Back on the theme of giving good service, I wheedled two tickets to the Manchester United v. Celtic football match here next month, after mentioning David's disappointment at the 20 minute sellout to my uberboss Greg, who snapped up a dozen tickets with which to woo clients. Now it turns out we might not get to see Beckham play if Man U passes him off to Barcelona or some other club.
It's hard to feel too bad for a guy who makes $12-18 million a year playing soccer (uh, sorry Jon, make that, "footie"), but this is pretty harsh:
"Any prominent footballer is just a share traded on the football stock market," Richmond Duff, a lawyer, told a reporter for The New York Times last night in an interview at the Builder's Arms pub in London. "This is pure commerce, and we'll easily find another handsome bloke with a ridiculous hairstyle."At the Bull's Head pub in Wilmslow, outside Manchester, Gary Turner, the head chef, said by phone that he, too, supported the selling of Beckham. "We've been known as a one-man team," Turner said. "If we got rid of him, we'd see if we were a real team rather than a one-man team."
James Marley of the Bull's Head kitchen staff said he was a rabid Manchester United fan but seemed dismissive of Beckham, saying: "I don't think he's that good. He's more glamour than anything else."
So what, Jesse Watts said in the Builder's Arms pub. She indicated that she would be grievously sorry to see Beckham go, not least of all because of his rugged good looks.
"I think he should stay because a) he's a sex symbol and Britain needs that; and b) he's an amazing footballer," Watts said. "I hate football, but he's an amazing player."