The former England superstar opened up on his relationship with the legendary Three Lions captain
Michael Owen and David Beckham were team-mates at Real Madrid, but never close friends(Image: Getty Images)
Michael Owen previously revealed that he never struck up a close friendship with David Beckham, despite the duo being England and Real Madrid team-mates. Beckham, 50, and Owen, 46, were two of the country’s most dynamic and marketable footballers in their heyday.
Eleven years after Beckham made his first-team debut at Manchester United, his stardom had taken him to the Spanish giants in the summer of 2003. Owen had also burst onto the scene at a young age, making an instant impact for Liverpool and England and earning a move to Madrid a year later.
Despite playing for bitter rivals in the Premier League, the pair would meet up for England duty. Once they made the move to Los Blancos expectations were high that they would become fast friends in the Spanish capital.
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However, Owen explained soon after that the two barely spoke outside of football with the striker preferring to live a more low-key existence in Spain. Owen even claimed their families very rarely mingled together with the duo’s lifestyles contrasting dramatically with one another’s.
“As much as we ended up living close to David and Victoria Beckham and were two English families living abroad in the same city, there wasn’t much in the way of social life as far as them and us were concerned,” Owen wrote in his autobiography.
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“Given that both [Owen’s wife] Louise and [Bekham’s wife] Victoria were quite lonely and both looking after young kids, they’d occasionally see each other while we were training. That was the extent of the friendship, however. This perhaps wasn’t a surprise given that, by the time we found ourselves in Madrid together, David and I had even less in common than we ever had.
“I certainly didn’t like wearing trendy gear or mingling among socialite company. David and Victoria on the other hand, were both bona fide superstars in their own right.
Michael Owen claimed that he never had a close bond with David Beckham at Real Madrid(Image: 2004 Getty Images)
“They were operating on a completely different stratosphere from a social perspective. I never once got the impression I was in the inner circle of David’s group of friends.”
While contentious, the remarks don’t even come close to the most scathing comments Owen has aired on Beckham over the years. The 1998 Ballon d’Or winner blamed his former Madrid team-mate for England’s elimination at the 1998 World Cup to Argentina following Beckham’s infamous red-card for kicking out at Diego Simeone.
“While it was clearly premeditated, it was immature and petulant more than it was violent. But for me, that almost makes it worse,” Owen penned in his book.
Michael Owen and and David Beckham were England team-mates for over a decade(Image: 2007 Getty Images)
“All I can say is that, as I sit here now writing this book, knowing how lucky a player is to appear in one World Cup, never mind more than one, I’d be lying if I didn’t say that what David did that day hadn’t let every single one of that England team down.
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“Did he deserve the abuse he got afterwards? Certainly not. What human being needs to see his or her effigy being burned? But David let us down, and I still hold some resentment about it today.”
Owen played for one season at Real Madrid before returning to the Premier League for an ill-fated stint at Newcastle. He later represented Manchester United and Stoke before retiring in 2013.
Beckham went on to kickstart the Major League Soccer revolution by joining LA Galaxy in 2007. He later played for AC Milan and Paris Saint-Germain before hanging up his boots in the same year as Owen.
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