« Home | Sun-watch: Shameless Page 3. » | Sun-watch: Cowardly naming and shaming, and buryin... » | Blair must go. » | What's more important than 7 innocents killed in G... » | Sun, Star and Express-watch: Burying bad news. » | So. Farewell then Abu-Musab al-Zarqawi. » | Rendition flashback. » | Sun-watch: Yes, even more Lady Mucca. » | Give them what they want. » | Sun-watch: More "Lady Mucca". » 

Tuesday, June 13, 2006 

Sun-watch: Sycophancy will get you places.

Oh dear oh dear. The Sun is fuming after the German tabloid Bild (more or less the German version of the Sun) wrote some rather nasty things about David Beckham's family.

Germany’s biggest newspaper plumbed new depths in their attack on innocent family members of an international sports star.

Of Joanne, they wrote: “Dear me, she is chubby. Arms, bust, bum, all very British. Joanne is the sort of girl who drinks sangria on the beach in Majorca. And then dances on a table with her top off.”

They also accused her of not working but of being a “professional sister”.

Of Becks’ mum they said: “Mama-ham, Sandra, 50 - the superstar mother with the peasant smile.

“Ex-hairdresser, a Robbie Williams fan. After the divorce from Beckham’s dad Ted a kitchen fitter, she’s single again.”

“Beckham, who gets a salary of 8.5million euros a year, bought her a house in Loughton, Essex. In the same place, the little sister lives.”

The poisonous piece tried to be clever by describing the Beckham group at the game with the introduction: “As delicious kicker David Beckham, 31, sang the English national anthem God Save the Queen, he displayed his closest family on the stage next to him.

“Curtain up for the Beckham family ... trophy wife Victoria, 32, we already know.

“With England flags on her behind, litres of cola and popcorn under her arms, Popham (her nickname in Germany) planted herself directly near to her two Zwerge (dwarfs).”

Even then the articles could not lay off having a pop at defenceless Romeo, who has long hair.

It claimed one person asked a Bild journalist: “What’s the name of the daughter Beckham.

As I'm sure you're aware, the Sun has never ever published a critical word of Beckham's wife, former Spice Girl Victoria Beckham. The following is simply a figment of Private Eye's imagination:

On January the 15th 2004 Victoria Newton, the Sun's piss-poor showbiz editor revealed that she had received a copy of Posh Spice's "top secret" rap album. According to Newton, "Victoria murders the Beatles and massacres George Michael... rubbish... torture... embarrassing." For those more worried about the looks of Mrs Beckham, on the 25 March 2004 Newton compared a photo of Posh with one of Geri Halliwell, describing Victoria as "stick-thin... doing her lady of lesiure routine." The Sun's sister paper, the Times, also ran a rather less than pleasant article by Julie Burchill which began: "Why do I hate Posh? Let's count the ways, because few things are as much fun as kicking a bighead when they're down." Indeed.

The Sun asks at the end of the article:
While the England players’ wives and girlfriends include stunners like Posh Spice, Coleen McLoughlin and Cheryl Tweedy, can anyone name a partner of the German footie stars?

Apart from the fact that most England fans aren't much interested in the German team or German football in general, they have a point. After all, the Sun would never have been critical of any of those gorgeous stunning birds, would they? Coleen McLoughlin wouldn't be the same shopaholic queen of chavs that the Sun was printing photographs of as she left numerous shops, would she? The Sun's changing views on McLoughlin have nothing to do with sucking up to Rooney (Coleen's boyfriend) after they settled his libel suit out of court with the paper, or the fact that the Sun now wants to get behind "our boys". Cheryl Tweedy is the fiancee of Ashley Cole. That would be the same Ashley Cole accused of being a "rear gunner" and having a gay orgy by both the News of the World and the Sun, despite never having the guts to directly accuse him. As for Tweedy (for it is she), was it really only a couple of years ago that she found herself in court for punching a toilet attendant and calling her a "black bitch"? At the time the Sun referred to her as Cheryl Seedy, but that's all forgotten now.

Another insider said: “David and Victoria are furious. They thought this was all about football and didn’t come to Germany expecting to be ridiculed.”

Obviously not. Rather than leaving the families to get on with England's preparations though, the Sun's "Woman" section promises:
The World Cup footie gossip
We're watching the stars' wives and girlfriends
And while Joanne Beckham may be "Arms, bust, bum, all very British", the same can't be said for the current inhabitants of that other Sun obsession, the Big Brother house. The "life" section whets your appetite for the paper's coverage with:
The Big Brother babes in bikinis
Fame-hungry wannabes who flashed flesh
Still, maybe this will make up for the way the Sun got burned over their previous criticism of the England team, still probably in the memory of both the stars and coach. After an especially poor performance from goalkeeper David James a while back, the Sun printed a picture of a donkey and asked readers to phone in asking which they'd prefer to see between the two posts. The England team responded by refusing to speak to any reporters from the paper.

Share |

Links to this post

Create a Link