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LONDON - Even at first glance it seems a no-brainer. David Beckham may soon be facing a choice between eking out the last years of his football career on drizzly winter afternoons somewhere like Blackburn - or under the balmy sun of the United States' west coast, with a little light celebrity partying for post-match relaxation.
And as one of the most famous footballers in the world contemplates his future from the substitutes' bench of Real Madrid's Bernabeu stadium, there is another powerful force pushing him into a move to the US - money.
The US football league has just amended its salary cap to allow teams to pay one star player an unlimited amount, a change openly dubbed the "Beckham rule".
The former England captain has reportedly been stalling on signing up for another season at Real Madrid but a return to the Premiership also seems unappetising.
It seems increasingly possible Beckham will choose to blow the final whistle on his European football career.
And if this is the end, the moment has been prepared for. Philip Anschutz, the billionaire leisure industry mogul, has been building up his relations with Beckham and hopes to lure him to join his Major League Soccer club, Los Angeles Galaxy.
The Beckham publicity machine, under New York billionaire Robert Sillerman, has drawn up plans for a Vinnie Jones-style afterlife in the film industry.
Americans, derisive still of soccer, are only dimly aware of Beckham. His fame rests more on his celebrity lifestyle, his ex-Spice Girl spouse and his promotional work for Gillette and milk.
A move to MLS, though, would provide the Beckhams with a base from which to manage a perpetual publicity blitz, of the sort that they have orchestrated on previous US visits.
Desperate to attract elite players from Europe who can draw big crowds, MSL has just torn up pay rules designed to avoid the fate of the old North American Soccer League.
In the 1970s, the NASL attracted big crowds with the likes of Pele and George Best and other global stars who came to play for a last big payday but it collapsed after an orgy of overspending.
Its successor allocated clubs US$1.9 million ($2.85 million) to pay 18 players' wages but from now they will be allowed to pay over the odds for one star.
England played Colombia in the US last year and Beckham said: "I'd love to be well known here." It seems it might only be a matter of time.
- INDEPENDENT
