Rob Blackhurst

Our sideways look at seven days in the press.

Rob Blackhurst

Sunday April 28, 2002

Observer.co.uk

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Alas, a sharpened pair of Italian Stilettos pricked the tabloid dream of an extended romance between two Swedes we think of as our own. We will never know the sums they could have made through joint endorsements of worryingly "live" yoghurts and self-assembly furniture. The mood must have been black indeed at Hello! Magazine as their plans to accompany the sweethearts on a herring trawl in the Baltic came to naught.

But the grey-beards and grand dames of Wapping were never in any doubt that Ulrikka's dream of setting up Sauna with Sven would disappear as inexorably as the ozone layer over Stockholm. What chance did a whinnying former weather girl have against the smouldering Nancy - a woman credited with every feminine wile plus a handy knowledge of contract law? Mills and Boon tales of Nancy's vice-like grip over Sven were everywhere, but the Mirror should surely be praised for a diligent foray into her childhood. "I remember a party we were at" recalled a "friend" conveniently available for media comment "The theme was primitive man. All of a sudden, the doors opened and there she was, hanging tied to a poll and being carried into the room by two men. She was dressed in a skimpy Jungle Jane leotard".

Yet the winning partnership was a combination of ice and fire. Sven's claims to be the coolest man alive were confirmed as the paper's revisited his civilised confrontation with Nancy's ex-husband emerged. The smitten Swede apparently popped round for pasta with the couple before announcing to that he was cuckolding the ageing lawyer's wife. This unflappability was on show throughout, as even the indignities of swapping his bespoke garb for what resembled a somewhat cheaper viscous-polyester mix in the form of the Burton's World Cup Suit didn't threaten his ice-cool demeanour. And Sven could be confident that his affair with Ulrikka would do his reputation in the dressing room no harm. "I don't think it will harm the respect he receives from the players - if anything, it could help it" Arsene Wenger leered.

The post-match analysis was simple. While Sven was maintaining the aching silence of the whatever might be Swedish for fjords, Ulrikka was singing like a canary. The entire Jonsson clan seemed to have spent most of the week on the phone to a tabloid hack. Imagine Sven's shock: decades after leaving the confines of rural Scandinavia for Rome and London, he finds himself bamboozled into marriage by a Swedish tribe. At first it was all fairy-tales and candy-floss: "I think she thinks Sven is the kind of person who will give her the kind of stability she is after long-term" her step-father cooed. Ulrikka's intimidatingly named mother, Gun, was preparing for nuptials: "she's very happy with Sven". But the winsome blonde herself was already sensing a rat. With Norris McWhirter skills of recall, her "friends" managed to repeat an perfectly honed soundbites to the Mirror: "Sven is behaving like a lying cad and like the worst kind of Tory politician caught with his trousers down".

As if on cue, the hang-dog features of Stephen "Nobbing" Norris peered out from the Mirror. Sven's seductive powers are now the stuff of legend, but the fleshy former Transport Secretary surely went to far when he pimped on behalf of her Majesty: "win the world cup and you can even date the Queen". Still, old roue Sven is not entirely averse to clasping the bosom of the establishment, according to the testimony of a comely Telegraph journalist "He was suprisingly attractive close-up, bearing a passing resemblance to Kevin Costner - and spent a good part of the interview checking out my legs" Christa D'Souza breathily confided: "I was touched when he not only said goodbye but slipped me his personal mobile phone number".

By Thursday, though, the long in the tooth Lothario turned up at Highbury with Nancy looking decidedly chastised. Finally, Ulrikka realised what she was up against and variously "threw in the towel" "proved no match for Nancy's Latin Defences", "lost a heavy-weight bout" and found that the "Love Match" had a final score of Italy 1, Sweden 0

"I am no longer part of this relationship" she vicariously sighed through another of her "friends". So what were the long-term implications of Sven and Ulrikka for New Labour? The Dulux dog from Henley, Boris (unrelated) Johnson MP saw an open goal: "If it all goes wrong for England in the world cup, there is one man who's role should not be forgotten. It was Alastair Campbell who recklessly and shamelessly introduced them to each other at a party - he even boasts of the fact - with all the tragic inevitability of a man introducing the iceberg to the Titantic. "Don't blame Ulrika when England crashes to defeat at the hands of Nigeria. Blame the Labour government."

The bagpiping cupid's darker side was on display this week through the memoirs of "Call me Mo" Mowlam. She was also feeling the sting of rejection at the hands of Downing Street hardmen for "daring to be more popular than Tony Blair". Choosing to spill the beans to that well-known socialist organ, the Daily Mail, she movingly chronicled her love for the great man turning sour. "We had always got on pretty well. During our early years in London, we were friendly enough with Tony for him to offer us his old kitchen table". But Mo had never had much time for Cherie. "I know enough lawyers" she tartly observed.

As the commentariat lined up to denounce Mo, even Mo herself could barely resist joining in - Monday was only the first day of the serialisation, but she already seemed to even be boring herself: "this feels like an extended moan, but it should not be read as that. I am proud of having been a Cabinet Minister in the Labour Government and proud of what it has achieved", wrote Mo in the Mail.

Given that, it was difficult not to agree with Robert Harris in the Telegraph that Mo had earmed her £350 000 fee by being distinctly Pooterish. There was certainly something sublimely messianic in her remark "Everywhere I went at Labour Party Conference in 1998 people wanted to stop and talk and touch me". Her complaint about the withdrawal of her Police Protection was like a duchess lamenting the loss of servants: ""you're driven everywhere and they collected the dry cleaning and did the shopping".

But there was serious news this week as the French electorate's jilting of Jospin was one of the few stories grave enough not to turn into a cross-channel spat. Everyone wisely agreed that Jean Marie Le Pen's routing of Lionel Jospin in the French Presidential Elections demanded some penetrating soul-searching. Unless you were a columnist, of course, in which case it provided convenient evidence to back up your off-the-shelf theory. Tony Benn in The Mirror said the French left were too right wing, Don Macintyre in The Independent said they hadn't modernised enough; the Telegraph blamed the EU; Hugo Young in the Guardian blamed the voting system. Meanwhile, the BNP might have seen their ranks swell enormously this week - not because fascism is spreading like wildfire through Europe - but because legions of our finest investigative reporters trundled off to infiltrate their nearest cell.

Good Week For…

Ageing DJs

The oft-predicted British "rock invasions" of America seemed a distant prospect this week when it emerged that for the first time since 1963 there are no British singles in the US top 100 chart. Finger-on-the-pulse Classic FM DJ Paul Gambaccini had the run of the Daily Mail to bemoan our pop failures, with a desperate plea for us to return to the glory days of the Smashey and Nicey years. We wouldn't dream of questioning the Daily Mail's right to recognise the brilliance of the Beatles - even if it is much keener now on the Fab Four than it was in the 1960s. But when only the Spice Girls, Elton John, Eric Clapton have seemed capable of challenging the Mariah and Britney hegemony, the real lesson is that British music must be in pretty good shape if the Americans aren't buying it - even if the brilliant adoptive Brit Kylie Minogue has enjoyed massive State-side success with Can't Get You Out of My Head.

Bad Week For…

Afghan parking permits

ITN War Correspondent Julian Manyon encountered an unusual danger in a war zone this week when he was marched out of a front-line base in Afghanistan in a row over car parking. The Daily Telegraph claimed that Manyon took umbrage when Afghani guard Abdul Jallil refused to let him park his beige Mercedes inside the main base. The 5ft 3 Afghan Guard told the 6ft 5 inch hack "If you leave that care there, I'll slash the tyres" Manyon allegedly retorted: "You do that and I'll smash your face in". Jallil complained tohis American seniors, who sent the red-faced reporter packing. "He was a big man but he didn't frighten me" said the former Northern Alliance soldier, "I have fought against the Taliban"