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Guest Post – A Brief History Of Home

Nov 11th, 2015 by 'holic

Once again the break in proceedings has led to our very own North Bank Ned to unsheathe his mighty quill for another look back into all our yesterdays. Once again I am indebted to him for his contribution. Cheers Ned.

The Emirates, idly unused while some international nonsense interrupts the season, is Arsenal’s sixth ground.

Most ‘holics will be familiar with what happened to the fifth one, Highbury, our venerable home from 1913 to 2006. Arsenal Stadium, to give it its formal name, was redeveloped as the Highbury Square luxury flats. Robert Pires owns one. The exteriors of the listed art deco East Stand and the matching West Stand are all that remain, along with so many memories of a slightly (OK, somewhat) younger version of this author.

But what fate befell grounds one to four?

The Invicta Ground

Ground four was the Invicta Ground on the south side of Plumstead High Street. Royal Arsenal played there for three seasons from 1890 before returning to the Manor Ground after the landlord tried to raise the rent. By then, Royal Arsenal had become Woolwich Arsenal and fully professional.

The ground was used briefly by an amateur side, Royal Ordinance Factories, before also being redeveloped for housing. Some of the properties in Hector Street, London SE18, which follows the goal line and one side of where the ground used to be, still have traces of the old terracing visible at the bottom of their gardens.

The Manor Ground 

The club had two spells at the Manor Ground, the three seasons to 1890 as a tenant and then for 20 years after returning from the Invicta Ground as owner.  A couple of miles east of Woolwich on Plumstead Marshes and famously muddy, the ground originally had no stands and spectators watched games standing on borrowed Army wagons. On its return, having bought the ground, the club erected a stand and built terracing. In 1893-94, our first season in the Football League, the typical gate was 6,000. A second stand was built in 1904.

The terracing at the Manor Ground was so steep that it was nicknamed the Spion Kop by soldiers returning from the Boer War (For younger ‘holics, the Battle of Spion Kop was a failed British assault on Boer forces holding a hill of that name in Natal, South Africa in 1900). Many clubs had steep terraces known as Kops, but ours was the first and predates Anfield’s by two years.

This clip shows us playing Newcastle at the Manor Ground in 1911.

After the move to Highbury in 1913, the Manor Ground was abandoned and eventually became an industrial estate. That, in turn, fell on hard times and has now been redeveloped as the West Thamesmead Business Park.

The Sportsman Ground

Ground two, the Sportsman Ground, was a few hundred yards closer to Woolwich than the Manor Ground, roughly where HMP Thameside Prison is today. The team played there for only six months from the start of the 1887-88 season before flooding drove them to what was then Manor Field on the Marshes. The Sportsman Ground, which was previously a field used for raising pigs, took its name from a long-gone pub where the players changed.

Plumstead Common

Ground one — though it is a stretch to call it a ground — was Plumstead Common. Royal Arsenal played there in its inaugural 1886-87 season. The pub the players changed in, The Star, is still on Plumstead Common Road.

Ground? 

Ground? — The club’s first game, played under the name of Dial Square, taken from the sundial above one of the gates to the Woolwich Arsenal munitions factory, took place over the river on the Isle of Dogs, possibly on a field that is now Tiller Road.

Whether that was an ‘away’ game or just the only place they could find to play is uncertain. However, the pub the team met in, the Royal Oak, was next to the station at Woolwich Arsenal and Plumstead Common would have been more convenient. Like the Sportsman, the pub is long gone, but it is where the ‘Royal’ in Royal Arsenal came from, by the way.

The Royal Oak, the Star and the Sportsman: three pubs with seminal match-day connections to the early days of our club, So ‘holics visiting the Tollie pre- and post-game are honouring a great tradition — though if Olivier Giroud started changing there, heaven knows what would happen.

Editor’s note. For additional reading and images may I commend this piece by Mark Andrews for abergkampwonderland.co.uk and reproduced on thearsenalhistory.com.

Posted in Guest Tales, history | 111 Drinks

111 Responses to “Guest Post – A Brief History Of Home”

  1. on 11 Nov 2015 at 8:21 pm1Gunnersaurus Stunt Double

    Last and first.

    BOOM!

  2. on 11 Nov 2015 at 8:22 pm2Cynic

    Look again, glory hunter 😛

  3. on 11 Nov 2015 at 8:27 pm3Gunnersaurus Stunt Double

    Ned. Nice piece.

    Pubs and Arsenal. If it ain’t broke…

  4. on 11 Nov 2015 at 8:30 pm4Gunnersaurus Stunt Double

    Heh Cynic.

    Tabs would be proud.

  5. on 11 Nov 2015 at 8:52 pm5TTG

    Ned,
    My daughter used to live just off Tiller Riad. If only we had realised it was hallowed ground!
    Great piece thank you as ever for your research

  6. on 11 Nov 2015 at 8:54 pm6behind the 8 ball but gunning for glory

    Splendid piece, Ned.

    High time to revive some of those traditions, especially the army wagons masquerading as stands. 😀

    Great clip too, and great pictures in the other linked article. A pub crawl of Arsenal haunts in South London sounds like quite the thing.

  7. on 11 Nov 2015 at 9:03 pm7bathgooner

    Good stuff, Ned. Thanks for that. Mead for the monks.

  8. on 11 Nov 2015 at 9:39 pm8behind the 8 ball but gunning for glory

    Blatter invents a new category, the “small emotional breakdown”.

    Wondering how that compares to the size of Mourinho’s.

  9. on 11 Nov 2015 at 9:50 pm9zicoinexile

    Excellent, Ned.

    Your monks sure have that history habit.

  10. on 11 Nov 2015 at 10:07 pm10behind the 8 ball but gunning for glory

    *prepares get well soon card to send to the swiss sanatorium*

    *apologizes for sick humor*

    *reorganizes supreme evil picture cards of football-related figures*

  11. on 11 Nov 2015 at 10:09 pm11Goonerholic

    Oh, z, just no. We’ll be rehashing the who makes the chips in the monastery joke soon. 🙁

  12. on 11 Nov 2015 at 10:09 pm12behind the 8 ball but gunning for glory

    Belting down rain here. At least it isn’t snow. Yet.

  13. on 11 Nov 2015 at 10:39 pm13bathgooner

    Who actually does make the chips in the monastery, H? 🙂

  14. on 11 Nov 2015 at 10:49 pm14Joe

    Indeed, excellent as ever Ned.

  15. on 11 Nov 2015 at 10:51 pm15Oskar the dog

    Gotta love a club which moved from a flooded paddock to a field on marsh land previously used for raising pigs. Bet the spuds can’t match that. No, wait, that’s what they raise now…

    The Sportsman used to be my fav hostelry before I left England, but not the one referred to by Ned. Mine was in Mogador, Surrey, once one of Henry VIII’s hunting lodges.

    Back in the ’60s my Sportsman looked like it had been left to decay since Hal last wenched there, without more than perhaps an occasional floor sweeping since. Even the patrons were mostly local peasantry. But when I visited it last in 2011 it wasn’t the same. Now all updated, full of Hoorays and trendy sports cars in the carpark. Nothing like my old Citroen Big 6 with the huge back seat where … but never mind what went on there after a gallon of Watneys Red Barrel.

    Oskar

  16. on 11 Nov 2015 at 11:04 pm16Cynic

    Come on chaps, you should know batter than this.

    No puns please, we don’t want any scraps.

  17. on 11 Nov 2015 at 11:56 pm17Goonerholic

    Don’t go there bath! 🙂

  18. on 12 Nov 2015 at 12:12 am18North Bank Ned

    Thanks, gentlemen, for the kind words, and to the Guv’nor for indulging me again. One of the things that makes Arsenal great is that we know our roots. We may now be one of the top clubs in Europe, but it all started with a bunch of workmates who changed in pubs — and probably sank a pint or two. Who can’t relate to that?.

    The exact location of the Sportsman Ground remains a matter of discussion. Plumstead Marshes extended down to the High Street/Plumstead Road in those days. If you look at early-19th century Ordinance Survey maps, Old Park Farm, poked up into a space between where the prison is today and Plumstead bus depot. I am guessing, and Mark Andrews — great link, btw, ‘Holic — may have more exact coordinates, that is where the ground was. I also suspect that by the time we played there it was a remnant of the farm north of the railway line that had been built in the 1850s. So vacant land suitable only for pigs and footballers. Later Victorian maps show the Manor Ground clearly marked on Griffin Manor Way, still extant and which runs up the prison’s western perimeter, which would put the Sportsman Ground further to the southeast of the prison.

  19. on 12 Nov 2015 at 12:22 am19Goonerholic

    Fine work Ned. Thank you so much. From all of us. 🙂

  20. on 12 Nov 2015 at 1:12 am20Trev

    Ah, here you are !

    Nice one, Ned.

    I’ll go and put some chevrons on the previous bar ……

  21. on 12 Nov 2015 at 1:16 am21Trev

    A few compliments from the previous bar ……. Sorry, didn’t have a chance to get in there before …..

    “Evening all,

    Finally a chance to catch up with the fine, measured report and drinks after a completely knackering first half of the week.

    Excellent drinks from GSD, zico – good to sse you on Sunday with one or two other fine Holics – TTG, Clive and NED, super stats on the youth players breaking through, or not, as the case may be. “

  22. on 12 Nov 2015 at 1:26 am22Trev

    Hope you don’t mind this – as it took a while in the last bar –

    “””
    Not worth adding anything about the match itself on a Wednesday evening but the ohoto of the smashed toilets is, maybe, a different matter.

    It’s not the first time that has happened, or that the padded seats installed in the away area have been slashed by Tottenham fans. I had to leave The Tollie fairly early on Sunday, to return an extra borrowed ticket to it’s owner. As I left and headed up Hornsey Road, I heard a lot of chatter from fans heading towards the pub, about an imminent attack by Spurs fans, expected in the area. There had certainly been an unusually big police presence in the steeets around The Tollie when I arrived there.

    I didn’t see any trouble materialise but Tottenham is the one fixture I won’t take my daughter to (apart from Galatasaray) as there is always that chance of something getting out of hand.

    It’s also been interesting to note the complete absence of any mention of the damage done in the stadium on Sunday, compared to the publicity given in the press, to a few Arsenal fans tearing down what were described to me as a few “cardboardy posters” at White Hart Lane.

    Given that they will smash them up again anyway, maybe Arsenal should remove all the toilets from the away area before the next Tottenham invasion.

    No offence, Dave, if you are dropping by and, yes, I know a lot of very decent Spurs fans, but there is an element down that end of the road that is not nice at all. “””

  23. on 12 Nov 2015 at 7:42 am23Goonerholic

    Trev, the chevrons were already there! 😉

  24. on 12 Nov 2015 at 7:59 am24Goonersince54

    Top stuff Ned
    Although i don’t know where you find the time for all this research,given all the Monkish things Monks get up to.
    Like chanting and praying,scrubbing the stone floors of the Castle,tilling the soil,going to confession,milking the Cows,flagellating yourself,getting out and about to the local villages spreading the word on the glory of Arsenal,[ oops sorry ]Glory of God.
    Perhaps the Monks have been granted 26 hr days by himself,so you can get through all the various tasks you have to complete.
    Half your luck.
    it’s a tough life being a Monk.

  25. on 12 Nov 2015 at 8:41 am25Trev

    Oh, sorry Holic ! They missed me somehow ?

    Yes, I was stuck in the previous bar with no chevrons – a truly ‘arrowing experience. ?

  26. on 12 Nov 2015 at 8:43 am26Trev

    “Monkish things”, Clive ?

    I think you’ll find that’s called Monky Business. ?

  27. on 12 Nov 2015 at 10:44 am27bathgooner

    It’s all cassocks, Trev. 🙂

  28. on 12 Nov 2015 at 12:37 pm28TTG

    Aaron Ramsey appears to have suffered a setback in his recovery from injury. Quelle surprise as Arsene might say. Poor lad has not been a straightforward healer since being Shawcrossed.

  29. on 12 Nov 2015 at 12:39 pm29behind the 8 ball but gunning for glory

    RE: 23: Yellow cards to a few for drinking after the last call? 😀

  30. on 12 Nov 2015 at 1:19 pm30mark andrews

    Ned,

    Cheers. I think the Sportsman was located where the new Serco prison is sited. Reason is much of the wording around the move to Manor Field leads to the conclusion that they moved a few fields up the Manor Way to the new ground from the Sportsman.
    If you look at the Thameside images there is a football pitch within the prison. Would it not be ironic…

    However the Prince of Wales is the most important pub as that was where the club was founded and the Lord Derby was a hub for the supporters and administrators of the club all through the Plumstead days. Role of the Royal Oak while important is overplayed due to it’s role in one key meeting.

    Mark

  31. on 12 Nov 2015 at 1:27 pm31behind the 8 ball but gunning for glory

    Invicta. Seems to have something to do with Roman invaders and the Kent Coat of Arms. Who knew?

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invicta_(motto)

  32. on 12 Nov 2015 at 1:32 pm32behind the 8 ball but gunning for glory

    Invicta to Invincibles

    A title of a book about Arsenal’s history?

  33. on 12 Nov 2015 at 1:52 pm33Porco Rosso

    Nice little potted history that, thanks Ned.

    And not a single ground missed out – the full shooting match! Now nobody will risk going off half-cocked. We wouldn’t want any loose cannons in here, after all, the landlord does ‘aim’ to please. And always hits the bullseye with his posts.

    Top that, Trev ☺

  34. on 12 Nov 2015 at 3:07 pm34Trev

    Well played. Porco !

    Not sure how many ‘shooting’ sports you have included in all those puns but, in any event, I am, as you read this, performing a long bow as a mark of respect.

    I am going to have to re-double my efforts to top that lot.

    Just don’t keep beating me at the puns though, otherwise my long bow might well become a cross bow.

    ?

  35. on 12 Nov 2015 at 6:38 pm35Porco Rosso

    Haha that’s properly dadjoketastic – I love a good topical pun, me!

  36. on 12 Nov 2015 at 6:49 pm36Gunnersaurus Stunt Double

    Spuds top striker? Hurri-Cane.

    Oh. Sorry Porco. That was a tropical pun. And not a good one.

  37. on 12 Nov 2015 at 7:37 pm37North Bank Ned

    mark andrews@30: Thanks for posting. I only wish I had seen your excellent original post before being alerted to it by the Guv’nor’s editor’s note.

    I did see the picture of the pitch in the middle of the prison when trying to match up Google Earth and some old maps (which put the Manor Ground immediately southwest of the prison, and, by inference, the Sportsman a tad southwest of that and nearer to the canal and drainage ditches that, I assume, were the source of the flooding, but we are only talking a difference of field or two at most; and if you have primary sources, I’ll bow to those). Nature has a funny way of jogging the historical memory through all the asphalt and astroturf of modern cities. There is a water feature in a square in the heart of New York City. It turns out that it is exactly above a long-lost pond on a long-lost ancient creek where the Lenape came to drink and water their animals long before Peter Stuyvesant pulled off the real-estate deal of the millennia.

    A short history of Arsenal pubs sounds a wonderful project. The monks might take some time, though, if not to make a start, certainly to complete it.

  38. on 12 Nov 2015 at 7:39 pm38North Bank Ned

    Trev@34: No doubt you’ve got Porco quivering.

  39. on 12 Nov 2015 at 7:43 pm39behind the 8 ball but gunning for glory

    Inspired by Ned’s writing and Clive’s monk comments @24, I tried a Google Images search for “industrious monk” but almost half the images on the first page of results are of Garry Monk. Interesting because I recently read an article saying Monk could be on the verge of getting sacked due to Swansea’s bad recent run of results. What does that say to me? It seems there is not much reward in being industrious these days. Not that I do expect Swansea to sack Garry Monk, or that the monks at Castle Ned do not get their just reward. Certainly hope not. 😀

  40. on 12 Nov 2015 at 7:46 pm40behind the 8 ball but gunning for glory

    Meant to say they should get their just reward. Better than stale bread at least. 😀

  41. on 12 Nov 2015 at 8:28 pm41mark andrews

    Ned 37.

    If you Google Earth Griffin Manor Way the area being excavated is where the Manor Ground was.

    When RAFC played there the Sportsman pub was still open and was not knocked down until approx. 1905

    As far as pubs go only the Star, the Who’d a Thought it, Lord Raglan and O’Neills (was Green Man) are still going with a link to Arsenal. All the others have been demolished or altered into something else.

    Cheers

  42. on 12 Nov 2015 at 8:58 pm42behind the 8 ball but gunning for glory

    the Who’d a Thought it sounds less dignified than the others.

    What’s in a name? Not that I have ever been to any of them of course. 🙂

  43. on 12 Nov 2015 at 8:59 pm43Trev

    Ned @38,

    I reckon so. Looks like he’s made a bolt for it. ?

  44. on 12 Nov 2015 at 9:04 pm44behind the 8 ball but gunning for glory

    Ned @38. I think that was Trev’s pun in reserve. 🙂

    Either that or his nup in reverse.

  45. on 12 Nov 2015 at 9:09 pm45Trev

    ‘Shooting puns in reverse’, bt8 ?

    Worra loada rubbish ! ?

  46. on 12 Nov 2015 at 9:16 pm46behind the 8 ball but gunning for glory

    mark

    Tried to see the excavation area on Griffin Manor Way and saw some construction cranes in the distance beyond a carpark but wasn’t sure that was it. Did see some interesting names of businesses in the area though, including Plumstead Radical Club which turns out to be a table tennis centre and several religious institutions including the Mountain of Fire & Miracles Ministry. Hopping neighborhood. 😉

  47. on 12 Nov 2015 at 9:27 pm47Oskar the dog

    You ‘industrious monk’ response didn’t surprise me at all, 8ball (#39). Like the woman researching for a book on successful women in business who Googled ‘women on top’.

    Oskar

  48. on 12 Nov 2015 at 9:30 pm48behind the 8 ball but gunning for glory

    The Football League renames itself the EPL. There are several nominees as to what the “L” represents but some of the leading possibilities include earthly, enigmatical, embattled, embarrassing, egregious, and eery. Perhaps a poll is in order.

  49. on 12 Nov 2015 at 9:38 pm49behind the 8 ball but gunning for glory

    Oskar. I wouldn’t tell you if I Googled that. 😉

  50. on 12 Nov 2015 at 9:44 pm50mark andrews

    behind 46. Borders Griffin Manor Way and Nathan Way. Below Hadden Road

  51. on 12 Nov 2015 at 9:54 pm51Cynic

    I tried a Google Images search for “industrious monk” but almost half the images on the first page of results are of Garry Monk.

    Think yourself lucky it wasn’t Harry…

    Saw this online earlier, from Martin Keown, talking about our injury record.

    One thing Wenger likes to do is to simulate the matchday pitch on the training ground – when I was there they had Desso pitches in the training ground, as well as the stadium. These are grass and artificial grass hybrids and are quite hard surfaces, and by the end of my career I could feel every impact in my joints. Imagine training on that pitch every day. Wilshere has been playing on it since he joined the club as a young child.

  52. on 12 Nov 2015 at 9:54 pm52Steve T

    Cheers Ned. An excellent read.

  53. on 12 Nov 2015 at 10:22 pm53Trev

    bt8, did you get the ‘Worra’ backwards thing ? ?

  54. on 12 Nov 2015 at 10:28 pm54behind the 8 ball but gunning for glory

    Takes two times for me Trev but on prompting ….

    I won’t give it away. 😉

  55. on 12 Nov 2015 at 10:29 pm55North Bank Ned

    mark andrews@41. Absolutely agree. That is exactly where old maps put it.

    bt8b: to clive’s point, they get all the self-flagellation they want. 🙂

    Trev@43: no quarrel with that…

  56. on 12 Nov 2015 at 10:39 pm56Porco Rosso

    Good work Ned. Get thee to a punnery!

  57. on 13 Nov 2015 at 12:27 am57scruzgooner

    ned, great stuff. a man after my own heart.

    a couple of things. on the 1896 OS chart (5’/mile), you can see half the invicta ground on the same map as the manor ground; the other half is on the next map down (http://maps.nls.uk/view/101202480). these maps show that there was a grandstand, too, on the east side of the ground, ending about at st. patrick’s catholic church. the terraces running east-west (roughly) on hector, and north-south (roughly) through the gardens of the houses on the west side of mineral street are also shown. if they’re all looking like the ones in mark’s article above, that’s just killer. i wonder if anything of the grandstand remains?

  58. on 13 Nov 2015 at 7:45 am58mark andrews

    Scruz 57.
    The Grandstand was knocked down, if it hadn’t fallen down by then and in 1897 the houses built over the ground and streets constructed.

    The terracing is the only visible part still visible running along the Hector Street back yards. The concrete is in remarkable condition for being set 125 years ago.

  59. on 13 Nov 2015 at 8:55 am59bt8

    Concrete excitement running rampant in the bar today. 😉

    Mark, is there any news of “Mrs Patel, lovely Arsenal fan, who let us into the garden and we were able to stand on the terraces where our Arsenal predecessors had stood over 120 years ago. The concrete appears to the untrained eye to be in remarkably good condition.”???

  60. on 13 Nov 2015 at 9:24 am60bt8

    Also about the club’s history I saw this part of your website Mark and thought it worth a link here:

    http://www.thearsenalhistory.com/?page_id=7

  61. on 13 Nov 2015 at 10:59 am61bathgooner

    Interesting site. Excellent record of matches from the mists of time. Good work.

  62. on 13 Nov 2015 at 12:02 pm62mark andrews

    bt8
    Very kind of you. And no news of Mrs Patel

    On the site the Andy Kelly team lines ups are very, very, impressive.

    http://www.thearsenalhistory.com/stat/aftlu.htm

    As is his full list of every Arsenal first team player, ever:

    http://www.thearsenalhistory.com/?p=10830

    Which sits within the lists section.

  63. on 13 Nov 2015 at 1:46 pm63Vinay

    Wonderful Ned and the only good part of an interlull is reading our history and getting to know so much new.

    Is the ramsey news true?? that is bad and sad. He was probably the most missed during the time he was away, specially the spuds game. If he is going to take more time then i sincerely hope Ox comes back and plays well for i am not at all convinced with Campbell.

    England Spain tonight and i just hope we do not see too many Arsenal players playing. We have endless coverage of our PM being at Wembley today but i do hope i get to see the game to even though it is in spain.

  64. on 13 Nov 2015 at 2:56 pm64North Bank Ned

    Big tip of the hat to thearsenalhistory.com. Top site doing God’s work.

    While we have nothing else to talk about, some more monkish diggings…

    The Sportsman, it seems certain, was also on Griffen Manor Way, a couple of fields to the south of the Manorway Gate out of the northeastern corner of the Royal Arsenal munitions factory (which was a huge site, 3 miles wide by 1 mile deep). When contemporary records talk of the team moving up a couple of fields from the Sportsman to the Manor Field, ‘up” appears to mean from the gate in the direction of Plumstead High Street, not the Marshes. The old maps don’t mark it as a public house, but they do mark what appears to be a square of buildings surrounded by fields on three sides. (You can see the outline of the edge of them in the map SCG posted.) Old maps don’t mark a farm there as such, but the Sportsman could have been a hostelry/small holding feeding and watering people going hunting on the Marshes rather than a pub on a street as we might think of one today.

    The monks come across a 2011 post by Mark Andrew’s colleague, the indefatigable Andy Kelly, in response to a Norwegian Gooner’s odyssey in search of the Sportsman, http://gunners.origo.no/-/bulletin/show/45415_hvor-laa-sportsman-ground (in Norwegian), saying that the story that Sportsman ground was formerly a pig farm is not true. The Norwegian site says Arsenal rented the field from a pig farmer called Walton. Andy describes this is “a legend”.

    I, too, doubt it was a pig farm. However, it is not unlikely that a hostelry in open fields would have kept some livestock to feed family and customers. An 1874 Post Office directory lists John Marshall “beer retailer and cow keeper” as resident there. By 1881, the Sportsman was home to Thomas Walton, “beer house keeper”, his wife, their six children and a carman (driver of a horse-drawn vehicle), according to the Census of that year. The 1891 Census, by when Royal Arsenal had been and gone, listed Thomas Watson, “publican”, his wife, their three children and servant as living there.

    Thomas Walton could have been the Norweigan’s ‘Piggy’ Walton. There is nothing to suggest he was a pig farmer as opposed to a beer-house keeper— and it seems that a team called Woolwich Union had been playing on his field for a couple of seasons before Royal Arsenal started using it, suggesting that any herds of anything were long gone, if, indeed, there had ever been any herds. However, it is not unreasonable to suppose the Walton family didn’t raise the odd chicken and pig or two in the backyard, or that the animals might not have occasional roamed over the football pitch, which was probably hard up to the buildings.

    There is also a story that the goalkeeper, Fred Beardsley, really was the keeper of the goals, carting the posts home for storage after each game. No idea if that is true, but I can’t see Cech or Ospina doing that…

  65. on 13 Nov 2015 at 5:25 pm65scruzgooner

    mark, interesting to know, thanks. would give me chills to stand there 🙂

    great site, by the way!

    ned, those old directions like “up” give me trouble, i can imagine the monks figure them out pretty well…

    love this history!

  66. on 13 Nov 2015 at 7:12 pm66mark andrews

    The Sportsman was a sports ground near a pig farm both run by the same chap Thomas “Piggy” Walton.

    Hence the sportsman was not a pig field but was close to one, and they could be heard on occasion while playing.

  67. on 13 Nov 2015 at 8:30 pm67bathgooner

    Great stuff, fellas. Gives one a real sense of the circumstances under which the early Arsenal players had to ply their trade. A fair bet that the highly paid, expensively conditioned, finely powdered and highly strung, ‘fancy Dans’ of today might struggle to meet those requirements.

  68. on 13 Nov 2015 at 8:56 pm68scruzgooner

    lol, bath. too true.

  69. on 13 Nov 2015 at 9:14 pm69bt8

    Scrape that pig dung off my shoe bottoms please. 😉

    Pig farmers in the past heard or herded their pigs, depending on whether they were deaf. The farmers, I mean, not the pigs.

    Excellent monkly drink, Ned. 😀

  70. on 13 Nov 2015 at 9:15 pm70bt8

    Pig farmers in the pasture would be another issue entirely.

  71. on 13 Nov 2015 at 10:14 pm71Trev

    Ned @64,

    Does that mean that Fred Beardsley, on his way home, used to do the post-match interviews ?

    😉

  72. on 13 Nov 2015 at 10:26 pm72scruzgooner

    oh, shit. i hope it’s not as bad as it sounds.

    http://www.espnfc.us/international-friendly/story/2712112/explosions-near-stade-de-france-during-match-vs-germany

  73. on 13 Nov 2015 at 10:57 pm73Doctor Faustus

    @72: worse …
    http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/14/world/europe/paris-shooting-attacks.html

  74. on 13 Nov 2015 at 11:17 pm74Trev

    @72, 73,

    Just read both reports. Horrendous news.

    Best not to say too much in this particular place but that is horrible stuff.

  75. on 13 Nov 2015 at 11:23 pm75can't be arsed

    is that why the silence yesterday
    was deafening about beirut trev

  76. on 13 Nov 2015 at 11:44 pm76Doctor Faustus

    @75: Is that entirely fair? If we cannot express shock and dismay for one horror without having to weigh in equal distribution of our sympathies would we be able to express anything?

    Beirut, wonderful city though it is, has unfortunately become familiar with acts of such senseless violence for a while now.

    I would think the higher degree of shock about Paris is due to the unexpectedness of it, and also because it is closer to home. Cultural home, that is.

    I hope it didn’t escape your attention that perpetrators of both crimes are likely to be traced back to same/similar worldview …

    We can of course peel back the layers of history and find common origination in the wounds inflicted by the colonial masters, but would that console the bereaved? Or help us move forward?

    Anyway, petabytes of internet angst and analysis would be spent on this, I promise to not add to that in this or any forum.

  77. on 13 Nov 2015 at 11:47 pm77can't be arsed

    yet you did

  78. on 14 Nov 2015 at 12:04 am78can't be arsed

    and made my point

  79. on 14 Nov 2015 at 12:11 am79can't be arsed

    .

    no ill will intended doc fau

    .

  80. on 14 Nov 2015 at 12:13 am80can't be arsed

    sorry if ye felt any

  81. on 14 Nov 2015 at 12:42 am81Trev

    Just meant the Guvna may not particularly want his blog turned into a political / religious forum – especially in the circumstances and given that a lot of comment would be based on assumption.

  82. on 14 Nov 2015 at 12:51 am82can't be arsed

    100%

    when ye make assumptions
    ye make an ass out of you and umptions

  83. on 14 Nov 2015 at 12:52 am83can't be arsed

    🙂

  84. on 14 Nov 2015 at 1:30 am84can't be arsed

    listening to
    24hr media mouthpieces
    frightened of dead air
    gibbering relentlessly
    shocked i’m sure
    sincere less so
    the occasional cobbled together piece to camera
    “lady diana” sombre
    the order of the day

    and
    you are right trev
    here is not the place for “that”
    but
    sometimes things spill over

    ‘holic’s church is a broad church

    God rest

  85. on 14 Nov 2015 at 1:50 am85can't be arsed

    *reporters don pancake make-up*

    the ikegami told them to !!!!!!

    i dunno
    the world’s bollix

  86. on 14 Nov 2015 at 2:16 am86Oskar the dog

    A mess is developing that will be hard enough to contain, never mind put an end to. And I don’t mean our injury list or the quality of the Engand football team…

    Oskar

  87. on 14 Nov 2015 at 2:19 am87Oskar the dog

    Broad church was an excellent series, cba. With that Dr Who guy and the nice scenery.

    Oskar

  88. on 14 Nov 2015 at 2:24 am88can't be arsed

    increasingly better written
    PTCs are done
    by increasingly expensive suits
    to increasingly ubiquitous cameras

    God alone can imagine
    how awkward the victim’s family’s
    are gonna feel
    when they discover they shoulda thought
    mohair
    much quicker
    and
    lord knows
    the sympathetic world does not love
    a slovenly mourner

  89. on 14 Nov 2015 at 2:26 am89can't be arsed

    howdy oskar
    hope you and chris are well

  90. on 14 Nov 2015 at 2:30 am90can't be arsed

    just find the whole thing so painfully sad and soul destroying

    the horrible actions of cunts
    followed by the dribbling beaks of alsos

  91. on 14 Nov 2015 at 2:54 am91can't be arsed

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=FmkC_leNM7M

    i keep posting this
    i don’t even believe in god

    it’s just a work of genius
    and a favourite of mine
    when it’s needed

    At Ease !

    .

    Are you chewing whilst running wif scissors in the corridor ?

    Nice one 🙂

  92. on 14 Nov 2015 at 5:30 am92can't be arsed

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=G4NRTks2M50

  93. on 14 Nov 2015 at 5:40 am93can't be arsed

    A GENIUS

    god rest
    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=HXNf8OqhIBk

    Scotland’s top o the range

    God Rest Billy Mackenzie

  94. on 14 Nov 2015 at 5:54 am94can't be arsed

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=UnO41-rKUsc

    feckin every feckin where

    🙂

  95. on 14 Nov 2015 at 6:03 am95Mondo

    Hey CBA you’re up,
    Here in the States it’s probably worse. The first thing out of the talking heads mouths was “Many Americans are worried about their own safety…”
    Let me tell you, the majority of us, at least the majority of me, are saying, we are with our parisian brothers right now, and are devastated at the loss of lives.

  96. on 14 Nov 2015 at 6:04 am96can't be arsed

    https://m.youtube.com/#/watch?v=WMGvQ2v-ZRM

  97. on 14 Nov 2015 at 6:05 am97can't be arsed

    trev knows

  98. on 14 Nov 2015 at 6:06 am98can't be arsed

    trev always knows

  99. on 14 Nov 2015 at 6:06 am99Mondo

    I wish it were so easy
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=INnFvMgET1E

  100. on 14 Nov 2015 at 6:07 am100can't be arsed

    ding ?????????????

  101. on 14 Nov 2015 at 6:08 am101Mondo

    Through and true cba

  102. on 14 Nov 2015 at 6:11 am102can't be arsed

    cracker tune mondo
    CRACKER
    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=38Vun2LYnoY
    😉

  103. on 14 Nov 2015 at 6:20 am103can't be arsed

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=BjzdQBzuvCM

  104. on 14 Nov 2015 at 6:38 am104can't be arsed

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ITYVXUvMtHI

    howdy francy ?

    (i think i’m in )

  105. on 14 Nov 2015 at 6:59 am105Mondo

    Nice ones CBA really. Cracker is our word. An underrated band oh yeah
    That Françoise Hardy is the equivalent of Dick Dale heh in my deluded mind.

    I got one for you, some French rap yes you heard that right my friend
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FDLy_3lDI_0

    Straight up and narrow

  106. on 14 Nov 2015 at 7:04 am106can't be arsed

    am off

    be back in the future

  107. on 14 Nov 2015 at 7:16 am107Mondo

    adios.

    here is to the people of paris

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KW-peug4e8s

  108. on 14 Nov 2015 at 7:37 am108North Bank Ned

    Events in Paris almost beyond words. Brings home the violence we read about around the world every day. Condolences and thoughts with all affected.

  109. on 14 Nov 2015 at 11:13 am109Cynic

    cba – two seconds after posting is the future, but don’t leave it even that long.

  110. on 14 Nov 2015 at 11:36 am110bathgooner

    Stay safe Holics.

  111. on 14 Nov 2015 at 12:31 pm111Trev

    cba,

    I know nothing, mate. It’s all just opinions.

    What bath said.

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