Beckham - Legend

In these days of greedy footballers, its refreshing to see a highly paid pro give his entire contractual salary to a charity.

Nice one Beckham

Biggest legend ever.

I've never really liked him but you can't argue with this gesture, a real gentleman.

Mmm, nice of him but it's all about the publicity. Charity wins but lets not call him St David, just yet.

Don't be delusional. Beckham knows exactly what he's doing when it comes to relinquishing his salary to a charity in Paris. He already is earning £25m a year in endorsements, without lifting a finger and he contractually agreed with LA Galaxy before he left a percentage share of their merchandising (i.e shirt sales) for the next few years, seeing as while Beckham was there, shirt sales rose by over 62%.

The Beckham brand needs no money, hence why the £800k a month from PSG will be going to charity.

I said at the time, that I understand that he doesn't need the money, but the fact is that I imagine most footballers would have taken the salaries. Did Rooney really need the extra £100k a week when he threatened to leave? No, but he snatched it up. Beckham might not need the money, but it still should be commended that he is giving so much money for charity and is playing football to play football.

In the same way Bill Gates is praised for giving so much away, even though he's still left a multi-billionaire.

Well done Beckham, a great gesture, about £3.3 million is the size of the donation.

Crimey wrote:I said at the time, that I understand that he doesn't need the money, but the fact is that I imagine most footballers would have taken the salaries. Did Rooney really need the extra £100k a week when he threatened to leave? No, but he snatched it up. Beckham might not need the money, but it still should be commended that he is giving so much money for charity and is playing football to play football.

In the same way Bill Gates is praised for giving so much away, even though he's still left a multi-billionaire.

This.

So Becks may end up with £20m+ for being the face of the world cup 2022 in Qatar and PSG are owned by an investment arm of the Qatar goverment.

Brand Beckham. Can't believe people still fall for it but a charity gets some money so everyone wins i guess.

I couldn't care less about endorsements, shirt sales, brands, PR stunts. None of that matters. How do those things directly affect our lives? They don't.

Giving his salary to a kids charity directly improves the kids' lives though.

It's that simple so why the cynicism from some quarters?

If peope are that bothered about folk getting super rich and only looking out for themselves, give some money to Oxfam or something. It might make you feel better.

Whether Beckham will still earn money or not, you cannot criticize him for donating a lot of money to charity.

It's like when Michael Schumacher donated $1 million to Hurricane Katrina, people were having a go saying that it was like £50 to him.

Well have you donated your £50? No. So you cannot criticize.

I don't anyone who's actually critized Beckham for donating money to charity, I certainly wouldn't. But it just seems very odd to donate money to charity and hold a press conference to announce it.

The next time I donate money to charity, I should place an ad in the local newspaper to make sure everyone knows.

They didn't hold a press conference to announce that he was donating money to charity, they held the press conference to announce the signing of Beckham. Press conferences for new signings aren't that unusual.

They held the press conference to announce the signing of Beckham and also to announce that he was giving money to charity.

By the way, I've been a Man Utd follower since 1977,. and in no way have a problem with Beckham. I was sad to see him sold to Madrid but telling people that you're giving money to charity is good PR, and has a "Look at me and how good I am" feel about it.

Nobody has criticised him for giving the money to the charity but there has been negativity and cynicism about the bigger picture.

John's post from above:

Don't be delusional. Beckham knows exactly what he's doing when it comes to relinquishing his salary to a charity in Paris. He already is earning £25m a year in endorsements, without lifting a finger and he contractually agreed with LA Galaxy before he left a percentage share of their merchandising (i.e shirt sales) for the next few years, seeing as while Beckham was there, shirt sales rose by over 62%.

The Beckham brand needs no money, hence why the £800k a month from PSG will be going to charity.

It's missing the point and focusing on something that is really of no importance whatsoever to anybody's life.

£25m a year in endorsements? If that figure was lower, I'd still have to go to work.

He'll earn a percentage of merchandising even though he's left LA? If he wasn't earning that extra money, my coursework wouldn't write itself.

Shirt sales rose 62%? My brother's need to get the kids ready for school in a morning neither rose nor fell in relation to that news.

Whether one thinks it's a PR exercise or a genuine gesture, it doesn't matter - just soak it up for a second or two, then go and do something that's actually useful. Beckham did.

And this:

but telling people that you're giving money to charity is good PR, and has a "Look at me and how good I am" feel about it.

Who cares? I need to make dinner. And the kitchen floor needs cleaning.

The next time I donate money to charity, I should place an ad in the local newspaper to make sure everyone knows.

Atila, if I saw an ad in the paper saying you'd given money to charity, I'd probably not give it a second thought and move on to something interesting, and I think you'd understand that.

I wouldn't care about your salary, how much you could afford to give and I certainly wouldn't care if placing the ad made you feel better about yourself.

Again, it makes no difference to anybody's life.

The charity and the people who benefit from your donation would be very thankful however because giving the money makes a big difference. That's something that has been changed - these people's lives, and they've been changed for the better by the action of giving. Too many people like to advertise, comment on and, more often than not, criticise things that other people do.

They get so bogged down in this that the act of doing something themselves is being lost under it all.

Beckham gave, people who needed it received. If everybody who has criticised this (and equally those who have praised it) gave just a quid instead of commenting on it, the kids would have been helped even more.

I should add that this isn't aimed at John or Atila in particular, I don't know either of you and you could be like a modern day Mother Theresa/Jane Tomlinson figure for all I know, just the general cynicism and criticism that seems prevalent today in lieu of people doing something themselves, criticism that appears on occasion to have taken more effort to research than a simple nice one Beckham would have done.

I hear the French TV Station 'Canal' are doing a 'Beck-cam' for tonight, and I see the BBC are doing a live text commentary. It's flipping over the top. Here's an extract from the BBC:

"David Beckham has just taken his coat off. He cannot be too warm, does this mean a debut is coming shortly?"

Mark 12:41-45 The Widows Offering

Jesus sat down opposite the place where the offerings were put and watched the crowd putting their money into the temple treasury. Many rich people threw in large amounts. But a poor widow came and put in two very small copper coins, worth only a few cents.

Calling his disciples to him, Jesus said, “Truly I tell you, this poor widow has put more into the treasury than all the others. They all gave out of their wealth; but she, out of her poverty, put in everything—all she had to live on.”

Just saying