Thaindian News

London, July 16 (IANS) David Beckham says there was a literal reason behind naming his newborn daughter Harper Seven.

According to the soccer ace, the unusual name is an amalgamation of Harper Lee, the author of his wife Victoria’s favourite book “To Kill A Mocking Bird”, and his own former shirt number ’seven’.

Dismissing speculation that they named Harper Seven after a character from Disney TV show “Wizards Of Waverly Place” or even Harper’s Bazaar magazine, he explained: “A lot of thought goes into our children’s names and Harper was a name that we’ve loved for a long time for a couple of reasons.

“One reason is Harper’s an old English name which we loved and one of the other reasons was Victoria’s favourite book is ‘To Kill A Mocking Bird’ and the author was Harper Lee. It’s a very strong, passionate book. That’s where Harper came from.”

The footballer went on to admit that his former shirt number seven, while he played for Manchester United and England, had also played a strong part in them choosing Seven as a middle name for the newborn, reports thesun.co.uk.

“And then Seven you know, a lot of people have assumed its just because of my shirt number that I wore for many years and part of it is because I had so much luck around wearing that number, wearing it for England, wearing it for Manchester United. It was such an influential number throughout my career and a lucky number… but that wasn’t the main reason.

“So we love the name, we love Harper Seven. We’re very proud of having her in our lives and in our family and it’s an amazing time for our family right now,” added the proud father.