Beckham by David Beckham Page A

O’Shea or Kieran Richardson. The manager has always had faith in the players who have been produced at the club. One of the best things about coming through the ranks at Old Trafford is that the boss involves the younger players in training—and gives them a game, too—as soon as he feels they’re up to it. He believes in the lads who have grown up at the club and, above everything else, that’s something for which my generation will always feel grateful to Alex Ferguson. The future isn’t a responsibility he hands over to someone else. When I was a boy, he knew who David Beckham was. Once I’d signed for United, he was following my progress the whole time: coming to games, watching training, talking to Eric and the other coaches about how I was getting on.
    When it comes to making a League debut, or even getting a start in a Cup game for United, you already feel like you’re part of the first-team set-up. That makes it easier for any young player to relax and do his best when he’s given his chance. With me, it seemed like I’d been involved at least since I was a kid, warming up alongside my heroes at Upton Parkas club mascot for the afternoon. By the time I was ready for United’s first team, I already got on well with the senior players. It wasn’t a case of: who’s this young so and so, coming in and thinking he can take our place? I knew them all and, just as important, they knew me.
    As it turned out, my first Premier League game was a bit of an anticlimax. There’s always a big atmosphere for Man United vs Leeds, whether we’re playing at Old Trafford or at Elland Road, and the groundwas buzzing beforehand. It was an incredibly hot afternoon, though, and the match was stifled because of that. It finished 0–0. I must have done all right because I played a few more League games before the end of that season and, by the summer, it felt as if, slowly but surely, things were starting to happen. What I didn’t realize, and none of us did, was that the manager had already seen enough and was ready to take one of the biggest gambles of all time. The season 1995/96 was the making of me. It was the making of all of us, thanks to a boss who believed in us even before we believed in ourselves.

4
DB on the Tarmac
‘What if we go out and prove the lot of you wrong?’
    There weren’t many better players in their positions anywhere in Europe; but Mark Hughes, Paul Ince and Andrei Kanchelskis were leaving Old Trafford. During the summer of 1995, we read about it in the papers like everyone else: Alex Ferguson had decided to sell three of United’s biggest stars. Andrei was a fantastic player but there’d been a problem between him and the boss. Stories on the back pages claimed that Paul had started acting as if he was bigger than the club itself. I know the manager wouldn’t have stood for it, but I never saw Incey like that: he was a large personality who drove the team on, like Roy Keane does now. Incey was as good a player at that time, as well.
    He might have been in his early thirties but, to this day, I think it was a mistake letting Mark Hughes go. Just ask Chelsea supporters. Mark went to Stamford Bridge and they’ll tell you what a great player he was for them. I have to admit that I’m biased. I was a fan back then and I’m a fan now that he’s manager of Wales. If it was up to me, Mark Hughes would probably still be playing for Manchester United. After Bryan Robson, he was my big hero when I was a teenager and that was still true when I had a chance to play alongside him. I was really disappointed he left: how were we going to win anything without Sparky in the team?
    I still remember how upset I was when I found out that Mark, in particular, was leaving. I was surprised, too: like most United supporters my first reaction was to wonder what the manager was doing. Youknew there had to be something going on for him