Last week, Sir Alex Ferguson of Manchester United announced his retirement from coaching at the end of this English Premier League season. For as long as I have been alive, Ferguson has been the coach of a Manchester United team that has rivaled my favorite sports team, Arsenal FC. This piece is not just about the end of the managerial career of a man who is widely considered the best in Premier League history, certainly in the conversation for best ever across all sports, but about what the combination of his and a number of his own players retirements mean for the Manchester club.

In April this year, former United wonderkid Michael Owen announced that this season will be his last. Unknowingly, this seemed to mark the beginning of the end of a significant era. Since Ferguson announced his retirement last weekend, former and current Manchester United stars have also joined him on the soon to be unemployed line. 

Paris St. Germain star, former LA Galaxy and Manchester United player David Beckham has also announced his retirement. 

Also, former retiree and current United player Paul Scholes has also announced he is hanging up his boots with the culmination of the Premier League season and current fan-favorite Ryan Giggs is touted to be next in line. These spur of retirements will most likely not destabilize the United franchise, but it defines the end of an era for many Great Britain soccer fans and followers around the world.

Late last millennium, I became aware of my loyalties in regards to sports franchises, and the first team I picked up was Arsenal. During this time period, the north London side and the Manchester side were in a protracted battle for the dominance of the English Premier League, a battle that spurned into the physical much too often. Both sides were the giants of English football and perennially faced each other for the league title so that added an extra spice to the blooming rivalry.  

The fierce rivalry was said to have begun in 1990 when an all-out brawl broke out over Arsenal faithful Nigel Winterburn lunging at United’s Denis Irwin. Over the next 15 years, we would get to see a melee in almost every game these teams faced each other. The skirmishes included a food fight in ‘04 after United ended Arsenal’s 49-game unbeaten streak, a soccer boot to Beckham’s famously pretty face in ‘03 and a captain v. captain one-on-one square up between Arsenal’s Patrick Vieira and United’s Roy Keane. Ferguson and his opposite number at Arsenal, Frenchman Arsene Wenger, have also had some toss ups in their nearly two-decade span in control of both squads. The violence was famously rumored to have ended with a “no-violence” treaty between the two franchises.

In the years since that dust up, a lot of those players have left those teams and the matchup has been a lot more mild-mannered in comparison to what we might have expected or become accustomed to. While United has maintained its spot at the top of the league, Arsenal has fallen of the pinnacle. The budding friendship between Ferguson and Wenger was some indication of the lack of animosity, but the sale of Arsenal captain Robin van Persie to United last offseason has confirmed that. Although most of the mentioned players are no longer with United, these string of retirements certainly solidified that peace position.

Acknowledging that the heated rivalry came to an end a couple of years ago is a reality that most fans haven’t faced. The key players from the tail end of the rivalry have moved on, and they all ply their trades for a different team. This widespread retirement spree is in no way the real end of that rivalry but the official end of it. Most fans, including myself, still won’t be able to let go of the imagery of Keane and Vieira going at each other or Martin Keown and Giggs getting into arguments. This does force us to come to a realization as it marks the end of a memorable era.

Lanre is sophomore in Media. He can be reached at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @WriterLanre.