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With any luck last night’s friendly between Melbourne Victory and LA Galaxy will be the last Australian football fans see of the MLS side for a while.
Over the past four years the Beckham road show, sorry the Galaxy team, have played three exhibition games against A-League sides in front of a combined crowd of 140,000.
But apart from the Galaxy players, who get to travel the world as some sort of Harlem Globetrotters, who have these games benefitted?
Some will say these games generate interest in the A-League, but really they just give reporters who usually have little interest in football a chance to interview Becks.
In 2007, there were 80,000 ‘football fans” at Homebush to watch Beckham score from a free kick in the 5-3 loss against Sydney FC.
But how many of those supporters followed that game up with one of Sydney’s A-League games at the Sydney Football Stadium?
When the Jets played the Galaxy last season, I had more interest in the Sydney FC – Melbourne Heart game being played at a rainy AAMI Park.
There were 34,000 at the 2-all draw at Etihad Stadium on Tuesday night, but going by the lack of noise it seems most were just ‘theatre-goers” rather than Victory supporters.
With the MLS season not matching the A-League, the only time we have seen the Galaxy is mid-season in the A-League and post-season in the MLS.
Is risking your stars for a meaningless game really worth it? At least Victory had the common sense to rest Harry Kewell.
With Beckham, now 36, expected to make a big money move to PSG it seems highly unlikely Galaxy would risk another trip Down Under without his pulling power.
You never know, PSG with Becks in tow could be visiting our shores some time in the future.
But at least the game would be played out of the A-League season, so it could just be used as a pre-season trial.
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