The 31-year-old former Leeds and Manchester City forward is out of contract at Anfield at the end of the season.

And Nicol, a former Liverpool player, believes Fowler could be tempted by a move across the Atlantic, although he warned that there is not the same money on the table as Beckham is getting at Los Angeles Galaxy.

"At the moment the first thing is the financial side," said Nicol.

"We've spoken, but as of yet there's nothing been settled. He's really just dipping his foot in the water here. It's something he's thinking about."

Beckham is getting 250 million dollars over five seasons at the Galaxy and Nicol is worried that other European-based players may think they too will get big deals if they move to Major League Soccer.

However, Beckham's deal is a exception outside of the normal salary cap rules.

The salary cap is limited to one million dollars per team, per season, with each team allowed to sign one player outside the cap.

Nicol has some money to spend after selling Clint Dempsey to Fulham in January, but not the kind that was spent on Beckham.

"Through the sale of Clint we have some money available," he said.

"But the problem we have is that, because of the type of money David Beckham has got, a lot of people think everybody has that kind of money, which is not the case."

Fowler's hopes of extending his Anfield career have been threatened by the arrival of Andriy Voronin from Bayer Leverkusen as the Ukrainian international will join a striker line-up that comprises England international Peter Crouch, fiery Welshman Craig Bellamy and Dutch star Dirk Kuyt.

And Nicol admits that Fowler is just testing the water.

"He's getting his ducks in a row. Whether he gets a contract at Liverpool or whether he moves on, he's dipping his foot in the water," said the Revolution boss.