Saturday, February 14, 2009

Beckham Staying in L.A.

So says Tim Leiweke, chief executive of the company that owns the Galaxy, and he sounds none to happy with the games AC Milan has been playing:

"He will be back here on March 9 and we don't want to entertain any more conversations now," Leiweke said. "It is a distraction to [Galaxy Coach] Bruce Arena, the team and the fans, and we move on. That's the last we're going to talk about this."

Asked what would happen if the Italian club made an offer over the weekend or next week, Leiweke said: "They'll come back. Sure they will. But we owe it to our fans [not to consider it]. They've been reading all these stories and we lose credibility by the day. That's not fair. We owe it to Bruce and we owe it to the rest of the team. We're a month away from our season."

Leiweke said AC Milan had not come close to offering what AEG and MLS believe Beckham is worth.

"They've never been in the ballpark," Leiweke said, referring to the figure of more than $10 million that MLS Commissioner Don Garber, who imposed Friday's deadline, said the league would expect to receive.

"What they've tried to do is use David and use us," Leiweke said. "We're not going to play that game anymore. This has been extremely damaging and distracting for our team.

Of course as we've seen, Beckham sounds more than ready to bolt to Italy, so I imagine he's going to be frustrated by this development. I also imagine that if he registers his disappointment, and AC Milan decides to pay what he's worth, this situation could change.

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