Beckham in 98-99. How good was he?

ryan_forlan

Gullible
Joined
Nov 3, 2002
Messages
2,268
Location
New Delhi, India
I was having an argument with an Arsenal friend of mine. It was a Beckham Vs Pires debate. He was being annoying, was laughing off at the suggestion that beckham was a better player. Anyway, for some weird reason, he decided that the best way of doing this is to compare the best seasons both players had for their clubs.
Now, both me and him only started watching club football(used to just watch world cups before that) around the 98-99 time. Having said that, we did not follow it religiously at that point. Hence, I felt my friend had missed out on the best season beckham had for United. Even I only noted and remember the highlights of that season. Becks also won the UCL player of the year and was 2nd in the Ballon D'or contention for that year.
I need your inputs here. How good was he that year? The stats/videos and the awards making him look very good. Even I did not know that he was good enough that season to be 2nd in the ballon d'or award thing. Was he the best United player that season?
 
He had an unbelievable season that year.

His deliveries to Cole and Yorke were like clockwork. He stepped up in big moments and was crucial to the success.

Pires was a great footballer but doesn't come close to Becks in my opinion. Obviously more tidy and neat on the ball but doesn't offer anything near what Beckham did.
 
Beckham was better at dead balls, pires was better at taking on his man, both we're brilliant players. Beckham probably had the better work rate though and I would have picked him over pires any day of the week.

The best example you could give your met though is watch THAT England V Greece game that took us to the World Cup in 2002 and tell him that if he won't be able to find a pires performance to match Beckhams that day, the sad thing about Beckhams mega fame is that people forget just how good a player he was.
 
No idea who was better because they both offered something completely different. Pires wouldn't have worked as well with our 99 team and Beckham wouldn't have worked as well in the Arsenal invincibles team, so it's hard to say if one was better than the other. But Beckham was fantastic in the 99 season. His link up play with Neville and supply to Yorke and Cole was one of the many pleasures of that season.
 
I think Beckham achieved about 25 assists and 10 goals in 98-99. I might be slightly wrong but the whole of the team from front to back played amazingly well that year. Hence the treble.
Personally i think Beckhams best season was 01-02 where he scored around 17 goals in an under-performing United side. Some of his goals that season were devastating.
He was never a player who would stand out in a Ronaldinho type way. Just a very very good player overall and possibly slightly under-rated by some.
 
Actual assists, 23, 16 in the league, 7 in the CL. Though this discounts stuff like him whipping in both corners in the CL, in which if include him having a key pass in build up that really should be an assist too, it's another 7.

Yeah, I randomly have this on some note from the past, I went to do it for all seasons, but gave up. Yorke was equally as impressive with 23 too, 14 in league, 9 in CL for him in direct assists.
 
Becks was absolutely immense in 1998/99, almost always involved in every crucial moment in every competition that season. I also think he played every game, I am almost sure he was the player with most minutes in 1998/99. Even in games where others are remembered more (Giggs semi finals FA Cup against Arsenal or Keane against Juventus), it's easy to forget that Becks scored our first goal in that semi against Arsenal and was absolutely everywhere against Juventus. Oh and in our last PL game when Spurs took the lead it was also him who got us back into the game and at the end of the game we won the 1st tophy of our treble.

There have been players who were more talented than him no doubt, but his contribution to our successes is hardly matched by anyone else / by very very few.

On a side note: When he was England captain at least mostly thanks to him England somehow still managed to reach the quarters of the tournaments, but since McClaren decided to get rid off him first of all they didn't qualify for the Euros 2008 at all and the less said about 2010, 2012 and 2014 the better!

Loved him always did, always will do :)
 
Someone said at the time a Beckham cross is half a goal, such was the accuracy and pace of the delivery, at his peak probably the best crosser of the ball the premiership has seen.
 
No matter how good a player is, if they consistently never do anything against your team it always sticks in your mind. Pires was very good, especially in that 2001-2004 period where he scored a lot of really nice goals but unless I'm forgetting anything I don't remember him ever playing well against Utd.

Beckham was incredible in 1999, especially in the really big games. He was world class and when you consider he came back to England to burning effigies of him in the street it shows how mentally tough he was.
 
beckham's peak years would be between 1998 to 2003 i believe. he was brilliant back in 1995/96 and 1996/97 as well(his first 2 seasons in the first team), although his form dipped a bit the next. but then he bounced back brilliantly from france 98 and gets better and better. brilliant player from the right hand side and it is a shame people these days think he is famous because of his face and fame, because he was really top class for us.

carried england through for a few years as well.
 
ryan_forlan said:
I was having an argument with an Arsenal friend of mine. It was a Beckham Vs Pires debate. He was being annoying, was laughing off at the suggestion that beckham was a better player. Anyway, for some weird reason, he decided that the best way of doing this is to compare the best seasons both players had for their clubs.
Now, both me and him only started watching club football(used to just watch world cups before that) around the 98-99 time. Having said that, we did not follow it religiously at that point. Hence, I felt my friend had missed out on the best season beckham had for United. Even I only noted and remember the highlights of that season. Becks also won the UCL player of the year and was 2nd in the Ballon D'or contention for that year.
I need your inputs here. How good was he that year? The stats/videos and the awards making him look very good. Even I did not know that he was good enough that season to be 2nd in the ballon d'or award thing. Was he the best United player that season?
Click to expand...

I'd probably have had him as a narrow second to Keano as our best player in the treble season. His consistency was phenomenal and he was without question one of the most dangerous attacking players in the world back then. He churned out chance after chance for us with his delivery from the right wing and set pieces. He's become a little underrated with the passage of time. I rate Pires as one of the best wingers of the Premier League era too but I'd say Beckham edges it.
 
I think Beckham is generally underrated by United fans. Every time I've tried to find list of rankings he is really far up but rarely have I seen him get the praise for reaching that kind of level.

I really rate him though, I think his best asset was the fact that for Beckham a cross was re-defined. He could receive the ball on his own half and still find the forward with a run or towards the box and it was nearly always precise enough to trouble the opponents. It was basically impossible for the opponents to stop him from crossing because he didn't have to beat anybody, he just needed space and he'd whip in a great cross.

The best way to appreciate Beckham is to watch our strikers goal highlights as you will see Beckham creating goal after goal with his cross field passes.
 
World Class crosses, extremely hard working player. Falls short of being properly world class for me.


in 98/99 he was terrific and one of many key players for us in that season
 
Pires wasnt as prolific a creator as Beckham but scored more goals. Personally Id have Beckham as he brought a lot more to the table in terms of work rate and attitude coupled with ability. Pires was a right fanny when he wanted to be. His international career wasnt great either given his talents.
 
It would be interesting if someone had a stat to show which strikers at united had the most benefit from Beckhams delivery. People harp on about Beckham crossing for Van Nistelrooy was unstoppable but i seriously dont remember that many assists for RVN. I imagine Yorke had the most benefit.

I hope someone reads this has this info.
 
Yeh, off the top of my head, it would be Yorke. It seemed every 2nd goal that season was a cross from Becks to Yorke.
 
Beckham was brilliant that year, one of the most productive players ive ever seen and as people have said very underrated because of his celebrity status.

In my opinion it wasn't his best year though which was 2001/02 for me but he was a beast of a player in those years from 1998-2002.

Off-topic but reading peoples opinions on the term 'World Class' in the last week or so hammers home that the term really is subjective and means different things to different people with some saying Rooney isn't WC, Cavani is, Beckham wasn't etc. Makes you wonder if the term has lost all meaning.
 
SiRed said:
It would be interesting if someone had a stat to show which strikers at united had the most benefit from Beckhams delivery. People harp on about Beckham crossing for Van Nistelrooy was unstoppable but i seriously dont remember that many assists for RVN. I imagine Yorke had the most benefit.

I hope someone reads this has this info.
Click to expand...

Brwned did a bit of research about this last year:

Brwned said:
I think I'll compile the numbers at some point myself to properly debunk the myth but I'm absolutely certain the Beckham-RvN partnership was nowhere near as prolific as some people remember. Despite Ruud scoring more in his first two seasons than Yorke in his entire time here I've no doubt Yorke scored a fair few more from Beckham assists.
Click to expand...

Brwned said:


There you go. 10 assists in two seasons. Yorke might've matched that in just the one!
Click to expand...
 
He was class. With all the celebrity furore it's easy to forget how committed and hard working he was to get to the top.
 
ryan_forlan said:
thanks a lot guys.
So you all think he deserved to be second in the running for ballon d'or that year?
Click to expand...

He certainly deserved to be in contention, but I'd have had Keane above him, and Shevchenko had a particularly good year too. Thinking about it Yorke should have got alot more plaudits for that season too.
 
Defining year of a great career, he raised his game and was almost untouchable that season.
 
It must rank as one of his best seasons, if not the best. Created countless chances for our strikers and scored some vitally important goals - like the leveler against Spurs before Cole got us in front. And his corners weren't half bad back then...
 
Ah Beckham. I've gone from overrating him, to disliking him for awhile with all the Ingerland and celebrity bullshit to being all nostalgic about him.

He was my favourite player when I was 12 and he was wearing the number 10. Then as I got older, I started appreciating Paul Scholes' no bullshit approach and clear talent that the sight of Beckham wearing sarongs and the field days the tabloids had over Ferguson kicking a boot in his face and his England love in made me sick of him. Didn't help that Solskjaer did a brilliant job replacing him in right midfield for a few months.

Nowadays, I view him as he should be, a United legend. The sight of him crying in his last game at PSG was quite sad. He should have been retiring at Old Trafford, like Scholes, Giggs and Alex Ferguson, instead of some no mark oil money club.

Beckham was immense in 98/99. He was involved in a lot of our defining goals that season. Off the top of my head, two assists for Yorke's two goals against Inter at home, the first goal against Arsenal in THAT semi final replay, a freekick against Barcelona at home, the equalizer against Spurs in the last game of the season and those corners against Bayern in the final.

One of my favourite moments of that season was him scoring the freekick (*edit* last minute freekick! Set the tone for the season, I guess) against Leicester, I think, in the first game of the season with the World Cup debacle fresh in our minds. A big double finger salute to the rest of the country, that was. This was why his England love in was so nauesiating to my teenaged self, although I understand now how big an achievement that was for him to actually turn his England career around at the time.

Pires? Bah. Guy couldn't even grow a proper beard.
 
NinjaZombie said:
One of my favourite moments of that season was him scoring the freekick (*edit* last minute freekick! Set the tone for the season, I guess) against Leicester, I think, in the first game of the season with the World Cup debacle fresh in our minds. A big double finger salute to the rest of the country, that was. This was why his England love in was so nauesiating to my teenaged self, although I understand now how big an achievement that was for him to actually turn his England career around at the time.
Click to expand...
This is what I'm hoping for Rooney.

Beckham was made the scapegoat, the club stood by him and we saw what he did that season. Ronaldo was under attack after 2006, came back and had the season that kick started his career as one of the best. Rooney has been public enemy number one this summer and I hope he can continue the tradition of doing the business with United and shutting England up.
 
I've still never seen a better crosser than Beckham. He had the ability to cross accurately from a fairly deep starting point. He probably didn't have the ability to dribble (although he had no issues beating the defender to get the ball in) but this fact was irrelevant to how he played. I've never understood why more wide players don't seek to do this. He'd get far more crosses in than anyone else because he didn't have to take the extra step/run to get to the line. He could whip it in pretty much anywhere he was standing, affording the defence less of a chance to block or disposes him.
 
Eric'sCollar said:
This is what I'm hoping for Rooney.

Beckham was made the scapegoat, the club stood by him and we saw what he did that season. Ronaldo was under attack after 2006, came back and had the season that kick started his career as one of the best. Rooney has been public enemy number one this summer and I hope he can continue the tradition of doing the business with United and shutting England up.
Click to expand...

Fair enough if you feel that way, but I'm not holding my breath. Beckham was a United youth graduate, was much younger than Rooney at that point of time, and had not publically wanted out of the club at that point.
 
Plugsy said:
I've still never seen a better crosser than Beckham. He had the ability to cross accurately from a fairly deep starting point. He probably didn't have the ability to dribble (although he had no issues beating the defender to get the ball in) but this fact was irrelevant to how he played. I've never understood why more wide players don't seek to do this. He'd get far more crosses in than anyone else because he didn't have to take the extra step/run to get to the line. He could whip it in pretty much anywhere he was standing, affording the defence less of a chance to block or disposes him.
Click to expand...



Unreal.
 
NinjaZombie said:
Fair enough if you feel that way, but I'm not holding my breath. Beckham was a United youth graduate, was much younger than Rooney at that point of time, and had not publically wanted out of the club at that point.
Click to expand...
I'm not saying in regards to a new start to his career but I'm talking about putting the shit behind him and having a successful season with the club.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.