ARSENAL 1 CITY 1
League Division 1
22nd November 1969
attendance 42,939
scorers
City Bowyer(43
Arsenal Neill(22 pen)
Ref Edwin Wallace
City Corrigan, Book, Pardoe, Doyle, Booth, Oakes, Summerbee, Bell, Lee, Bowyer, Young – subDonachie(unused)
Arsenal Barnett, Storey, McNab, Court, Neill, Simpson, Robertson, Sammels, Radford, Graham, Armstrong – sub George(75)
IAN BOWYER SCORES CITY’S GOAL
The more professional than entertaining displays of each side at Highbury were more outweighed by the controversial, abject performance by referee Mr Edwin Wallace.
There were few chances in the game, apart from the goals the only major effort occurred in the first five minutes when Sammels fed George Graham and his thundering shot easily beat Joe Corrigan but rebounded of the inside of the post.
On 22 minutes Graham was a little luckier, the City players and fans would say very lucky. He played a one-two with Radford but seemed to have run too wide as he entered the area, and collided with Joe Corrigan, referee Wallace adjudged the City custodian had pulled Graham to the ground, and pointed to the penalty spot. Neill made no mistake with the spot kick, smashing it into the top left of the net.
Just before half time Mike Doyle played a firm free kick into the area where Ian Bowyer controlled the ball with, what he claimed his chest, before dispatching the ball into the Gunners’ net. Neill of Arsenal, who is chairman of the PFA exclaimed “Was I in a good position to see the handling? Yes, too good. It doesn’t do anything for the blood pressure, that sort of thing. I wish I’d had my back to it. We protested but the referee had told us before the start that once he had made a decision there would be no question of changing it.”
There was little else to talk about in the second half until the last quarter of an hour when Charlie George came on as substitute. Mr Wallace ran up to George aggressively with book in hand, and foe everyone in Highbury it looked like George had been booked for entering the field of play without permission. And boos could be heard until the final whistle. After the game the referee ridiculously announced that he had not booked George but was just making a note of his identity.
The Gunners’ manager Bertie Mee commented “How could anyone be sure? It looked as though he had been booked, and we don’t know that this was not the referee’s intention at the time”.
