When your average 37-year-old player announces he has chosen to leave his club it is the sort of news that is greeted with a disinterested grunt by the football world.
Wherever he ends up for his final fling, David Beckham the brand is very much alive and kicking- James Calvert
But when that player happens to be David Beckham, the world sits up and takes notice.
Last week the former Manchester United, Real Madrid and England star said he would be leaving LA Galaxy in a couple of weeks when his contract comes to an end.
He has decided that six years is more than enough time spent showing Americans that football, as its name suggests, is actually supposed to be played with your feet.
However, what really got everyone’s juices flowing was when he said he has no intention of retiring and believes he still has one more challenge left in him, a comment that has sparked an international scramble for his signature.
Clubs in Australia, Russia, Brazil, China and even South Africa have all been smashing open their piggy banks and checking down the back of their sofas to see if they can scrape together enough cash to bring the Beckham bandwagon to town.
How many other players could command that sort of interest despite the fact that their best days are behind them? I can’t think of many. Actually, I can’t think of any.
The truth is, if this was a decision based purely on football, then few of these teams would be remotely interested.
All the skill is still there, of course, but the pace and boundless energy that made him such a formidable talent at his peak have been eroded by the years. Plus six years of League One standard football will hardly have kept him razor sharp.
But that’s the thing about Becks; when you sign him you are not just getting a footballer, you are also getting the most famous football icon of the past two decades.
And that alone makes him worth his weight in gold. Well, certainly marketing gold anyway.
What better way to raise your club’s profile that signing the most recognisable footballer on the planet, even if he is a little past his best? A player who only needs to change his hairstyle to make the front page of the newspapers.
At this point the only interested club that doesn’t really fall into the ‘desperate for attention’ category are Paris Saint German. But, as a relatively new member of Europe’s financial elite, they wouldn’t mind the credibility that goes with having a player of Beckham’s reputation on the books. Not to mention the merchandising boost that goes with it.
The interesting thing about this is that while the clubs all have their ulterior motives for signing the midfielder, Beckham himself is really only interested in the football side of things.
It’s certainly not about the money: if he never kicked a ball again he would still earn more in a month than most of us earn in a lifetime.
And that is why one of the conditions of his move is apparently that he must be a first-team regular and not just a marketing tool to be sat on the bench and used only in event of a publicity crisis.
Despite all the hype that has surrounded Beckham for the past 20 years, deep down inside he is just a lad who loves to play football. And he wants to keep that part of his life going for as long as possible, which is admirable.
Speaking personally, I would love to see him go back to England for a last hurrah. He more than likely wouldn’t make it into one of the top sides in the Premiership, but I’m certain he could do a job for a mid-table team, maybe push them on to qualify for Europe or something.
Realistically, however, I see him either going for the Paris option, provided he is given assurances of first-team football, or failing that, then probably somewhere like China, where he will at least believe he is doing his bit to promote the sport he loves.
Wherever he ends up for his final fling, one thing is for certain: While David Beckham the player may be on his last legs, David Beckham the brand is very much alive and kicking.
Roman wields his well-worn axe
At the beginning of the season, when I was trying to decide which Premier League manager would be first for the chop, I warned that neither of the two Robertos were safe.
Now one of them has gone, unceremoniously discarded by the ruthless Roman Abramovich, and the other one’s position is looking increasingly precarious after Manchester City crashed out of the Champion’s League at the group stage for the second year in succession.
But let’s leave Roberto Mancini aside for now as I am fairly sure there will be plenty to say about him in the near future. Let’s focus on Roberto Di Matteo, who lost his Chelsea job after less than a year and despite winning the FA Cup and Champions League double.
True, the club had not been on the greatest of runs with just two wins in their last eight games and their Champions League future is hanging by the thinnest of threads.
But it was only a month or so ago, after the 4-2 victory over Tottenham Hotspur, that the pundits were purring about the way Di Matteo’s table-topping team were maturing into a side that played effective and attractive football.
The simple truth is that Di Matteo was not going to last whatever he achieved. He was never Abramovich’s first-choice appointment and it seemed very much like the Russian was just waiting for an excuse to get rid of him. (Although it could be argued that Abramovich stuck to his word. He gave Di Matteo a two-season deal, and the Italian got summer and autumn).
What makes the decision to get rid of him strange, however, is that the man Abramovich really wants at the club – Pep Guardiola – is still not available. Which means we are now in the rather daft position of Chelsea having yet another short-term manager.
What makes this even dafter than usual, though, is that Chelsea have appointed as manager Rafa Benitez, who is ridiculously unpopular with their own fans. In fact, I would go as far as to say he is not just unpopular but hated by a large part of the Stamford Bridge faithful.
It’s hard enough for a manager at Chelsea anyway, knowing the owner changes managers like most of us change underwear, without the added pressure of being hated by your own fans.
There is, of course, the outside chance that Benitez could be a roaring success, win over the supporters with a quick start, grab a couple of trophies and earn himself a 10-year deal at the end of the season.
But I think we all know that isn’t going to happen. Come May the chances are Chelsea will be looking for their 10th manager of the Abramovich era.
I have to say I am surprised Benitez took the job. He knows he isn’t liked by Chelsea fans and he knows he is effectively only keeping the chair warm until Guardiola stops playing hard-to-get.
The Spaniard will deny it till the cows come home, but it seems like an act of desperation from a man still suffering from his Inter failure.
And I think he is sadly mistaken if he feels six unpopular months at Stamford Bridge is going to do much to enhance his CV.
(Spare a thought for Mark Hughes, by the way. Despite being overwhelming favourite to become the first managerial casualty of the season he couldn’t even win that. It doesn’t rain.)
sportscolumnist@timesofmalta.com
Twitter: @maltablade