Gunners U-turn over cannon

For more than 50 years it has proudly symbolised Arsenal's origins and powerful ambitions. But tomorrow the football club will announce that the cannon on its crest is to complete an about-turn.

By swivelling the cannon logo by 180 degrees, Arsenal will not just be tinkering with tradition but setting in place yet another money-spinning innovation.

After a nine-month consultation with a London-based team of designers, the club is set to announce the first change to its crest since 1949 at tomorrow's home game against Southampton.

The time it has taken might suggest a complete redesign, but the Evening Standard understands that the change is the relatively minor one of revolving the cannon so that it will point right rather than left (or "east" rather than "west", as the image consultants rather grandly describe their innovation).

This is not down to some kind of footballing feng shui but is the key to a very lucrative marketing plan. The redesign of the cannon, which symbolises the Woolwich Arsenal origins, will enable the club to copyright the logo, thus ensuring it can make even more from the sale of replica shirts and all the other branded paraphernalia eagerly consumed by fans.

Mark Kleinman, chief reporter of Marketing magazine, said: "This means all the existing merchandising that fans have bought becomes redundant and children will pester their parents to buy the stuff with the new logo. The logo change will add nothing to their plans for world domination but it will annoy their fans." It is likely to annoy some 350,000 supporters who own current versions of the Arsenal shirt, at a cost of around £40 each, which will soon be redundant.