Saturday, 25 May 2013

Beckham's MLS plans put on hold by Manchester City

The former England international had been looking for a venture in the United States, according to commissioner Don Garber, but will now take a step back to consider his options


David Beckham's plans to buy an MLS franchise have been put on hold after Manchester Cityannounced a partnership with the New York Yankees to form New York City FC.

The Paris Saint-Germain midfielder is set to retire from football at the end of the season but retains an option to buy a new franchise in United States.However, MLS commissioner Don Garber has revealed that Beckham's plans have stalled following City's recent announcement.

"We've got some work to do on our next couple of teams," Garber told reporters. "We're pretty focused on taking a deep breath after this [New York] announcement and have got to figure out how to manage David's interests and figure out what kind of expansion would still make sense for us.

"We still don't have teams to the south of Washington DC and that represents 70 to 80 million people, which is bigger than the population of United Kingdom, but we have got to figure that out and we have got to do it at the right time, with the right facility plan.

"David has spent some time looking in Miami and we have been looking at the market there as well but Miami is proving to be a difficult sports market in America in itself.

"It's got a unique community, fabulous diversity which are all things I think are very positive for our sport but there are clearly weather issues there.

"We are a spring/summer sport and it gets pretty hot in Miami. We haven't been able to make any progress on a stadium and facility plan, so we have got to spend some time on that."

Although Beckham may not be set for an imminent return to MLS, Garber was quick to praise the former England international for the impact that he has made on the sport in America.

"David was great for us," he added. "Everything we asked David to do off the field, he did. He flew back from the opening ceremonies of the Olympics and came to play that morning in our All Star game against Chelsea, which we won.

"David sort of transcends sport in so many ways and now he wants to transcend his playing career into a business career.

"David really believed in MLS, he elevated the appeal and popularity of our sport. He took it off the sports pages and pushed it into the popular-culture scene and around the world and this new relationship [with Manchester City] will help to do the same thing."

No comments:

Post a Comment