Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Beckham presence, Henderson, Neville additions breathing new life into team
David Beckham may have been a co-owner of Inter Miami CF since the club’s inception, but his greater involvement with the club ahead of the 2021 Major League Soccer season has created a new energy around the team.
Beckham, who was in the United Kingdom for most of Inter Miami’s inaugural season due to travel restrictions made in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, has been in South Florida since Christmas.
Jorge Mas, Inter Miami’s managing owner, said Beckham has regularly shown up to Inter Miami’s facility in Fort Lauderdale at 7:30 a.m. since coming back to the area and has been working with people at all levels of the club — from first-team players and coaches, to trainers and nutritionists to academy players and their parents.
“That sets a tone,” Mas said. “It sets an aspiration and expectation level from ownership. David Beckham’s career, his mark, was always that he was the hardest working player on the team, irrespective of his icon status. He was a hard-working player. We want to have the hardest working team. We want to be feared and respected. David being here sets a tone for doing that.”
To Beckham, the changes around the team have as much to do with new chief soccer officer and sporting director Chris Henderson and new coach Phil Neville getting settled into their roles after being hired last month.
“This building has changed overnight since Phil and Chris came in,” Beckham said. “There’s a unity there that wasn’t there. That was important.
“People would turn around and say, ‘What’s your system? What are you playing? 4-4-2?’ The important part is the details. How fit are the players? What are they doing on and off the pitch? Phil has made a huge difference so far with that. There’s a real plan. We can see that with the training the players have done so far. There is a synergy.”
With preseason training camp officially starting on March 8, Inter Miami’s brass spoke with the local media — while remaining socially distanced — during the launch of their new secondary jersey at Inter Miami CF Stadium over the weekend, touching on several topics leading into the season.
“This building has changed overnight since Phil and Chris came in. There’s a unity there that wasn’t there. That was important.”
David Beckham
More additions on the way
Inter Miami had a roster overhaul during the offseason, recently singing center back Ryan Shawcross and defensive midfielder Gregore, and they’re expected to make a couple of more additions before the season starts.
Henderson said the team is looking to sign two more players — a full back and an attacking piece — before the season starts on April 17, with the team’s roster currently at 26 players.
MLS teams can have up to 30 players on their active rosters.
“We’re waiting on some decisions at the league level for where we are and what we can do this year and then we will see,” he added. “We will evaluate our team when we get our full group in. Hopefully, everybody is in by April 17, but we’ll see.”
Henderson confirmed reports that the club has been in talks for former Arsenal left back Kieran Gibbs, who currently plays for West Bromwich Albion in the Premier League.
Gibbs’ contract with West Brom is set to expire over the summer, meaning he may not join Inter Miami until the middle of the season if he winds up signing with them.
“With Kieran, that is a possibility,” Henderson said. “We have had some initial talks with him. We are also looking at other options, but it could be that it plays out that if he is the one we land on, he could come after.”
As for the attacking piece, Henderson said the player they’re looking to add could be a central attacking midfielder or winger.
“If we end up in a 4-2-3-1 system,” he said, “it is somewhere in the band of three.”
Stadium news
Inter Miami expect to continue to operate at partial capacity to start the season due to the ongoing COVID19 pandemic.
“It won’t be a full house in April,” Mas said. “Will we have 3,000, 6,000 [or] 8,000? That’s probably the range to open in April. My aspiration is that as the season moves on and more people get vaccinated, things become easier. Hopefully, at some point in the summer and early fall, we can hopefully debut with a full house.”
As for the status of the Miami Freedom Park stadium project, Mas was optimistic that a deal will come soon.
“It’s been almost three years of negotiations with the city,” he said. “Frankly, I think over the last three or four weeks — there were a lot of issues with COVID, things happening in the city and a multitude of law firms involved in the negotiations — but I am very optimistic we will have an agreement on a lease in March and I frankly look forward to a vote in front of the City of Miami Commission in late-March, early April.
“I am very optimistic we are very close to finally bringing a project that our residents approved and pushed for and hopefully get the green light from the commission in the next 45 days.”
More business
The reveal of Inter Miami’s new secondary jersey — “La Palma” — sparked questions about whether the team would have a main sponsor on its jerseys during the 2021 season.
The club is hoping Inter Miami won’t play without a sponsorship logo on the front of their jerseys for the second consecutive season.
“We’ve had multiple conversations with global brands about being our jersey sponsor,” Mas said. “Going back to 2020, there were a lot of rumors. We were at some points very close to having a jersey sponsor. We had multiple opportunities. For this year, ‘21, we are in conversations with sponsors. I do anticipate having a jersey sponsor for this year.”
As for future jerseys, Inter Miami remain open to incorporating more pink into their kits.
Inter Miami’s game-day jerseys have used white and black as primary colors, so far, with pink as secondary colors. The team’s practice jerseys use pink as a primary color.
“Going forward we have a lot of pink with our ideas,” Beckham said. “The team wears it every single day, the fans love it and we’re listening to that.”