Leeds United is one of the grand old names of English football, but had it not been for the financial misdemeanours of their forebearers Leeds City, not only would the Whites not exist, but Arsenal Football Club’s fortunes would have been very different.
As sliding doors moments go, the ramifications of those wrongdoings back in 1919 led to top-flight fixtures between ourselves and Leeds United for over a century, but threatened to destroy the burgeoning career of Herbert Chapman.
City’s finances had always been precarious. Formed in 1904 and elected to the Football League the following year, the club faced difficulties pulling crowds into the ramshackle Elland Road, with the lure of the more successful rugby club simply too strong.
With City facing re-election to Division Two in 1912, Chapman – a 34-year-old former inside forward - swept into Elland Road as general manager and successfully campaigned to keep City in the Football League, allowing the great innovator to get to work.
In what would become the norm as his legendary managerial career developed, Chapman introduced salt baths and golf breaks and encouraged his players to pitch ideas during team meetings. This key aspect of his management strategy was perfectly illustrated during his time in north London when Charlie Buchan suggested the WM formation idea to Chapman and the rest of the Gunners team in 1925.
The new manager’s team finished a promising sixth in Division Two in his first year at the helm, before climbing to fourth in 1913/14, but the onset of World War I set into motion a chain of events which would ultimately spell Leeds City’s demise.
Chapman temporarily vacated his post as manager in 1916 to take charge of the nearby Barnbow munitions factory. Before his departure, he recommended that his assistant George Cripps take control of administration, while team selection became the responsibility of new chairman Joseph Connor. Cripps and Connor’s relationship was tense, and after Chapman returned in 1918, Cripps, demoted back to assistant, sued the club for wrongful dismissal, and informed his solicitor James Bromley that the club made illegal payments to staff throughout the war years.
As City’s players readied themselves for the 1919/20 season, full-back Charlie Copeland was shipped out to Coventry City on a free transfer after being denied a pay rise, and he also revealed the extent of City’s illegal wartime payments to the authorities. Copeland’s solicitor just happened to be Bromley, who was accused by Connor of leaking sensitive information to Copeland.
Following an inquiry, Leeds City were expelled from the Football League eight games into the season, and eventually dissolved after the club's directors failed to cooperate by withholding financial records.
Five City officials – including Connor and Chapman – were banned for life, although Chapman later earned a reprieve after he categorically proved he was working at the armaments factory when the payments were made.
Bruised by the experience, Chapman remained out of the game for three years before taking charge at Huddersfield Town. There he won a hat trick of league titles between 1924 and 1926, before rejuvenating Arsenal, where success and innovation tumbled along together throughout the club’s glorious 1930s.
As for Leeds City, in October 1919, over 30 representatives from Football League clubs haggled over City’s players in the city’s plush Metropole Hotel, with the entire 16-man squad fetching around £10,000 in an auction. Moves were soon afoot to create Leeds United, who joined the league a year later.
Meanwhile, in Division One of the West Yorkshire League, Leeds City, formed in 2006, trudge along, far removed from the Elland Road intrigue which destroyed their namesake over a century ago, but inadvertently paved the way for Chapman to become one of our - and English football’s - most influential figures.
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