I was wandering up Stourbridge High Street, in the West Midlands, on a grey Monday morning this week when I spied a TV crew walking towards me. Not a common sight in these parts. I raised a comradely eyebrow. “We’re on Bellingham watch,” explained the reporter. You see, Jude Bellingham, English football’s wunderkind – and apparently a lovely chap to boot – is from these parts. It wasn’t clear to me, or perhaps even the crew, what being on Bellingham watch entailed. What were we looking out for? Had word got out that he had popped home?
Like a meerkat, I peered into Pound Bazaar to see if he was in there, but no joy. Neither was he in Greggs. The news editor who had dispatched the crew had plainly concluded that on the morning after a brilliant performance the night before, there was nowhere else to be but on the kid’s home patch. Anxious to be of assistance, I pointed them in the direction of the nice chap in Timpson I’d been chatting to, who I knew at that moment was busy cutting some keys for me, thinking happily about Bellingham and England as he worked.
