David Beckham thanks fans in Sydney after the exhibition match against Sydney FC. Photo / Getty Images
Paul Smith is in Wellington for David Beckham's flying visit, the buildup to Saturday night's LA Galaxy clash with Phoenix and the match itself.
Let's get the confession out of the way first: I'm a Beckham fan. Always have been, ever since he scored that goal for Man U from the halfway line.
Nothing has changed my mind, not the sending off against Argentina in the '98 World Cup, not the dodgy
sarong-wearing incidents, not even the decision to leave serious football behind and join LA Galaxy.
There are Man United supporters who will tell you he was no good when he played for them, and England fans who wanted him gone long before he won his 99th cap last week.
There are also those who snigger that he is stupid and he only married Posh to further his brand.
But the fact is this: he was, is and - for a while longer - will be a great footballer.
When he's on the pitch, things happen. He finds the man in the box that no one else noticed was there, or he threads through a delicious pass, or he scores one of those amazing free kicks - just as he did last night against Sydney FC.
If you watch him interviewed, it's clear he's not going to win a Nobel prize for literature any time soon, but he just seems like a nice, balanced guy who loves football and cares about his kids.
Which, when you think of the worldwide adulation he enjoys, the crazy money he is paid and his international A-list celebrity status is pretty amazing really.
(The hotel where he stayed in Sydney even noted that unlike most of the celebs who stay there, he didn't come with a list of demands and he turned down a top-of-the-range suite in favour of a similar room to his Galaxy teammates.)
In travelling Down Under, he has stepped far outside the heart of the soccer world - though, being based in the US nowadays, he'll be used to that - but Sydney appears to have gone wild for him.
What will be interesting over the next four days is how the capital of a rugby nation, which prides itself on knocking down tall poppies, takes to the global superstar of football.
