David Beckham Lovers

MARKO Arnautovic has been called many things during his short career, but maybe never David Beckham.

Consider it done now, Arnie, because you can go on to be another Becks, or Stoke's version at least.

Technically, the comparisons are obvious to anyone seeing the way the 24 year-old Austrian wraps his right foot around a football.

Whether it be crossing from the flank, or taking aim with the kind of free-kick he buried at Old Trafford, appropriately enough, the similarities are evident.

And he seems to have a better left foot than Becks.

Mark Hughes also said after Arnie's fine showing against Newcastle on Saturday that he had rarely seen a better player when it comes to crossing on the run, a talent at Beckham's disposal because he didn't always have that burst of pace to leave his full back standing.

Arnautovic is also starting to show the strength, bravery and temperament that once turned Beckham into such a fine player.

There have been question marks over Arnie's temperament, maturity and attitude, but there was for Beckham too before that infamous red card at the 1998 World Cup proved a watershed in his development as a character as well as a player.

He doesn't have Beckham's energy and physical endurance, but those could yet lie within his grasp at his current rate of progress since swapping intermittent appearances in the Bundesliga with more regular showings here in the Premier League.

There are even early signs that Arnie can eventually become the kind of talismanic presence for Stoke that Beckham so famously was for club and country.

The connections between the two are still relatively tenuous, granted, but not impossible to conceive if Arnie matures into the kind of player and character lying well within his capabilities.

Launch his own brand of fragrances, and start strutting around Hanley in a thong, and the deal is well and truly sealed!