Regulars
SPORT
The emperor has no clothes

by Craig Turp
April 2005

Of all the patronising phrases that foreigners come out with when talking to Brits, the most criminal (and usually one of the first) is the classic “You’re English? David Beckham, very good player.”

This statement pisses the English off for two reasons. Firstly, it assumes that we think David Beckham is the epitome of Englishness, a wonderful individual and national hero loved and adored by all, as opposed to rather sad people who actually care what brand of jeans or shirt someone is wearing. Secondly, it assumes that we think David Beckham is a good footballer, which of course he isn’t.

The myth of David Beckham remains one of the most skilfully crafted marketing tricks in history. If for nothing else, Beckham deserves credit for forging a watertight reputation as the world’s greatest footballer, based on little more than smoke and whistles and magic illusions, and very little hard evidence. Well, it’s time the spell was broken: The emperor has no clothes. You read it here, in Vivid, first.

Of the many people who have fallen for Beckham’s conjuring act is Fernando Perez, the president of Real Madrid. Perez’s disastrous policy of signing the world’s most famous as opposed to best players has destroyed in two years the legend that is Real Madrid, nine time winners of the European Cup. Unquestionably, two of Perez’s early signings, Luis Figo and Zinedine Zidane, were footballing dynamite, and helped Real Madrid lift the European Cup in 2002. Then it all went wrong. Sound football thinking went out the window, and the lure of a footballer’s marketing pull began to outweigh his actual ability. Ronaldo, a gifted genius of a player who has never, alas, regularly delivered what he promised, arrived in the summer of 2002. Beckham arrived the year after. Neither has strengthened the team. Today, when their form is woeful, they remain fixtures in the team for one reason: their marketing value to a gullible Asian public that knows very little about football.

This season Real Madrid has been terrible. Beckham, Ronaldo, Figo, Zidane and even the usually consistent local boy and club captain, Raul, have been the main cause of the team’s poor form. Yet all five, known collectively as the galacticos, have guaranteed places in the starting XI every week. Michael Owen, that gifted English goalscorer, wilts on the bench, alongside Guti, the team’s would-be new leader. Guti’s story is endemic: an inconsistent centre-forward, he was converted two seasons ago into a midfield player of some promise. Given a regular berth in the team at the start of this season, as well as taking over the vice captain’s responsibilities, he performed well and was consistently the team’s best player and its on-field leader. Then, during the winter break, Perez decides the team’s midfield lacks strength. Tomas Gravesen arrives from Everton to beef things up. Who makes way? The woeful but marketable Beckham, or the brilliant but relatively unknown Guti? You, as they, say, do the maths. The Real Madrid leadership certainly did, and put the final nail in the coffin in the process.

Craig Turp edits Bucharest in your Pocket.