After weeks of speculation and rumour, England captain, Manchester United hero and world superstar, David Beckham has been transferred to Spanish super-club Real Madrid for a fee of 25 million pounds sterling.

Whilst visiting California with his wife and ex-"Posh" Spice Girl, Victoria recently, Beckham kept a cool head and a closed mouth as the U.S. media swamped him with questions about the suspected transfer deal that was about to take place. On his return to the UK after he had just learned that he had been awarded an OBE by the Queen, Beckham again remained close-mouthed, greeting reporters at the airport with a polite "Thank you" on being congratulated on his award, but again remaining silent when asked if he was going to be transferred to Madrid or Barcelona or perhaps Milan.

He and his popular wife were then off to Japan on another of his off-season promotional tours. He arrived in Tokyo to hoards of press and spectators as the news had broken that the deal was done and that Beckham was indeed about to become a Real Madrid player. Beckham is an idol in Japan but again chose to remain silent on the matter. To his adoring fans, however, it seemed to matter little who the mighty Beckham played for. He was there, in their country, on their soil, and for the moment, anyway, that was enough.

It is only a matter of weeks since Manchester United manager, Sir Alex Ferguson, at a televised press conference, stated that Real Madrid had a lot of money to tempt other clubs to sell their players, but that they were not going to tempt Manchester to sell David Beckham. So much for that.

Barcelona's newly elected President, John Laporta, had made Beckham his prime target and his election campaign focused on his bid to sign the 28-year-old. He was willing to pay 30 million pounds, but in the end Manchester and Beckham fell in with Real and they were able to land him at the bargain price of 25 million!
Serious negotiations had taken place before the deal was done, which went far beyond the tag on the transfer amount and it is now known that Beckham agreed to fall in with Real Madrid's policy on player sponsorship contracts.

He has agreed to the club's demand that they receive 50% of every players' personal contracts from any deals they negotiate after joining the nine-times European champions. Beckham was paid 20,000 pounds per week at United, out of a wage of 90,000 per week, in exchange for his image rights although that did not include his personal sponsorship deals. But the England captain has now agreed to hand over 50% of all future sponsorship contracts for products he might agree to endorse.
Beckham has also assured Madrid's sporting director Jorge Valdano that trips such as his current one to the Far East will be restricted to the close season and will not distract him from commitments to his new club.
Valdano revealed how he had discussed image rights at length with Beckham. "It was the key to the negotiations", he said. "We demand 50% of our players image rights. We consider this issue indispensable because the other players have followed this policy. In the case of Beckham it was more complicated because his potential image is very impressive - but the player agreed." He went on to remark that this player wanted to come to Real even though he was losing money. Valdano added that "Getting David Beckham for Madrid will make us a better club and a better team." That would seem to be a fair bet!

The "T's" still have to be crossed and the "I's" dotted, but this most talked about football transfer ever is expected to be completed on July 2nd, following a medical examination in Madrid.

Mr. David Kenworthy

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