But if I could have found a safe place I would have shouted them down; a zone of immunity like a football pitch, where players perform to the crowd but are kept out of reach by security. But Beckham, ever the target of vile abuse, never took that option.Eric Cantona needed to hear only one idiot to fly into the stands, but Beckham could listen to a thousand voices questioning his sexual practices and barely bat an eyelid. It takes strength to do that, and to cope with a rapacious celebrity interest many times greater than that which drove George Best to drink.Old Trafford loves its renegades like Law, Cantona and Keane, and Beckham became bracketed with them because of the reaction of others. Privately, we may have thought he looked a prat in a sarong, inwardly we seethed when he got himself sent off against Argentina in the World Cup, and we could do without the posing as a fashion icon, but when the opposition hordes vilified him he became elevated to near-martyr status.It began from the moment he made it to the first team.

In his first game, in September 1994, United were lambasted by Port Vale for sending an under-strength side to the Potteries, and how we giggled when a team of unknown names such as Beckham, Scholes and Neville (Gary) won 2-1. Suddenly we had reason to believe that the whispers about the kids might have some grounding.Butt, Scholes and even the other Neville, Phil, made it to the Premiership ahead of Beckham, yet as soon as he arrived the beauty of his passing was apparent. A new Gerry Daly, I thought, which for all the qualities of the will-o’-the-wisp Irishman, became faint praise when Beckham scored that goal from his own half against Wimbledon The date should be remembered: 17 August 1996. It was the day he was transformed into the extraordinary.Posh, Diego Simeone, even Sir Alex Ferguson, have occasionally seemed like props as the boy David became the world brand Becks, and Old Trafford might have rung to dissenting voices on days when the style seemed more important than the substance, had the visiting bile not made it vital to support him.And he does have the terrace hero’s capacity to dig out something special even on the dog days. A cross whipped in, or a free-kick that bends and breaks the hearts of defences.

Look back on his time with United and the lasting images will be of expectation whenever he had the ball, and the slightly bemused grin on his face when he delivered.Like Best, he is too pretty fully to win over a Mancunian crowd and that, added to his over-concern about image, is perhaps why there is a slight ambivalence about his going. If Cantona had been transferred there would have been riots, but with Beckham, adored as he is, the mood is that itis good business.He was never one of us, but on most days we wished we were him.. England’s head coach Sven Goran Eriksson goes on holiday today frustrated at the refusal of his demands for a minimum of four weeks between next season’s FA Cup final and the start of Euro 2004. The Football Association has confirmed the date of the final as 22 May, only three weeks before the opening game in Portugal on 12 June. A Premier League spokesman said that the delayed finish was because Champions’ League and Uefa Cup games had been split into separate weeks; even though there are fewer Champions’ League matches under the new format, there will be more midweek dates overall.As recently as last Wednesday, after England had improved their chances of qualifying for the finals by beating Slovakia at Middlesbrough, Eriksson emphasised his determination to have a month’s preparation. He said that the freshness the team showed in the second half was because of the combination of “rest, holiday and work” they had enjoyed since club football had finished, adding: “At the end of the season, we are almost dead.” The FA’s post-mortem on the last World Cup conceded that England tired considerably as games wore on, failing to score a single goal after half-time.If England make it to Portugal, their problems will be even worse should one of the four Premiership Champions’ League entrants reach the final.