The final Football League match played by the Gunners and the Saints prior to the inception of the Premier League.

More poignantly it was the final game played with the North Bank as a terrace, on which fans had stood on since 1913.

Date: Saturday 2 May 1992

Competition: Football League Division One

Location: Highbury

Attendance: 37,702

Referee: David Phillips

Match Report:

Arsenal 5

Campbell 66, Wright 70 (penalty), 89, 90, Smith 83

Southampton 1

Cockerill 68

Line-ups:

Arsenal: D Seaman, L Dixon, N Winterburn, D Hillier, S Bould, T Adams, D Rocastle, I Wright, K Campbell, P Merson (R Parlour), A Limpar (A Smith).

Southampton: T Flowers, J Kenna (I Dowie), F Benali, M Adams, R Hall, S Wood (K Moore), B Horne, G Cockerill, T Hurlock, M Le Tissier, A Shearer.

There was a party atmosphere in the North Bank for this game that marked the end of the famous terrace. Following the Taylor Report it was to be knocked down and replaced with a 12,500 seater stand in readiness for the 1993-94 season.

For the first hour there was little to indicate that it would finish in a flurry of goals. Ian Wright had a goal disallowed for offside whilst Southampton felt aggrieved not to have been awarded a couple of penalties.

Arsenal started to dominate in the second half and, in the 66th minute, a Paul Merson corner eventually found Kevin Campbell who just got enough of his head to the ball to loop it over Tim Flowers.

The lead was short-lived as Glenn Cockerill equalised with a near post flick from Micky Adams’ cross after some smart work by Matthew Le Tissier.

Any optimism that The Saints may have gained from their goal was quickly snuffed out two minutes later when Wright restored the lead from the penalty spot after Merson had been pulled down by Francis Benali. Lee Dixon had graciously allowed Wright to take the spot kick as he was in contention to win the Golden Boot.

Arsenal pulled further ahead after 83 minutes when Alan Smith converted another Merson corner, which went in off the underside of the bar.

As the clock ticked into injury time, most Arsenal fans seemed happy with a 3-1 victory, but Wright was not finished. He scored a second goal that was one of the best ever seen at Highbury. He took a throw from Seaman on the edge of the Arsenal penalty area and sprinted up the left wing, shrugging off Terry Hurlock. He then cut in and slotted the ball between Flowers and Kevin Moore, just inside the post.

Even then this was not enough for Wright. With one final attack Smith won ball just outside the Southampton penalty area and put the ball across the face of the goal for the simplest of tap-ins for Wright’s hat-trick, although he made hard work of it, scuffing it in off his shin.

The final whistle blew and the Arsenal fans on the North Bank were in ecstasy. It was, perhaps, fitting on this day that all five Arsenal goals would be scored at the North Bank. Many thousands stayed on as long as they could to savour the final moments of standing on their “home” one last time.

And you can now re-live those final North Bank moments with this video:

Post-match comments:

With regards to the season as whole, George Graham reflected: “Achievement-wise it has been a disappointing season. We’ve taken a lot of criticism from all quarters. We could so easily have finished lazing around in mid-table – but we didn’t. We put a run together. Everyone was quite surprised when I said we wanted to go to the end of the season undefeated. And that’s exactly what happened. Some of the goals have been breath-taking.”

Of his new goalscoring machine he said: “Ian has got this lovely attitude. He has not been cosseted, he was out of work as a kid. He realises he’d rather be here than working for a living and I don’t mean that nastily.”

Talking about the Golden Boot, Wright said: “It’s been on my mind all the time about the goals – who was going to finish with the most, myself or Gary Lineker. I’ve finished with 29 goals, one in front of Gary. But playing in this team I’m always confident of scoring.”

George Graham already had plans for the new season, with £5m to spend: “I’m going to strengthen the side. But I don’t think anybody will join us up front. The competition is too strong.”

Southampton manager Ian Branfoot had coached Ian Wright at Crystal Palace and added: “He is some player, isn’t he? How can you plan for that?”

Terry Hurlock felt that the scoreline did not reflect the balance of play, saying “we didn’t deserve that did we?” as the players left the pitch.

Facts about linked to the match or players:

Ian Wright became the last player to score a hat-trick against the same opponents home and away in the same season in the old First Division. The first player to achieve this feat in the Premier League was Emmanuel Adebayor for Arsenal against Derby in 2007-08.

During the 1992-93 season, a mural depicting fans sat in a stand was erected at the North Bank. This proved something of a bad omen as it wasn’t until the sixth home game of the season that an Arsenal player scored at that end of the ground.

The rest of the season:

This was the final game of the season, Arsenal finished fourth in the First Division, having remained unbeaten in their final 17 games. Unfortunately, this was not enough to secure a place in the UEFA Cup the following season. Southampton finished 16th but were never in danger of being relegated.

Arsenal did, however, finish as top scorers in the First Division with 81 goals.

Facts relating to the Season:

This was the final season when the First Division formed the top tier of English football. The Premier League was formed for the following season with both Arsenal and Southampton as founder members. Based on the form shown in their run-in, Arsenal were made 6/4 favourites to win the inaugural Premier League.

Leeds United won the First Division title with three former Arsenal players in their ranks: John Lukic, Chris Whyte and Lee Chapman.

Background to the article

This season we’ve been asked to write a regular page in the official Arsenal programme based on a classic match featuring the opponents for each game we play in. Programme editor Andy Exley has kindly given us permission to reproduce the match reports on our blog. We will also be including additional material that didn’t make the final edit of the programme. If you can’t get to The Emirates, the programme is available on iPad and iPod for a bargain 69 pence per issue.

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