Friendly match : Angers – Arsenal : 1-1 Final score (3-4 on penalties)

By Walter Broeckx At first I thought I was at a concert as there was a rock band playing live when the teams came out in a strange stadium that had one side of the ground open. I think they are going to build a new stand on that side. The starting line up: Martinez, …

Predictions can be made emotionally. But adding in a few facts can help as well.

By Tony Attwood In recent weeks I’ve written a lot about Arsenal’s situation when it comes to next season, and we’ve touched on a whole range of issues that will affect just how well the club will do in 2019/20. Issues such as the reality of there being a limit of £45m on transfer expenditure …

Arsenal’s 100 years in the top division: the final chapter

By Tony Attwood This series began with the article “This season Arsenal celebrate 100 years in the top division” and here we reach the conclusion of the series. And here, as the final point, we move on to the issue of why so many clubs voted for Arsenal rather than Tottenham as the additional club …

100 years in the top divison: how the League voted Arsenal in

By Tony Attwood I have been re-telling the story of how Arsenal came to be in the first division in 1919 in celebration of 100 years in the top flight, knowing that many people, including some who claim to be Arsenal fans, will allege that the whole process was fixed. I am hoping that the …

How AST promoted the notion that Arsenal had a budget of £40m for transfers

By Tony Attwood Way back on 21 October 2014, the Evening Standard ran the story that “Arsenal have £42m to spend in January, claim ‘frustrated’ Supporters’ Trust “ That may look a rather familiar tale given that through this summer we have been hearing that Arsenal only have a £40m (or sometimes £45m) transfer kitty.  …

100 years in the first division: football gets muddled, but Arsenal are straight.

By Tony Attwood We have now reached a point in March 1919 in our story of Arsenal’s election to the first division, when the clubs were actively debating how the league should be expanded, and what was find here is that everyone now followed the lead of Athletic News, to the effect that each of …

The most bonkers transfer rumours this summer & all from the same source!

 By Sir Hardly Anyone When I was invited to write a piece on the silliest transfer rumours so far this summer I didn’t actually think I would be taking them all from one source, for I searched low, high, and then even lower to find the most ludicrous tales. But two things happened.  I found …

100 years in the first division. Plans are made, but not by Arsenal.

By Tony Attwood The story so far Intro: Arsenal celebrate 100 years in the top division Promotion in 1919: celebrating 100 years in the top division 100 years in the First Division: how the match fixing scandal opened the door for Arsenal Arsenal’s 100 years in the first division: the debate begins 100 years in …

One day it’s £45m total budget, now Arsenal are spending £75m on one player

By Tony Attwood Until the Arsenal supporters club meeting with Arsenal directors at the stadium on 25 July the story was everywhere: Arsenal had a budget of £40m or £45m.  Anything else had to come from player sales. Indeed so hard up is the club (so the story went) Ozil was going to be transferred …

100 years in the first division – how the argument developed

The story so far Intro: Arsenal celebrate 100 years in the top division Promotion in 1919: celebrating 100 years in the top division 100 years in the First Division: how the match fixing scandal opened the door for Arsenal Arsenal’s 100 years in the first division: the debate begins By Tony Attwood As we have …

Incredible journalist makes predictions over Arsenal transfers (satire)

By Sir Hardly Anyone Untold’s regular round up of the ever more desperate fantasy make believe of England’s semi-skimmed journalists. “Unai Emery’s summer transfer budget is not restricted to just £40million, according the Arsenal’s managing director Vinai Venkatesham.” That’s in the Metro today.   And was on Untold Arsenal yesterday.   Never mind.  At least they didn’t …

Arsenal’s 100 years in the first division: the debate begins

by Tony Attwood This article carries on the series of pieces looking back over the events that led to Arsenal’s election to the first division in 1919, and dispelling the many myths that surround the issue. From January 1919 onwards there was an almost constant state of discussion going on within the Football League over …

Arsenal directors make it clear that £45m transfer limit is a newspaper myth

By Tony Attwood By no stretch of the imagination has this been a transfer window that could be called “one hell of a rush to spend money” – at least not so far as the top six from last season are concerned. At the moment of writing the table of all the players in and …

100 years in the First Division: how the match fixing scandal opened the door for Arsenal

by Tony Attwood As we saw at the end of the second part of this series on 2nd April, 1915, (Good Friday) Manchester Utd, played Liverpool and beat them 2-0.  This was a surprise as it was only Man U’s third win in the last ten.  In fact, in retrospect it was an even bigger turn …

The home and away issue – the player who can solve the problem

By Tony Attwood. Of course this might not be the first time one of the national papers in England has taken up my theme, but it is the first one I have seen: the idea that Arsenal deliberately play a different line up at home and away. The newspaper in question is the Daily Telegraph …

Promotion in 1919: celebrating 100 years in the top division

By Tony Attwood In the first part of this series (Arsenal celebrate 100 years in the top division)  I mentioned the match fixing episode involving Liverpool and Manchester United, as a result of which Chelsea were relegated in 1915 However this was not the only match fixing that was alleged during the last few years …

Why does everyone in football seem to have something to hide?

By Tony Attwood Are there cover ups in football?   Cover ups of corruption, incompetence, match fixing, the old boys network looking after each other, abuse of money, abuse of power, that sort of thing…. Certainly in the case of the child sex abuse scandals that have swept across English football in recent years it …

All the players being tipped today by journalists as coming to Arsenal – and the team.

By Sir Hardly Anyone I know how tough it is to have to plough through line after line of bland gibberish at the start of each article telling you for the 93rd time this week that Arsenal are desperate to sign players after missing out on the champions league at the end of last season. …

This season Arsenal celebrate 100 years in the top division

by Tony Attwood 100 years ago, at the start of the 1919/20 season, Arsenal started the new campaign back in the first division, after an absence of six years – that break made up of two seasons in the second division and four seasons when the league was abandoned due to the war. 100 years …

Time to get ready for this season’s rule changes

By Tony Attwood There is not too much being written about the differences between last season and the 2019/20 campaign – but there really are a number of interesting twists which are, I suspect, going to take a few players, and commentators, by surprise. There are changes to the rules on free kicks, substitutions, goal …

Why a Champions League slot really is possible at the end of this campaign

By Tony Attwood It was interesting to read the recent TalkSprout headline, “Chelsea and Man United are in turmoil’ – Arsenal hero predicts 2019/20 top four” The hero is Perry Groves, and unfortunately he doesn’t give us any real insights in the interview, other than to say that we might grab the slot because Chelsea …

Arsenal – Fiorentina: 3-0

Arsenal starting this preseason match with : Martinez, Chambers, Mustafi, Monreal, Jenkinson, Olayinka, Burton, Kolasinac, Nelson, Saka, Nketiah. So a very young side with a few experienced players. Captain Monreal with an early error but Mustafi could block the shot and the ball goes out for a throw in. The ref allowing a lot of …

The crowd and the media against the Arsenal part 4: modern times.

By Tony Attwood In this series I have been looking at the way some fans and much of the media has been at war with Arsenal throughout the club’s history, and how the club’s response to this situation has varied. The failure to win anything between 1953 and 1970, and the dramatic decline in fortunes …

82 players tipped by the media to be coming to Arsenal this window

By Sir Hardly Anyone. Seven new names have been added in the past week and eleven have had their details updated with new claims made in the media. Of course these stories are just inventions by a bunch of journalists and bloggers with noting better to do, but some people seem to take the whole …

The crowd and the media against the Arsenal part 3

By Tony Attwood This is the third part of our exploration of the history of the relationship between Arsenal, the media and Arsenal supporters. Our two previous articles on the relationship between the club, the media and its supporters has taken us to the end of the glorious 1930s era of four league titles and …