Beckham return now a question of how long he will play, not whether

May 26, 2007

Oliver Kay

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/football/euro_2008/article1843071.ece

As he settled into his seat in the directors’ box at Turf Moor moments before kick-off last night, Steve McClaren was said to be “all but certain” that he would recall David Beckham to the England squad. By the time Aaron Lennon limped out of the B international against Albania barely ten minutes later, any lingering doubts might just have been removed from the head coach’s mind.

All week the stage has appeared to be set for Beckham to make a dramatic return to the England team against Brazil on Friday, in the first senior international to be played at the new Wembley. Barring any last-minute change of mind on McClaren’s part – and he should not ignore the claims of David Bentley, who impressed on the right wing last night – the former captain’s recall to the squad should be confirmed this lunchtime at a press conference in Yarm, a couple of miles from the head coach’s home in the North East.

McClaren continued to be evasive on the matter last night, saying that he was “not even going to discuss that” and that all would become clear at noon today. He said that “all the squad was decided before the game” against Albania and that all that remained was to assess Lennon’s injured knee, with the likelihood that the Tottenham Hotspur player will be named in the squad, but that at least two other players will be added to a larger than usual squad.

Bentley could possibly be one of the additional call-ups, having shown a nice touch, plenty of sharpness and a Beckhamesque delivery from the right wing that earned praise from McClaren for his “arrogance and assurance” in the face of light-hearted abuse from the Burnley public, who eventually showed their appreciation by offering a rare ovation to a player from Blackburn Rovers. But it is likely to be another player with the initials DB who wears the England No 7 shirt at Wembley on Friday.

In the past 48 hours, the question has ceased to be whether Beckham will be recalled to the squad, but how he will be incorporated into the team – and for how long. Given that the 32-year-old will soon be leaving Real Madrid for the relative backwater of Major League Soccer, McClaren’s decision has appeared to smack of short-termism, revolving around the friendly against Brazil and the Euro 2008 qualifying match against Estonia in Tallinn five days later, but the head coach is said to be approaching the matter with such an open mind that he will continue to monitor the player’s form for the Galaxy if all goes well next week.

As for how it will affect the team, the only immediate answer is that McClaren would not bring back Beckham and the accompanying baggage simply to add to his options on the substitutes’ bench, given that one of his reasons for exiling him in the first place was a concern about how he would adapt to a drop in status having given up the captaincy and presumably lost his place in the starting lineup.

The likelihood is that Beckham will start at least one of the two forthcoming matches on the right-hand side of midfield, a prospect that will leave others, most notably Frank Lampard, fretting over the potential knock-on effects.

It is all a far cry from last August, when Beckham’s exclusion was almost McClaren's first act upon succeeding Sven-Göran Eriksson as head coach. His belief was that England needed more pace and penetration and that there was little scope for retaining the former captain as a mere squad player, but McClaren pointed out on Thursday that he “never closed the door” on a recall, a message he will reinforce at today’s press conference. It merely needed a dramatic improvement in Beckham's form for Real to catapult him into the head coach’s plans for the next two matches.

Fabio Capello, the Real coach, weighed in yesterday to say he could see no reason why Beckham, in action for his club against Deportivo La Coruña tonight, should remain in exile. That is easy for Capello to say now, less so when he briefly excluded the player in January over his decision to announce his move to Los Angeles. How times change, particularly in the extraordinary life of David Beckham.