Arsene Wenger Says It's 'Strange' Facing Manchester United Without Alex Ferguson

In the run up to Arsenal's trip to Old Trafford, Arsene Wenger has said what most football fans have been thinking this season: it's strange facing Manchester United without Sir Alex Ferguson in the dugout.

As reported by BBC Sport, the Gunners boss spoke of how odd it felt taking on the club without the man.

"It will be a bit strange without Sir Alex Ferguson there on Sunday," he told reporters at his pre-match press conference before stating that Ferguson's successor needed to be given the opportunity to prove himself. 

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David Moyes has shown great competence at Everton, so you need to leave him time to really get a grip on Manchester United, and he is slowly doing that. You see it now in the results. When someone has been there for 26 years and goes, it takes time for the guy who comes in. It is very dangerous and difficult for the manager who comes in. For me, Moyes is dealing very well with the situation.

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Wenger is now the longest-serving manager in the Premier League following his great rivals' retirement.

It seemed as though the enmity between the two veteran league winners mellowed in recent seasons with Arsenal's fading competitiveness cited by many as the key cause for a thawing of relations.

Prior to the Gunners' fall from grace however, tensions were often high between Wenger and Ferguson and the conflict between the bosses trickled down into the temperaments of their players on the pitch and off it.

Back in October 2004, Cesc Fabregas famously threw a slice of pizza at the Scot after United put an end to the unbeaten run of Arsenal's Invincibles, halting their streak to 49 games.

After the game the two managers clashed in the corridor between their teams' changing rooms at Old Trafford following a tirade by Wenger against Ruud van Nistelrooy. Their row eventually lead to the Catalan sending the cheese and pepperoni airborne towards Ferguson's face.

A year later, the Metropolitan Police called for the pair to calm their feud amid fears that the animosity would spill over into violence between fans in the run up to a game at Highbury, as reported by the BBC at the time.

Comparing their heated past relations to the sense of camaraderie promoted by the two on the stage at events and in the press between matches in their later exchanges, it's difficult not to think that the majority of the venom came from the United boss.

It must be difficult to stay angry with a team and manager when your side are able to beat them 8-2.

Considering that Wenger didn't feel the need to reproduce any hostility after such a result suggests that Ferguson was the more antagonistic man, but judging by his comments the Arsenal boss clearly misses the sparring and solidarity with his fellow doyen of the Premier League era.