Them & Us Part 1 - 1886 to 1893: Gentlemen v Players

This is a series of articles that attempts to look at the historical development of the relationship between the club, the players and its fan base. This is currently featured in the August edition of the Gooner Magazine

http://www.onlinegooner.com/covers/index.php?id=206

The journey starts with the club’s foundation in which all three strands were almost one and the same. Despite the club’s regal sounding name, ‘Royal Arsenal’ were merely humble Victorian industrial workers. Muck had never been too far away from the club’s founding fathers, their first match as Dial Square FC was on a muddy field on the Isle of Dogs on December 11th 1886. An open sewer had run beside the pitch that day, the frequent retrieval of the ball from which had required human excrement to be scraped off it before play could resume. Once the Woolwich incarnation of the Arsenal had found their home at the Manor Ground in Plumstead, the main liquid disposal pipe for South London had overshadowed the ground. It would often frequently give off a rancid smell during matches.

The club’s founders were also no strangers to slumming it, one such influential figure is that of Jack Humble (right), who had remained involved with the club right up to the move to Highbury in the following century. He had incredibly walked over 400 miles from his home town in Durham to find work at the Royal Arsenal in Woolwich. By 1886 Woolwich Arsenal had become Kent’s ‘elephant in the room’. Though it had a presence in Woolwich for over 200 years prior, a frantic arms race with the rapidly expanding French empire had brought a huge increase in the demand for labour, which had been filled by ‘migrants’ from all over the UK.

These workers had mainly come from the Midlands, the North and Scotland; barely a migrant in the contemporary sense of the word; however in late 19th Century Kent they had been as exotic as Amazonian tribesmen to Kent’s indigenous population. Their chosen past time of Association Football was also out of step with the past times of Kentish folk, who were mostly a Rugby and Cricket playing bunch. Those who played for the club, those who ran the club and those who watched the club came mainly from a very narrow spectrum. They were either the workers who had toiled at the Arsenal, or squaddies from the nearby Woolwich Barracks. Their fans were a committed bunch, 15,000 of whom before an FA Cup 4th Round tie in 1891 had swept snow from the Manor Ground pitch in order for the tie to go ahead. They were also intimidating; opposition sides had often been on the receiving end of alcohol fuelled abusive language on match days, which on one occasion actually lead a sensitive referee to abandon the game.

The club had found out though that a southern work’s amateur side had their limits. After their 4th Round FA Cup elimination by the professionals of Derby County, two of their star players had been poached by the opposition. To the club’s board it had signalled that a move to professionalism was the only viable option for the club’s progression. However, while professional Football had by this time exploded in the North, it had been sneered at as vulgar by those governing Football in London and the Home Counties. The opponents of Professionalism had claimed that the essence of the game revolving around the love of playing in a spirit of fair play would be destroyed by the influence of money and the necessity of winning.

Such concerns however were disingenuous; amateurs had often been ex-public schoolboys and the professional classes, compared to Professionals that were almost entirely working men selling their labour to survive. This hypocrisy had been perfectly summed up by the 19th Century Publication ‘Football Field’, which stated ‘let those who sneer at Football Professionalism over their walnuts and wine consider for a moment what it is for a working man who has to be thrown on his own resources’. Football you see, though for many centuries a folk game played by medieval villagers had died out among the common folk by the time of the industrial revolution and the long 15 hour factory shifts that it brought. Football by the 19th Century had become game a codified by and played by pupils of the public schools in order to extol virtues of the ‘muscular Christian ideal’. What was once the game of the ‘unrefined rabble’ was now they preserve of the ‘gentleman classes’, those with the luxury of leisure time.

Successive Factory Acts from 1844 onwards had gradually lowered the hours of a working week for the masses. An improved British economy and a fear of the angry masses causing the kind of uprisings seen in continental Europe in the 1840s brought the compromise which saw increased leisure time for working people. By the 1870s a 5 ½ day working week had become the norm, meaning that from thereafter numerous work’s football sides suddenly sprung up, watched by numerous colleagues letting their hair down at the end of a working week. Improved health conditions meant the masses were rapidly challenging ex-public school domination of Football. The unease of seeing their dominance eroded in such a manner was too much for the ‘gentlemen’ amateurs to stomach.

The growing professional dominance had mainly come from the Northern mill towns, particularly the original ‘invincibles’ and unashamedly professional Preston North End. The need for strong competition and regular gate money for such sides saw the formation of the Football League in 1888. At the onset the league had no sides south of the Midlands due to the resistance of the ‘gentlemen’ amateurs. Now a side drawn mainly from a bunch of humble factory workers threatened to spread the virus of professionalism on their manor. Royal Arsenal were immediately expelled and boycotted by the London FA and now faced financial oblivion.

A key figure at the London FA around this time had been Nicholas-Lane ‘Pa’ Jackson of public school amateur fundamentalist side, the Corinthians (left). Jackson had mourned the loss of Football as an exclusively old public schoolboy past time and believed in the unquestionable hierarchy of proletarian professionals subordinate to the ‘gentleman’ amateurs. In 1886 the first professional selected for the England side was forced to wear a different colour shirt from his ‘gentlemen’ team mates. By 1892, despite the growth and success of the professionals it had remained a convention that a Corinthians ‘gentleman’ captained England. The superiority complex of the ‘gentlemen’ captain toward their professional team mates was such that they would travel in a separate compartment, dine separately and generally blank his team mates when not on the field of play.

For two years this kind of treatment had been what Royal Arsenal were up against, until in 1893 the Football League accepted the Arsenal as their first Southern side, thus making it a de facto national league and signalling the beginning of the end of public school domination over the London football scene. The worker’s side had struck a revolutionary blow against the old boy network; however their battle for survival had barely even begun.

Wengerism: An Appraisal

As Ancient Greek Playright Euripides once stated "Those whom the gods seek to destroy they first make mad". Also, it's a feature of madness to believe that when you are at odds with conventional wisdom, it is everyone else who lack the capacity for rational thinking in contrast to your quite obvious sanity. As a certain empire in North London seemingly falls further into decay its faults are there for all to see, except of course for the emperor who continues to expresses his full confidence in the quality of his recent expenditure on clothing. And as Football's Rome continues to fall, what started out two years ago as a whisper has continued to incrementality rise in volume ever since - that despite the increase in the quality of Football, the season as unbeaten champions, the two doubles, the only ever European Cup Final, the shiny impressive new colleseum and the seemingly perpetual safety of champions league qualification what exactly has Rome ever done for us?

The deficiency in quality is clearly there, when faced with an irresistable force like a Drogba, a Rooney or a Messi one cries out for an immoval object like an Adams or a Bould. One is also reminded when looking at Almunia and Fabianski this season how two decades earlier a previous emperor George Graham had removed John Lukic in favour of David Seamen, recognising that though the former can do a job in the top flight a team contending for supremacy needs a supreme keeper who with an extra 4 clean sheets a season could gain a further 10-15 points that's makes the difference between title contenders and mere pretenders as it had done 12 months later.

That said though, those who through the internet forums often deride Wenger loyalists without any hint of irony as 'rose tinters' need to assess their own grasp on reality in not recognising that the club since it's move to Ashburton Grove has been working within financial restrictions from the debts incurred due to the third of a billion pounds required to acquire such a large amount of space so close to Central London and building a huge stadium on the site of it. Many such fans are advocating that in an era of global economic downturn in which banks are less inclined lend money and the inland revenue more inclined to pursue football clubs for what is owed to them, that the Arsenal Football Club proceeds on the basis of spending beyond its means.

Some sections of our fans are also bemoaning Wenger's lack of trophies in recent years, however since winning our last trophy in 2005 two sides which have won a domestic trophy include Portsmouth and Liverpool. Pompey fans by their own admission would happily swap our Premiership status and solvency for their 2008 triumph and upcoming date at the world's most overrated stadium in order to win a trophy which is now universally recognised as less valuable than it once was. As for Liverpool, they can only look on in envy that we now have the new stadium that they have been crying to acquire in order to match our level of match day revenue. They will also envy that the debts we have occurrd incurred are both practical in that we acquired something that would generate income and servicable seeing that in all likelihood we shall be in the Champions League next season.

It's also worth noting how the free spending days may also be numbered for the two sides who's shadow we have been living in since 2005 in regard to the Premiership title. Manchester United's debt stands at £716.5 million, they only broke even last season through the sale of Ronaldo without which they would have slipped £30 million into the red due to the £41 million interest payment on this debt. There are indeed only so many players you can sell for £80 million each season. Also, being the arch Blairite that he is don't be surprised if Fergie takes a leaf from Tony's book and retires before his own impending credit crunch can hurt his legacy, leaving the whole detritus to his unfortunate successor. In Chelsea's case Abramovich had reportedly lost three quarters of his wealth due to the credit crunch. Abramovich's break even target for the club of 2010 has also been spectacularly missed. The fact that they are considering selling the naming rights of Stamford Bridge shows that they are being brought back down into our orbit in a financial sense. At same point they too will also need to expand their match day revenue to the same as ours and United's by moving to a bigger stadium, the complications which are involved with that Arsenal can obviously testify.

However financial insolvancy is all well and good, but what about five trophyless seasons, can that be acceptable even from your clubs greatest ever manager? Well if Bill Shankly could go seven trophyless seasons from 1966-73 with Liverpool, why not? Liverpool could have sacked Shanks after Arsenal defeated his young inexperienced squad in the 1971 Cup Final, a squad roughly the same age as the current Arsenal squad. Liverpool's squad circa 1971 had included Toshack, Clemence, Heighway and Keegan. The aforementioned were not exciting big name signings but bargains from footballing outposts like Scunthorpe, Cardiff and Skelmersdale United (!). This squad was formed to replace, and by the start of the 1970s had very much been in the shadow of, Liverpool's successful 60s outfit which included Ian St. John, Ron Yeats, Tommy Lawrence and Roger Hunt. Shanks had never had Wenger's record of 13 consecutive top 4 finishes either.



By Shanks's retirement in 1974 Liverpool had won the title back and had the foundations of a side that would dominate the game for two decades. Whether Liverpool would still have achieved this by sacking Shanks in 1971 is a matter of debate, as too is whether Wenger could possibly get near matching anything like this kind of legacy for Arsenal over the coming years. However it's a clear testiment to what patience with 'Jam Tomorrow' Promises may bring. And those who continue to ask what Rome has ever done for us may wish to ponder the fact that when Rome fell around 500 AD a long dark winter that lasted an entire millenium had past before the renaissance came along around 1500 AD, so moral of the tale is be careful what you wish for.

In League With The Devil's Music

If anything can possibly be worse than a musical hero following one of your rivals it must be someone who you would consider to be the bane of your musical life following your beloved side, for Arsenal have quite a few of those. Islington born and bred, singer Dido (left) to her credit did the decent thing and supported her local side; it’s just a shame her musical output happens to be terminally dull. In an interview with Four Four Two magazine in September 2003 she reveals that her father had taken her and her older brother, Rollo from the equally dreary techno band Faithless from a very young age. She had also dated Sol Campbell back in 2004. Dido stated in the 2003 article that she held no objection to the gentrification of the club in recent years, then again how could she oppose gentrification of anything when her albums are more than likely to be the soundtrack of many a dinner party held by the flood of nauseating bourgeois types who have invaded the borough of Islington in recent years.

As a fan of Soul music I've always considered M People's bland radio friendly output the antithesis of the genre. As those who have subscribed to Arsenal TV know full well their Bass player Shovel, quite possibly named after the instrument I'd like to hit him with, has tried to build for himself a second career as a professional Gooner. From the same brand of Anti-Soul we also have Sharleen Spiteri from Texas - The band who was once famously second on the bill to David Brent’s Foregone Conclusion. She is also a major fan of North London’s finest and is close friends with Thierry Henry. Henry, as many of you will remember, had announced the birth of her daughter Misty Kyd via a message on his shirt after scoring against Manchester City on the same day back in September 2002. (below)


On the subject of music which lacks any authentic degree of soul, were it not for that well known maxim ‘Americans don’t do irony’ you would have expected Starsky and Hutch actor turned singer David Richard Soulberg to have chosen his adopted moniker with a large dollop of the stuff. If he’s dreary ballads were typical of the charts circa 1976-77 then no wonder many a pop picker turned toward the anger and alienation of Punk rock. However on emigrating to London in the mid 90s Mr Soul had took residence in Islington and had encountered David Dein at a dinner party in the local area. As he explains ‘I talked to a gentleman for several hours about everything except football, and at the end of the evening I asked him what he did. He told me he was the vice-chairman of Arsenal’. After taking up David Dein’s invite to attend a game at Highbury, Soul became hooked on the red and white. The career high point for David Soul had been displacing Elvis from the UK number one spot he had been occupying for 6 weeks in the wake of the King’s untimely death in 1977 with the tune ‘Silver Lady’. Who knows, maybe another Trophyless season for the Arsenal might see Soul displacing Elvis’s ‘Wonder of You’ with his other UK chart topper ‘Don’t Give Up On Us’ as our official anthem (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jlfhIo4QeAg).

If the dross of mid 70s pop is personified by David Soul, then symbolic of the detritus that is early to mid 80s music and style are Islington born and bred Spandau Ballet. Lead singer Tony Hadley and the Kemp brothers have publicly professed their allegance to the Arsenal, the latter two even decorated their house red and white for the 1971 FA Cup final. Gary Kemp explains though how at the start of the decade they helped to define, his Football supporting was relegated to back of his rather extravagent closet. He explains that ' if you’d asked me who I was in the early ’70s, the answer would have been simple. I was an Arsenal fan and a David Bowie fan. As I got older there was a period when I started to hide the football side away. You wouldn’t go to the New Romantic nightclubs, such as Billy’s or the Blitz, and talk loudly about football'. However by 1986 two of the Spandau boys publicly attached themselves to the beautiful game in it's ugly post-Heysel period. Both Martin Kemp and Steve Norman (below) were snapped up by legendary player manager Roy Race for Melchester Rovers.


In consideration of the flatness of the surrounding landscape of 80s pop, Wham, with hindsight seem reasonably good. In terms of ability though, they were very much a one man band. George Michael's musical partnership with Andrew Ridgeley could well be described as thus - George made the music, Andrew made the coffee. In expressing the dreadfulness of Jedward, Frank Skinner had described them in his column in the Times as 'Wham made up entirely from a partnership of Andrew Ridgeley and Andrew Ridgeley'. Sadly for us though, it's Andrew who is the confirmed Gooner. Appearing on Fantasy Football League in the mid 1990s, Andrew had revealed that he was an Arsenal fan, just as Football and indeed the Arsenal were becoming more and more fashionable. However this would come as a great surprise to avid viewers of 80s pop videos. In the video for Freedom in 1984, back in the days when Arsenal were banned from Match of the Day for being too dull and Islington was much less fashionable, Andrew quite clearly sports a QPR shirt (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2d_1puJ4kFQ). What would be cool though is if Andrew ever accompanied the talented one to Highbury. Did Andrew ever take George up the Arsenal? Maybe they were never that close.

We did however dodge a major bullet in the 80s. I can recall at the infamous FA Cup 3rd Round tie against Millwall in 1988, while surrounded by ugly scenes on the terraces an equally ugly one appeared on the pitch. Phil Collins had turned up to present a cheque to the winner of the Arsenal Lotto, leaving us wondering if the bald one was a Gooner. In a Shoot magazine feature on famous fans, I remember Collins had been listed as a QPR fan. Was Phil going through an Andrew Ridgeley moment and considering defecting to the Arsenal? Quite possibly. Luckily though, a few years later at the 1991 FA Cup Semi against Spurs at Wembley, at the height of national 'Gazzamania' the Beeb had interviewed 'Tottenham fan' Phil Collins at half time. Sadly for Collins (below), I very much doubt that he has experienced too many days in Paradise since.

Singing With The Enemy

In the mid nineteenth century Karl Marx had referred to religion as the ‘opium of the people’, however by the second half of the following century in a much more secularized western hemisphere there were quite clearly two contenders for the vacated throne. Both Football and popular music would go on to generate the level of fervour, hysteria and cult like devotion that had long since been lost to theology anywhere in Great Britain by the end of the 20th century. As Paul Weller (left) once stated on a track from the Jam’s third LP ‘All Mod Cons’ ‘to be someone must be a wonderful thing: a famous footballer, a rock singer or a big film star? Yes I think I would like that’; (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vnUH94BftYo) sentiment which most of the male population of the nation would concur with and in that particular order. The Modfather had long been a musical hero of mine; however in a recent interview Weller had revealed himself to be a season ticket holder at Stamford Bridge. This to me had come as a shock, remembering that in the late 90s when asked how he felt about Sky using ‘Out of the Sinking’ as its theme tune to their Premiership coverage Weller stated he was pleased however didn’t own a satellite dish nor particularly followed football. Therefore Weller turns out to be not only a Chelsea fan, but one of the worst kind – that which had latched on to the post-Abramovich bandwagon. Should the small club in Fulham feel inclined to adopt a Jam number for their own, ‘That’s Entertainment’ may not be befitting. In consideration of their fans Head-hunting past though, ‘A Town Called Malice’ may well fit like a glove!


Another hero from the same music movement which spawned the Jam is Joe Strummer, whose music and world view I have always held in high esteem. Years after leaving the Clash Joe went on to pen a tribute to Tony Adams (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yv0Y4na9uLo), could Uncle Joe have been a Gooner? Sadly not. Despite his admiration for TA his heart also lie at Stamford Bridge. Having such an association with the west side of the Capital as both Joe and the Clash had done maybe its not so surprising, however what about a singer from a band associated with North London and Camden such as Suggs from Madness? Again no joy here either, as one remembers from his ‘Blue Day’ cup final tune for Chelsea in 1997. ‘No commitment, your an embarrassment’ – indeed! (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KpN_TOP9hg8)


Madness were the leading lights of the Ska music scene in London by 1980, challenged only by the raw energy of Coventry band the Specials further up the M1. The Specials had invested faith in local talent by forming their very own 2-Tone label which had brought through other Midlands groups such as the Selector and the Beat. Maybe lead singer Terry Hall (above) followed this philosophy by backing the local footballing talents at Highfield Road? After all Terry’s formative years would have over seen a period in which they rose up from the old third division to the top flight and remain there until the new millennium. Again you’ll be disappointed, young Terry’s head was turned by the glamour of Georgie Best and is an ardent Man United fan. Rumour has it he even relocated to Stockport when forming the Colourfield in the mid eighties just to be closer to Old Trafford. Terry’s disloyalty to the Sky Blues is such that lord only knows what punishment Judge Roughneck would deem befitting for such a crime!
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5LudUWPbnBo)


Terry also exhibited all the usual cocky arrogance of a non Manchester Red during the Specials' comeback tour last summer at Leeds. Apparently, though the band were going down a storm Terry decided it appropriate to goad the crowd with the comment 'Thanks very much for Cantona', of course in reference to the infamous transfer of the Frenchman across the Peninines six months after winning the title with Leeds United. The yorkshiremen had not seen the funny side however and thus a shower of coins then rained down on the Specials' frontman. Terry had then quickly expalined to the crowd that his comment was merely in jest, however the last laugh was no doubt on him after the League One side dumped Terry's beloved Reds out of the cup roughly seven months later.


Can this hall of shame get any worse? Brace yourself chaps. As a musical hero can much taint the Honourable Robert Nesta Marley (left)? The dubious appropriation of the Banana Splits theme tune for the chorus of Buffalo Soldier is surely outweighed by the bravery of surviving an assassination attempt in 1976 for his commentary on the socio-political injustices of Jamaica in the Cold War era through his music (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7nlFZm3eiR8). From numerous Athena posters his love of the Jazz cigarette seems to come second only to his love of the beautiful game. Who then did Bob support? Well none other Tottenham Hotspur! How could Marley succumb to such dishonour? After all N17 is a long way from Trenchtown. One school of thought is that Bob had been a big admirer of South American Football, having been based in London in the late 70s after the Shooting in Kingston around the same time as Ardiles and Villa had been signed for Spurs. The other school of thought is that chain smoking marijuana does strange things to one’s thought process. Bob Marley had passed away on May 11th 1981, a date which oddly sits between the first game and replay of the 1981 Cup Final. The official verdict was the spread of cancer throughout Marley’s body. I’m no coroner but I believe his death was more likely to be hastened by the widespread belief that Chas & Dave were the most musically gifted fans that Spurs had to offer. Just goes to show that at the Lane they were musical as well as Footballing philistines.

In the words of a question once posed to us by the Stranglers, what ever happened to the heroes? Well thankfully there’s still Ray Davies (left) of the Kinks. A source of great music in the swinging sixties and a wide range of influence on those that followed. Whether it be the archetypal Englishness of Blur or Madness, the laddish sibling feuding of Oasis or the sexual abiguity of Bowie, the influence of the Kinks has been felt time and time again. In the Times Newspaper before the last game at Highbury lead singer and main songwriter Ray had wrote that ‘my father instilled in me the belief that Highbury was the most hallowed of places and the stadium itself epitomised the noblest spirit of true Corinthian sporting endeavour ...the players were as close as it got to god-like status and the club itself was secure and unmovable, a sporting monolith that would last a thousand years’. (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article713738.ece)

Well folks, that certianly is a sentiment I could applaud all day and all of the night. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F4DV-5d6a5g