Nice and warm at Brunton Park for that season opening Capital One Cup tie against Accrington a week last Saturday wasn’t it, mind you at least it wasn’t as warm as it was when Manchester City played Woolwich Arsenal at Hyde Road in Ardwick back in September 1906 in their first match of the 1906-07 First Division campaign. The temperature that Saturday apparently well over 90 degrees centigrade, which proved to be a problem for some of City’s new players who weren’t particularly match-fit in a big period of change for the Sky Blues.
The home side in the summer having had 17 players temporarily suspended until January 1907 for making additional payments over the £4 a week wage cap, while their manager Tom Maley was suspended from football for life. City having had their accounts audited by the Football League after player Billy Meredith was found guilty of attempting to bribe an opponent to throw a game, Meredith then during his suspension deciding to go clean on City’s wage structure after the Citizens failed to financially support him during his time on the sidelines.
Meredith an interesting character to put it mildly as he played with a toothpick between his lips, that coming after he first chewed tobacco until the cleaners refused to wash the spit off his shirts. After serving his ban he moved across Manchester to sign for United who he played for, with the war taking out a chunk of his career, until 1921 when he went back to City where he would play the last game of his career in the FA Cup in 1924 at the age of 49 years and 245 days old. The Welsh international also winning 48 caps for his country.
Things have certainly changed these days on the £4 a week rule as far as Roberto Mancini is concerned, but for then new secretary-manager Harry Newbould he faced a much bigger concern. His side losing 2-0 at half-time at Hyde Road and down to eight men with sunstroke as Conlin, Grieve and Thornley were all too ill to continue. Newbould therefore choosing to switch to a 1-3-3 formation consisting of one full-back, three half-backs and three forwards, his plan being to try to catch Woolwich Arsenal offside at every opportunity.
It worked for a while as well, and Conlin, perhaps the inspiration for Efe Sodje these days, who had played with a handkerchief tied over his head during most of the first-half managed to make it back onto the pitch five minutes after the break, with City now lining up in a 1-3-4 formation, Conlin even able to set up Dorsett for a goal to make it 2-1 and bring City back into the game. By that point though exhaustion was understandably affecting the remaining Sky Blues and City ended up down to five men plus their goalkeeper when Buchan, goalscorer Dorsett and Kelso were all forced to leave the field too.
Remarkably however after the referee had spoken to his linesmen, in the days 60 years before substitutes were permitted, they agreed that there was no reason for the game to be abandoned. Arsenal not surprisingly scoring twice more to make it 4-1, but they were at least too sporting to cash in too much late on against six-man City. As for the home side, things didn’t exactly get much easier for them as just two days later they were on the pitch in league action once more, this time at Goodison Park where not surprisingly they got thrashed 9-1 by Everton.
The following Saturday it was on the road again but at least this time the scoreline was down to 3-1 at The Wednesday, and from that game on City managed to get things together a bit as their new side bedded in. Although a revertion to early season form saw them win none of their last five games, with relegation only being avoided by two places and five points. The two clubs making the drop being Derby County and Stoke City in a Division One campaign in which Newcastle United won the title, thanks mainly to a record of 18 wins and one draw out of their 19 home games.