SPORTS
Midfielder plays his final game for LA Galaxy and is craving a return to the Champions League.
David Beckham is feeling the pangs of past hungers. In trademark beard and beanie, the most famous footballer on the planet is enthusing about a return to football's most testing stage. If he wants to prove, at 37, that he has one more challenge left in him, then why not go for the toughest on offer: the Champions League.
"I always loved it when I went back to AC Milan being back in the Champions League," he says. "I still miss playing in it, they are the games you love playing in. So of course I'd want to play in it again. We'll see where I go next. If it's a team that's in the Champions League then it will be nice to be back."
Beckham is chatting backstage after delivering a smooth performance in his last press conference as an LA Galaxy player. After today's MLS Cup final against Houston Dynamo, he will make the final transfer of his playing career. The way he is talking, it sounds like he wants to go from the Home Depot Center back to the grand old stadiums of Europe. Surely seeing his old colleagues Paul Scholes and Ryan Giggs still mixing it with the European elite encourages his ambition?
"Yeah of course," he says. "It's nice to see them still playing at Manchester United. They have had successful careers there and to see them playing like they do is great. I'm 37 years old, the same age as Scholesy, although Giggsy is even older. Me and Scholesy grew up together and played with Giggsy and it is great to see them still playing."
Beckham's most likely route back into Europe's elite competition would be with Paris St-Germain but it would be a real challenge to secure regular first-team football in Carlo Ancelotti's talent-saturated squad. The wealthy Russian clubs would offer him another route, but Beckham has expressed a wish to be close to England so his children can see more of their grandparents. Perhaps an ambitious club such as Monaco, currently in the second tier of French football, can persuade him that qualifying for the Champions League is as exciting a challenge as playing in it. Beckham certainly is not thinking of an imminent retirement, so is willing to hear out plans beyond the next year.
"I plan to keep playing as long as I can because I know when Scholesy stepped away he came back and regretted stopping. I want to continue to play as long as my legs will take me. You know when it's time and obviously Scholesy realised it wasn't his time at that moment. And I'm the same.
"This next move will be a move that is about the football. That has never been any different for me. People say some of the moves have been about money but my career has never been about money."
One dimension of his post-playing career is already taking shape. Tonight will not be Beckham's last involvement in the MLS. His contract allows him to purchase an expansion team (that is, a new franchise joining the MLS) but there has also been talk of him becoming part of the LA Galaxy ownership structure. "I'd like to be an owner because I don't want to be a manager," he says.
He would also welcome a future role as an ambassador for Manchester United. "Manchester United was a big part - and the most successful part - of my career so to be part of Manchester United going forward I'm sure that will happen in some way. I'm not surprised to see them still top of the league after all these years."
Even though Chelsea and Manchester City have outspent United in the transfer market? "I've always said that money is OK sometimes but it doesn't last forever. I think Manchester United are a club about history. Other clubs might have the money and might be able to pay players more but when Manchester United come calling it's impossible to turn them down.
Beckham has always said it would be difficult to play in England for a club other than United but he would not hesitate to return to his home country if the national side came calling. Having last been capped in 2009, he knows it is highly unlikely but the hope has not been extinguished.
"Someone asked me if I was going to play in England or for a European team, does this give me hopes of playing for England again? I said, 'woah, I hadn't really thought of it'. Actually I had thought of it and it's one of the reasons why I've never retired from England. It's not like I think I will play for England again but I would never ever turn any chance down to play for my country. But do I think it will happen again? No."
International football, Champions League football: Beckham is clearly enthusiastic about pushing the boundaries of what is possible in the late autumn of his career. He will want to close his American period with a second MLS title tonight. After that we will see the true size of his appetite.
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