MIAMI: David Beckham’s hopes of launching a Major League Soccer franchise in Miami took a giant step towards becoming reality Tuesday after city officials approved the sale of land crucial to a proposed stadium project. Miami-Dade County commissioners voted by 9-4 to approve the transfer of a three-acre parcel of land worth $9 million to Beckham’s consortium, which reportedly hopes to launch its MLS team by 2021.
Beckham’s group had already purchased six acres of land next to the site for some $19 million in Miami’s Overtown district.
The group hopes to build a 25,000-seat stadium on the site. Beckham’s group has said the cost of the stadium, which still needs to be approved by city planners, will be met by private investors with no public funds being used in its construction. Beckham announced in 2014 that he intended to bring a team to the South Florida city, exercising an option he was granted when he joined the Los Angeles Galaxy in 2007.
Under that deal, Beckham was granted the right to launch an expansion team for $25 million instead of the typical fee estimated at more than $100 million. — AFP
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