Becks drops in briefly

MONEY machine David Beckham will be in New York this weekend to maximise promotion around the Super Bowl airing of the latest underwear commercial for his H&M range. Beckham is shown in his briefs zip-lining across London rooftops. The pre-publicity for last year’s H&M ad claimed a Hollywood celebrity homes tour bus had surprised Becks while he was filming dressed in his pants in Beverly Hills — but that turned out to be part of the ad.

JOHN SURTEES’ 80th birthday on February 11 is sure to reignite the campaign for him to receive a long overdue knighthood — especially as 2014 sees the 50th anniversary of his F1 world championship triumph with Ferrari, making him the only racer to win that title on two and four wheels. Sir Stirling Moss, who never won a world championship, described his old rival not being similarly honoured as ‘ridiculous, he’s a great Englishman’. MANCHESTER CITY’S financial accounts are by no means as easy on the eye as their free-flowing football. Ferran Soriano’s salary is not disclosed because unlike his £2m-a-year predecessor as chief executive, Garry Cook, the Spaniard is not a director of the club.

And the monster pay-off to Roberto Mancini and his entourage is not revealed either, being wrapped up in the extraordinary £233.1m paid in overall wages. A good proportion of the £30m wage increase from the previous year would have been handed over to Mancini & Co.

JOHN INVERDALE, who will present BBC coverage of the RBS 6 Nations, is also the early favourite to host the 2015 Rugby World Cup for ITV. Such high-profile roles point to Inverdale’s broadcasting career having survived the major blunder of saying on Radio 5 Live that Wimbledon champion Marion Bartoli was ‘never going to be a looker’.