How Red Is North London?

I spend far too much time on Twitter “debating” with people I shouldn’t – mostly Spurs fans who try to “educate” me on Arsenal whenever I talk about the way our club is run. Spurs fans like to think they know our history better than we do and a quiz such as how well do you know your team from Ladbrokes, shows they are a tad more informed on average about their history than the Gunners fans who took the quiz.

16% of Gooners scored four out of 10, with the same proportion scoring five. When it comes to super-brains, 8% of fans managed to get every single question right (I took the quiz twice scoring 10/10 and 8/10), some of them covering players, games and subjects which feature a long way back in the club’s history. Less than 1% of fans managed to complete the quiz without getting a single question right.

Spurs fans on average scored slightly higher than our more modest average score of 5/10. Comfortingly, just 4% Spurs fans got a perfect score, although far fewer managed to do the quiz without getting anything right. 

However, the differences are marginal, while we’re a long way from being as clueless about our teams as Stoke City fans, who scored just 3/10 on average!

Based on these scores you would imagine most Spurs fans are pretty clued up about their own club but most seem remarkably obtuse when confronted by hard facts and history. For example:

Pre 1900
Let us start with the founding of the two clubs. Tottenham were founded in 1882 in Middlesex, 4 years before Arsenal were founded in 1886 by members of an armaments factory in London however Spurs did not become a professional club until 1895, 4 years after Arsenal had turned professional in 1891. Arsenal’s professional status irked their fellow southern clubs and they were banned from participating in their league. Arsenal sought to set up a professional league for southern clubs but ultimately failed. Tottenham were supporters of this move and planned to join Arsenal’s new league had it got off the ground.

In 1893, a full 2 years before Tottenham became a professional club Arsenal were invited to join the football league; the first southern club to do so.

Major points: Arsenal a top flight club and a professional football club long before Tottenham

1900 to 1920
Tottenham won the FA Cup in 1901, the first non-league club to do so and joined the second division of the football league in 1908, four full years after Arsenal had won promotion to the top flight of the football league.

In 1913 after 26 years in the Woolwich/Plumstead areas financial problems forced Arsenal to look for a new home. After much deliberation the then Arsenal owners settled on a site in Highbury, North London. During this time the team from Middlesex, Tottenham, were in decline and the suspension of professional football in 1914 for WW1 was a small relief to a Tottenham club rooted to the bottom of the league and in trouble of joining Arsenal in the second division.

When football resumed in 1919 Arsenal who officially finished 6th in division two were elected to the new football league top division at the expense of Tottenham, Barnsley and Wolves. Understandably this upset the team from Middlesex and speculation of bribery was rife but records state that an impassioned plea from Sir Henry Norris on the basis of history saw a voting victory of 18 to 8 in favour of Arsenal rejoining the top division. However Norris did threaten to start a breakaway league in protest of the match fixing by Manchester United and Liverpool. It is rumoured that the football league offered Arsenal a place in the top division to placate Norris. Spurs fans will say this was Norris holding the other teams over a barrel but it’s not so different from the proposals they supported a few decades before or indeed the creation of the Premier League.

Major points: Tottenham made history with their first major trophy, the FA Cup

1920 to World War 2
In 1920 Tottenham made it back into the top flight and the year after won their second FA Cup. Arsenal won their first major trophy, the FA Cup, in 1930. The 1930’s proved to be a great decade for Arsenal and they went on to win a second FA Cup in 1936 as well as 5 league trophies. By 1933 Arsenal had overtaken Tottenham’s trophy record and have never relinquished it.

Major points: Spurs won their 2nd FA Cup in 1921 however by 1939 Arsenal had 5 league trophies and 2 FA Cups.

Post WW2 to 1960
In 1947/48 Arsenal, the only team in North London at the time, secured their 6th league title and their 3rd FA Cup in 1950 to overtake Tottenham’s 2 despite having lost 9 players in WW2 – more than any other team. In 1951 Tottenham won their first ever top flight title. In 1953 Arsenal regained their 6 title lead over their geographically closest rivals with their 7th first division title.

Major points: By the end of the 1950s Tottenham had won their first league title and had taken their trophy haul to 3 trophies. Arsenal finished the decade with a total of 10.

The 1960s
The early sixties saw a purple patch for Tottenham with a league and FA Cup double in 1961 – the first in the 20th century- and a 4th FA Cup in 1962 to reclaim the moniker of best cup team in the south from Arsenal. In 1963 Tottenham became the first English team to win a UEFA competition. Tottenham won their 5th FA Cup in 1967, their first trophy as a North London team after their borough in Middlesex became a part of the London Borough of Haringey in 1965.

Major points: The 1960s was definitely Tottenham’s decade however their history making only took them to 8 major trophies compared to Arsenal’s 10 and only 1 trophy as a “North London” club compared to Arsenal’s 10.

The 1970s

The sixties saw Arsenal become a distinctly mid-table team however a UEFA competition win in 1970 saw a brief revival and the clinching of the club’s first league and cup double in 1971.

Tottenham had another small patch of cup success in the early 1970s with a UEFA Cup win in 1972 sandwiched between two League Cups.

Arsenal finished the decade with their 5th FA Cup in 1979 to extend their trophy lead over their now established North London rivals.

Major points: Tottenham won a European competition however they still finished the decade with 11 major trophies to their names to Arsenal’s then total of 14.

The 1980s
The 1980s started well for Tottenham as they went on to win 2 more FA Cups and another UEFA cup taking them level on major trophies with Arsenal however still vastly behind on league titles. Spurs started to wane as the decade went on and Arsenal finished strongly with a League Cup win in 1987 and a historic title win in 1989 to restore a trophy lead over Spurs.

Major points: A good start of the decade for Spurs once again overshadowed by the achievements of Arsenal with a dramatic league finish to take the total league titles to 9 to 2.

1990s
By their own standards, after 30 years as a cup team, Tottenham started and finished the decade well with an FA Cup and a League Cup win in 1991 and 1999 respectively. By contrast Arsenal won 6 more major trophies including a league title in 1991 losing only one game along the way, a League Cup and FA Cup double in 1993, a European trophy in 1994 and a League Title and FA Cup double in 1998.

Major points: Arsenal further increased their trophy lead over their nearest rivals and finished the decade with 11 to 2 in League Titles and a total haul of 22 to 16.

2000 to present

The first 5 years of the current period saw Arsenal win the FA Cup 3 times and the league twice including a sensational double in 2002 and an incomparable undefeated season in 2004. Tottenham won a League Cup in 2008, the most recent trophy for either club and their other highlights include running Arsenal close for a Champions League spot on two occasions although ultimately failing both times. The first time, in 2006, was blamed on a dodgy lasagne and the most recent, in 2012 saw the reportedly best Tottenham team in 50 years blow a 13 point lead over the reportedly worst Arsenal team in 16 years.

Major points: Despite an 8 year barren period Arsenal finished the current period with a total of 13 league titles and 10 FA Cups to Tottenham’s 2 and 8.

In a nutshell Tottenham whilst historically a very good cup team cannot be the biggest club in North London and have no right to tell Arsenal “North London Is Theirs” as Arsenal were a North London club for 52 years before Tottenham became a part of North London or London at all for that matter. Not to mention the fact that Tottenham haven’t been more successful than Arsenal for over 80 years. It’s a technicality but hey, we’re not the ones constantly bringing up a move that happened before the incredibly vast majority of Spurs fans were even born.

Municipal Borough Of Tottenscum

On the other hand, if things were different we would be living in an era where Tottenham moved to East London.

Arsenal have won 27 major trophies as a North London club and 10 of those were before Tottenham became a part of London in 1965.

From a trophy point of view Arsenal have always had the same or more trophies than Tottenham since 1932 and have always been ahead since 1987 and ahead in league titles since 1931.

Tottenham had 7 major trophies and set numerous English records before 1965 so are, and probably always will be, Middlesex’s most successful team.

Spurs have a very long way to go to catch up with Arsenal.

A few facts for you:

• Tottenham have never won the league as a “London” club
• Arsenal were in “London” for 79 years before Tottenham was absorbed into London
• Arsenal were in a North London postcode for 52 years before Spurs were
• Arsenal have 27 “North London” trophies Spurs have 11 – 2 less than Arsenal’s North London League titles
• Tottenham bid for the Olympic Stadium so relocation to a different part of London is weak ammunition

So the next time a Spud tells you to bog off back to South London kindly educated them on the history of their club and their clubs geography and if that doesn’t work tell them to bog off back to Middlesex ;-).

Thanks for reading! Please comment on this post, subscribe by email, share with friends and follow me on twitter (@thedanielcowan). Please check out the official NLIR Facebook page http://facebook.com/northlondonisredblog for news, views, freebies and more. 

Don’t forget to tune into the funniest Arsenal podcast around “Goonersphere Podcast“