Is David Beckham any good? Discuss.

David Beckham is hardly beyond criticism (he took a hammering in the press after the Portugal game) but I'm really starting to question if he is any good these days...period. He has become a marketing phenomenon, the great untouchable in the English game. If he looked like Paul Scholes, would he have been dropped by now? Against Austria (watched with just a handful of fellow Brits thanks to the ridiculous $20 entry fee charged by the pubs, apparently something insisted upon by Setanta and out of their hands), he seemed limited to firing 50 yard passes every time he received the ball, 3 out of 4 of which failed to find their target and simply resulted in handing back possession cheaply. He has never had much pace to be fair, but we are let down by having a wide midfielder that is singularly unable to beat a defender with a quick dash to the byline. Whilst he has unrivalled ability to whip in crosses, (not that he showed it yesterday) this skill is wasted when England's key striker stands at barely 5 feet 7 inches. I get the impression that people who don't follow the game closely think Beckham is the greatest player that ever lived, and those that do watch him regularly are very aware of his failings.

And don't even get me started on Frank Lampard....