Beckham (42 page)

I tried to keep that smile on my face too. Or, at least, keep a frown off it. I knew the cameras would be cutting away to the bench. I knew how much fuss had been made in the media about me being left out. The evening was supposed to be about the game, though. Not about a player falling out with his boss. I didn't want to take the focus away from the players out there. If there was anything to be said, I could say it if I got on. Meantime, it was all about not letting on how sick I was feeling. I wonder if any other game, against any other team, could have made me forget, even for a minute, where I was and what had happened that day. Real Madrid were 3–1 up, in a position they didn't need to take any risks. But they just came at us the same way they had at the Bernabeu, pinging passes about, looking like they were going to score every time they attacked. I was swept away in it along with 67,000 others.

Ronaldo destroyed us. Raul was out with appendicitis, so the big man was on his own up front and Madrid played an extra midfielder, Steve McManaman. Steve and Zidane, Figo and Guti along with Roberto Carlos were free to get up and support Ronaldo whenever they wanted.

As if any of them needed an invitation. As if Ronaldo needed any help. He scored a fantastic hat-trick in the hour he played. I got the call to go on a couple of minutes after Ronaldo's third goal. I was desperate to be out there. Not to make my point now, just to be involved in an amazing game of soccer: we were 3–2 down on the night, 6–3 down on aggregate, half an hour still to play. The atmosphere when Seba Veron came off and I went on was a bit eerie. He'd played well and deserved the applause. What was weird was that, when I stepped up the slope to the touchline to replace him, it sounded as if the cheer I'd usually get stuck in some people's throats. I could understand the United fans not knowing where they stood with me right at that moment.

‘Whose side are you on? Whose side are we on?'

It was uncomfortable. But the uncertainty in the crowd just made me all the more determined to make a mark in the time we had left. A minute or two after I got on, Ronaldo was subbed. He'd had a great game. Everybody inside Old Trafford knew it. The whole crowd got to their feet and gave the bloke the kind of ovation a United player would have got. Never mind we looked like we were being knocked out of the Champions League. The Manchester crowd knows its soccer and they knew they'd been privileged to be there, watching Ronaldo play. I've got my own reasons for having great memories about United's supporters: they always stood by me when I needed them. But I felt really proud of them in a different way that night, watching their reaction as Ronaldo walked off, hands above his head, clapping back.

If I enjoyed Ronaldo's moment, I enjoyed my own even more. We got a free-kick on the edge of the Real penalty area. If I'd been picking and choosing, I might have wanted to be a yard or two further out. The closer you are to goal, the quicker you need to get the ball up and then down again to beat both the wall and the keeper. I'd practiced it tens of thousands of times on my own, on a training field after everyone else had gone home. Teaching my foot, my leg, the rest of my body how it felt when I got it right. And learning how to make it right more and
more often. So that now, head swirling, gasping for breath, the future bearing down on me like a dead weight, I could switch distraction off like a light. It's the ball in front of you. The glimpse of white goalpost you can see beyond the wall of defenders. It's the spot on your boot and the angle at which that meets the ball. Step up. Strike. All the practice leaves you knowing, instinctively, when one's on its way, barring a save. I was up in the air before the ball had even settled in the net behind Casillas. It'd flown in. Nothing to do with the circumstances. I was celebrating what I'll remember as my best free-kick ever in a Manchester United shirt.

At 3–3 in the game, I was buzzing. I felt like I'd been plugged into something. Still two-down on aggregate but there was more in us, I was sure. But then, all of a sudden, Madrid players were coming up to me and having a chat, while this incredible match was crackling on around us. First, Guti ran alongside me and asked me if we could swap shirts at full-time. Then, Roberto Carlos was grinning at me again:

‘Are you coming to play for us?'

Ten minutes left and it was Zidane's turn.

‘David? Your shirt?'

I was chasing around, still trying to make things happen. Those players weren't trying to psyche me. They were just stone cold sure they could beat us all night long. Why not sort out the formalities now? Maybe they were right to be so relaxed. Maybe they did always have enough that, however close we got to them, they'd just find another gear. Five minutes from time, though, Ruud made a great run into the box. His shot came backoff the keeper and I stretched out at the far post and toed it over the line as me and Ivan Helguera fell down in a heap together. I could glimpse supporters' faces in the crowd behind the goal in the Stretford End. Not just celebrating, but their eyes widening:

‘What's going on here?'

Because of their away goals—Ronaldo's goals—we still needed another two to advance. But there was enough time to get them. The
Real coach, Vicente del Bosque, brought on an extra defender: for the first time in three hours, Real were going to try and hold on to what they had. I got one cross in that Ole, who'd played really well, couldn't get proper contact on. It was the kind of chance that, five minutes into a game, he'd have scored from. And then we got another free-kick, on the edge of their box. It was almost dead center and, this time, my shot went over the bar. There went my match ball.

We'd won the game, but lost on aggregate. I couldn't help it. Of course I was disappointed we were out of the Champions League. As we shook hands with the Real players, there was a moment or two of: if only. And then, elation washed over me. I felt more fulfilled by the 30 minutes of soccer I'd just played than I had by any game all season. The crowd, when I'd come on as a sub, had seemed a little subdued. The reception I got after the final whistle was better than any I could remember at Old Trafford. I'm always the last player off the field anyway and after the Real game I wanted to hang around and soak it up. I certainly wasn't saying goodbye to Old Trafford that night. The opposite: I thought I'd done all I could to put doubts about my commitment and worth to the club behind me. During the ninety minutes, it had been all about the team. Now, though, I let my feelings show and went to the four corners of the stadium to return the applause.

By the time I got back to the dressing room, I had Guti and Zidane's shirts under my arm. And a warm glow inside. I remember the manager saying to me quietly:

‘You played well, David.'

I wondered if he thought then that he'd made a mistake about me and about the team that night. It wasn't the time, or the place, to ask.

‘Yeah. Thanks, boss.'

I'd never changed and gotten out of Old Trafford so quickly. Half an hour after the game, I was at the Malmaison Hotel in Manchester to meet Tony and Ellen Healy, Pepsi's Marketing Director, for dinner. They must have thought I was on something: I was that high. I hadn't felt so clear
about things, happy in myself, for what seemed like months. I wanted to talk about the game. About my goals. About the crowd. About Ronaldo and the rest of them. I had a grin on my face all evening. I kept phoning Victoria who was away working in the States. I told her everything that had happened the first time I called. But I kept phoning back to say it again. I missed her being there. I went on from the Malmaison to the Lowry to have a drink with Dave Gardner. The two of us went over the whole night again. We had to. The weirdest thing, though, happened just as I was getting ready to leave. I half thought I was being set up. This Spanish guy, a Real supporter, came over. He didn't speak much English. There was quite a lot of thumbs up and ‘good game' going on. He motioned to me: an autograph. On his shirt. He turned round for me to sign. He was wearing the number. 7, Raul's shirt.

When I got back to the house in Alderley Edge, everything was quiet. Mum had got the boys off to bed for me. I poked my head in their room but decided not to wake them up and tell them about Daddy's great night. I was still hyped up: sleeping would have been out of the question. I made myself a bowl of noodles and a pint of iced water. I put the television on: Manchester United vs Real Madrid. I hadn't taped it. When I'd left home eight hours earlier I'd had other things on my mind. This was a second broadcast of the whole game. I slurped my noodles and settled into it. The hat-trick. The free-kick and scrambling my second goal. The free-kick I'd missed: I was annoyed with myself, watching it. But then the camera cut away to the manager's reaction and my blood ran cold. He was craning his neck, watching. He turned away as the ball went over the bar. Then, when he looked back, his face just told me everything I needed to know. His rage, his frustration: and it was all Beckham's fault. He reacted as if I'd just lost us the game. As if, in that moment, I'd just got us knocked out of the Champions League. Maybe anybody watching the television would have seen the same. Maybe you needed to have lived through the past six months to really understand what was obvious to me:

‘It's over. He wants me out.'

Something sank in as I sat there with the last few minutes of the game flickering past on the screen. The manager had had enough. I'd grown up as a person and he didn't seem to like what I'd become. I already knew that, deep down. Now it looked like he'd seen enough of me as a player, as well. As a player wearing a United shirt, anyway. His face in the seconds after I'd missed that second free-kick made me feel like a door had just been slammed in mine. I'd been flying all evening. I genuinely believed what I'd done during the game would force a way back in for me. No chance. If it was anything to do with the boss—and, of course, it would be—I was sure I was finished.

There were three League games before the end of the season: three games to win to make sure United took back the title. I played every minute of those three games: away to Spurs, at home to Charlton and away to Everton. The rumors that had me going to the Bernabeu kept circulating. The manager had said he'd thought they'd disappear once the quarter-final was out of the way. They didn't. It seems with some stories, once they get a head of steam on, they have a life of their own. We won 2–0 at Tottenham and, between then and the next match, there were quotes from Spanish newspapers saying Real weren't going to buy me.

‘Never. Never. Never.'

The next day, everybody was saying that ‘No' obviously meant ‘Yes'. Hadn't Real said they weren't going to buy Ronaldo a year ago, too? I won't pretend that the attention that I was supposed to be getting from Real, and from other clubs, didn't make me feel better about myself. Reading that they might want me was reassuring at a time when it seemed like United didn't. But the speculation was getting in the way. I wanted to get on with playing. I'm sure the manager wasn't happy about the distraction, either. Maybe that's why it felt as if I was involved in my own private Arctic. The mood—for me, at least—before the Charlton game was intense in all the wrong ways.

I scored the first goal in a game we had to win to keep ahead of Arsenal. The shot took a deflection, going in at a strange angle. My reaction wasn't the obvious one, either. Rattling around in my head had been the question: was this my last game at Old Trafford for United? A lot of other people had been asking the same that week. As I wheeled away towards the supporters, the instinctive joy that comes with a goal collided with the thought that I might never be doing this again. The celebration stuttered. I was happy to score but choking back tears at the same time. We beat Charlton 4–1. It turned out to be enough to win us the League, although we didn't know that until the following day when Arsenal lost to Leeds.

Meanwhile, we celebrated another win with the United supporters: if this was going to be a farewell to Old Trafford, I was happy there'd been a goal for them to remember me by. I found myself standing next to Gary and feeling very sad as I looked around the place I'd got used to calling home. He leaned over. He asked me what was wrong. I told him:

‘They're having talks with other clubs.'

Gary just didn't want to think it was true. I know we're best mates. I also know how much he loves Manchester United. He wouldn't ever have wanted me and the club not to be together. After I'd changed and had something to drink in the lounge, I took Brooklyn out on the field for a kickabout. Old Trafford was empty, sunshine still creeping over the roof of the stand. If I was going to go to pieces, that would have been the moment: the place looked beautiful, still echoing with the voices of the 60,000 fans who'd been jammed in there an hour earlier. Brooklyn just wanted to play, though. He didn't want his dad getting emotional on him with an open goal waiting. It was a bittersweet afternoon. I'm glad I finished it in the company of my boy. I was starting to feel resigned to my fate.

And then, one last time, it all changed again. Was it just the relief of winning the title? Did we all relax, including the boss? For a week, never
mind the gossip in the papers, all seemed well in the world. During training, I felt like I was welcome, like I belonged, for the first time in months, the boss laughing and joking with me in the way he had for most of the last ten years. The game at Everton was a trip down the East Lancs Road to pickup the silverware. We were already champions before we kicked off on the last day of the season. The atmosphere in our dressing room during those few weeks had been as strong as I could remember at any time during my United career. I loved it now, feeling back in the thick of things with the lads. For a few days, anyway, those moments in front of the television watching the manager seemed not to matter. I couldn't really believe I'd ever have to walkaway from this group of players, this marvelous soccer club. I enjoyed the celebrations after beating Everton 2–1 as much as anybody. I'd even scored the first goal. Because we'd had to come from so far behind to beat Arsenal, this Premiership trophy was one we'd really had to work hard together to earn. We hadn't lost a League game since the turn of the year. On the field at the final whistle, as we paraded the trophy, and in the dressing room afterwards, I felt part of it all again. If you'd asked me that afternoon if I was leaving United, I'd have told you: