HexagonalBlog

The Beckham affair ends, for now

So in the end, David Beckham will stay at Milan until the end of the Serie A season, spend a summer with the Galaxy on June 30 through the end of the year, and then who knows what will happen.  Oh, and Milan will come to the States to play a friendly in LA. 

Frankly, I think the whole deal is pathetic, and MLS have been shown to be a bunch of big-talking fools who are out of their depth on the international scene.  I'm tired of talking about it David Beckham; what I wrote last month on this blog still reads well to me. 

What's good and what's bad about David Beckham

I haven't written anything about David Beckham's loan move (and possible permanent transfer) to AC Milan, mostly because it sparked a flood of disparate emotions that I needed to sort through in order to write a coherent post.   I still haven't worked through all of them completely, but this post needs to be written, so here it is.

"Shouldn't you be in Austria?"

Nice touch, Barra Bravas.

David Beckham on 60 Minutes

Last night the 60 Minutes segment on David Beckham aired, so I decided to watch network TV for a change.  The interview was conducted by CNN's Anderson Cooper, and it seemed to be an attempt to reintroduce David Beckham to a national audience without the presence of his pop star wife.  The only mention of Victoria was when Beckham showed off a new tattoo that featured a portrait of her.  The segment covered most of his career trajectory, from his beginnings with Manchester United to his years with the English national team to his move to MLS and the abortive start last season.   

There were two dominant questions in the interview -- 'Why did David Beckham decide to come to America?' and 'Haven't we been through this before with Pelé?'  Beckham gave a good answer about his passion for the game and his interest in raising the game's profile in the States to a new level, which may not be the best answer but still good enough.  Tim Leiweke of AEG handled the second question, but I don't think his answer was all that memorable.  I wish he had said something about the soccer landscape being so different now than in the 70s, thanks in part to Pelé's influence.  I also with he had said that David Beckham's success is not necessary to ensure the long-term success of Major League Soccer.  His success would be very nice to have, to be sure, but it would be nice to see soccer officials not be drawn into the 'One Man/One Event that will establish American soccer' mentality that the mainstream press is all to eager to portray.

In the end, it was a decent piece produced for a non-soccer audience, which is very different from that which reads this and other soccer blogs and publications.   Aside from the news of Beckham possibly becoming a part-owner in MLS, there wasn't anything in the piece that soccer fans didn't already know.  But it is a chance to see David Beckham without having to know that he's married to a Spice Girl.

UPDATE (3/25/08): I added the link from the CBS News website.

Beckham's future with England

Well I hope you had an enjoyable Thanksgiving with your family and friends (at least my American readers).

The big event in world football this week has been England's failure to qualify for Euro 2008, after being given a lifeline by Israel just days before.  You can find summaries and commentaries just about anywhere on the web, and the fallout keeps getting worse for the English national team. 

Although they will never admit to saying so, the LA Galaxy front office (and by extension, the MLS front office) have to be relieved by this news, because Beckham will no longer be out for a maximum of six weeks during the summer.  Perhaps it will inspire MLS to arrange their schedule like a proper league instead of the ridiculously skewed schedule last season. 

I know that David Beckham has said that he is not thinking about retiring and will always make himself available to the national team as long as he is playing well.  On one hand, such an attitude is admirable, but on the other it stands in the way of what England must do between now and the World Cup qualifiers, which is rebuild the side.  If I were the new England coach (God forbid, but let's assume) I'd bring back Beckham for a friendly so that he can reach 100 caps since that's so important to him.  Then I would thank him for his service to the national team and politely ask him to step aside in order to bring younger talent into the team. 

Assuming that England qualify to South Africa in 2010, if David Beckham is still their first-choice right-sided midfielder, then English football is in a much worse state than I thought.

Observations on the Austria-England friendly

So while I'm waiting for Don Garber to give his speech I'm reading the commentary of the Austria-England friendly on the BBC website.  And I came across the following featured comment:

"How bad has England football side got when they have players from MLS in their first XI?" Novelo on 606

That's funny, because MLS hasn't announced their First XI yet.

You know, if the English are going to take their swipes at MLS, it would be nice if they got their facts straight.

I don't get it

I really don't get why some people are upset that David Beckham isn't playing.  It's not like Beckham can't play because he's off to Europe to play in a Eurocup qualifier.  I could understand why people wouldn't be happy in that case.  But Beckham is hurt.  Injuries are part of the game, and part of the risk of sporting events.  Yeah, it really stinks that he picked up that injury while playing for England and aggravated it while playing for Real Madrid, but that happens.  It also stinks that folks are paying prices way above average in the hopes of seeing him play, but that is the risk associated with attending a sporting event.  The Galaxy want Beckham to play.  The League want Beckham to play.  Beckham wants Beckham to play.  But he can't.

Frustrated I can understand.  Upset, even angry - no.

UPDATE: Alexi Lalas just said words to that effect in his interview during the MLS match tonight.

Beckham has landed

David Beckham's flight should have landed by now.  If it's the British Airways flight (according to this site it is), they should be taxiing to the international terminal as I'm writing this. 

So what's the situation at LAX?  Lots of media?  Any?

An idea of what's to come

To give you all an idea of what's coming as people become drawn to the player, the icon, that guy named David Beckham, I present a brief excerpt from Paul Gardner's The Simplest Game (p. 251) about the arrival of another icon 30 years ago:

The Cosmos were still playing at the rundown Randall's Island Stadium in New York (CBS had to paint the muddy patches green), but suddenly the austere press box at Cosmos games was jammed, full of people who could not pronounce Pelé's name, and whose conversation made it painfully clear that they knew nothing of soccer.  But well-heeled people who moved with a swagger not seen before in soccer press boxes, and who made a fuss if they didn't get a good seat.

Recreating the Galaxy

It wouldn't have been difficult to improve upon the LA Galaxy crest and colors, but whoever the club hired did a good job.  It's silly to expect a club formed 12 years ago to develop a shield akin to teams that have been around for over a century, but it's good to see MLS teams move away from the horrible color combinations and edgy pseudo-futuristic logos in favor of a more mature look.  The new crest is one befitting a club that likes to think of itself as "the premier club in American soccer" (snort, chuckle).