As England captain David Beckham was doing his best to defend himself against accusations that soccer had become an afterthought in his diary behind celebrity interviews and sponsorship photo shoots, several of his interrogators were sipping from Pepsi cans emblazoned with an image of him dressed as a gladiator.
Such is the confusion that arises when you try to distinguish between Beckham the brand and Beckham the man that even he finds it difficult to explain or differentiate.
On the one hand, he seems to crave a life away from the paparazzi lens but on the other, he has consented to so many endorsements you can no more escape his image during a cosy chat in a Lisbon suburb with the man himself than you can at a London underground station.
Even so, it was difficult to withhold all sympathy as he described a lifestyle that, he said, prevents him driving his two sons in the park without a fleet of photographers for company.
What Beckham does not seem to comprehend is that most England supporters could not care a jot about his celebrity lifestyle or his alleged affairs. They care only about the toll those problems have taken on his soccer career, leaving him not only visibly drained on the pitch but a shadow of the inspirational captain he once was.
Throughout Euro 2004, he denied any fitness problem and, perversely, his obvious inability to shuffle up and down the right wing led some observers to conclude he was deliberately restraining his attacking instincts for the good of the team when the truth was that he was simply worn out.
He admitted: "We don't do as much conditioning work in Madrid as we did at (Manchester) United. I didn't feel as fit in the second half of games as I did the season before and maybe that spilt over into this tournament."
He is aware that knives are being sharpened, but nooses were being tightened around his effigy after he was sent off against Argentina in France 98, another game lost on penalties.
He reasons that as he recovered from that to become a national hero, his recent difficulties should not prevent him reinventing himself again
Such is the confusion that arises when you try to distinguish between Beckham the brand and Beckham the man that even he finds it difficult to explain or differentiate.
On the one hand, he seems to crave a life away from the paparazzi lens but on the other, he has consented to so many endorsements you can no more escape his image during a cosy chat in a Lisbon suburb with the man himself than you can at a London underground station.
Even so, it was difficult to withhold all sympathy as he described a lifestyle that, he said, prevents him driving his two sons in the park without a fleet of photographers for company.
What Beckham does not seem to comprehend is that most England supporters could not care a jot about his celebrity lifestyle or his alleged affairs. They care only about the toll those problems have taken on his soccer career, leaving him not only visibly drained on the pitch but a shadow of the inspirational captain he once was.
Throughout Euro 2004, he denied any fitness problem and, perversely, his obvious inability to shuffle up and down the right wing led some observers to conclude he was deliberately restraining his attacking instincts for the good of the team when the truth was that he was simply worn out.
He admitted: "We don't do as much conditioning work in Madrid as we did at (Manchester) United. I didn't feel as fit in the second half of games as I did the season before and maybe that spilt over into this tournament."
He is aware that knives are being sharpened, but nooses were being tightened around his effigy after he was sent off against Argentina in France 98, another game lost on penalties.
He reasons that as he recovered from that to become a national hero, his recent difficulties should not prevent him reinventing himself again
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