Word.ws English Dictionary

bend it like Beckham

Syllables: bend it like Beck·ham/ˌbɛnd‿ɪt laɪk ˈbɛkəm/

bend it like Beckham verb: to kick a football (soccer ball), especially during a free kick, in a manner which causes it to move in a curve rather than in a straight line.

bend it like beckham: to kick a football (soccer ball), especially during a free kick, in a manner which causes it to...
Image: Regular Daddy, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Verb

bend it like Beckham (third-person singular simple present bends it like Beckham, present participle bending it like Beckham, simple past and past participle bent it like Beckham)

  1. (intransitive) To kick a football (soccer ball), especially during a free kick, in a manner which causes it to move in a curve rather than in a straight line.
    • Bud [a dog] harried the ball across the garden. He dribbled it with his nose, bending it like Beckham.2002, Jenny Oldfield, “Saturday, May 26th”, in My Little Life: When Shah Went Weird, London: Hodder Children’s Books, Hodder Headline, →ISBN, page 37
    • The whole of England held its breath as [David] Beckham stepped back, looked up, paused, and, well, bent it like Beckham into the top corner. The nation's roofs lifted off. […] I too leapt into the air and jumped for joy when Beckham's shot hit the back of the net.2002, John [Peter] Sugden, “Five Past One, September 2001”, in Scum Airways: Inside Football’s Underground Economy, Edinburgh; London: Mainstream Publishing Company, →ISBN, page 177

Forms of bend it like Beckham

third-person singular presentbends it like Beckham
present participlebending it like Beckham
past participlebent it like Beckham
pastbent it like Beckham

Origin of bend it like Beckham

From bend + it + like + Beckham, referring to the skill of the English footballer David Beckham (born 1975) in kicking a football with a curling shot. The term was popularized by the title of the film Bend It Like Beckham (2002).

Questions about bend it like Beckham

What does bend it like Beckham mean?
Bend it like Beckham means to kick a football (soccer ball), especially during a free kick, in a manner which causes it to move in a curve rather than in a straight line.
What part of speech is bend it like Beckham?
Bend it like Beckham is a verb.
How do you pronounce bend it like Beckham?
Bend it like Beckham is pronounced /ˌbɛnd‿ɪt laɪk ˈbɛkəm/ (UK).
What is the past tense of bend it like Beckham?
The past tense of bend it like Beckham is bent it like Beckham.

Words near bend it like Beckham in the dictionary

  1. bencoves
  2. bencyclane
  3. bend
  4. bend dexter
  5. bend down
  6. bend it like Beckham
  7. Bend of Islands
  8. bend one off
  9. bend one's elbow
  10. bend over
  11. bend over backward

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: bend it like Beckham (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-bend it like Beckham.wav, LL-Q1860 (eng)-Naomi Persephone Amethyst (NaomiAmethyst)-bend it like Beckham.wav.

Cite this entry: “bend it like Beckham.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/bend_it_like_beckham. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.