Not the best speech a would-be son-in-law ever made. He answered as if I’d just asked him if egg and chips would be all right for tea:
‘Yeah. No problem.’
I suppose I’d been getting wound up about it enough for both of us. I know how much Tony and Jackie love Victoria, so I realised his relaxed attitude about us getting engaged meant they’d decided I wasn’t the worst sort in the world. In fact, they’d already made me feel part of the family: this was just the next step for us all. Maybe I could have saved myself from a potential heart attack by not posing the big question, but asking Tony – like going down on one knee to Victoria – wasn’t just for show. I was only going to do these things once in my life, which meant they were incredibly important to me: I wanted to make sure I went about them the right way.
I’d like to say that it was because those were the months when I fell in love with Victoria and proposed to her that I don’t remember much of United’s season in 1997/98. The truth is, I’ve probably done my best to forget reaching that May and not having any kind of winners’ medal to show for it. It was new to all of us, the generation who had grown up together during the 1990s. We’d won Youth Cups and Reserve leagues and then, when we stepped up to the United first team, we’d just carried on where we’d left off as kids. The season ended up being a painful one, learning what it felt like to lose. Suddenly, here were Arsenal, doing what we expected to do ourselves: winning the Double. Without wanting to be disrespectful about that Arsenal team, the disappointment didn’t ever undermine our belief in ourselves. They won their games but at United we felt we lost the Premiership by not winning ours. Confidence was still high but maybe our standards had slipped along the way.
We badly missed Roy Keane, who had ruptured his cruciate ligaments in October, and was out for almost the whole season. No team is quite the same without its best players but, when Roy’s not in the United side, there’s something more than just his ability as a player that the rest have to do without. He was and still is a huge influence. For leadership and drive there’s absolutely no one to touch him: he’s a great footballer, of course, but he also brings out the best in the players around him. Whoever he’s getting at out on the park during games, his passion and determination always get that player, and the rest of the team, going. People can come in and cover for him but nobody replaces that strength United get from Roy. We didn’t talk about it during the season. The supporters did, the papers did, but we just got on with our games. Maybe it’s only looking back now that I realise how much we missed Keano.
I was lucky, though. So were Nicky Butt, Paul Scholes and the Nevilles. We were finding out what it was like to miss out with United, but we were getting the chance to be part of an England team together. And a successful England team at that. When it came to the end of the season in May 1998, we were hurting from losing out to Arsenal, of course, but there wasn’t the time to sit down and feel sorry for ourselves. Almost as soon as the last League game had been played, I was packing my bags for La Manga in Spain, and joining up with the other United lads and the rest of a 27-man England squad to prepare for the biggest summer any of us had ever known. I might have felt a little weary after a long English season, and maybe we all did, but that wasn’t important. I was about to experience a World Cup for the first time. France 98 meant new dreams and new expectations: as if being a husband-to-be didn’t already have me buzzing every day. I couldn’t wait for the tournament – and another chapter – to start.
‘Oh, you’re the soccer player, aren’t you?’
There are plenty of football supporters in England who would rather see their club win the League than see the national team win the World Cup. I can understand that. You follow your club 365 days of every year; you’re thinking and talking about it far more than the England side. Everybody gets involved when England are playing in the major tournaments and big games, but your passion for the team you support is there all the time. When I was younger, maybe I was a bit like that. Even though I thought about representing my country, all my focus was on making it at United. Playing for England didn’t really begin to matter to me, and didn’t begin to seem like a realistic ambition, until after I’d found my feet at Old Trafford.
When I was a boy, Dad used to take me to watch schoolboy internationals involving players who were my age or just a little older, but I don’t think we ever went to see the full England side play. In my early teens, I played Representative football for my District and my County but I never got a sniff of a chance beyond that. Once I’d started at United, I did get invited for trials at the FA National School, which was based at Lilleshall in Shropshire in those days. I went along knowing full well that, even if I’d been offered a place, I wouldn’t have taken it up. As it turned out, I never had to think twice about the decision: the coaches at Lilleshall thought I was too small for a sixteen-year-old. I do know players – current England team-mates like Michael Owen and Sol Campbell – who went there and had a really good time. But it wasn’t for me. There was only one school where I wanted to be learning my game: Old Trafford. Who could be better teachers for me than the likes of Nobby Stiles, Eric Harrison and Alex Ferguson?
It’s an honour for any player to represent his country. But you can’t make it happen for yourself. All you can do is concentrate on playing for your club and hope that you catch the eye of the right person. As a teenager, I had enough on my plate trying to establish myself at United. That first Double-winning season, though, brought all of us into the limelight – and into the reckoning as far as England was concerned. When it happened for me, it all came quicker than I could have imagined, and was a bigger thrill than I’d ever let myself dream it might be. Almost overnight, it seemed I went from being a promising player at my club to being a regular part of the England team challenging for a place in the 1998 World Cup finals in France.
Terry Venables had left the England coaching job straight after Euro 96. I’d already met his replacement, Glenn Hoddle, during the Under-21 Toulon Tournament at the end of the 1995/96 season. We knew Glenn was going to be the next England manager, so it was quite exciting that he came out to France to watch a couple of games and introduce himself to us. As a player, Glenn had been a hero of mine. I’d always admired not just his technical ability – he really was a man who could hit a Hollywood pass – but also his whole approach to the game. I even got him to sign my England shirt after one of the matches. I’m not sure if the Toulon tournament was the first time he’d watched me, but I had a good game the night he showed up. He didn’t say anything to me but, going into the new season, the possibility of playing for the full England side was in the back of my mind for the first time.
There aren’t many players who get an England call-up completely out of the blue. New caps very rarely come as a complete surprise. I was lucky: I was playing in a successful United team and, at Selhurst Park, had scored the kind of goal that brings you to people’s attention. Obviously, an England coach knows all about you anyway, but my start to the season meant there was a lot of speculation in the press, talking about me as a future England player who might be ready for his chance. There was a World Cup qualifier, away to Moldova, in September. I should have spoken to Gary Neville about it, but I think there was a bit of rivalry there: he was already in the England team and I wasn’t. Most players have a story about a dramatic phone call or their club manager pulling them aside at the training ground to tell them the news. I found out I’d made the England squad while sitting on the sofa at my mum and dad’s. Mum and I had been flicking through teletext, when the details came up. As soon as I saw the name Beckham on the list of players Glenn Hoddle had chosen for his first game in charge, I jumped off the sofa. I surprised myself how excited I was. Mum and I hugged, laughing out loud, and then I was on the phone to my dad who was at work. For once, I think he was completely lost for words. He was proud, though. As proud as I was to be given my chance.
Whenever a new challenge has come along during my career, my first instinctive reaction is to suddenly find myself feeling like a schoolboy again. That was definitely true as I prepared to