Portrait of Beckham defaced
(Agencies)
Updated: 2004-07-01 09:34

A photographic portrait of David Beckham at the Royal Academy of Arts was defaced by graffiti Tuesday, officials said.

A photographic portrait of David Beckham has been defaced amid lingering frustration among England fans after their team was knocked out of the Euro 2004 tournament. Beckham is pictured shortly after missing the penalty. [Reuters]

The vandals appeared angry with the captain of England's soccer team for his performance when the team lost to Portugal and fell out of the Euro 2004 tournament last week.

The words "You loosers" was written in indelible red felt pen on the 1.67-meter-tall picture of Beckham in an exhibition of pictures of the world's greatest living soccer players. The use of a double "o" in the second word may have been a double reference to "loser" and "Rebecca Loos," the woman who earlier this year claimed she had had an affair with the married England captain.

The words "Beckham and Meier, you loosers" also were scrawled on a wall opposite a portrait of Pele, one of the world's greatest soccer players, in an apparent reference to the Swiss referee Urs Meier, who officiated during England's Euro 2004 quarterfinal defeat to Portugal and disallowed a last-minute English goal.

The Beckham portrait was one of the most popular in the "FIFA 100 exhibition," which was designed to celebrate the centenary of world football's governing body. The list of the 125 greatest living players to feature in the exhibition was specially selected by Pele, the Brazilian superstar.

The Beckham portrait showed the 29-year-old star wearing a T-shirt and standing in a hotel corridor holding a soccer ball. It was taken earlier this year by the Scandinavian Mark Hom, a leading portrait photographer.

Beckham and his wife, former Spice Girl Victoria Adams, are two of the best known public figures in Britain.

But the England captain has been sharply criticized for missing two penalty kicks during the European Championships, one in the first match loss against France and the other during the penalty shoot-out against Portugal that knocked England out of the tournament.

The curator of the exhibition, David Grob, said staff at the Royal Academy of Arts had made a complaint of criminal damage to police.

"The picture is a write-off. We have reported it to the police and we will have to get another one printed," Grob said. "It is enormously irritating. We hoped the academy would inspire everybody to good behavior. You do not expect people to act like football hooligans. It is very frustrating."

Grob said the academy had sold about 10 full-size prints of the Beckham portrait for US$13,650 each, and about 30 smaller prints at US$610 each. "It has been our biggest seller," he said.

An academy spokeswoman said police were investigating the crime.

Pele had described the exhibition as a "fitting tribute" to the 100th anniversary of FIFA and a "wonderful celebration of the beautiful game." It is due to visit 12 other countries before finishing in Berlin in time for the World Cup in Germany in 2006

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