MLS chief defends Beckham deal

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Beckham negotiated an extended lease from the Galaxy at AC Milan in a "timeshare" agreement made between the two clubs two weeks ago.

The deal will see the midfielder remain in Italy for the rest of the Serie A campaign before returning to California to play in the second half of the MLS season. And Garber told ESPN: "Listen, they get him back for half the season and they get a guy who's performing for one of the best clubs in the world."

He added: "David's over there doing extraordinarily well. The LA Galaxy is not AC Milan and you've got a guy who's starting for AC Milan who's going to come back after a couple more months and he's going to play for the Galaxy.

"That's a very positive thing."

Garber said he hoped Beckham would decide at the end of the season not to trigger a release clause in the five-year contract he signed in 2007.

"You've got to look at the reality of what this business is about," he said.

"It's either getting some of David Beckham or it's getting none of David Beckham and I'd much rather be where we are and have him for the second half of the season and then, again, hopefully for a couple more seasons after that which was not guaranteed in his last contract."

At the same time, Garber said there was more to his league's success than Beckham and that the protracted saga over his future during the winter would soon be forgotten.

"This was a big story for all of us and arguably it's one of the biggest sports stories over the last six months or so but David Beckham is not a one-man stimulus package for Major League Soccer," he added. "This was a complicated process and it's worked out in a way that's good for David, it's good for the Galaxy and good for Major League Soccer."