Material boy meets Material Girl

It makes sense for a man who likes to be known as A-Rod to be dating Madonna, even if the singer herself vehemently denies it. After all, their egos would be cooing whatever the state of their libidos or their marriages.

A-Rod is Alexander Emmanuel Rodriguez (left), born in 1975 to Dominican immigrant parents in the Hispanic enclave of Washington Heights, north of Harlem. Few people beyond the USA know him because he is a baseball star and baseball is the 'American pastime'. But he is equivalent to a top soccer player, both in money and manners.

He cut his teeth on Dubya Bush's Texas Rangers and then went back to his home town to sign with the greatest team of them all, the New York