Showing posts with label Brentford F.C.. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Brentford F.C.. Show all posts

Tuesday, February 16, 2010

17 February 1940 - Highbury Hits The Silver Screen

On 17 February 1940, The Arsenal Stadium Mystery opened in theaters across Britain. Directed by influential English filmmaker Thorold Dickinson, the movie was one of the first to include football in a prominent role.

The story follows Inspector Anthony Slade (played by Leslie Banks) as he attempts to solve the murder of a football player who died from poisoning while his amateur side, the fictitious Trojans, were playing a friendly against Arsenal at Highbury. The movie was actually filmed at Highbury, with several Arsenal players, including forward Cliff Bastin and full back Eddie Hapgood, playing parts. But of all the Gunners players and staff to appear in the film, only manager George Allison (pictured) had a speaking role.

To film scenes of the match between Arsenal and the Trojans, Dickinson shot footage of an actual league match between the Gunners and Brentford, played on 6 May 1939. In order to double as the Trojans, the Brentford players wore a special striped kit for the occasion.

The actual match ended as a 2-0 win for Arsenal. It was the last match for either side before the league suspended football for the duration of World War Two.

Sunday, January 31, 2010

1 February 1936 - The Floodgates Opened

On 1 February 1936, the sides in the four levels of the English pyramid set a collective League record by scoring (or conceding) a total of 209 goals in a single day. Nine players scored hat-tricks and three players bagged four goals each.

The goals were scored in 44 different matches, for an average of 4.75 goals per match. Highlights included Chester City's 12-0 win over York City and Chesterfield's 5-6 win at Crewe Alexandra, both of which were in Division Three North. In the top flight, Brentford rolled over Wolves 5-0 and West Brom flooded Liverpool 6-1, while the largest margin of victory in Division Two was West Ham's 6-0 win over Bury. The only scoreless League match that day was Aldershot's 0-0 draw with Bristol City in Division Three South.

Division One's last place team Aston Villa delivered the day's biggest upset by beating hosts Derby County, then in second place, by the score of 1-3. The win did little to change Villa's fortunes, however, as they finished second from bottom are were relegated to Division Two.

Monday, August 17, 2009

18 August 1979 - Brentford Beats Death

On 18 August 1979, Reading FC drew 2-2 with Brentford FC, thus ending Reading's 1,103-minute streak without conceding a goal. The match was the season-opener for both teams, and the first in Division Three for the newly-promoted Reading.

Reading's keeper throughout the streak, which consisted of 11 consecutive clean sheets, was Englishman Steve Death, who made 471 appearances for the Royals from 1969 to 1982. The streak began on 28 March 1979, with Reading's 4-0 win over Grimsby Town. At the time, the Royals were playing in Division Four. The win moved them into first place in the table, which is where they finished after following up the win over Grimsby with a season-ending run of 7 more wins and 3 draws, earning promotion to Division Three.

The streak was an English league record until 31 January 2009, when it was broken by Manchester United's Edwin Van Der Sar.