Morning:
8°c
Now then, now then, if anyone out there wishes to show appreciation for the saviour of the national team by way of some Christmas gifts, I advise an armchair laden with electronic gadgets, a box of giant Havanas, and the blingiest neckwear on the market.
It's the least he deserves, because there's an unmistakably Sir Jimmy Savile OBE flavour to the way in which he has fixed it for David Beckham to swap his sinecure at LA Galaxy for a seemingly imminent loan stint at AC Milan . . . a move that will enable Becks to retire, if ever he does retire, with spells of varying length and lustre at all three of the world's greatest clubs under his jewel-encrusted Armani belt.
From Milan's point of view, this arrangement is logical only in marketing and merchandising terms.
Head coach Carlo Ancelotti has the courtesy to claim that Becks “could play in every midfield position”, but it requires lateral thinking enhanced by acid to imagine the 33-year-old displacing Ronaldinho, Kaka, Clarence Seedorf, Emerson, Andrea Pirlo or Gennaro Gattuso in a team not riven by lack of creative talent, experience or virtuosity in the taking of free-kicks.
The deal is clearly designed to afford him the sort of glorified training regime Arsenal gave Beckham a while ago, rather than revive him as a first-team regular in one of the planet's more demanding domestic leagues.
Even so, there can no longer be much doubt about Capello's eagerness to extend Beckham's England future, if solely as an second-half substitute for Theo Walcott, to the 2012 World Cup.
If Don Fabio isn't willing in principle to take him to South Africa, he would hardly have pressured Milan to make Beckham an offer he couldn't refuse.
This makes perfect sense. Beckham may have the explosive pace of a rocking horse with rheumatoid arthritis, but his delivery from the right remains a precious option in games England need to turn around with 20 minutes remaining.
He could yet become the Sir Stanley Matthews of his generation because, weirdly and rather wonderfully, his appetite for representing his country only intensifies the wealthier and more feted he becomes.
Tempting as it is to speculate snidely about him going to Milan to sate his wife's passion for haute couture, once again he displays his commitment to what so often has looked a lost cause.
Several years after his friend Paul Scholes quit the national side, Beckham willingly embraces the indignity of spending months in AC Milan's reserves to ensure he overtakes Bobby Moore's outfield record of 108 caps.
He may even have an eye on Peter Shilton's all-time record of 125, and you'd be rash to put it entirely beyond him because this is the Terminator of international football.
Every time his England career is killed off, by an impatient media, unappreciative fans or a new coach — and it's happened half a dozen times since his red card against Argentina in France a decade ago — those metallic globules recoalesce and give it fresh life.
Long may he continue to deride his obituarists.
We need Beckham in the England squad, at least as much for the shining example of patriotic devotion he sets as his sporadic offerings on the England right, and Capello has done a typically wise thing in bringing his godfatherly presence to bear on those who owe him favours.
Mourinho still too willing to dive into a dispute
In a belated bid to reposition himself as football's George Washington, Jose Mourinho can no longer tell a lie about Didier Drogba. “I do not have to defend them any more,” declares the Inter Milan coach of his former Chelsea charges, “but I think it is correct if I say Drogba is a diver”.
And there we all were, worried sick that the Ivorian suffers a chronic inner ear disorder that plays merry hell with his balance.
Why Mourinho includes Robin van Persie among others he brackets in the Tom Daley category is beyond me, but this rare foray into veracity is as welcome as it's belated. Nothing makes the heart grow fonder for Mourinho than his absence.
If he moved a little further away than northern Italy, perhaps to the International Space Station, I believe I could grow to love him in time.
No way back if Spurs don't put on their Sunday best against Bolton
It is the reflex of the deeply traumatised to seek crumbs of comfort where they may, and yesterday's jaunt to Italy offered one of those to beleaguered fans of the club that provokes more daily hilarity than Sarah Palin.
In the sense that Spurs conceded just one penalty and picked up merely the one red card, the UEFA Cup defeat at Udinese was half as bad as that at Stoke, when they so memorably contrived a brace of each. Yet it would be irresponsible to cite this as an omen of dramatic improvement.
The absence from the bench of David Bentley, presumably punished by Juande Ramos for stating that the team is clueless, offers a hint about the state of dressing room harmony.
As for goalkeeper Heurelho Gomes, whose concession of that spot-kick invites an appraisal by a psychiatric conference, such is his confidence that if you sent a balloon in his direction, he'd nervily palm it towards the nearest striker. Then again he went a whole match without bursting into tears, which made a nice change.
The importance of Sunday's home clash against Bolton cannot be overstated. The subsequent fixtures are at Arsenal, at home to Liverpool and away at Manchester City. Anything short of a win on Sunday, and the gap between Spurs and 17th place could soon be immune even to the most lavish spending on strikers in January.
Barton's beacon will never be a shining one
Seldom since Jonathan Aitken settled the last instalment of his debt to society has any ex-inmate offered up such a cloying and unconvincing show of contrition as Joey Barton, who trots out a mea maxima culpa in an interview.
“I hope I can be a shining beacon for kids who have been in trouble,” he says.
“Hopefully young kids who look at squeaky-clean professionals like David Beckham and Michael Owen but can't relate to them, can relate to me.”
The flaw in his logic is plain to see. Any youthful oaf prone to committing acts of grotesque drunken violence who studies the parable of Joey Barton will assume that an absurdly-brief spell in jug and the nausea of the public are no barriers to resuming a lucrative career.
If he wishes his life to act as a deterrent, a new career as an estate agent in his native Liverpool would be rather more effective.
