She might not have been holding space for Brundle, but our man wasn’t going to dwell on that. He pivoted skilfully to Prince Salman of Bahrain, the McLaren top boy, who gave him a much more generous welcome. Back in the game.
Desperately pushing his way through the crowds in search of he knew not quite what, as if in some sort of terrible anxiety dream, Martin tried to talk to the back of a bloke who I think might have been the male model Jacob Rott. The back of Rott did not answer him, and nor the front of Rott.
I am hazarding an educated guess as to this individual’s identity, by the way, because F1 provides the media with a rundown of the celebrities who will be in attendance. It’s a tremendous mixture: on the one hand, a who-isn’t-who of influencers, grifters and nobodies, yet marbled throughout with some absolute greats of their fields – your Michael Douglases, the Catherine Zeta-Joneses, the Sir Mark Cavendishes of this world.
Also on this occasion, a good handful of England footballers who have sadly not attracted the attention of Herr Tuchel: Ruben Loftus-Cheek, Morgan Gibbs-White, Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall… the double-barrelled surnames perhaps gulling class-obsessed Monegasque organisers into thinking them posh?
Further to these, from the world of the performing arts and popular music, may we present for your delectation Dadju, Rampa, Pawsa and Reezy, names who will need no further introduction to any reader of His Majesty’s Daily Telegraph. Brundle dodged or missed many, but thank God for good egg Karen Gillan from Doctor Who, who very sweetly said: “Oh you are the legendary news reporter.” Martin, charmingly: “Oh no, I’m Martin Brundle from Sky Sports.” In a world of Erivos, be a Gillan.