As soon as the general election of October 1974 was announced, a trainee journalist on a local evening paper wrote a high-flown intro to a front-page story proclaiming that the eyes of the nation were turning to Northampton. The speculation was that the main party leaders, Harold Wilson, reinstalled as prime minister, and the deposed Ted Heath would both pay visits to the town before polling day to try to conquer two marginals: Northampton North and South. They did arrive – on successive nights – on which the novice interviewed Heath and shook hands with Wilson.
Nonetheless, that overblown sentence did cause a certain amount of ribbing from my colleagues in our favourite bar, Shipmans. But, aged 22, I had already been allowed to cover the less-than-decisive election eight months earlier, so must have performed well enough to be allowed another crack – even though there were complaints from a Labour candidate, a Liberal and two Tories, all of whom thought my copy was a bit too cheeky for the Northampton Chronicle & Echo. But I got away with it.
And it started a lifelong journalistic love affair. Though I have covered hundreds of actual sporting events, I have always regarded elections as the most exhilarating sport of all. Not for me the world-weary sigh of Brenda from Bristol, told by the BBC that Theresa May had just called the snap poll of 2017: “You’re joking! Not another one!” Fifty years on, I’m still infatuated.
And I have been privileged to play some sort.