When David Beckham woke up in his Miami Beach hotel room on Monday morning, he looked out at the sea and sky and noted their rapidly-changing hues as he got ready for the gala launch of his long-awaited Major League Soccer franchise.
The erratic weather, he decided, was the perfect metaphor for how his life has been since February 2014, when he first announced that he had set his sights on establishing an MLS club in Miami – a mission that proved more tortuous than he had ever anticipated.
“There was a little bit of sun, then there was rain, then there was just cloud, then there was sun again – and that’s how the last four years have been for us,” he told The Times.
“I’ve sometimes gone to bed with an email saying it’s happening and it’s good, then woke up to four saying it’s not,” he said.
The granting of a franchise to Beckham and his team of co-owners is the latest in a series of expansions that have grown the MLS from just 12 clubs in 2006 to the current 25. Whereas the 24th - Nashville - paid an entry fee of $150 million, Beckham had an option included in his contract as a player with the Los Angeles Galaxy from 2007 to 2012 to pick one up for a knockdown $25 million.
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The MLS embraced his selection of Miami, a melting pot of Latin American culture in which fútbol has the potential to thrive, but not his lack of local investors with the sufficient financial, political and community clout necessary to lend stability. Negotiations for a stadium site had also faced a litany of twists and turns and the MLS board of governors had dug in their heels: no locals, no deal.
On a gloomy day in early December 2017, Beckham picked up the telephone to Marcelo Claure, Kansas-based chief executive of Sprint and a co-sponsor of his MLS bid, to break things off. They fixed a meeting to say their goodbyes and sever business ties.
“I said ‘I’m coming to New York, I just can’t see any way through now, we’ve tried everything, spent a lot of money, spent a lot of time over the last four years and we’ve exhausted it. We can’t go any further because we’re not getting any closer,’” the former England captain revealed.
“We both sat there depressed, like young kids, discussing what’s going to happen next,” he says, shaking his head at a memory that he admits pains him. “Then we looked at each other and said ‘You know what? Let’s have one more try.’”
A flurry of activity followed. In the offices of Jorge and Jose Mas – businessmen whose bid for the Miami Marlins baseball team had just fallen through – telephones started ringing. Claure was convinced that their support could swing things.
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At a late night meeting at a New Jersey airport restaurant, as waiting staff hovered waiting to close up, Don Garber - commissioner of the MLS – convinced the Mas brothers to get on board.
“I say there’s a reason why it’s taken four years – and they are the reason,” said Beckham, 42.
In three weeks, the public will be invited to help name the team and choose its colours through a social media “global engagement” exercise. Beckham’s group has also scouted sites for a football academy to nurture local young talent, which they aim to finalise within three months.
Without Beckham, Jorge Mas said that he and his brother would not have contemplated signing up.
“He brings elements that work perfectly into our ownership team. The MLS image as some second-tier league, that’s not good - I want to be part of a new wave of owners who push for this to come to an elite tier. And that’s David,” he said.
