Five great footballers who retired early as Varane calls it a day | OneFootball

Footballers have a short shelf life, making it all the sadder when a talented player has to retire early from the game.

The average career span of a professional footballer is eight years, while the average retirement age is 35, according to the PFA. But some players, whether it be through injury, personal circumstance or a loss of love for the game, hang up their boots before even then.

Raphael Varane became the latest great to call it a day earlier than expected, announcing on Instagram that he has played his last game and will move into a non-playing role at Como.

“I have no regrets, I wouldn’t change a thing,” he wrote. The central defender, who won the World Cup and four Champions Leagues during a glittering career, is just 31, but injuries have taken their toll.

Let’s remember some other greats of the game who bid farewell sooner than expected, in chronological order.

Five great footballers who retired early from the game:

Jack Wilshere

After breaking into the Arsenal team at just 16, Jack Wilshere was projected to be one of the outstanding talents of his generation. And for the first half of his career he was just that, but the latter half was blighted by injuries.

The midfielder never quite reached his full potential, and played out his final years at the likes of Bournemouth and West Ham United, before retiring in 2022 after a short spell at Danish outfit Aarhus.

“In truth it has been difficult to accept that my career has been slipping away in recent times due to reasons outside of my control whilst feeling that I have still had so much to give.

“Having played at the very highest level I have always held such ambitions within the game and if I am truthful I did not envisage being in this position at times,” he said.

“However, having had time to reflect and talk with those closest with me I know that now is the right time and despite the difficult moments I look back on my career with great pride at what I have achieved.”

Read – Five times injuries changed Premier League title races

Sergio Aguero

One of the all-time great Premier League strikers, Sergio Aguero found the net 260 times in 390 appearances for Manchester City. After a trophy-laden decade at the club, he joined Barcelona in 2021, but it turned out to be a short-lived stint in Catalonia.

A week after scoring his first goal for Barça against Real Madrid in October, he was taken to hospital with chest discomfort diagnosed as cardiac arrhythmia. Although it was initially thought he would be sidelined for three months, he announced his retirement from football in December of that year.

Read – Sergio Aguero’s best goals for Manchester City

Eric Cantona

The shock that accompanied Eric Cantona’s sudden retirement from football in 1997 was palpable. Here was arguably the best player in English football at the time ending his career at the age of 30 (thirty!) when there was so much more to be won at Manchester United.

The Frenchman was a beacon for the club’s success in the nineties, the key ingredient in ending their 26-year long wait for a league title. That’s why it was a shame that he missed out on United’s Champions League success just two years later, as well as France’s World Cup triumph in 1998.

But it was typical Cantona to bow out in such a way. His appetite sated, he went out on his terms and leaving everyone wanting more, including his manager Alex Ferguson, who wrote a heartfelt letter to the ex-striker.

Read – Eric Cantona and how he made us feel

Marco van Basten

When Diego Maradona was once asked who the best player he ever saw was, he answered “it’s between Romario and Marco van Basten.” Try and imagine, then, what the world missed out on when the Dutchman had to retire at the age of 31.

But by that stage he had effectively already been in retirement for two years due to his recurring ankle injuries, his last game for AC Milan being the 1993 Champions League final against Marseille.

Before then Van Basten had proven himself to be one of the greatest footballers of all time, having won two European Cups, three Ballon d’Or awards, and scored perhaps the most spectacular goal ever seen in a major final when he netted the winner against the USSR in the Euro 88 decider.

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Just Fontaine

A prolific striker in his day, Just Fontaine set the record for most goals in a single World Cup campaign when he scored 13 goals for France in 1958 – a record he holds to this day and likely always will.

Fontaine, who scored 30 goals in just 21 caps for the French national team, formed part of the highly successful Stade de Reims team that won three league titles and reached the final of the European Cup in 1959.

Sadly for Fontaine, he had to retire at the age of 28 due to injury, just four years after his exploits at the World Cup in Sweden.

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