AFTER Ramon Calderon, the indiscreet and excitable president of Real Madrid, said last weekend he would try to make David Beckham’s stay in Spain a longer one, a newspaper published a striking cartoon. It caricatured Calderon as a bodyless, faceless man, a pair of legs in suit trousers and the rest of him a garlic. Not a clove, but a whole bulb, its roots turned upwards as if they were his hair. It was a diverting and rather Daliesque sketch. A short caption was enough to make the point - this was how seriously the Beckhams, committed to a future in California, would take Calderon and his new idea. And everybody got the reference: this, the garlic, was how Victoria Beckham sees Spaniards.

With Mrs Beckham and Spain, the smell of garlic has never gone away. Early in her husband’s four-year stint here, she was quoted as saying something about Spanish people reeking of garlic. The quote made headlines, did the rounds, stuck in minds, kept reappearing. From time to time since, she has made sweet public utterances to the effect of how much she and her family like Spain. But the initial impression stayed.

David Beckham won much of Spain over, his wife less so. Beckham’s first few months at Real Madrid would be the most scrutinised, and the absence of Victoria, working elsewhere, was deemed curious and in some places – like the gossipy Richard-and-Judy equivalents on the weird planet of daytime Spanish TV - disapproved of.

Beckham himself looks back now on what has been a sometimes chaotic professional life - “six head coaches” - in the same breath as a jumpy Madrid life - “four different houses” - although the family have all been in Madrid since 2004. Beckham says he has enjoyed the fact that his two older sons have grown up for 3½ years with two languages and a strong outdoor culture. Romeo and Brooklyn have been enthusiastic spectators at Real matches.

To Spaniards, the Beckhams were fascinating and distant. Some patriots felt chuffed when the Beckhams came here, giving the city of Madrid a front-page profile. And there’s a vast appetite for celebrity in Spain, and within it a discomfort about being able to claim few global A-listers as their own. The hunger resides not so much in tabloid newspapers as in magazines and a television industry that produces a steady supply of the type of show that can keep Rebecca Loos, a Spanish speaker, employed years after the “event” that made her famous.

The Beckhams’ leaving has attracted a few sneers, with some mutterings that America is more Victoria’s target than her husband’s. Calderon called David Beckham a “half-baked actor” six months ago, referring to his decision to commit his next five years to a career in the United States.

A language issue has coloured the way Beckham was perceived by a wider public, beyond Real Madrid fans. His command of Castillian was not such that he was ever going to appear on many chat-shows. After his second year with Real, the club’s director of football, Arrigo Sacchi, described his limited Spanish as “a major setback for a man who should be a leader”.

Beckham’s Spanish has since got a good deal better: His friendship with Raul, the Madrid captain and Spain’s highest-profile footballer, has not been built on sign language. Last week he spoke to more than 200 journalists only in Spanish . . . for 65 whole seconds. He made two mistakes: one wrong gender, and if you were a stickler, an incorrect verb. He said only two words in English in those 65 seconds. As for the rest of the press conference . . . well, it was almost all in English.

And if the phone-ins and the blogs have been largely complimentary of Beckham on his departure, the language thing got to some folk. “Verguenza,” boomed one man on local radio. “It’s an embarrassment. Four years here, and he can’t do his last press conference in Castillian.” “I’m shy”, said Beckham during his 65 seconds, “and it wasn’t so bad, was it?”

Explore Football

• Premier League

• Football League

• Scotland

• European Football

• International Football

• TheGame

• Live Match Tracker

• The Fink Tank

• Fantasy Football