By David Gold
October 28 – The Major League Soccer (MLS) play offs have thrown up the marketing man’s dream – a game between David Beckham’s LA Galaxy and Thierry Henry’s New York Red Bulls.
The pair, two of the most iconic and marketable men in the sport, and will come face to face for the first time since they moved to the United States.
New York’s victory over FC Dallas on Wednesday night (October 26) set up the clash with LA Galaxy, who won the Western Conference title in style.
The first leg will be this Sunday (October 30), and the return next Thursday (November 3), and in all will feature the two teams with the biggest payrolls in US football.
And in ex-Manchester United and Real Madrid star Beckham, and former Arsenal and Barcelona man Henry, they have two players whose net worth is estimated to be in the region of $280 million (£174 million/€197 million).
Beckham of course makes up the majority of that figure ($219 million/£136 million/€154 million), and the clash between the pair will be eagerly awaited, in particular by MLS broadcaster ESPN.
Their clash is the first stage of the MLS play offs, the traditional finale to the season, featuring the top 10 teams from the Western and Eastern Conferences of US football, playing each other for the right to contest the MLS final.
As New York finished fifth in their league, they will go into the clash as underdogs, and Beckham will be particularly keen to win, with this season being in all likelihood his last before a probable move to French league leaders Paris St Germain.
Confirmation of the glamour tie is the second major boost for American football this week after it was revealed that the average attendance in the MLS had risen for the third year in a row, reaching a record high since the league began in 1996, at 17,872.
The best supported club was Seattle Sounders, also for the third year in a row, with 38,496, and the figures put the MLS ahead of its Portuguese, Russian and Brazilian counterparts among others.
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