Real Madrid and Man U gave the author thrills, chills

	Real Madrid's Ronaldo (right) was the early star of a 2003 match against Man U, but David Beckham (not pictured) would steal the show. AFP/Paul Barker
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By Grant Wahl

If you were going to see your first game at Old Trafford, the fabled Manchester United home known as the Theater of Dreams, you couldn't do much better than the night of April 23, 2003, when Man United met Real Madrid in a Champions League showdown for the ages.

There are three essential criteria for a game to be considered among the greats. One, it must be significant. Two, the game must be superbly played. And three, it must be larded with drama, compelling plots and subplots taking place on and off the field of play.

This one had it all. Import? Here was a quarterfinal elimination match pitting the planet's two most popular clubs in the world's most popular annual tournament. Excellence? Here were global stars at or near the height of their powers: Zinédine Zidane, Ronaldo, David Beckham, Luis Figo, Roberto Carlos, Ruud van Nistelrooy and Ryan Giggs. (In case you're counting, the rosters included six World Cup champions and three World Players of the Year.) Drama? Here was a back-and-forth barnburner that featured seven goals and the fascinating endgame between Beckham and Sir Alex Ferguson, who left Becks on the bench(!) only to see him score twice as a second-half sub.

I had gone to Manchester at the invitation of Man United, which was willing to make some of its top figures available to Sports Illustrated in advance of its impending summer tour to the United States. That the club was willing to do so on the day before the biggest game of the year struck me as remarkable, but I wasn't about to complain. How often do you get a private audience with Sir Alex Ferguson?

Real Madrid had won the opening leg 3-1 at the Bernabéu, and with Man United needing goals you got the sense something special was afoot from the opening whistle.

Indeed it was, but that foot was Ronaldo's. Less than a year after his World Cup-winning resurgence, The Phenomenon showed why he's one of the greatest strikers of all time. Three times Ronaldo lost his defender, Rio Ferdinand. Three times Ronaldo scored, fed by the sublime passes of Zidane, Figo and Roberto Carlos. When Ronaldo left the field at the 68-minute mark, the Old Trafford faithful rewarded their visitor with a much-deserved standing ovation, the kind of perfect sports moment that gives you goosebumps.

But the game wasn't done yet, for Man United had responded to each one of Ronaldo's strikes, first by Van Nistelrooy and then an own-goal. With Real Madrid leading 3-2 on the game (and 6-3 on aggregate) the drama somehow ratcheted up to another level.

In the 62nd minute, Ferguson brought on Beckham.

Ferguson's benching of his biggest star seems unfathomable in retrospect, but it was clear that they were going through a messy breakup. Only a few weeks earlier, Ferguson had kicked a shoe in the locker room that hit Beckham in the forehead, opening up a gash that needed stitches.

And the day before the game, during our one-on-one interview, Ferguson had let loose a bombshell. To hear Sir Alex discuss the teenage Beckham was to hear a tale of youthful innocence and talent corrupted -- or at the very least distracted -- by fame. "He was blessed with great stamina, the best of all the players we've had here," Ferguson told me. "After training he'd always be practicing, practicing, practicing. So there's a foundation there that never deserted him. And then ..."

It was a long pause, one of those times when silence communicated more than words ever could. Suddenly you realized, in that fleeting moment, how deeply Ferguson longed for the schoolboy Beckham, for a simpler era, for a time when his star wasn't spending his free hours with Sir Elton John and the Naked Chef.

"... his life changed when he met his wife, really," Ferguson finally continued. "She's in pop, and David got another image. And he's developed this fashion thing." (He said "fashion thing" with an expression of total bewilderment.) "I saw his transition to a different person. So long as it doesn't affect his football side, it doesn't bother me at all." Clearly, however, Sir Alex had decided. The glitz had affected Beckham's football side.

But Beckham had the best response imaginable. Eight minutes after trotting onto the field, he buried one of his trademark swerving free kicks in the Real Madrid goal. Fourteen minutes later he scored again on a tap-in.

Manchester United won the game, 4-3, but Real Madrid won the series (6-5). In the end, the viewing public was the biggest winner. I'll never forget the final images of that night, of Beckham and Zidane exchanging jerseys, of the shirtless Becks standing in the center circle, clutching Zizou's Real Madrid shirt and waving to the Old Trafford faithful as if he were issuing an early good-bye.

Which, in many ways, he was. It would only be a matter of months, of course, before Beckham had his own Real Madrid jersey.

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