James Lawton: A final day of grace for George, a beloved and tragic figure who enhanced our lives

'Wayne Rooney is blessed with the talent of Best without the curse of his glamour'

When Edith Piaf, the little sparrow who sang hauntingly of her lack of regret, was buried in Paris, they adorned her coffin with a single flower and a battle ribbon of the Foreign Legion. In Brazil, the streets were jammed when they said farewell to both Garrincha, the enchanting little winger who might have been a model for George Best's self-destruction, and the obsessively driven motor racing star Ayrton Senna.

No doubt there will be a similar outpouring of emotion in George's native Belfast today when he is taken to a place of honour in Stormont. They will throw flowers on the street.

We can be equally sure of the reaction this will provoke in those quarters where it is held we have turned into a nation of cloying sentimentality when we put aside the problems that assail our own lives and families and take to the streets with flowers and cards and candles in an orgy of deflected grief.

It will be said that the mourning of George has been excessive, a significant echo of that which accompanied so uncontrollably the tragic death of the Princess of Wales, and also that it has been unmindful of the true nature of his life, his failures and his betrayals, of himself and others.

Perhaps, in the way of a last farewell to someone whose flaws did not prevent him leaving a legacy of courage and beauty in that which he did best, playing football of the gods, there is a brief duty to defend not so much his life in all its aspects but the great dignity of those who have been willing to express the depth of their sorrow at its passing.

All kinds of people who had been touched by him one way or another have been saying that something they remember so vividly has gone out of their lives, and will almost certainly never be replaced - something that belonged in another world, an innocence, an exhilaration, a belief that anything was possible.

It has been, at least for so many of his generation, a little death of their own. He has reminded them of what he had and what he lost and, really, are there so many who can say truly that in one respect or another they could not have done better with their lives? Best, like the little sparrow, sang that he had no regrets and he persuaded some that everything which followed his football career was some wild celebration of what happened, with such sad but unforgettable brevity on the field of play. This was transparently not so, and the louder he protested the clearer it was.

A degree of honesty does not take away the sting of his parting because if in many ways George failed himself, he did not lack assistance. Indeed, perhaps the most enduring impact of what he achieved as a footballer of such breathtaking precocity, is that what happened to him could never quite occur again.

Paul Gascoigne, the most naturally gifted player bred in these islands since Best and before Wayne Rooney, destroyed himself quite as methodically, it is true, but his own testament speaks of an instability of nature that no amount of shepherding could have protected.In fact, Gascoigne had the benefit of the intelligent concern of Terry Venables, his manager at Tottenham, who once spoke of his fear that when he looked into the face of the young Gazza he saw the potential of it to resemble the sad expression eventually worn by another infinitely gifted young player in his charge, Diego Maradona in Barcelona.

The recounting of Best's experience, the way he was plunged into the celebrity life while still living in council house digs, has underlined the degree of care now being exerted at his old club.

When Sir Alex Ferguson walked on to the Old Trafford pitch carrying a wreath for Best this week, he could do so without the need for a moment's reflection on his own performance as the guardian of outstanding young talent. He raged against the meanderings of another finely talented youngster, Lee Sharpe, and when Ryan Giggs was hailed not as an exciting prospect but the new Best, he threw down a protective screen that shielded the Welshman utterly from the worst effects of instant celebrity.

Such a security mechanism is now firmly in place as Rooney promises to outgrow some not-so-remarkable follies of youth and graduate to a stardom built almost entirely around the extraordinary nature of his talent. Rooney is blessed with that talent without the curse of Best's glamour. Curse? In his day, you have to say that was the effect.

Such considerations, though, should perhaps be kept in the margins for at least one more day - a final day of grace for the memory of a beloved and tragic figure, one who at whatever long-term cost to his own, enhanced our lives. If football had a battle ribbon, we know where it would be best placed today.

Meddling clowns turn long-suffering clubs into a managers' circus

Portsmouth's Milan Mandaric juggles the poisoned chalice of the manager's job. Newcastle's Freddy Shepherd looms over the embattled figure of Graeme Souness. Southampton's Rupert Lowe considers elevating a man of no significant football experience to the stewardship of a club that has become the despair of its fans. It is probably too much to hope that any of them will stop for a moment and consider where they have gone wrong.

It is really so simple. They should briefly scan the records of upper echelon football and see if they can find a story of success that involves a hands-on chairman - someone poking and prying in the belief that he has a real idea of the mechanics of football success, of which players to buy and which not to indulge.

They will not find one. It would be best if they devoted a moment to consideration of the page the fabled inside forward Len Shackleton devoted in his autobiography to the collective wisdom of the football directors. It was left quite blank.

Every major club in this country has been shaped by football men of authority given, at least in the formative stages, complete control of team matters: Manchester United (Busby and Ferguson), Arsenal (Chapman, Graham, Wenger), Leeds (Revie), Liverpool (Shankly, Paisley, and now Benitez), Chelsea (Mourinho), Spurs (Nicholson.) When Ipswich Town were a significant club it was when Sir Alf Ramsey and then Sir Bobby Robson held the reins.

When the Revie years neared their peak, one Elland Road director asked: "Why is it that the manager gets all the praise around here?" He had to be told that it was because Revie had been allowed to get on with the job he was best equipped to do.

It is such a basic principle. Whenever any of the commercial titans who take over football clubs make appointments in their own firms we know that they seek out men of maximum experience and drive. It's called protecting the business.

But then when it comes to football they believe they can walk in off the street and know precisely what to do. The unsuccessful ones, this is. The smart ones adhere to the self-evident truth that in any successful operation there is no substitute for knowledge and experience.

Shepherd, Mandaric and Lowe might like to see themselves as champions of the people, characters with the drive and the wish to make football dreams come true. Reality paints a different picture. It is of meddling clowns.

Only zero tolerance of thuggery will redeem rugby's reputation

The latest outbreak of thuggery in rugby is redeemed only by the possibility that French club Biarritz may sue the South African captain John Smit on behalf of their wounded player Jerome Thion.

Thion has a fractured larynx courtesy of a Springbok elbow. For decades this sort of thing has happened in rugby without causing a flicker of a doubt in the belief that it was an intrinsic part of a tough, rough sport. Police who swoop on errant footballers as a matter of course seem to go along with rugby's tolerance of violence which would not be permitted in the street.

The game argues, of course, that this isn't the street, this is a highly charged collision of strong men - and must be judged in this light. It is an absurd little outcrop of spurious machismo. Breaking somebody's larynx with your elbow has no legitimate place in any sport.

Rugby is supposed to be a professional game, a claim which more than ever is looking like a macabre joke.