It’s been a long time coming…or so it seemed to those agonizing over David Beckham’s injury-plagued debut stanza in late 2007 with the Los Angeles Galaxy. He was only able to join the team after the expiration of his contract with Real Madrid at the end of their own season - where they won the season’s league title by the slimmest of margins over FC Barcelona.
Upon arrival in LA, he was recovering from injuries which he had sustained in Real’s campaign as well as with ENGLAND; his fitness level was greatly compromised. His GALAXY debut came in a friendly versus CHELSEA, but he played only a few minutes and was nearly injured further in a tackle challenging for the ball.
In August, Beckham scored a goal for Galaxy at the Home Depot Center, in the semifinal of the Superliga North America tournament. That was to be the only goal he would score during the season, because then - early in the Superliga Final, a 50/50 ball challenge got him a new injury which had him sidelined for all of September and into October, the final month of the MLS season.
Beckham did play a handful of matches at the very end of the season, and then proved his fitness in the ensuing offseason. At the end of the year, the team took on clubs from Canada, New Zealand, and Australia, and then in the 2008 preseason, they played in the Panpacific Championship tournament in Hawa’i and took a 3-match tour of Asia. He scored goals and assists in several of these matches; however, none of them counted toward his official MLS league tally…
..none of them, that is, until they met the San Jose Earthquakes at the Home Depot Center. This was not only the season-opener for the 2008 expansion team, but also the home opener for the Galaxy, with many luminaries and press there to bear witness.
The hoopla - which also included a marquee primetime telecast as part of a doubleheader on ESPN’s networks - made it all the more exciting for fans anxious for some positive result from the team. The Galaxy had just fallen to the Rapids 0-4 in their season-opener, and everyone was hoping that there would be no more of that - not at the H-D-C.
When Beckham opened the scoring with a goal in the 9th minute, it was his first official league goal, as well as being the first goal of the year for the team. Ah…sweet relief !
He made this goal off of an assist from Landon Donovan, who then made a goal later in the first half -that from a Beckham assist ! With a goal and assist credited to each, the Galaxy came away with a 2-0 win, and - more importantly - this initiated great fan rejoicing !
Beckham fans - and especially all Galaxy fans, so patient in their recent suffering - will mark this moment in time and remember where they were when it happened…
