David Beckham a wimp?

LOS ANGELES: Bullies had it in for David Beckham when he was a teenager. Rather than going out and getting rowdy with them, the soccer star preferred to stay in and watch football, as a result he got tagged as being a bit of a wimp.

"There was a bullying side to starting sport so young because you're not going out. On Monday at school people would be like, 'You stayed in, you played football'," said Beckham.

When Beckham was 16, he had temptations, he admitted.

"Friends wanted to take me down to the corner shop to get a bottle of cider and stay out for the night. But my instinct was to stay in, watch 'Match Of The Day' and prepare for a Sunday league game," www.hollywood.tv reported.

"Last year I bumped into those same people, and they were like, 'Can we come and watch you play in Madrid?'"