David Beckham took time out of his busy schedule to watch Salford City take on Swindon in League Two action on Saturday afternoon.
Manchester United legend David Beckham co-owns Salford City alongside his former teammate, Gary Neville. Recently, Beckham shared that he played a pivotal role in saving the club from a challenging situation.
Although he is often spotted in the United States working on his Inter Miami team, Beckham devoted his full attention to Salford City on Saturday, near where his former club, Manchester United, is based, at their 12,000-seat stadium.
Salford posted an update to their followers, celebrating Beckham’s presence at the Peninsula Stadium with a message: ‘Great to have co-owner Sir David Beckham here at the Peninsula Stadium today,’ complete with a starry-eyed emoji.
During the visit, the former England captain cheerfully greeted Swindon’s manager, Ian Holloway. Beckham’s mood would have been buoyed by Salford’s swift 2-0 lead, although the match became tense when Swindon equalized. However, Salford clinched a dramatic stoppage-time victory thanks to Kallum Cesay.
But things could have been very different for the club has Beckham not stepped in a matter of week ago.
David Beckham took time out of his busy schedule to watch Salford City take on Swindon
Beckham recently ‘saved’ Salford with former Manchester United team-mate Gary Neville
Discussing the experience with The Athletic, Beckham mentioned, ‘I rarely panic, but when Gary approached me with the news that the club needed urgent help, I was concerned.’
‘My concern was primarily for Gary, who has been committed to Salford from the start. While I’ve spent considerable time there, I know how much the club and its fans mean to him,’ Beckham added.
‘For him to say, ‘we need to sort this out’… He very rarely burdens me with anything, so I knew this was something we had to fix.
‘Without even asking me it was always going to be a yes for many reasons. The values we always had as kids, with our families, with our mums and dads, with our kids now. We were part of a football club that had real values, that looked after people, that looked after their players, looked after their fans. That’s when we knew we needed to make this happen.’
Majority shareholder Peter Lim left the club, which lost £22.5million across seven years, in 2024, meaning they faced an uncertain future.
Beckham and Neville partnered with Declan Kelly and Lord Mervyn Davies to build a new consortium in May, with the first board meeting taking place on Saturday morning, with Beckham present.
He initially became involved with Salford in 2014 when he partnered with more fellow former Manchester United team-mates Nicky Butt, Ryan Giggs, Neville, Phil Neville, and Paul Scholes.
The club enjoyed four promotions in five years but are yet to make it out of League Two.
Salford are currently in League Two but are bidding to reach the Championship in five years
Beckham initially became involved in the club in 2014 alongside other ex-United team-mates
This season, however, they had won five of their last eight matches before Saturday, with Karl Robinson’s side sat third in League Two behind Swindon and Gillingham.
Gavin Fleig of the City Group is joining the club as CEO to handle day-to-day matters, while Manchester United’s Ronan Joyce has become chief business officer of the club.
Salford’s aim is to reach the Championship in the next five years.
‘We’re very ambitious but we also understand that you take it one step at a time,’ Manchester United fan Kelly added. ‘We’re going to get an outsized amount of attention because of who’s involved but we’ll deal with that and chart our own course.’
