Van Nistelrooy had spotted loose grass at the spot

Lisbon: Taking a penalty in a major championship is a tense moment for even the biggest soccer star. But, does the earth really move?

David Beckham says it did.

The England captain was the first player to take a penalty shootout after his team wound up 2-2 following extra time against host Portugal in the Euro 2004 quarter final.

He fired his spot kick high and wide and into the crowd at Lisbon’s Stadium of Light, and then looked back at the penalty spot, gesturing to the referee that something was wrong with it. “I have watched my penalty on television and, when I plant my left foot to take the kick, you can see the ball lift up,” he said. “I could not have hit the ball that way normally if I tried.”

Uefa said later that Beckham was the only player to moan about the shootout at the Stadium of Light Thursday. Although Rui Costa also missed, he didn’t complain and ortugal won 6-5.

But Ruud van Nistelrooy, Beckham’s former colleague at Manchester United, was also worried about the state of the penalty spots. He said his Dutch team had checked the area before its quarter final victory over Sweden in Faro Saturday. It also went to a shootout.

“We trained on this pitch the day before and we checked the spot kick,” Van Nistelrooy said. “We saw the spot kick was very loose grass and you saw that Becks, when he took his, that his standing leg moved the grass so that the ball moved.

Van Nistelrooy had no problem on his spot kick, firing it into the roof of the net as the Dutch advanced 5-4 on penalties after a 0-0 tie at the Algarve Stadium.

The England squad, which played three times at the Stadium of Light, made several complaints to organisers about the state of the turf near the penalty spots.

“I complained after each of the practice sessions we had at the stadium,” said coach Sven-Goran Eriksson. “I talked to the Uefa official responsible for the pitch and he promised it would be repaired before the game. I don’t know if they did that.”

Uefa spokesman William Gaillard said repairs were made. “Venue managers had replaced the turf around the spots before the match following complaints from Eriksson,” he said.

The referee, Switzerland’s Urs Meier, had inspected both penalty spots and was happy for the shootout to go ahead.