100 Years Since Herbert Chapman: 6 – What happened to Chapman at Leeds?

Previously in this series:

• 1: Taking over from failure
• 2: Approaching a 100th anniversary at Arsenal of mega-importance.
• 3: The Arsenal that Knighton left behind
• 4: Knighton is removed
• 5  A  new manager

This is part of a series of articles that looks at the life and times of Herbert Chapman, looking at Chapman’s time at Arsenal in relation to celebrating 100 years since Herbert Chapman came to Arsenal.

At the heart of our enquiry is the question “What on earth made Herbert Chapman move from a club that he had just taken to the top of the league, winning its first two championships (Huddersfield), to a club that that had only just escaped relegation, and had never won anything at all (Arsenal).

Strangely these are questions that are not normally examined.   Indeed if we look at the Wikipedia page on “Arsenal managers” what it says is that

“In the close season of 1925, Norris proceeded with wholesale changes at the club and advertised the role of manager in the Athletic News:

Arsenal Football Club is open to receive applications for the position of TEAM MANAGER. He must be experienced and possess the highest qualifications for the post, both as to ability and personal character. Gentlemen whose sole ability to build up a good side depends on the payment of heavy and exhorbitant [sic] transfer fees need not apply.

“The notice caught the attention of Huddersfield Town manager Herbert Chapman, who according to journalist and former Arsenal player Bernard Joy wanted to manage a London club: “Arsenal appealed to him because it was a struggling club, something he could work on and make a power in the land.”  He joined Arsenal in June 1925, and laid the foundations for the club’s first period of success.”

Which is ok as far as it goes, but it really doesn’t go very far, because for a start it doesn’t really take into account the fact that if Chapman had stayed at Huddersfield he was in line to become the first ever manager ever, to win the league three times running with a club.

As it was he had won the league twice running (1923/4 and 1924/5) and had everything in place at Huddersfield to make it three in a row – which is in fact what happened to the club after Chapman left and moved to Arsenal in the summer of 1925.   It seems at the distance of 100 years an extraordinary thing to give up, just to join a club that had never won anything, and indeed (if subsequent propaganda is to be believed) under an owner who was very, very tight when it came to spending money, and of dubious moral background.

Indeed what makes the situation even more curious as this article shows (but which is, in my experience a matter rarely if ever debated when we consider the life of Chapman) that Chapman had been involved (even if just at the fringes) in one of the biggest footballing scandals of the early 20th century, while at Leeds.  What on earth would make him want to leave his extraordinary success at Huddersfield, to join up with a man running Arsenal who is still considered by many to be one of the biggest charlatans ever to darken the good name of football – Henry Norris.

This is a prime question that I wish to answer in this series celebrating 100 years since Chapman joined Arsenal, and to understand what was going on we have to go back to Chapman’s time at Leeds City, a second-division club.  In the last two years of football before its suspension for the duration of the First World War, Chapman had worked in the role that we would today call “manager” at Leeds City, taking them from 19th in the league to fourth, and the edge of promotion to the first division.

But Chapman had strayed into territory which according to the League at least, broke its rules, in particular paying a full year’s salary on contracts that expired before the season ended, which meant the players in effect were paid more than the maximum wage in place at the time, allowed.

Chapman argued that this was an error and that he had reported the error to the club once he realised the problem. He told the directors of Leeds who told the League but despite owning up before they were charged, the club actually got fined for the error and Chapman was warned about his future conduct, even though he does not seem in any way to have been responsible.

Howerver it does seem that the club was possibly involved in making illicit payments to players, something which then helped them bring players in from other clubs; players interested in earning more than the allowed maximum wage.  But when we say Leeds were “possibly” doing this, so we could say the same about many other clubs.   Football had a maximum salary rule, which no one (players or managers) liked and from what has been revealed, it was quite often broken, if not by extra payments then by gifts in kind (such as rent-free accommodation).

But of course there were as ever people who were willing to reveal all to the authorities, either because of their moral position or because they wanted a cut of the extra money said to be floating around.  It was in fact rule-breaking on an industrial scale and either Leeds were picked upon because they were just too open about what was happening, or because they were not careful enough to ensure everyone got a cut of the cake.

Certainly what finally took the club over the edge was when a reserve player demanded a salary normally reserved for first-team players.  The club refused and the player apparently said he would tell the authorities about the illicit payments if he were not given the extra.   He was transferred but told the League nonetheless

The League demanded to see all of Leeds’ financial documents, Leeds refused because of what it called confidentiality agreements and the League acted and ejected Leeds City from the League.

Now of course this was not the only scandal of the era.  Bury, Coventry and goodness knows how many other clubs were involved in other match-fixing and finance scandals – one particularly popular route to paying extra was for a director or a friend of a director to give a player a second job at a decent salary.  Quite often the second job didn’t exist but it got round the rules and kept the player on the books of the club.

But whether it was carelessness, arrogance, or simply not taking enough precautions to hide matters, Leeds City were found guilty and ejected from the league in 1919 after eight games of the 191/20 season (the first season back after the war), not actually for making illegal payments but for failing to produce documents when demanded by the imperious Football League.

During the First World War Herbert Chapman was officially a consultant for Leeds City FC as well as being a senior manager of the weaponry factories based at Barnbow near Leeds, and it was only when clubs started to reform and work out which players they still had available that the real animosity at Leeds City broke out.  Inevitably there were threats to reveal to the League what had been going on, illegally, with Leeds’ finances.  and the suspicion is, from 100 years later, that those who were not getting their share, were routinely threatening to reveal all.

Certain a number of people including players must have known what had been going on, or at least what had been alleged to be going on at Leeds, and equally inevitably the chatter that had happened during the war would have included a fair amount of exaggeration, as men waiting in the most appalling of mental and physical situations, sought to give some meaning to their lives.

Nevertheless, the first post-war season began with Leeds City part of the league, and it was not until Leeds had played six games that the Football League called them in with a demand to see all the documents for the final year of the club before the suspension of the league.   As a result, the club was found guilty of making illegal payments, thrown out of the League and Chapman among others banned from football for life.

There were, and still are, questions about why the directors of the club refused to provide documents, and why instead they accepted their being removed from the league.  Whatever answer one comes up with it will of course in modern parlance be a conspiracy theory – but it is hard to find any explanation for Leeds being thrown out other than there was either a conspiracy to have them ejected no matter what, or it was obvious that there was a way back for  Leeds – as there clearly was once the new club Leeds United, was formed.

Certainly, the League wanted to make an example of someone, in order to show that football was not fixed.  And certainly the next season an inquiry found that Coventry and Bury had colluded in match-fixing.  And indeed in an earlier article we noted in passing how Leigh Roose was most certainly getting more expenses that he was not entitled to.

That Chapman got caught up in the affair was typical of the times, everyone anywhere near the situation was guilty and banned from football, including Herbert Chapman.  But he had been working in other areas during the war, so there was no reason why he might not look for work elsewhere.   Indeed he took some time off, and then got a job as a manager at the Olympia Oil and Cake Works at Selby.  Football, for Chapman at least, seemed to be a thing of the past.

The series continues…