ALEX SONG has retired from football and he will now join many of his final Arsenal team-mates in going on to a life outside of the sport.
The former Gunner announced his retirement from football with his last club being Djibouti Premier League side Arta Solar 7.
Song, 36, enjoyed a long career that saw him star for the likes of Arsenal, Barcelona, West Ham and Russian outfit Rubin Kazan.
His last game for the Gunners came in May 2012, as he helped the club finish third in the Premier League with a 3-2 win over West Brom.
He was sold to Barcelona that summer. However, he never managed to hit the heights expected of him at the LaLiga outfit.
Song left behind an Arsenal squad that would all go on to their own things in life.
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Here, SunSport takes a look at where the rest of the stars who played that day are now.
Wojciech Szczesny
The goalkeeper, 33, joined Juventus in 2017 and has since made 227 appearances for the Serie A giants.
He battled Gianluigi Buffon for the No1 spot when he first arrived but he has made the position his since the Italian legend left in 2021.
Last season, he suffered a health scare on the pitch as he started to feel chest pains, but has since made a full recovery.
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Carl Jenkinson
Jenkinson, 31, is still playing football but down under at Newcastle Jets.
He had two loan spells away from Arsenal at West Ham and one at Birmingham City.
He left the club permanently in 2019 and joined Nottingham Forest before moving to Melbourne City on loan in 2022.
Thomas Vermaelen
Vermaelen left Arsenal in 2014 to join Barcelona, but like Song, he also struggled to star at the club.
He retired from football in 2021 after spells with Roma and Vissel Kobe.
He was most recently an assistant coach for the Belgian national side.
Laurent Koscielny
The Frenchman has returned to Lorient where he is an under-17 coach.
Arsenal signed the now 38-year-old from the Ligue 1 side in 2010 and he played 353 times for the Gunners, and was appointed captain of the club in 2018.
He left under a cloud when he signed for Bordeaux after the club failed to convince him to stay.
Andre Santos
Santos was very much described as a flop during his time at Arsenal.
He left the club after two seasons and returned to Brazil to play for clubs such as Gremio, Flamengo and Figueirense.
He retired from football in 2018 and set up a restaurant called Flavours in Sao Paolo, however, it appears to have since permanently closed.
Francis Coquelin
Coquelin, 32, struggled to hold down a starting role at Arsenal throughout his time at the club.
He had loan spells at Lorient, Frieburg and Charlton before eventually leaving on a permanent deal in 2018 to Valencia.
He is now starring for Villarreal, having joined the club in 2020, and in his first season won the Europa League.
Gervinho
Gervinho enjoyed a colourful career as he left Arsenal a year after Song.
He moved to Italy and played for both Roma and Parma either side of a spell in China with Hebei China Fortune.
The rapid winger then moved to Trabzonspor before his most recent club in Greece, Aris Thessaloniki.
In the summer, he was linked with a move to Serie D side Trapani.
Tomáš Rosický
Rosický retired from football in 2017 one season after leaving Arsenal for his boyhood club Sparta Prague.
He is now working at the club as the sporting director.
Yossi Benayoun
Benayoun was only at Arsenal for that season as he was on loan from Chelsea.
He continued to play until he was 39 at clubs such as West Ham, QPR, Maccabi Haifa, Maccabi Tel Aviv and Maccabi Petah Tikva.
Like Rosicky, Benayoun is also working as a sporting director, but at his last club Israeli side Beitar Jerusalem.
Robin Van Persie
The Dutchman, 40, is now back in his native Netherlands where he is the assistant coach of Feyenoord.
Erik ten Hag reportedly wanted Van Persie to join him at Manchester United but he was rejected by the former striker, who revealed he wanted “stability”.
He played for United after leaving Arsenal following a controversial transfer in 2012.
Substitutes
There were also some notable names on the subs bench for Song’s last game for Arsenal.
Goalkeeper Lukasz Fabianski is currently playing at West Ham while Aaron Ramsey is back at his boyhood club Cardiff City.
Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain had a missed spell at Liverpool and is now at Turkish outfit Beşiktaş.
Striker Marouane Chamakh retired in 2019 and has since earned his coaching badges in Morocco.
Source: Soccer - thesun.co.uk
