28th August 2017
She was waiting to go on stage, the whole high-cultural world at her feet. With a sly grin on her face she glanced at the Daily Telegraph's birthdays column, a sure sign that she had Made It: "Miss Florence Welch, ballerina, 31".
All young women were still addressed as such throughout the Telegraph's pages, but she didn't mind that. It occurred to her, though, that she had never so much as seen Ed Sheeran or Sam Smith even mentioned in the paper, let alone as "Mr" in the birthdays column, even though the popular papers hardly seemed to write about anyone else. She wondered about her friends, who would often turn up at the Wells: Chris Martin, just retired as the man who had restored the central status of cricket in English life, the captain who, after leading England to regain the Ashes in 2005, had led them to win three consecutive World Cups. The best team in the world, no argument. It wasn't all people from his sort of background, though: Jermain Defoe, Daniel Sturridge, the great new hope Ruben Loftus-Cheek ... association football was as archaic as Mackeson stout to them.
Or what about James Blunt, ex-Army, Foreign Secretary and Tory MP for Kensington, now the party's safest seat? Even in Notting Hill, they voted for him. Or maybe Will Young and Tom Chaplin, loyal equerries to Charles & Camilla? She wondered what would have happened to their lives and careers had that Polish shot not gone in in the last minute shortly after her third birthday, thus denying England a place at the 1990 World Cup.
There was a near-universal consensus that not qualifying was the end, the point of no return. Gordon Brown had done his best to revive the game when he became PM in 1997 - people said that John Smith, had he lived, would have done better - but to no luck. She knew little about either sport, of course - neither was much covered in her world - but she was aware that gridiron football (most people just called it "football" these days) attracted crowds of 90,000 to Wembley, 75,000 to Old Trafford, 60,000 to the Emirates. Soccer was a sport for socialist diehards, maximum crowds of 20,000 in a good year for the Cup final at Selhurst Park, and very few of them under 40. In countries where it was still to the fore, La Liga had maybe ten times the TV audience. People had said this new Labour leader might bring about a revival, but hadn't they just flopped, dropping below 200 seats for the first time since WW2?
She remembered that she still quite liked Oasis, and wondered whether they might have been bigger - maybe platinum several times over rather than just going single platinum with their biggest album, and gold with all the others - if Poland hadn't scored in such a way. Their world remained very squalid. Certainly she never read about them in the Telegraph. She had vaguely heard of Hillsborough, but grounds hadn't changed that much. Not enough people came to justify it. Only last year a fan had been killed at Maine Road the night she performed with the Hallé orchestra, and it just got a line on page 14.
She knew that there was paranoia in the United States that their sport was being stolen, because that was acknowledged as part of the reason why that scary President Trump had won. In the 2016 Super Bowl, for the first time, there were more British-born players than American-born ones. Nobody had dreamt (it occurred to her that she still used this word but she didn't know anyone else who did) of that even a decade earlier. Loss of nation, loss of culture, loss of identity was a big thing everywhere. Promising to kick the Brits out of the NFL had been a big statement of intent for Trump. It wasn't going to work, of course.
She sat down for a while, and wondered. And then she went on stage, and forgot about it.
She was waiting to go on stage, the whole high-cultural world at her feet. With a sly grin on her face she glanced at the Daily Telegraph's birthdays column, a sure sign that she had Made It: "Miss Florence Welch, ballerina, 31".
All young women were still addressed as such throughout the Telegraph's pages, but she didn't mind that. It occurred to her, though, that she had never so much as seen Ed Sheeran or Sam Smith even mentioned in the paper, let alone as "Mr" in the birthdays column, even though the popular papers hardly seemed to write about anyone else. She wondered about her friends, who would often turn up at the Wells: Chris Martin, just retired as the man who had restored the central status of cricket in English life, the captain who, after leading England to regain the Ashes in 2005, had led them to win three consecutive World Cups. The best team in the world, no argument. It wasn't all people from his sort of background, though: Jermain Defoe, Daniel Sturridge, the great new hope Ruben Loftus-Cheek ... association football was as archaic as Mackeson stout to them.
Or what about James Blunt, ex-Army, Foreign Secretary and Tory MP for Kensington, now the party's safest seat? Even in Notting Hill, they voted for him. Or maybe Will Young and Tom Chaplin, loyal equerries to Charles & Camilla? She wondered what would have happened to their lives and careers had that Polish shot not gone in in the last minute shortly after her third birthday, thus denying England a place at the 1990 World Cup.
There was a near-universal consensus that not qualifying was the end, the point of no return. Gordon Brown had done his best to revive the game when he became PM in 1997 - people said that John Smith, had he lived, would have done better - but to no luck. She knew little about either sport, of course - neither was much covered in her world - but she was aware that gridiron football (most people just called it "football" these days) attracted crowds of 90,000 to Wembley, 75,000 to Old Trafford, 60,000 to the Emirates. Soccer was a sport for socialist diehards, maximum crowds of 20,000 in a good year for the Cup final at Selhurst Park, and very few of them under 40. In countries where it was still to the fore, La Liga had maybe ten times the TV audience. People had said this new Labour leader might bring about a revival, but hadn't they just flopped, dropping below 200 seats for the first time since WW2?
She remembered that she still quite liked Oasis, and wondered whether they might have been bigger - maybe platinum several times over rather than just going single platinum with their biggest album, and gold with all the others - if Poland hadn't scored in such a way. Their world remained very squalid. Certainly she never read about them in the Telegraph. She had vaguely heard of Hillsborough, but grounds hadn't changed that much. Not enough people came to justify it. Only last year a fan had been killed at Maine Road the night she performed with the Hallé orchestra, and it just got a line on page 14.
She knew that there was paranoia in the United States that their sport was being stolen, because that was acknowledged as part of the reason why that scary President Trump had won. In the 2016 Super Bowl, for the first time, there were more British-born players than American-born ones. Nobody had dreamt (it occurred to her that she still used this word but she didn't know anyone else who did) of that even a decade earlier. Loss of nation, loss of culture, loss of identity was a big thing everywhere. Promising to kick the Brits out of the NFL had been a big statement of intent for Trump. It wasn't going to work, of course.
She sat down for a while, and wondered. And then she went on stage, and forgot about it.
Last edited: