Owen Pulls the Heart-strings and Button the Purse-strings

If you had to come up with a couple of characteristics uniting Michael Owen and Jenson Button, the answer would probably be openness and intelligence. Each of these young superstars presents an open face to the world, as well as a marketable smile. Each has a quick, shrewd mind. Neither is an angel but in general their behaviour does credit to those who have guided them through an environment of vast rewards and constant scrutiny. Yet now they are linked by question marks against their loyalty.

First it was Button who shocked the world of formula one by announcing, last week, that he would be leaving the BAR-Honda team, with whom he has worked wonders this season. At the end of the year, he announced, he will return to Williams, the outfit that gave him his break in grand prix racing when he was barely out of his teens.

He and his managers appear to have exploited a contractual loophole based on semantics - to be precise, the small matter of the difference between the terms "will" and "intend to" in the agreement made by Honda to supply engines to BAR. Button's contract is said to depend on Honda delivering engines and, in the opinion of his lawyers, "intention" is not a hard enough term to satisfy the requirement.

David Richards, the boss of BAR, believes that no loophole exists and is fighting Button's decision to leave. Given the way the world works, however, it would be more than a surprise to see him succeed if Button's mind really has moved elsewhere. Probably the best thing Richards can do is attempt to prove that he and his legal advisers do not write contracts with built-in loopholes, and then go for compensation.

The case of Owen is, on the face of it, more straightforward. His contract with Liverpool ends next year, at which point he would become a free agent. After a strangely opaque period in which there seemed to be a reluctance to take the first step, his agent and the club recently started to negotiate a two-year extension. Owen was prompt in publicly expressing his pleasure.

And then on Monday night came the stories that he was negotiating a move to Real Madrid, with Fernando Morientes or Samuel Eto'o, plus £10m, travelling in the opposite direction. The talks with Liverpool had stalled, it was said, over a single detail.

This time the opacity surrounds the true desires of Rafael Benítez, Liverpool's new manager, who is in the process of reshaping the team to suit his own plans. Does Benítez want to break down the locally-produced core of Gérard Houllier's team, in order to give himself something easier to mould? Or are Owen's advisers using the story of Spanish interest as a means to persuade Liverpool to concede a disputed contractual point?

Once money is involved, loyalty becomes a slippery commodity. But different sports perceive it in different ways, and no two could be much further apart than football and formula one. One is a sport of the people, in which there is a strong bond between the supporter and the club. When Tom Finney, for example, chose to stay at Preston North End throughout his career, he was adored for it. Grand prix racing also encourages fans to develop powerful relationships, but they tend to be with individuals. Juan Manuel Fangio switched teams every other season, purely out of self-interest, yet no one thought any the less of him.

Formula one is a world of subterfuge and intrigue, and many will admire Button for learning to use its techniques to his own advantage. In his case, the victims of any disloyalty will not be any segment of the public but those engineers and mechanics who laboured over the past 18 months to provide him with a car good enough to carry him to third place in the current championship. In the paddock, he will be viewed in a slightly different light.

Among footballers, however, a move is seldom seen as disloyal to the rest of the squad, the coaching staff, or the board of directors; it is a betrayal, first and last, of the season ticket holders. Even in the post-Anelka age, the players are expected to display some sort of unselfish identification with the fans.

If Owen goes, Liverpool's fans may decide that his contribution to the club has won him the right to a generous farewell. For Button, however, the only real difference is that he will be autographing differently coloured baseball caps next season; the hands that hold them out will be unchanged.