sued the paper.  He lost, and was then thrown out of the club.

My view (and it is nothing but my view as one who has written a book about the man) is that before we put up a statue we need to rehabilitate the man, and have all the facts together on his activities, just as we have done over the 1919 promotion affair.   I do hope that in the next year or two I’ll be able to publish a book on the whole of Norris’ life – if no one else does that first.  Maybe the statue comes after that.

Which raises the question – if we were to go for three statues who would be go for?

Chapman created the club in its modern style, gave us the name we now have, and was involved in changing the rules of football.  Plus he gave us a cup win and a league title – our first of each.

My thinking has taken me forward and back, looking for someone who was earlier than Chapman but did just as much for the club, and someone in the present day who has again be so forward thinking as to transform the club.

A triumvirate of reformers across the years from 1886 to the present day.

Here’s my nominations:

Jack Humble: one of the founders of the club who stayed on and became part of the committee that ran the club.  He remained as a director through the Norris era, resigning only when Norris went, on the grounds  that he had to accept responsibility for what happened in Norris’ reign.

Herbert Chapman, our pivotal figure

Arsene Wenger, who has transformed the club, giving us our influx of players from around the world, the new training facilities, the incredible youth project whose benefits we are seeing today with the arrival of Wilshere, Jay Emmanuel-Thomas and the like, the new stadium, the Unbeaten Season and the trophies.

That would be my choice: Humble, Chapman and Wenger.

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Other articles:

The original article on the Chapman memorial

Jack Humble

Norris and Arsenal’s promotion of 1919

Untold Arsenal

OK, I know there is a bust, and it used to be in the marble halls at Highbury.

Now it is at the Directors’ Entrance at Emirates Stadium and (according to the club) “greets the thousands of guests which visit the stadium each year.”

Well, yes, up to a point.   (Apart from the fact [...]]]> By Tony Attwood

OK, I know there is a bust, and it used to be in the marble halls at Highbury.

Now it is at the Directors’ Entrance at Emirates Stadium and (according to the club) “greets the thousands of guests which visit the stadium each year.”

Well, yes, up to a point.   (Apart from the fact that it should be “who visit” and not “which visit”).  The directors’ entrance is on the Emirates Stadium’s official tours so yes lots of people see it.

Actually, just to be accurate, this ain’t the original Herbert Chapman bust, but a replica – they left the original at Highbury (hopefully on purpose).

But here’s the problem.  Chapman is revered as the founder of the modern club – the man brought in by Norris who completed the Great Task, of the transition from a small club from Kent to a giant in world football.

And I don’t get to go in the Directors’ Entrance.

So how do I venerate Chapman upon arrival at the Ems?  How do I say to people who I take along for an occasional visit when my partner can’t use her ticket, “This is the Founder.  This is the man who started the Great Task”.

(Sorry I seem to have slipped a bit into North Korean here – but you know what I mean).

There is not any Chapman anywhere as far as I know, on the way into Arsenal. (OK maybe there is and I don’t happen to pass it so I have missed it so you can now tell me, and I will issue a full apology for wasting your time).

At a time when the club has put the old south bank clock on the outside of the stadium opposite the south bridge, and put a new replica giant inside the stadium and given us back the North Bank and the Clock End, where is the tribute to Herbert Chapman?

Chapman was the visionary, as well as the man who gave us success.  He introduced numbering on shirts (the FA and League told him to stop), he wanted to take floodlighting forward (it had been tried for years, and he wanted it as a regular feature), he proposed the ten-yard penalty semi-circle (the “D”).    He got Gillespie Road tube station change to Arsenal, and indeed he changed the name of the club from The Arsenal to Arsenal.

And perhaps most of all, he gave us our first major trophy – the Cup in 1930, and then the League in 1931, before tragically being cut short in his prime.

Which therefore leads to the question – why is there no HERBERT CHAPMAN STATUE at the Ems?

Now I know you can’t go round putting statues up all over the place in an area that has 60,000 people walking around it at the time of a match.  But the designers have been innovative in building the Highbury Wall which commemorates every player who ever played at Arsenal.

So surely there must be somewhere to put a statue to Chapman that each and every one of us can pass, and reflect upon as we go to the go and point it out to guests and visitors, and be photographed next to?

I’m going to start my own little bit of lobbying on this – I hope you feel it is a good idea.

About this site

The Woolwich Arsenal web site exists to explore all aspects of Arsenal’s history.  To give some focus much of the reporting is on Arsenal 100 years ago (hence “Woolwich Arsenal”) but the site does also pick up on other historic issues – such as this campaign to get a Chapman statue.

Want to know how Tottenham have stolen our history?  Read the story of the 1919 promotion from an Arsenal perspective, and much more – all indexed on the index page.

And if you fancy knowing about what football and life was really like 100 years ago, trying “Making the Arsenal” which is available from that last link, or via Amazon.

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Today we think of [...]]]> This article continues from the one published yesterday – it explores the fact that by the summer of 1910 Henry Norris owned three clubs – Croydon Common in the Southern League, Fulham in Division 2 and Woolwich Arsenal in Division One.   The first part of the article can be read here.

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Today we think of the non-league pyramid as being very much low key – a long way behind the Football League.  But in the early part of the century this was far from the case.

First we need to remember that anything resembling automatic promotion from outside the League to inside was still well over half a century away.  Second, the Football League, despite its name and its inclusion of Bristol City, Woolwich Arsenal, Chelsea and Tottenham was still basically a northern league with no pretensions of being national.

The only reason Woolwich Arsenal did not enter the Southern League is that as they were the first team outside the north and midlands to go professional there was no Southern League for them to enter and the reactionary London FA banned Arsenal from playing teams outside the Football League.

So when it came along the Southern League collected up a number of teams who could have held their own in the Football League.   Thus when club historians celebrate the fact that for three years there was a Southern League team in the FA cup final Southampton (1900) Tottenham (1901) and Southampton again (1902) it sounds a real David and Golliath thing, it wasn’t.

So the claim that Tottenham are the only club from outside the Football League to have won FA Cup should be considered in the light of events – it is perhaps like having a Championship club get into the Final today – nothing more special than that.

One of the reasons why the Southern League became strong so quickly was that it had different rules from the Football League.

From the 1893-94 season the League introduced a system known as “retain and transfer” which effectively put footballers into a form slavery.  A player registered with a club could never play for another club without the permission of the club with whom he was registered.

That might not seem too bad until you note that this applied for all time and in all circumstances.  The club did not have to play to player, and they did not have to pay the player.  They could effectively sign a player and then end his career by just leaving him to rot. They didn’t have to renew a contract even – they really could just leave him.

The only incentive the club had to release a player was if they could get a transfer fee.   However the Southern League did not introduce this system until 1910, so many players liked the Southern League for its more liberal approach. The Scottish League also did not have this system, so again that was attractive to players – and after 1900 both of these leagues started to pay higher salaries.

Not content with treating players like dirt the football league then introduced the £4 a week maximum wage.  The league was helped in this regard by the abolition of the footballers trade union at the same time.

So this is the league Croydon Common were in, playing at the Nest – later to be the home of Crystal Palace.   They then suffered some set backs with stands blowing down and catching fire (an issue recounted in “Making the Arsenal”) but by 1908 they were in the first division for one season before going back down.  But they won the second division again in 1913-14, but in 1914-15 (the final year before the war) they again ended up bottom.

All the clubs were suspended during the war, and then returned in 1919 to start again.  As we know Arsenal managed to get their promotion at this time, but Croydon Common did not return – in fact they were the only club from the Southern League not to return after the war.  There are reports that they actually were wound up in 1917 which is curious, since there were only unofficial matches, and there was no real reason to wind them up.

Unless… Henry Norris had had enough. If he was paying to maintain the ground, he might have felt that with Highbury taking up all his finances, and Fulham.  Sad to say, it seems that Arsenal were indirectly responsible for the demise of this team who today we would call a solid middle of the table second division side.

Among the players who had connections with Croydon Common and Arsenal were Arthur Box and Earnie Williamson.  Several Croydon Common players also played for England including Willam Balmer, Harry Hadley, Earnie Williamson and Sam Wolstenhome.

So, to summarise Croydon’s existence, they were Champions of Southern League Division 2 in 1909 and again 1914.

Here’s the details of their Southern League history, followed by their FA Cup history.

SEASON    LEAGUE     P    W    D    L    F    A    P      POS

1907-08   SOUTH-2   18   10    3    5   35   25   23      3/10
1908-09   SOUTH-2   12   10    0    2   67   14   20      1/7
          WEST-1A   12    5    2    5   16   24   12      5/7
1909-10   SOUTH-1   42   13    5   24   52   96   31     21/22
1910-11   SOUTH-2   22   11    3    8   61   26   25      5/12
1911-12   SOUTH-2   25    8    2   15   43   45   18     11/14
1912-13   SOUTH-2   24   13    4    7   51   29   30      4/13
1913-14   SOUTH-2   30   23    5    2   76   14   51      1/16
1914-15   SOUTH-1   38    9    9   20   47   63   27     19/20

F.A. CUP

1908-09   4Q    NORTHFLEET UNITED                   A    1-1
          4Qr   NORTHFLEET UNITED                   H    4-3
          5Q    BRADFORD PARK AVENUE                A    2-1
          1     WOOLWICH ARSENAL                    H    1-1    @ Crystal Palace
          1r    WOOLWICH ARSENAL                    A    0-2
1909-10   5Q    LEYTON                              H    0-1
1910-11   5Q    WORKINGTON{1}                       H    3-1
          1     GRIMSBY TOWN                        A    0-3    Ordered to be replayed
          1     GRIMSBY TOWN                        A    1-8
1911-12   5Q    RIPLEY TOWN & ATHLETIC              H    4-1
          1     LEICESTER FOSSE                     H    2-2
          1r    LEICESTER FOSSE                     A    1-6
1912-13   5Q    LUTON TOWN                          H    2-0
          1     WOOLWICH ARSENAL                    H    0-0
          1r    WOOLWICH ARSENAL                    A    1-2
1914-15   6Q    BARNET ALSTON                       H    4-0
          1     OLDHAM ATHLETIC                     H    0-3

http://www.fchd.btinternet.co.uk/indexc.htm F.C.H.D.

Woolwich Arsenal index

Making the Arsenal – the story of 1910

What was he doing?  Well, it seems he thought of himself as the man who could build football in the south of England into something as powerful as the football league in the north [...]]]> By the summer of 1910 Henry Norris owned three football clubs: Woolwich Arsenal (division 1), Fulham (division 2) and Croydon Common (Southern League).

What was he doing?  Well, it seems he thought of himself as the man who could build football in the south of England into something as powerful as the football league in the north – and so he fancied himself as chairman of a new football league of the south.  It never happened and in the end he focussed on Arsenal, but there was a time when alternatives were possible.

Norris left no diaries or notes so we study his life through his actions and the activities of those around him.  And in this sense there is quite a lot of data.  The idea of a southern rival to the football league had a series of false  starts as I will show below, and this is exactly the sort of situation that would lead Norris to push his way in and shout, “OK I am taking this shambles over.”

He was in many ways a sort of Lord Sugar character but without the humour and self-deprecation.

So, to turn for a moment to Croydon Common.

Croydon Common FC was formed in 1897 as a local league amateur team, and they turned pro in 1907, just as Norris was starting to get into his full football mode – three years before he bought Arsenal.

When Norris took over Croydon Common is not at all clear but they went into the Southern League divsion 2 on turning professional, and such evidence as there is suggests that Norris put in the money at this point, even if his name was not on the books at Companies House.

The London FA had decided to have a bash at forming a new ‘Southern League’ as early as 1890 but the motion to form the new league was lost by one vote.

Woolwich Arsenal became seriously interested in the prospect in 1891 when the side was transformed as a professional club.  The authorities had told everyone not to play them, because of the professional issues, and Arsenal were reduced to playing friendlies against northern teams.

When Arsenal called a meeting to discuss the idea of a southern league 26 clubs attended, the new league was agreed and 12 clubs elected:

• Chatham,
• Luton Town,
• Millwall Athletic,
• Marlow,
• Swindon Town,
• Reading,
• West Herts,
• Ilford,
• Woolwich Arsenal,
• Chiswick Park,
• Old St Marks
• Crouch End.

Crouch End then withdrew.  The unsuccessful clubs were:

Chesham, Wolverton, City Ramblers, Woodville, Uxbridge, St Albans, Erith, Westminster Criterion, Old St Stephens, Upton Park, and Tottenham Hotspur who came bottom of the poll with one point.   Why Tottenham could get no votes other than their own vote for themselves is a matter for another day.

But then no sooner were the celebrations over than some of the clubs had a change of mind, and in total five clubs dropped out.  I can’t find any reason why this was so other than that it was “considered by the committee who refused to endorse the decision” and that suggests underhand skulduggery.  The London FA had raised the fuss about Arsenal’s professionalism, and was almost certainly at the heart of the lobbying, threatening all sorts of actions if the clubs formed this league.

So in the end the matter was dropped by Arsenal.

Then Milwall Athletic had a go in 1894.  At their meeting they attracted  Chatham, Clapton, Ilford, Luton Town, Milwall Athletic, Reading, and the 2nd Scots Guards.   At a later meeting they also managed to attract Casuals, Crouch End, Crusaders, Old Carthusians, Old Westminsters, Royal Ordnance Factories, and Swindon Town.

But now with the cat (which I assume was the London FA) being out of the bag there was still there was a lack of enthusiasm.   More teams came and went, the Scots Guards opted out, Southampton came in and eventually there was a second division of Bromley, Chesham, Maidenhead, New Brompton, Old St Stephens, Sheppey United, and Uxbridge. Woolwich Arsenal suggested their reserves could play in this league (by now having got into the second division of the football league), but the other clubs would have none of it.

But now the drive for another league outside the football league was too strong and so the 1894 Southern League, proposed by Millwall Athletic (which became Millwall) got going with two divisions.

Division 1

• Chatham
• Clapton
• Ilford
• Luton Town
• Millwall Athletic
• Reading
• Royal Ordnance Factories
• Southampton St Mary
• Swindon Town

Division 2

• Bromley
• Chesham
• Maidenhead
• New Brompton
• Old St Stephen’s
• Sheppy United
• Uxbridge

The story of Norris and Croydon Common continues in the next article

Woolwich Arsenal Index

Untold Arsenal

If you want to know more about Norris and his personality, and what he did 100 years ago, you will enjoy “Making the Arsenal”

Players out

Players in for the first game of the season

Goal: – E Bateup  The keeper we signed and lost

2: Right Back – A Gray  [...]]]> So after two weeks meandering through the history books, here for the first time in 100 years, is the team that started the 1910/1911 season for Woolwich Arsenal.  There’s a piece about each one of them on this site.

Goal: – E Bateup  The keeper we signed and lost

2: Right Back – A Gray  200 games but now forgotten

3: Left Back – J Shaw  Pat Rice in disguise he eventually took over after Chapman

4: Right half – A Ducat  Played for England at football and cricket!

5: Centre half – P R Sands The first captain of The Arsenal at Highbury

6: Left half – R J McEachrane  346 games in 14 years

7: Outside Right – D Greenaway  Lost in the mists

8: Inside Right- A Common Our big name signing who joined in 1910

9: Centre forward  – W Rippon A brief appearance but two records

10: Inside Left – CH Lewis  Not quite as versatile as reports suggest

11: Outside Left – F Heppinstall  Frank Heppinstall – one of the unknown heroes of the club

Manager: G Morrell the man who had to answer to Norris

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Read the complete story of 1910 in “Making the Arsenal” – the book

More on Woolwich Arsenal

And of course there is Untold Arsenal

By Tony Attwood

Willis Rippon joined Woolwich Arsenal in 1910 and played just nine games for the club scoring two goals.  But despite this tiny input into the club and despite the fact that little [...]]]> This article is one of a series reviewing all eleven players who played in the first Woolwich Arsenal league game in 1910/11 season.

By Tony Attwood

Willis Rippon joined Woolwich Arsenal in 1910 and played just nine games for the club scoring two goals.  But despite this tiny input into the club and despite the fact that little is known of him beyond the bare bones of his footballing career, he managed to get himself on two exlusive lists.

First he is one of a tiny group of players whose brothers were also registered with the club.  Arsenal.com has said that both brothers “represented” the club – and although this is true for Willis in terms of the first team, it was not true of Thomas.  I am presuming at this point he was a reserve player.

Willis Rippon is also one of the select group who scored on his first appearance – a 1-2 home defeat to Manchester United on 1 September 1910.  He incidentally also scored in his second match – a 1-1 draw away to Bury.

He played in the first seven games, plus two more later in the season, but after those two opening goals never scored again and left the club to move to Brentford later in the season.

Willis Rippon was born in Beighton near Sheffield in May 1886 and died in 1956.  He started out at Hackenthorpe (a local Sheffield club), then Rawmarsh Albion, Sandhill Rovers, Kilnhurst Town (all local Sheffield clubs), before moving to Bristol City and then his brief time at Woolwich Arsenal.  After that it was Brentford, Hamilton Academical, Grimsby Town and Rotherham.

Quite what took the player to so many clubs, and what on earth could cause a move between London, Hamilton and Grimsby is hard to imagine.

His brother Thomas “Pip” Rippon (4 February 1888 – 29 May 1950) is better recorded, despite the absence of any first team appearances at Arsenal scoring 47 goals from 154 appearances in the League, according to Wikipedia.  He too played for Grimsby and was still playing for Lincoln in the 3rdDivision north in 1922.

And unless I have missed someone en route this concludes a review of the 11 players who played for Arsenal in the first match of the 1910/11 season – fitting perhaps that it should conclude on the day that Arsenal start their 2010/11 series of friendlies against Barnet.

Just in case you have been reading I’ll do a quick summary of those 11 players in the next piece.

Alf Common

Alfred Common joined Woolwich Arsenal for the 1910 season, aged 30.   The official list shows that he played for South Hylton, Jarrow, Sunderland (joined in 1900), Sheffield United (joined 1901 – transfer fee [...]]]> Continuing the series that covers all eleven players who played for Woolwich Arsenal in the first match of the season 100 years ago.

Alf Common

Alfred Common joined Woolwich Arsenal for the 1910 season, aged 30.   The official list shows that he played for South Hylton, Jarrow, Sunderland (joined in 1900), Sheffield United (joined 1901 – transfer fee £325 – he went on to score in their Cup Final win), Sunderland again and Middlesbrough, before doing three years at Woolwich.  Even when he left in 1913 he hadn’t finished as he went on to Preston.

Common was one of the players whose activities beyond football can in part be seen through their football.  Born in 1880, the son of a riviter, he got the first of his three caps while at Sheffield United aged 24, but then, at the height of his career he refused to re-sign for Sheffield, because, as the books and web pages now put it, “he wished to return to Sunderland where he had business interests”.

In those days of the maximum wage “business interests” among players were common – they were in fact the way around the maximum wage.     With the player only working at the club in training sessions in the morning, these could be legitimate, such as running a tobacconists shop of an afternoon.  But they could also be slightly further removed from reality.  They might have a “share” in a business owned by the club, which paid a regular dividend.  A job might have been found for a relative – and that job might exist, or might not.

Whatever the state of play with Alf Common despite his huge success at Sheffield he want back to Sunderland who paid £500 for both him and the goalkeeper A Lewis.

What makes the business interests seem slightly askew is that within six months he was off to Middlesbrough for £1000 – the first ever £1000 transfer which was an absolute sensation at the time.  It was such a leap in price, and so unexpected (£350 was the going rate for a top player at the time) that there was even an investigation into the dealings, although there was nothing wrong.

What made the whole thing even more bizarre is that Middlesbrough had only been in the league five years and there was a lot of talk about underhand dealings at every level in the club.

Of course Sunderland and Boro are not that far apart – about 35 miles in fact – but that was hardly a commuting journey after training in the days before cars and tarmac roads.  So the business interests seems to have been a ploy.

However Middlesbrough was shortly after convicted by the FA of paying illegal bonuses for wins in the FA Cup to players during 1904 and 1905. None of the players was found guilty but eleven out of the twelve directors were thrown out of football.

With the maximum wage clearly in disarray as far as the top players were concerned the FA also tried to regain the power that they had seen slipping from them ever since Woolwich Arsenal went professional.  They argued that  ‘buying and selling players is unsportsmanlike and most objectionable’ and following Alf Common’s transfer they constructed a new rule to take place on 1 January 1908, that transfer fees were to be limited to £350.  The clubs however had no interest in following the rule and just ignored it, and eventually it was withdrawn.

Whatever the background however the transfer in footballing terms was a success, as Middlesbrough avoid relegation that had looked certain, and he went on to score 58 goals in 168 games.

Business was not overtly stated when Alf Common came to Woolwich Arsenal, but he may have wanted to set something up in London.  He played either at number 8 or 10 (the two inside forward positions) but in January 1912 he switched to centre forward (number 9) following the long term injury of J Chalmers who had been occupying the position.  The move to centre forward was unusual, given that Common was 5 feet 8 inches tall – (the same as Arshavin).  Worse he was also getting quite tubby.  Even 100 years ago centre forwards tended to be a little taller and a little leaner.

His demise came in the relegation year of 1912-13 when he failed to score in his 12 games and was sold to Preston.  He retired from football in 1914 and moved on to being a publican in the Darlington area, dying in 1946 aged 65.

His goal scoring record at the top of his career was

• Sheffield  United played 79 scored 24  Ratio:  30%
• Middlesbrough played 178 scored 65  Ratio: 36%
• Woolwich Arsenal played 80 scored 23  Ratio:  29%

More Woolwich Arsenal

And don’t forget the book: “Making the Arsenal”