Stewart Francis' Beckham Jibe Wins Edinburgh's Best Joke

When asked by the Bbc what makes a good joke, Francis said "a clever one-liner is succinct, to-the-point and you just move on to the next one. No harm, no foul." He claims not to have thought about the contest when he was writing his show for the comedy festival "I was just doing my act and I had the good fortune of it finding favour with some people so that's great in that sense. I just sit down, talk to myself a wee bit and words just kind of pop into my head; words that we all use. I just choose to put them in a sentence and see how it plays out."

On the subject of controversy in comedy, Francis said "I do jokes that are close to the bone. I don't make a theme of it, you just get in there, drop your little nugget and move on. I don't dwell on it."