Question of the week: If Steve McClaren’s reason for not picking David Beckham is one of age, then why the devil is he trying to persuade Paul Scholes out of international retirement?

Back when it first happened, I had serious doubts that Beckham’s sacrifice was anything to do with football. It seemed too much like McClaren was trying to show he was his own man, stamping his authority on the squad at the expense of one of England’s better players.

And the news that the England boss has been begging Scholes to reconsider his retirement proves I was right.

Nothing against Paul Scholes, of course, who has been in excellent form for Manchester United and who would probably be a decent addition to the squad, but there is no denying one simple fact: Scholes is older than Beckham.

McClaren insisted he had dropped Becks because he was ‘looking to the future’ – which was a legitimate reason. But how can he possibly justify that when he tried not once, but twice, to persuade an even older midfielder to rejoin the fold?

So far I have been reasonably impressed by the way McClaren has performed as manager and I have found the majority of his decisions, team selection and tactics to be spot on.

But somehow this whole Beckham issue just doesn’t feel right – more personal vendetta than considered thinking. The new manager may keep insisting the door is not shut on a Beckham return, but it looks to me like it is shut, fastened, chained and bolted.

For the former England captain, the news that McClaren has been on the phone to Scholes must have hurt like hell.

And he doesn’t deserve that.

Friendly chat

I was chatting to my mate Ray last weekend and we struck up a deal.

Manchester United can win the Premier League title if, in return, Sheffield United can finish fourth from bottom.

Sounds fair to me.

Now all we have to do is persuade the other 18 teams to make sure that happens…

Stuart Pearce

It’s interesting to see how desperate people get when it comes to football.

Stuart Pearce was, as a player, one of the hardest men you could meet. He was full of passion, strength, determination and aggression. And, up until a couple of weeks ago, he seemed to have transferred all those characteristics into management at Manchester City.

But, after a poor start to the season, he has now started to put his faith into a small fluffy horse that his daughter gave him.

The young girl asked him if he could put the horse next to him on the bench for the recent home match with West Ham. Despite his tough guy image, he agreed. And they won.

Not that he is superstitious or anything, but after the half time interval in the next match against Everton, with his team 1-0 down, he came back out and “Beenie”, the horse came with him.

City went on to get a last second equaliser. And Beenie got the credit.

“Beenie has come through our academy system, or rather my daughter’s academy system, and he made the trip to Everton. Beenie got us a result today,” Pearce explained.

Rumours that the pressure could be getting to Stuart appear to have some foundation…

Lord Stevens report

I purposely left space in today’s column so I could take a look at Lord Stevens report into football bungs which was due out on Monday. I needn’t have bothered.

While the English football world waited with baited breath for the report, it turned out to be a less than exciting announcement. Of the 362 transfers he investigated, Stevens announced that 323 were clean.

The other 39, however, which involve a total of eight different Premier League clubs, will require further investigation which has forced the inquiry to be extended by two months.

Let’s be honest, I think we all know there is an element of corruption when it comes to transfers. Personally I think the fact that Lord Stevens has already shown 90 per cent of the deals he investigated to be clean is a positive fact.

Of the remaining 10 per cent I think you will find at least half of those are also clean which means we are looking at a figure of around one in 20 of all transfers that are dodgy.

Of course the figure should be zero as even a single bung is bad for the game. But at least the problem is not as widespread as some had feared. And that’s a positive.

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