Public Relations affects England soccer lin-up

ROD LIDDLE writing for the Times Online reports that:

".... it is assumed, probably correctly, that Beckham’s defenestration from the England set-up was a judgment based more on public relations than on Beckham’s apparently declining ability on the football pitch.

A new manager who began the job tainted by his association with the discredited previous regime asserted his supposed independence by dropping the player most closely connected to Sven-Göran Eriksson — the player Sven would never drop, no matter how hopelessly he was performing. Steve McClaren seems not to have the slightest intention of picking Beckham, no matter how catastrophically his first-choice XI perform."

The interesting part of this is a media comment that recognises a PR strategy into the management mix. The important part is that it shows how important it is, even for a Football star, to have a public relations strategy.