David Beckham and Sir Alex Ferguson. Two absolute Manchester United legends, who have gone down in immortality at Old Trafford.
The young Beckham was undoubtedly the poster boy of the Class of ’92, the handsome blonde who went from kicking a ball against a wall in Leytonstone to winning the treble and captaining his country. The wily Ferguson, meanwhile, came down from Scotland to knock Liverpool “off of their f*cking perch”, and managed to do just that, winning no fewer than 38 trophies at Old Trafford. Everything United could play for, Fergie won, and he has been afforded a status that is closer to saint than football manager in the city of Manchester.
Yet it is widely known that Ferguson and his poster boy, the winger with precocious talent who scored from the halfway line against Wimbledon, had an incredibly volatile relationship. But how exactly did Beckham and Ferguson come to feud? And why didn’t the winger live out his dream of retiring at Old Trafford? GOAL breaks down one of football’s most infamous bust-ups…