Beckham '50-50' for Chelsea clash

A troublesome ankle injury picked up on England duty against Estonia in June and aggravated in his final appearance for Real Madrid prevented Beckham from taking a full part in his first training session for his new club on Monday.

The former England captain had targeted Saturday's World Series of Football friendly with Chelsea to make his bow for the Major League Soccer side but Yallop admits it is touch and go whether he will feature against the Premier League outfit.

Speaking in front of a watching Beckham after the Galaxy's 3-0 defeat to Tigres UANL, Yallop said: "It's probably 50-50.

"He's still sore but we're hoping it's just going to ease off a little bit so he'll be okay.

"He got a lot of work done today, it feels a bit better and we'll wait until Friday to see how it's really feeling.

"But it does feel better and that's the promising thing."

Yallop also insisted the decision on whether Beckham flies to Denver on Thursday to make a personal appearance at the MLS All-Star Game is ultimately down to the midfielder.

Beckham is due to make a promotional visit to the showpiece game against Celtic on behalf of Major League Soccer commissioner Dan Garber.

He will be introduced to the crowd at Dick's Sporting Goods Park and conduct a live interview with US sports cable network ESPN.

Yet there are concerns the five-hour round trip from Los Angeles could hamper Beckham's efforts to be fit in time for Saturday after Yallop had revealed on Monday that the 32-year-old's ankle had swollen up on the flight to California from London last week.

Asked about whether the prospective trip from Los Angeles to Denver was a good idea, Yallop admitted: "Probably not.

"We'll see. He'll make a decision. It's only a two-hour flight or whatever, but we'll see.

"I'm just hoping he's going to be okay for the game on Saturday. He'll train before he goes. He's his own man, he knows what he needs to do and if he feels that it's okay to go, we'll talk to him and make sure it's cleared with our doctors.

"But he won't go if he's going to make it worse."

Meanwhile, Yallop described the disappointing performance against Tigres as one of the worst nights since he joined the Major League Soccer team.

Beckham joined the pre-game team meeting and watched his new team-mates for the first time but it made little difference as the Galaxy were outclassed by their Mexican opponents in the 3-0 defeat.

"We've had a good run really in the four games leading up to this and we let ourselves down tonight," Yallop said.

"I think we felt that we could just turn up and start playing with David, if you like, not playing but just here. That showed.

"We can be erratic in our play. Sometimes we play well and sometimes we don't. Tonight, especially the first half, was one of the worst nights I've had since I've been here.

"It happened to be David's first game and that's obviously very disappointing."