Author Archives: keenosafc

She Wore A Yellow Ribbon: The Story of Arsenal’s Forgotten Season 1979/80

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It is late in the evening on the 14th May, 1980, and The Jam, sum it up: ‘The dying spark, you left your mark on me’, the previous three hours had indeed been The Bitterest Pill. The 1979/80 football season had been a momentous journey for the Arsenal and while it still had two more games to go of a never ending story, symbolically it ended when Carlos Pereira lurched to his left and blocked Graham Rix’s penalty kick. I’d watched it through my fingers, held up over my face with tears streaming down my cheeks – I knew what would happen before the penalties even started.

That evening, so soon after defeat to West Ham in the FA Cup Final, five days earlier, was the severest blow upon the deepest bruise. Yet less than two weeks earlier, as the non-stop Brian Talbot headed the single goal sufficient to claim a place in the Cup Final a different conclusion hung like a dream in the barmy spring night air. For in the space of nine days Arsenal had claimed two of the greatest victories in their history: 1-0 in Turin; and 1-0 in the Cup semi-final 3rd replay: nine days that represent the zenith of Terry Neill’s tenure as Arsenal manager. Although we weren’t to know then, the poignancy of those few days would later grow and spread exponentially, every time we saw the hazy re-runs on YouTube of Paul Vaessen’s goal in the Stadio Comunale, the goal that causes Paul’s star to blaze still in the Turin sky with a magnitude rarely equalled.

It was a season which taught lessons to me, the boy to the man who now writes these words that football glory can eclipse the smallness of mere trophies, that it resides in the community which exists between a club, its team, and its supporters; glory is located in the shared space where those three things overlap: in the end Turin and Highfield Road were enough, and to go with Big Willie Young, Rixy, Sunderland, Pat Rice and all the golden shirted heroes into the long night of time past was a victory of a bigger kind! Victoria Concordia Crescit.

She Wore A Yellow Ribbon: The Story of Arsenal’s Forgotten Season 1979/80 is my attempt to capture the joy and the sadness of that long, long season, which now, from the viewpoint of contemporary football, seems so unimaginable. It discusses the chemistry and the football engineering of Neill and Don Howe as they built their great cup team of the late seventies, and how that side came of age in the sun at Wembley in May 1979, and started the 79/80 season as genuine pretenders to the crown. Over the longest of seasons via Europe, Swindon Town in the League Cup, Turin, Liverpool again and again and again it builds to a sustained moment of football elation courtesy of Vaessen and Talbot and then crashes with a sudden and bewildering fall, to leave its own story hidden beneath the debris of its ending. But to pick over that debris is not the act of a car-crash fascination it is to acknowledge that the values of football surpass the littleness of defeat, that going through it trumps even victory. The tears soon dry, next season soon comes, and it’s the Arsenal, it’s the Arsenal! So come on you Gunners:

“What did she wear?
She wore, she wore
She wore a yellow ribbon
She wore a yellow ribbon in the merry month of May
And when, I asked, oh why she wore her ribbon
She said it’s for The Arsenal and were going to Wembley
Wembley, Wembley
Were the famous Arsenal and were going to Wembley.
WEM-BER-LEY, WEM-BER-LEY…”

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Spurs win the battle; But Arsenal winning the war

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Spurs beat Arsenal. They deserved to win.

And as predicted, what followed their victory in the North London Derby was a string of tweets and comments about how the win proves their has been a “power shift” in North London over the last 5 years.

A power shift that has seen Spurs finish above Arsenal once.

A power shift that has seen Arsenal win 3 trophies (and in the final for a 4th at the end of the month).

In that same time, Spurs have won nothing. And the only time they have played at Wembley is when they had to hire it.

Spurs fans use “records” such as “highest Premier League attendance” and “most Premier League goals in a calendar year” as proof of the power shift.

Meanwhile, Arsenal win actual trophies.

It is actually hilarious to watch the media try to justify this power shift. So desperate are they to report on Arsenal’s demise that they are creating records and new barometers of what success is.

Only last week, a Chief Sports writer for a British paper declared “Spurs do not need to win trophies to be a successful club”. OK.

And then yesterday, the leading story on BBC Sport was about how “Spurs victory over Arsenal shows they are best of the rest.”

That beating Arsenal proved they were the second best team in England – behind Manchester City. Even though victory took them to 3rd in the league. After Liverpool’s win yesterday, they have already dropped to 4th, and if Chelsea win tonight, it will be back to 5th.

2nd best team in England, but 5th in the table? Better than Arsenal, Chelsea and Man U, but are the only side of the 4 not to have won anything last year.

In fact, Spurs are the only side in the top 6 to have not won anything this decade.

Arsenal have won 3 FA Cups since 2014. For Spurs, you have to go back to 1981 to capture their last 3 FA Cup wins.

The last team to win the league title at White Hart Lane? Arsenal.

The weekend’s victory was deserved by Spurs. Just like Arsenal deserved to beat Spurs when they won 2-0 earlier in the season. That seems to get forgotten about when talking about power shifts.

I saw a tweet floating about late yesterday.

“Spurs have won 6 of the last 9 Derby games against Arsenal, with 2 draws and only one win for the Gunners”. It was created to try to highlight the power shift.

Yet a quick check of the records shows it is fake news.

In the last 9 North London Derby’s, Spurs have won 3 (not the 6 the tweeter claimed). And that is if you cut it off at 9. If you increase it to the last 12, it is still just 3 wins for Spurs. 3 wins in the last 12 North London Derby’s.

So this Spurs power shift has resulted in 3 wins in the last 12 games, and finishing above The Arsenal once in 21 years. OK.

Spurs should finish above Arsenal again this season. The second time in 22 years. But what does it all mean if they do not win a trophy?

Nothing.

The sadist inside me actually wants Arsenal to finish 6th this season. Finish 6th with Spurs 5th. Finish 6th with Spurs 5th and Arsenal winning a trophy. Finish 6th with Spurs 5th and Arsenal winning a trophy and Spurs winning nothing.

13 league titles, you’ve only won 2.

Keenos

No passion left in the North London Derby

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On a Thursday the feeling would start….. the nerves, the anticipation, the hatred. Friday, is about making the arrangements, what pub, what train, what time. Saturday comes and we jump out of bed, it’s never a struggle,  and we pace until we leave the house. It could only mean one thing…. London derby!

The result means everything, it’s about pride, it’s about status and it’s about pecking order. It’s not 3 points, it’s everything. Form goes out of the window, it’s about two teams fighting with everything they have and usually comes down to a bit of luck on the day.

Well, that’s how it used to be.

Now, its all a bit more respectful. I don’t like that.

I sat on the train yesterday after waking at 4am and not being able to sleep. Nerves, felt sick, not confident but the hope was still there. I listened to a couple of blokes on the train who were also on their way to Wembley, they were Tottenham fans, and were talking about how great it is to sit with 80,000 Tottenham fans every other week. They felt the club was going in the right direction with a new fan base and how magnificent it was that they are getting so many new fans.

At first I got some satisfaction as thinking ‘You have no idea just what is ahead of you when you move into your new ground’ then I started to feel a bit deflated. Is this what it’s become. Success now is about how many people you get through your gates? How many people will buy the over priced crap lager and how many people wear the shirt?

When I got to Wembley we walked up to the ground with them. What’s that all about? Where was the atmosphere outside the ground? Where was the nervousness? It’s all gone. To be honest I felt exactly the same at their place last year. The atmosphere was flat, they stood outside their pubs tapping their toes to Chas n Dave, drinking out of their plastic glasses and looked menacing, but actually they weren’t. The hatred is starting to die.  Exactly the same can be said at The Emirates, it’s all very gentlemanly.

Silly kick off times don’t help but our fan base, as has theirs, has been diluted with a new passive hardcore.

Our form this year,  along with a split fan base isn’t conducive for a good day out. Half hearted attempts at songs, sitting in arenas rather than football grounds all contributes to a pleasant day out. But I don’t want a pleasant day out. I want a day of emotion and elation, I would even take anger rather than the acceptance that has become my new best friend.

I sat with 3 people to my right yesterday wearing half and half scarves. Half and half scarves for that game in the away end. Unbelievable. Shocking. Disgraceful.

I also saw loads of them wearing them, more of them than our lot to be honest. Where have our London derbies gone? How did they end up like this?

Rewind to a few weeks back and the semi final against Chelsea. A league cup semi final and for many fans it was an option game. Most hardcore and regulars chose not to go. I went in my usual seat which is littered with old clockenders with a history to be faced with a bunch of new faces. Now I have some respect for these fans who will come to any game they can get a ticket for, that I have no problem with. But, I sat watching a London derby semi final! I’ve never sat for a semi final in my life! Within 5 minutes I was told to sit down by someone who I’ve never seen before. Two kids in front of me wearing their scarves and really up for watching their first semi final stood on their chairs. Great I thought, maybe we do have a new generation coming through. Shouting abuse and making the odd wanker sign and they were ready for their love affair with our club to take hold. No, they were told to sit down, they sat down for the rest of he game and applauded politely at the end like all the others.

My opinion is there are a few reasons for this sudden change,  the main one being so many proper Arsenal have had enough and stay away now. They keep their season tickets and away scheme members as an insurance policy but they then sell them on to these people who want to visit an arena and want to wear a half and half scarf. There is no singing because they don’t know the songs, there is no hatred because they haven’t had the experiences…..and sadly, they never will.

I get people wanting to stay away, totally understand that, trust me, I am very very close to also calling it a day myself.  But, we have to keep fighting. I keep hearing that people will come back when Wenger has gone but I feel scared that there won’t be a club to come back to. You will come into the ground and hate it because it’s being allowed to be taken over by people who want a pleasant day out. People who wear half and half scarves and people who want to sit down for a semi final against Chelsea.

My message to the half and half scarf brigade, don’t fu**ing do it, don’t buy them for your kids as they won’t thank you, don’t come into an Arsenal away end looking like a dick.

Be Arsenal, stand, sing, and fight against the oppression.

*JD*