The 40s - War years

Despite the ongoing war the government wanted things to try to give the population something to take their minds away from the hostilities, football (naturally) was one of those things......

      There were restrictions ie, dates, venues,  crowd sizes and everything was still played on an organised manner.  Footballers during this period were effectively " on loan" but still had to register for other teams depending on where they were based during the war and leagues were based on a geographical basis. When back home on leave, they could still play for their home team....

     Obviously soldiers etc were moved around during this period and to help keep fitness levels and moral up, inter regiment games etc were also played...

       In Arthur's case, he was at times stationed in Northern Ireland with the Royal Engineers, so during that time he signed for Linfield. It was also during this period that he met the future Mrs Wright.........

Games played - that we know of....

 

 

 

 

Summaries & reports from some of these games are featured below....

Arthur played the first of his 18 games ( predominantly as an inside forward)  for Linfield on 8 March 1941 in a 3-2 victory at Distillery. His second game, nearly a month later was also against Distillery but this time it was the semi final of the Irish Cup. The game ended 3-3 with Linfield winning the replay although Arthur did not play in that game...

Then on 26 April Arthur played in the Irish Cup Final against Belfast Celtic, with  Celtic winning the game 1-0..........

Next season (41-42) Arthur played 9 games scoring 8 goals the highlight of which was another Irish Cup Final, winning 3-1 against Glentoran at Celtic Park.........

Arthur only played one further game for Linfield at the beginning of 42-43, on Sept 26 , scoring one of the goals in a 2-1 win over Belfast Celtic in the Gold Cup........

However, Arthur was also selected to play for the N.Ireland league team against the S.Ireland league in Dublin. A crowd of 30,000 saw the N.Ireland team run out 2-1 winners......