Scarlett Thomas: Ooh, Becks, I'm missing you already. So step forward James of Lancashire

While the name Gazza still conjures up the masculine dregs of Loadsamoney, Posh 'n' Becks are as woman-friendly as L'Oréal

A nation holds its breath and waits. Will David Beckham, England's most famous sporting icon, soon be leaving Manchester United for Real Madrid? According to some commentators, Beckham's relationship with Man U manager Alex Ferguson is at an all-time low. There was the flying boot incident, and now, it seems, Becks isn't even making the team. In Manchester United's recent crucial matches, he wasn't in the starting line-up. Could this have been the final humiliation? At the end of the last match, Becks, who had come on briefly only in the second half, took off his Man U shirt and waved to the fans. Was he waving goodbye?

The Beckham era began, for me, one evening in 1996 while I was watching football on TV in my one-bedroom flat in Westcliff-on-Sea, thinking about giving up my rubbish job to become a writer. If I was a proper football geek I would remember exactly what match I was watching, but I can't. I think it may have been Manchester United against Wimbledon. I do, however, remember seeing this blond midfielder scoring a goal from somewhere near the half-way line and thinking, "Wow, could this be a new Paul Ince?" I was a big fan of Ince at the time, and still feeling the vague flush of excitement from Euro '96. This was the time of Gazza, Teddy Sheringham, Eric Cantona, Baddiel and Skinner's Fantasy Football and, of course, "Three Lions on a Shirt" (which still makes me cry every time I hear it).

Perhaps Euro '96 was the beginning of the era that Becks would eventually come to represent. There we all were, in a country laid to waste by Margaret Thatcher, with barely any industries left except the creative ones. Is it any wonder people suddenly became rather serious about British art, films, pop music and, of course, football? How all this culminated in "Vindaloo" is still uncertain, but it did. Football songs became popular. Young male novelists such as Nick Hornby wrote about football (and pop music) to great acclaim. After Becks scored that amazing goal, everything seemed to change. Women liked football. They even understood the offside rule (it wasn't hard, it turned out). Football, David Beckham's football, turned out to be rather, well, fluffy.

This was, after all, a footballer who wore skirts, and whose hairstyles were copied by men who, once, would never have considered a hairstyle at all, visiting the barber with only a number – 1, 2 or 3 – in mind. This was the footballer who married a Spice Girl and became part of a duo as well-known as salt 'n' vinegar (or even salt 'n' Lineker). Posh 'n' Becks.

The darlings of Heat, Hello! and celebrity magazines worldwide, we've seen them wear matching clothes, go shopping, get married, sue to retain their brand names and, of course, have babies. And those brand names and their dum-de-dum combination are important. The footballer with the weird voice and the Spice Girl, also with a weird voice, have mutated into a three-syllable phrase known by everyone in this country. While the nickname Gazza still conjures up the masculine dregs of the Loadsamoney era, "Posh 'n' Becks" is a gossip magazine phrase: a phrase that is as woman-friendly as Maybelline or L'Oréal.

Yet, somehow, this was the era in which I lost interest in football. As other women got excited about Becks, I became bored with the celebrity culture he represented. And, in the real world, football will never be as fluffy as Posh 'n' Becks made it seem. England is as known for its football hooliganism as it is for its pop stars and sports heroes. Many women, while enjoying the Posh 'n' Becks phenomenon, will not go to football matches because they are too dangerous – or too expensive. There are rumours that if Beckham goes to Real it will be for something like £38m. That's obscene, but it is the price of celebrity culture. Anyway, cricket is now my main sporting passion. It's always been much more of a women's sport. It was a woman who invented overarm bowling, after all. And in what other sport do players come off the field, eat cake and then go back on again?

Cricket is not only more exciting than football but far less tainted by celebrity. Some people have even said that James Anderson of Lancashire could be cricket's David Beckham. Just don't tell the celebrity magazines.