Beckham getting a knighthood? WTF???

[surreal]

http://news.sky.com/skynews/article/0,,30100-1268368,00.html

Beckham Knighthood Row Denied

Updated: 15:10, Thursday May 31, 2007
Reports that footballer David Beckham faces a growing campaign in Whitehall to stop him being awarded a knighthood have been dismissed by the Cabinet Office.

The 32-year-old is believed to be in line for a top award in Tony Blair's forthcoming Resignation Honours List.

But some Whitehall officials were said to be against making him a 'Sir' because of his forthcoming move to the US.

They apparently felt it would effectively prevent the Real Madrid star from playing for the national team.

The claims come on his return to the England football squad for matches this week and next.

However, a Cabinet Office spokeswoman said there had been no discussions, and civil servants were not in a position to stop nominations in their tracks. 

The Evening Standard newspaper had quoted an unnamed source as saying: "Some officials feel there is nothing wrong with honouring a player who is based in Europe and free to represent his country if required.  "But they feel there is a big difference if the same player is earning his main income and paying tax in the United States and unable to play for England."

Sky's Niall Paterson said: "Civil servants are asked as a matter of course to consider each and every candidate to avoid the risk of embarrassment.  "There will be concerns in Whitehall that Beckham is no longer a resident in the UK and is effectively a tax exile."

A knighthood for Beckham, who already has an OBE, would make his former Spice Girl wife Lady Beckham - a title she says she would relish.  Speaking last year, she said: "I'd love that, that would be quite fabulous. It's just so camp, it's wonderful isn't it? Lady Victoria... that would be quite amazing."

As well as his record as England captain, Beckham's claim for a knighthood is bolstered by his work for charity and his role in helping to secure the 2012 Olympic Games for London.

Is this part of Blair desperately wanting to leave an indelible mark on this country - moreso than, oh I dunno, the big fucking WAR!!!  Is this why he's in the middle of a World Tour at the moment???  Why the fuck couldn't they have done what was done with Thatcher, a good old revolt....

I mean, I have nothing per se against David Beckham, he's been a good footballer and a decent role-model, but for fucks sake - his wife will be even more unbearable now....

[Santa's Boyfriend]

I'm hoping Blair'll knight Gerry Adams.

[Utter Shit]

I mean, I have nothing per se against David Beckham, he's been a good footballer and a decent role-model, but for fucks sake - his wife will be even more unbearable now....

I've asked this before on here but didn't get a satisfactory response, so here goes again - what, exactly, makes Victoria Beckham so detestable? I have literally never seen her say or do anything that remotely deserves the abuse she receives. She even got stick during the whole Becks/Loos scandal, when she was clearly the victim. Fucking ridiculous. Every interview I've ever seen or read with her, she comes across like a really decent woman, all she seems interested in is her husband and children. Yet she seems to be hated by so many. It's bizarre.

[fauxgems]

I've asked this before on here but didn't get a satisfactory response, so here goes again - what, exactly, makes Victoria Beckham so detestable?

Yeah, I think people tend to get their anger confused with the cocoon of media gobshite that surrounds her, rather than the person. She may be a fashion-grabbing stickwoman of pouty pointlessness, but there seem to be loads of nasty assumptions made about her intentions and persona, when, as far as I can see it, she's done nothing but be a bit of a needy wife and a mediocre singer.

[gatchamandave]

I've asked this before on here but didn't get a satisfactory response, so here goes again - what, exactly, makes Victoria Beckham so detestable? I have literally never seen her say or do anything that remotely deserves the abuse she receives. She even got stick during the whole Becks/Loos scandal, when she was clearly the victim. Fucking ridiculous. Every interview I've ever seen or read with her, she comes across like a really decent woman, all she seems interested in is her husband and children. Yet she seems to be hated by so many. It's bizarre.

At  the  risk  of  being  called  a  misogynist  by  PC  Savage < again > I've  always  found  her...umm...hot...

[Catalogue Trousers]

However, without meaning to be misogynistic, this:

It's just so camp, it's wonderful isn't it? Lady Victoria...

is one of the most vapid pieces of airheaded shite that I've heard in a long time.

[ccbaxter]

The assumption that Beckham is, of course, a great role model does baffle me a bit too. I think his re-selection for England is a little pointless and retrograde, and I wouldn't be all that distraught if a niggling, short-term calf strain ruled him out of the next few matches - but bear him no real ill will, long-term, really... (just in case he's logging on to CaB this evening...)
But beyond doing his job for excessive remuneration, giving a general thumbs-up towards various charity efforts - again against a backdrop of fairly richly rich pickings - how is he quite so very special, when also taking into account his fucking around and potentially fucking up his very own family...?

[the midnight watch baboon]

I really feel she probably tastes quite like vinegar.

Size four decent role model lol geta grip 

[aaaaaaaaaargh!]

Bobby Moore captained his country to win something and never got knighted and Bob Paisley never got knighted either.  Why should Beckham get one?  Having said that, a knight in the England football team would be a jape.

[Mr. Analytical]

He was in an England side that slumped out of five different tournaments in complete humiliation.

Why doesn't he fucking retire?

[P K Duck]

Bobby Moore captained his country to win something and never got knighted and Bob Paisley never got knighted either.  Why should Beckham get one? 

Because he sums up the Blair ethos of appearance over content. And because Cherie Blair fancies him, most likely.

Victoria Beckham is possibly the country's biggest attention-seeker, and that is a field with much more challenge and competition than any football pitch. So really, under the Blair guidelines for success, it is she who should be knighted.

Why are we paying Blair to go on tour? Oh yes, to get him out of the country, good call, carry on.

[hoverdonkey]

Oooh, lovely cross though. He ran round lots too.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

Steady on, some of us are probably knighted but don't realise. They're meaningless.

[CaledonianGonzo]

He was in an England side that slumped out of five different tournaments in complete humiliation.

That's worth some sort of prize

[ccbaxter]

Be fair, he was part of an England team that actually won a tournament abroad. Though the sainted, scandalously-mistreated Glenn probably deserves most credit for that Le Tournoi triumph. In which Beckham showed early promising signs of that petulance that would work so well for him in future.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

That's worth some sort of prize

Hey hey hey.

Not complete humiliation. No.

[Geraint]

He was in an England side that slumped out of five different tournaments in complete humiliation.

Why doesn't he fucking retire?

yeah, he's just clogging up a first team place that could be used on a born winner like Jermaine Jenas or Kieron Dyer. oh no, hang on - you're talking utter shit. Giggs has just retired from international football having failed to qualify for a major tournament, should he take the blame for that as their most high profile star?

[Mr. Analytical]

yeah, he's just clogging up a first team place that could be used on a born winner like Jermaine Jenas or Kieron Dyer. oh no, hang on - you're talking utter shit. Giggs has just retired from international football having failed to qualify for a major tournament, should he take the blame for that as their most high profile star?

  My point is that Beckham's NEVER performed at an international level.  His supreme moment of triumph in an England shirt was equalising at home to Greece.  Greece.  At Home.  Equalising.  He'd talk and talk and be the world's most famous footballer but when it came time to actually play in a tournament it was "I'm fitter than I've ever been in my life but I need a bit of a rest... it was quite a long way from the bus to the changing rooms".

  Don't get me wrong, I don't think that if you kept him out of the England side then all problems would miraculously disappear, but I think that bringing him back was a serious backwards step particularly when there were much bigger and more pressing questions that needed answering.

  1) England's attack - Crouch can't get a game despite Rooney's form being atrocious and neither Owen nor Smith being fully fit and on their game.

  2) Frank Lampard clearly has some kind of psychological blackspot about playing in an England shirt.

  3) Steven Gerard is a precious artifact child who sulks if he doesn't get to play the attacking central mid-fielder role, he will also brief the media intensely in order to get said role despite the fact that a) he plays on the right hand side regularly at Liverpool and b) he can play a holding role incredibly well.

  4) We HAVE international-level wingers but whenever we stick them on we continue to play narrow and our full backs continue to sit back.

  5) Point 4 is largely due to the amount of churn in the side and poor training.  The fact that after Beckham left nobody was given the job of doing free kicks suggests that frankly, the behind the scenes training is a joke.  There's no tactical progress or innovation going on.


  Bringing Beckham back is a way of distracting the media from the fact that McClaren hasn't addressed ANY of these issues.  In fact, I'd argue that bringing back Beckham is an example of the England camp deliberately retreating to its comfort zone where it can rely on Beckham to hoover up the publicity and produce the free kicks while none of the tough questions get answered and nobody has to do any proper work to improve or change the side.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

Greece.  At Home.  Equalising. 

From 30 yards. In the 93rd minute. After carrying the entire team for 92 minutes. To get us to the World Cup.

[chand]

4) We HAVE international-level wingers but whenever we stick them on we continue to play narrow and our full backs continue to sit back.

Do we? Aaron Lennon may turn out to be a top player but at the minute he's like some kind of frenetic wind-up toy whirring around uncontrollably, occasionally doing something good almost by accident, and Shaun Wright-Phillips is adept at sitting on a bench and causing his stepdad to sulk unprofessionally in the studio at half-time. Beckham may be slow and unable to burn defenders off with pace and skill (although no more so than he was in his prime), but he's a pretty useful player to have in the squad at least, since he can actually provide an assist. If England played like Man United with goals from all over the shop making a hatful of chances every game we wouldn't need him, but sadly England are constantly below-par and we get suckered into slow, ponderous games where fuck-all happens. In those games it's useful to have someone who can whip a decent free-kick into the box. In the long term we need to find a way of playing actual good football, but until then we need someone like Beckham to help us fulfil our role as the Bolton of the international scene.

[Mr. Analytical]

We don't get "suckered into" playing dull football.  That's the way the national side naturally plays.  There are serious issues with creativity which, to me, speaks of organisational problems such as group dynamics (remember when Beckham was a "talisman"?  healthy teams don't need those) and poor player selection systems.

I mean, form seems to have no effect on whether or not you play in the England side.  Rooney's form has been shocking but he's still an automatic selection, as is Lampard.  Owen's played only a handful of games in the last year and gets selected ahead of other people and the whole way the team plays is fucked, doesn't work but nothing is done to address it.

I agree that Beckham deserves a place in the squad, he should never not be on the bench purely because he's decent at passing the ball and we invariably seem to end up clogging it up the pitch so that kind of player's useful.

Having said that, I honestly think that Beckham is a psychological crutch.  This is quite common for the England team, last summer it was the fitness of Rooney.  If everyone's concentrating on whether or not Beckham plays then there's less room in the press for wondering why Frank Lampard is still an automatic selection and why Gerard refuses to play a proper holding role for his country.

[jimmy jazz]

...and why Gerard refuses to play a proper holding role for his country.

Isn't it fair for Gerrard to complain? It's not like Jermaine Jenas is moaning, Gerrard is perhaps the best old-fashioned midfield dynamos in the world for Liverpool. In the middle he is something else, he doesn't stop working and creating chances. We also have Hargreaves and Carrick who are very good defensive midfielders. To tell him to shut up and stop complaining isn't fair, the man has earnt the right to play in the position he wants by being the best English player in the world but isn't allowed because of managerial incompetence. The team should be built around Gerrard, he is a true matchwinner.

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

Cut Out (One Of) The Middle Men
Whether Frank Lampard was actually injured against Andorra or whether, as is widely accepted, the injury was exaggerated after McClaren finally had the guts to drop him actually makes no difference. The fact is that it was done. Frank Lampard was left out. England won, albeit against poor opposition, and the midfield partnership of Steven Gerrard and a defensive midfielder (in this case Hargreaves) had paid off.


So it was nothing short of utter stupidity when, on Friday, McClaren decided to play Gerrard and Lampard in midfield together. As usual, a troop of former players, teammates and pundits came out to insist they could play together - seemingly without considering that if it was true, they probably wouldn't have had to make the same comments after every England game that the pair have played together in the last five years.


Most insulting to the intelligence of the people watching is the claim that the partnership worked - that "the balance was right". It was, I suppose, in that neither got in each other's way going forwards or left gaps at the back. But that was mainly because neither ventured out of their own half more than two or three times. And even then, the goal came because Gerrard failed to close down his man.


Whichever of them you think should start, the fact is they don't work together. It's something McClaren has all but admitted, not only when he left Lampard out in Andorra, but when he tried to shoe-horn him in on the left against Spain and when Gerrard was shifted to the right last year. But for some reason that's all been forgotten.


It will be interesting to see how this one pans out. Friday's boos would suggest most of the nation has come down on the side of Gerrard, and the vice-captaincy suggests he will not be left out. But McClaren has appointed Lampard's best friend as skipper; you can imagine the hissy fit there if 'Lampsy' was dropped. Unfortunately, with McClaren so weak he's scared to upset anybody, he risks upsetting everybody.

[Mr. Analytical]

Isn't it fair for Gerrard to complain?

  No.  It's the manager who picks the team and having players lobby for positions is an impossible state of affairs, though to be fair I think he only started doing that because of Beckham's ridiculous "I can play in the hole because I played there once for Real" spiel.

  I'd agree that on the basis of formand fitness, Gerrard's the only definite pick.  I think Hargreaves and Cole are bang in there too but neither of them are completely fit.

  Similarly, on the basis of form and fitness my first choice striker would be Crouch.  Owen's not fit, Smith and Rooney have terrible form and the others are largely unknown quantities, untested in big internationals.


Shoulders' article touches on my problem with the England team.  I think that it's institutionally sick.  Under Sven, it didn't matter how badly Beckham played, he was always picked and captain.  He also hung on to Emile Heskey beyond the limits of reason in the latter stages refused to make a tough decision about Lampard and Gerrard despite it being clear that they can't play together.

What England needs is a Mourinho-style manager who'll kick the bad habits out of them and tell them that either they play the way they're told or they can watch the game at home.

It astonishes me how little bottle England managers have and how cautious they are.  Does anyone honestly think that anyone would think less of Steve McClaren for dropping Frank Lampard?  the only people who might are the players and if they don't like it they can fucking join him on the bench.

there's too many chiefs and swollen egos.

[Geraint]

(remember when Beckham was a "talisman"?  healthy teams don't need those)

what the fuck were Alessandro Del Piero and a 75% fit Francesco Totti doing in the World Cup winning Italy squad then? what has Del Piero even done since 1998? How about Christophe Dugarry, a skilful but overall very ordinary support striker who won a world cup and a CRAZY amount of caps during France's successful spell, purely because he was Zinedine Zidane's best mate? and would Zidane have kept his place in the 2006 French side past the group stages, where he was terrible, if it wasn't for past glories and his 'iconic' status throughout world football? Gabriel Batistuta, the best centre-forward of the 90s, was dropped by an oridinary Argentinian side because the manager thought his long hair 'lacked discipline'.  Roberto fucking Carlos has about 100 caps for Brazil, he's hasn't even been very good at club level on a regular basis for almost a decade, and talented forwards would either win 80+ caps or just a handful based on what their manager thinks of the Brazilian club teams they're most closely associated with. Several massivel talented dutch sides have flopped at or failed to even qualify for tournaments because of internal arguments between 'the Ajax lot' and 'the Feyenoord lot', or even once 'the De Boer brothers' vs 'all the darkies'. Sorry if i'm taking your comments the wrong way, but you seem to be using Beckhams selection and perceived 'talismanic' status as an example of how woefully unprofessional England are compared with the countries that actually win stuff quite often. Surely all those examples above of players being selected or dropped for ridiculous reasons and daft politics illustrates that this is not the case? i haven't even touched on the 'special treatment' a lot of players get when they're an obvious superstar in a pretty weak footballing nation.

I also find it a little bizarre that you can recognise the 'serious issues with creativity' in recent england sides, yet your main solution seems to dropping beckham, their most creative midfielder and their leading provider by far when he plays (and i'll accept that at present that's a real 'best of a bad bunch' compliment) - the whole team lacks fluidity from open play so his set pieces and good crossing from deep take on far more importance than they would in an england side firing on all cylinders, surely?

[Mr. Analytical]

Actually the dutch national side is an excellent example of the problem I'm talking about.

A squad full of talented players who are completely incapable of playing together because of massive internal problems.  In the case of the Dutch it was club sectarianism and occasionally racism and in the case of England it's a weird gentleman's club set up where everyone's friends with everyone else and nobody wants to confront uncomfortable truths.

I'm not blaming Beckham for the problems, I'm saying that Beckham was an integral part of the culture that lead to us crahing out of the World Cup last year.  With a new manager it should have been time to confront some of those uncomfortable truths.  However, McClaren evidently accepted that Beckham simply can't play in tournaments and dropped him but rather than surging forward and confronting stuff like Lampard and Gerrard he stopped.  Now he's left with the same old internal problems but no Beckham... so he goes back to Beckham and we get someone who can whip in the odd free kick and the press forgets that the England team has massive problems that run beyond the issues of form and fitness and seem to contribute to a selection culture whereby form and fitness mean nothing.

[Beagle 2]

I think there were a few occasions it would have been sensible to leave Beckham out of the side/substitute him over the past few years, I think that this idea of having an undroppable captain is completely unnecessary anyway, and that at times they have been too rigid and 'head in the sand' about England's shape and selection.

But to suggest Beckham can't fit into the team anymore, that we would have got any further in competitions without him in the side is just confusing. Saying "he was an integral part of the problem" is all very fine and dandy but basically meaningless. it's not his fault when and where he's asked to play, and he definitely was - and remains - one of the best eleven players in the country and the bloke who should be behind all our set pieces if he's on the pitch. It's up to the management to get the best out of these players. What exactly do you mean "Beckham simply can't play in tournaments"? Players shouldn't be rushed back from injury, that much is true, but apart from that, I just can't see where you're coming from, any of you naysayers. What do you want? You're falling for the hype and expecting him to dribble it past people and score ten rather than plug away doing what a quality right-sided midfielder and set piece taker does.

What are your solutions Analytical? How different would the team you put out there actually be? Because I bet it's much the same as the one we go with tomorrow, give or take a couple of players, one of which it seems would be Beckham, who is playing very well at club level and put in a fine performance against Brazil. I don't see how this is any better. He should never have been dropped. There is no fucking amazing plan B that everyone's too blind to see, we're simply not good enough to be fucking about with ego's making silly points and dropping our best players.

This is not GD terrotiry is it, sorry!