WHEN I arrived at The Emirates Stadium last Saturday, the press lounge was crammed with football's A-list.

Now, I like to think of myself as a man of the world and one not easily given to over-excitement, but even I wandered through the door and giggled like a schoolgirl.

'Wow! There's Stan Collymore! And look! There's Marcel Desailly!'

The posh seats were the same, rammed with managers from other clubs and foreign nations. Arsenal against Manchester United was the hottest ticket in town and everyone wanted to be there.

Everyone except for Steve McClaren, that is.

No, Second Choice Steve decided to fly out to Los Angeles to check the condition of David Beckham.

And indeed, where better to gauge an international footballer's fitness than at the Home Depot Centre for LA Galaxy against...erm...the Hollywood United Football Club.

Yes, just hours after a thrilling climax to the biggest Premier League game of the season, McClaren settled down to watch the former England captain rattle two goals past a team containing such luminaries as the guitarist from Def Leppard and someone called Anthony LaPaglia in a 12-4 victory.

London or Hollywood? Where would you go on the company expenses? We all like to take advantage of the perks of our job, and it's nice to see that McClaren is just like the rest of us.

A biro here, a stapler there and maybe an all-expenses trip to Los Angeles as well, it's endearing isn't it? And it obviously worked because yesterday afternoon, Beckham was back in the squad.

Regular readers will know that I have never wavered in my support of Mr Posh Spice.

I thought he was hung out to dry after the World Cup, needlessly dropped from the squad as a muscle-flexing exercise for the manager and, when he was finally brought back into the side, his crosses opened up the packed rearguard of Estonia like a tin of sardines.

He is a consummate professional and still a very good footballer.

HOPELESS QUEST

However, is anything to be served by his recall other than his hopeless quest for 100 England caps?

Eliminated Israel are not going to beat a superior Russian side desperate to qualify, are they?

We're as good as out of the European Championships and if McClaren thinks that hauling a barely fit right-winger back into service is going to change anything, he's quite clearly mad.

We may as well go the whole hog and give Gary Lineker a chance to equal Bobby Charlton's goalscoring record as well.

McClaren was the man who dropped him and started the pointless chain reaction that led the former Manchester United star to abandon top-flight football and head for Tinseltown.

If he'd been less hasty, less keen to 'make his mark', none of this would have happened.

I respect the fact that he admitted his mistake and brought him back in May, but this mea culpa has gone too far now.

We're all but out of the European Championships and it's about time people started accepting that. Even if, by some ludicrous freak of football, we do sneak into the tournament, we need to look forwards, not backwards.

This is an opportunity to test out players for the future like the recently chastised David Bentley.

McClaren's England reign has been characterised by ridiculous decisions.

Perhaps it's appropriate that it will end with one as well.