In the early days of the World Cup, with the group stage underway and the world’s eyes locked on Qatar, the host of soccer’s biggest championship was eager to take advantage of the spotlight shining on its tiny desert nation.
To sell itself to the world, Qatar had spent millions of dollars on celebrity endorsements, including agreements with a battalion of former soccer players who could speak to fans with street cred and in a common language. Now, the time had come to roll out its biggest signing, the one star in its arsenal in a league of his own: David Beckham.
So during a midweek lunchtime, plans were drawn up for Beckham and several other ex-players to show up at a fan zone set up close to Doha’s bayside Corniche. There, they would greet fans and be interviewed by an employee of the organizing committee on a specially built stage. Beckham’s team agreed to the request that he attend but set two conditions: his presence was not be announced ahead of time, and reporters were not to be alerted.
The event was a dud. The fan zone at Al Bidda Park was so deserted at the arranged time, in fact, that the event was canceled, even though Beckham and the others were already backstage, according to multiple people familiar with the plans.
The curious incident, though, was emblematic of the unusual relationship between Qatar and Beckham. It is a partnership with a pitchman who rarely pitches and an arrangement that has shadowed, rather than showcased, the host country. But it also has produced a strange reality in which one of the world’s most recognizable celebrities is at once everywhere but also nowhere.
Beckham’s face is plastered on billboards all over Doha. He appears in advertisements on television during halftime breaks and in social media feeds promoting a pass to access cultural events in Qatar. He also has been spotted in the V.V.I.P. stands at World Cup stadiums, and he was filmed visiting the England team before its elimination.