Was David Beckham Really A Great Footballer?
The David Beckham documentary on Netflix reignited interest in the former England captain. But after a career at Manchester United and Real Madrid, in which he won almost every major club honour he could win, the question still remains about whether or not he deserves to be remembered amongst football's greatest players. FourFourTwo's Adam Clery takes a look at the player he was... and the player he could have been.
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00:00Right, so first and foremost, if you just have never seen David Beckham play because
00:05maybe you weren't old enough or maybe you're not even into football, you just watched the
00:08documentary and this came on your recommended feed and you thought, oh, I'll give it a watch.
00:11This is how David Beckham played football.
00:13So he first breaks through at Manchester United on the right-hand side of midfield as part
00:17of that famous golden generation of players, that class of 92.
00:22And Alex Ferguson very, very quickly replaces all the old heads in the team, all the experienced
00:27players with this crop of young talent.
00:30They then, as I presume most of you know, go on the most astonishing run of domestic
00:34and finally European success.
00:36And what David Beckham would do is he would stick to the right-hand side of midfield in
00:40this sort of area and use his frankly astonishing crossing ability to find a Manchester United
00:45strikers in the penalty area.
00:47Now, interestingly, the role of a winger back then was to run really fast with the ball.
00:52Their job was to carry the ball down the flank to cross the ball from these sort of areas.
00:56But David Beckham, he didn't really have that skill set.
00:59He wasn't blessed with pace.
01:01It was a major criticism of him at the time.
01:03So he wouldn't do that.
01:04Instead, he would float around this much deeper area and cross the ball with tremendous whip
01:11from here.
01:12And because he was so abnormally skilled at curling the ball, it meant that by the time
01:16it did reach the attackers in the box, it was traveling as if it had come from this
01:21sort of area.
01:22And also something that really helped him was he had a near telepathic understanding
01:26with his fullback, Gary Neville, who would make these overlapping runs for him to either
01:30get into the space to deliver that kind of cross, or because he's made that run to take
01:35a defender away from this area to give him the space to do that.
01:39He played just shy of like 400 games for Manchester United, I think.
01:43And this unbelievable crossing ability he had, combined with the fact that he then took
01:47all the corners and the free kicks so we could do the same thing from there, gave him something
01:51like 120 assists in that time.
01:54You add those 120 assists to the 85 goals he scored, and over those 400 appearances,
02:00he was contributing a goal to this team every game and a half.
02:04And that is really good.
02:05That alone puts him in the very, very top bracket of footballers.
02:09And the same was true for his time playing for England as well.
02:11He was in largely a similar sort of setup with quite a few similar sort of players,
02:15including, of course, Gary Neville, who would make those same overlapping runs for him to
02:19help create a bit of space for him to do his crossing from this area of the pitch.
02:23He still never looked to beat players and get down the line.
02:26Not that he needed to, of course.
02:28115 appearances, which puts him third, I think, in the all-time ranking, as well as 17 goals
02:33and 42 assists.
02:34That's a goal contribution just under every two games.
02:38Again, that's brilliant.
02:40But then, as you no doubt saw in the documentary, went to Madrid, didn't he?
02:43And the thing is, this was the early 2000s, not like it is now, where every time David
02:48Beckham did something brilliant on the continent, you saw a clip of it all over social media.
02:52Immediately, it kind of dropped off most people's radar.
02:56The only time you could watch David Beckham play for Madrid was if you had Sky Sports
03:01and you could be bothered to stay up to like 8pm on a Sunday to watch him put crosses in
03:05against Osasuna.
03:06And I will circle back to this at the end of the video, but it's worth pointing out
03:09that if somebody is one of the biggest celebrities on the planet off the field, and then they
03:13go to a place in the world where you no longer can see him on the field, that kind of becomes
03:18all anybody really knows in England.
03:21But while he was in Spain, his game evolved massively.
03:24Now, as they mentioned in the documentary, Beckham was never going to play on the right-hand
03:28side of midfield for Madrid because they already had Luis Figo, who was good enough that he
03:32was not going to get replaced in that position.
03:35And while in the documentary they mentioned that Beckham was playing behind Figo, he was
03:39doing so from central midfield.
03:42They moved him over here into the middle of the pitch to accommodate all the big stars
03:47they had in that team.
03:50If you're not actually into football, and you have just clicked on this video because
03:53you liked the documentary, you like David Beckham or something, and you don't know what
03:58this team is, Jesus suffering f**k.
04:03Like this is the most unbelievable collection of footballers you could ever hope to put
04:08on a pitch.
04:09They never won anything together because that's not how football works, but on paper, this
04:14is just mind-boggling.
04:15Imagine they announce a new boy band tomorrow and it's Harry Styles, Drake, Timothee Chalamet,
04:23the guy from The Bear, and David Beckham.
04:25It'd be a complete f**king mess, wouldn't it?
04:27But you'd want to watch it.
04:28Anyway though, football, David Beckham's move to the middle meant that his game changed.
04:32It meant he started doing things differently.
04:34Figo was very happy to vacate this space.
04:36He wasn't exactly hugging the touchline, so that meant that when he did, Beckham could
04:39then drift out into this side and play those kind of deep crosses he had been playing at
04:44Manchester United.
04:45So he could still get a bit of his game in there.
04:46But when he wasn't able to do that, it meant that he was having to play these passes from
04:50a far more central position, often from a far deeper position than he was ever used
04:55to doing it.
04:56And all of a sudden, he started developing this almost Andrea Pirlo-like ability to sit
05:00deep and find players either out on the flanks, into the space, or to hit the target players
05:05directly with over-the-top or direct-through balls.
05:08Now he was really, really good at that aspect of the game, but because he'd never really
05:11played centrally before this, and he was largely partnered by Guti in the middle, it
05:15meant that this was a very soft area for Real Madrid.
05:19It meant they struggled to really control games.
05:22And I'm not lumping the blame for this at Beckham's feet.
05:24The problem was the team as a whole, but the reason this never succeeded was because it
05:28lacked a lot of the steel and the guile required to go on and win titles.
05:33Having Beckham and Guti and occasionally Cambiasso or one or two others in the middle just didn't
05:37have that requisite toughness.
05:40But the other side of his game, actually playing there, getting the ball and doing things with it,
05:44Beckham was a complete revelation.
05:46It looked like he should have been playing in that role his entire career.
05:50And the thing is, he was so good at doing it that as this project collapsed around Real
05:54Madrid and they realised, oh yeah, you actually need to build a cohesive team, not just go
05:58out and buy the best 11 players you can.
06:00He was the only Galactico, the only big, big star of this crop that remained in the side.
06:06By the time they did bother getting around to win the league in Beckham's last season,
06:09he was now playing in this kind of 4-3-3 set up on the right hand side of a midfield three.
06:14So he was free to drift out into these areas to get on the right hand side where he liked
06:18to do things.
06:19But primarily he was a central midfielder.
06:22And of course, after that, he went to America and then he went to Italy and then he went
06:25to France and all sorts.
06:27But it was during this point of his career, from his breakthrough at Man United to the
06:30end of his time at Madrid, that he was considered one of the best players in the world.
06:36So was he?
06:38Well, in short, I have watched a lot of match footage.
06:41I have read stuff that was written about him at the time.
06:43I've read stuff that's been written about him since.
06:44I've done, honestly, I promise you, about three days worth of research into this video.
06:49And my opinion is thus, if anything, David Beckham is probably grossly underrated, especially
06:57in England.
06:58Look, his dead balls, his free kicks, his corners, like all of that stuff.
07:01You don't need to discuss those.
07:02He was the best in the world at doing it at the time, and he still remains now one of
07:06the best who has ever done it.
07:08Like the curl, the whip, the spin he was able to put on a football.
07:12It's called bend it like Beckham for a reason.
07:16He was able to do it in open play, he was able to do it from a dead ball, he was able
07:19to do it when he was running at pace.
07:21You cannot take the stance that he wasn't brilliant at delivering a football.
07:25But to say that's all he did, to say that was the only tool he had in his box, oy oy,
07:31is just so, so wrong.
07:35For a start, he was an athlete so far beyond the standards of the time that were you to
07:40just transplant him into today's football, he would still be one of, if not the, most
07:46athletic players in it.
07:48And if you don't think that's an absolutely staggering factor, by the way, here's a graph
07:51that exists on the internet that you can go and look at, co-produced by the University
07:55of Stafford and Sunderland, that shows how the Premier League has changed in terms of
08:00its physical requirements over, this is about a six year period.
08:04In terms of the distance the players cover, how often they sprint, how intense their sprints
08:09are, how far their sprints are, every single year it gets harder and harder and harder
08:14to be an athlete in that sport.
08:17And this is 2006 to about 2013, right, to extrapolate that line back to the 90s where
08:21Beckham was playing and extrapolate it forward to where we are now, the disparity will be
08:26absolutely enormous.
08:27And yet, and this is the best stat I've ever done in a 4-4-2 video, by the way, two seasons
08:31ago, because the last time they published this number, the player in the Premier League
08:35who covered the most distance in one individual game was Leandro Dendonga.
08:41He ran 13.2 kilometres playing for Wolves.
08:45And yet in 2001, so 22 years ago, David Beckham's average distance covered in a Premier League
08:52game across the entire season was 14.1 kilometres.
08:58If you were to somehow pluck David Beckham out of that era and put him in today's Premier
09:03League, the average distance he would run, not the top, not the max, the average distance
09:09he would run would be the most anyone had run in the Premier League that entire season.
09:15He would do that every single week.
09:18In that infamous performance against Greece, you know, he scores the free kick right at
09:21the end and he basically decided he had to play Greece on his own.
09:25He ran 16.1 kilometres.
09:29You see, pretty much anywhere in Europe, bar Great Britain, right, if a player like David
09:34Beckham had emerged with his athleticism and his commitment and his range of passing ability,
09:39he would have been immediately played in central midfield.
09:43But the English game in the 90s, and this isn't a criticism, by the way, football is
09:47just different wherever you go and whenever you go there, meant that he wasn't really
09:50the kind of template you want for a central midfielder.
09:54He wasn't robust enough, he wasn't tough enough in the tackle, he didn't really drive with
09:57the ball well enough.
09:58So instead, he gets played out on the right-hand side, where on the one hand, he can still
10:02use his delivery to feed the two centre-forwards, he can contribute in that way, and other teams
10:06can't target his sort of perceived physical weaknesses, but he also can't really control
10:12games of football.
10:13He can't dictate the tempo, he can't be the pace setter, he can't be seen to have a great
10:18footballing brain.
10:19Like, I might catch hell for this, but in terms of what they can physically do and how
10:23they like to do it, there's very little difference between Andrea Pirlo and David Beckham.
10:27If anything, Beckham's got way better athleticism than he did, but Beckham never played in the
10:32central midfield, he never started as a 10 and worked his way back.
10:35There are very few games where you can see David Beckham controlling everything, where
10:40it all goes through him and he's spraying passes around, you never saw it.
10:44Except... you did.
10:46In the Champions League final, Roy Keane was suspended and unsure what to do, Alex
10:50Ferguson decided to put David Beckham in central midfield, move Ryan Giggs to the right and
10:54play Jesper Blomqvist, I think that's how you say it, over on the left.
10:57And that game is available in its 90 plus 3 minute entirety, and honestly, go and watch
11:03it and just watch David Beckham.
11:05He's playing in central midfield, he floats around deep in front of the back four, he
11:09receives the ball, Bayern are trying to man-mark him, but his knowledge of space and his ability
11:13to find it is really, really good and he keeps getting on the ball and playing some
11:17of the best passes you have ever seen.
11:20That game is pretty much David Beckham being Andrea Pielo before anybody really knew what
11:24being Andrea Pielo meant.
11:26And that's without even factoring in that both of Manchester United's goals came from
11:31David Beckham corners.
11:32And of course then, when he moved to Spain, it was pretty obvious that's where he should
11:36play, so Madrid had no problem sticking him in central midfield, and even when Figo left,
11:39they didn't move him back out to the right, he stayed there.
11:42There's a great highlights package that for some reason someone has put on YouTube of
11:45David Beckham playing as a central midfielder in one game.
11:48And you can see in it that as he's had more time to learn the role, he isn't just spraying
11:51out these great passes everywhere, finding the flanks, finding the centre forwards, but
11:55he's also becoming more dogged and determined in the central midfield as the recovery runs
11:59are better.
12:00You can see he's learning all the other sides of the game that stopped him getting put there
12:04in the first place.
12:05So come on then, Adam, if you're so clever and David Beckham was supposedly this absolutely
12:09brilliant player who was slightly misunderstood in his own country but was seen as a brilliant
12:13sort of central midfielder on the continent, why?
12:16Why then?
12:17Why isn't he so highly rated?
12:18Well, like I said at the start, it was the early 2000s.
12:23What Manchester United loved to do with David Beckham on this side was effectively have
12:27him get the ball anywhere in the pitch and try and hit the two forwards, and even if
12:30that didn't work, you had players like Roy Keane and Nicky Bott and Ryan Giggs and whoever
12:34else, they would effectively crash that situation if it was cleared, getting a rebound.
12:39Man United loved to have Beckham just stick it in the mixer.
12:42At fair play, it was a really, really effective strategy, so they did it a lot.
12:46They would constantly win the ball back and immediately recirculated to Beckham, who would
12:50do the same thing over and over and over.
12:52So all football fans in England ever really saw him do was A, score eye-catching free
12:57kicks and take eye-catching set pieces, and B, do the same thing, delivering the ball
13:02from the right-hand side over and over and over.
13:05He looked like a one-trick pony because he was, but he looked so damn good being a one-trick
13:11pony, and several of those one-trick pony moments became so iconic within the sport
13:15that he became this global celebrity.
13:17He became Brand Beckham.
13:18He married a Spice Girl.
13:20He outgrew the sport itself.
13:21So then when he moved to Spain and he had this footballing rebirth as a central midfielder
13:26who can control the game, who can show how good a footballing brain he's got, nobody
13:31can see that because it's not on telly anymore.
13:34You're not going to a game once a season to see Man United play and watching Beckham in
13:38the flesh.
13:39You only see him when he's playing for England, where lo and behold, he's still on the right-hand
13:43side putting those balls in, being a one-trick pony.
13:46And of course, because he had outgrown football itself, you still hear about him.
13:49He's still in the news.
13:50He's still on all the papers.
13:52He doesn't go away.
13:53He just exists to you purely as a celebrity, as the guy who married the Spice Girl, as
13:58the guy who's got the modelling contract.
14:00You're not seeing what he's doing in his day job.
14:03You're just remembering what the one thing he was doing in England was and then seeing
14:07him as a celebrity.
14:08So long story short, some English football fans think David Beckham was a one-trick pony
14:12because they only ever saw him do one trick, like that little one where they put the leg
14:17up and they sort of hop to the side.
14:19They only ever saw him do that when he went to Spain and he was balancing on a beach ball
14:22and juggling and he's got the flaming thing on the end of his nose.
14:27They never got to see that because it wasn't on telly, it wasn't in the stadiums for them.
14:31So nobody's fault, it just is.
14:34And if you're a bit sceptical about all this, or you would just like to learn more, then
14:37honestly that Champions League final is available for free on UEFA's website.
14:42Just go and watch it.
14:43Look at any highlights package of him playing for Madrid in the last couple of years.
14:46Go watch the extended footage so you can see him doing all the non-spectacular stuff.
14:50I've had a great old week watching all of this.
14:53And if you are sitting there thinking, well, I would like to learn more, Adam, but specifically
14:56only from you, not anybody else ever, they all terrify me, then hey, subscribe to 442.
15:02This is what I do.
15:03This is my job.
15:04I'm here every single day talking about stuff and you can tweet me or text me or whatever
15:07it is, at Adam Cleary, C-L-E-R-Y, and tell me what I should do a video on because it's
15:12slim pickings during an international break and that Beckham documentary's really helped
15:17me out.
15:18Yeah, 442 on all the socials.
15:19It's in the corner of the video.
15:20Buy the latest issue of the magazine.
15:22Declan Rice on the cover.
15:23He's handsome, isn't he?
15:24Until next time, I have been Adam Cleary.
15:26This has been David Beckham and you can sort of see it, I think, although he's ginger and
15:32I'll see you soon.
15:33Goodbye!