After a deeply depressing week, when the Whites were battered by Brentford, lost Aleksandar Mitrovic and haven’t strengthened their squad, where better to boost the spirits than a trip to Arsenal. You’ll hear that Fulham haven’t ever won at Arsenal rather a lot before kick-off this afternoon, but that isn’t actually true. If you count the London Challenge Cup, which we really should as the Whites won it three times, then Fulham famously won at Highbury in 1919 when ex-Gunners boss Phil Kelso masterminded an expected victory for the Second Division side at the start of the first competitive season after World War One.

Although the competition, which survived until 1973, eventually became a nuisance to London’s bigger clubs it was created with a buzz as a regional alternative to the FA Cup in 1908 by the London FA. The Whites lifted the trophy in its second season as a Second Division side, thrashing Tottenham in the final at Stamford Bridge. The resumption of competitive club football was eagerly anticipated after the horror of the war, where the Whites lost several players, including youngsters Ernie Thompson and William Maughan, who wore number three and four next to each other forging promising careers in the black and white before dying in the trenches aged only 22 and 24.

Kelso, who had guided Arsenal to two FA Cup semi-finals before being tempted back from his native Scotland by the Fulham board after the departure of Harry Bradshaw, remains the club’s longest-serving manager. Steering the Whites through the Second World War was no mean feat, but the disciplinarian – who introduced the concept of travelling and staying in hotels as a team – successfully kept the Whites in the second tier throughout his tenure. He remained remote from his players, having never played the game professionally, but was remarkably successful.

He used the transfer market successfully, bringing big names to Craven Cottage, including forward Arthur Brown, outside right Bobby Templeton, Andy Ducat, who was capped for England in both football and cricket and the tremendously talented Danny Shea. Fulham battered Bromley 8-0 in the first round of the competition, with a hat-trick from inside left George Martin, only to be drawn against ‘The Arsenal’ as they were then known. Les Knighton’s side had the better of a goalless draw at in October 1919, attended by 7,000 fans, setting up a replay at Highbury a fortnight later. Kelso’s side went behind to an early strike from Arsenal inside left Wally Hardinge, but stunned a home crowd of more than 9,000 by going in at half-time 2-1 up thanks to a brilliant brace from the deadly Donald Cock. The first of outside left Frank Penn’s 52 goals clinched a 3-1 win for the visitors, who were knocked out in the semi-finals and went on to finish sixth in the Division Two table.

The Fulham side that afternoon featured one of the greatest goalkeepers in the club’s history, Arthur Reynolds, whose club record of 420 appearances for a number won was only broken by Jim Stannard in the 1990s. Reynolds who spent twenty years at the Cottage was ever-present in his first two seasons after signing from his hometown club Dartford, and helped the Whites reach the FA Cup semi-finals in 2012. He is widely considered to have been very unlucky to have never won an England cap despite being one of the best custodians in the country, playing until the age of 41, and still visiting the Cottage to watch the Whites until his death in 1971.

Also in the eleven was the wonderful Wattie White, who made more than 200 appearances for the Whites, after arriving from Everton. The Scottish international had played in the FA Cup final for Bolton and won two Scottish senior caps during his Goodison Park stint and was an exceptional inside forward, who made two of the Fulham goals at Highbury from inside right, whose technical skills belied his short stature. He would surely have won more international honours were it not for the First World War and continued watching the Whites until he died in Fulham in 1950.

Kelso, whose tenure was dogged by the match-fixing attributed to centre forward Barney Travers, retired after avoiding relegation on the final day of the 1923/24 season when outside left Fred Linfoot’s winner beat Stockport County in front of 20,000 and kept the Whites up by a point from Nelson. He became a publican, serving as the popular landlord of both the Grove – now the Grove Tavern in Hammersmith Grove – and the Rising Sun on the Fulham Road, whilst staying in football as the chairman of the Football League Managers and Secretaries Association.