Now win the real one, Harry
England welcome party,
There will be bread and circuses for the masses at this World Cup, and there was bread and salt for the England squad as Russia tried to wrap its political enemy in an embrace that was part awkward, part sincere, as hostilities were suspended for five weeks.
After 23 members of the United Kingdom’s diplomatic staff were expelled from Russia over the fallout from the Salisbury poisonings, eight new visas have been issued by Moscow for British consular staff for the four weeks of this tournament. This thaw will last only as long as balls are still being kicked around, but it affirms football’s remarkable power to transcend politics – when politicians want it to.
England’s regulation pretournament open day featured local children, dignitaries, heavy metal and a sacred Russian ritual: the presentation of a loaf of bread with accompanying salt cellar and samovar (tea pot) to Gareth Southgate and Harry Kane, manager and captain, by a woman in national dress. The idea is that you break off a piece of the bread and dip it in salt before consuming. One guide to Russian etiquette warns: “You should not refuse, or the host would be greatly offended.”
There were enough Russian police and plain-clothes officers on hand to deal with any offence that might have been caused on either side. Some patrolled on rooftops as the over-egged rituals of a trade delegation visit vied with bristling police activity to set the tone. A three-year-old boy called Artur Shvarcz presented a ball to Southgate and other youngsters climbed trees beyond the fences to view their guests. Those inside watched England’s players run through training, minus Marcus Rashford, who had a “knock”.
On the surface, this could have been any other England visit to Eastern Europe, but this one is coloured by worsening relations between London and Moscow. Lindsay Skoll, minister and deputy head of mission at the British Embassy in Moscow, insisted there was no trepidation about England’s presence in Russia so soon after the Novichok attack in Salisbury and subsequent retaliations on both sides. “To be honest, no, and that’s because this is the culmination of two years of really hard work,” Skoll said. “I mean, seriously hard work, and preparation at every level, whether that be consular, press, working with the Football Association really closely, working with the Russian host government and authorities. So, genuinely, this feels like we’re in a good place.
“I don’t doubt the sincerity of the Russian government and the Russian people here. I’ve been struck by how authentic that feels – coming off the train yesterday in St Petersburg. And just today you can see how popular the England team is. I think there was always a feeling that if England didn’t play for whatever reason then it wouldn’t be quite the World Cup.”
Skoll’s staff brought along representatives of three charities who, she said, offered “a really good chance to open Russian eyes to some other issues” – a children’s orphanage, a cancer survivors’ trust and a disability group for children with cerebral palsy. The frictions, however, are always evident, a point underlined by FA chief executive Martin Glenn and chairman Greg Clarke sitting on their hands while the rest of the Fifa Congress applauded the arrival of Vladimir Putin yesterday.
Skoll said: “This is a really good chance to highlight the stuff that I know Russia makes a Fifa commitment to Fifa about – [for them] to walk the walk.”
The deeper awkwardness will become apparent only when England start playing games, and we see how many England fans show up. But British officials have
spent two years preparing, and a suspension of animosity is clearly in place.
“Of course we’ve got disagreements with Russia. That does not change, but I can honestly say we’ve had a really great degree of cooperation between both sides,” Skoll said. “If I look at the policing, for example, it’s been really first class – and again that’s been two years. We’ve had lots of Russian football police in the UK and vice versa. I’m taking a roaming embassy team to all the England match venues. As part of that, we take out specialists, British police spotters for example. And this is all part of the trust we’ve built up between us.
“I know a lot of people have majored on the expulsions and how many people we lost. We had 23 expulsions from Moscow. A lot of them were experts and consular trained, and people were right to have a degree of concern. But what we’ve been able to do is work with the Russian government. I’ve secured extra visas. I’ve got really top people flying in, so, therefore, I’m very confident I can take out a very good consular team – as good as it would have been – to all of those match venues.
“We have a very good ops centre set up in Moscow, connected to London, and we have other emergency teams on standby.”
Risk has been mitigated, Skoll said, to the level of any Olympic Games or World Cup. The imponderable is whether a football tournament can make any long-term difference to Anglorussian relations. Soon, for example, the British embassy’s St Petersburg office will be shut on Vladimir Putin’s orders. “It will officially close before Aug 1, so it will be open for the duration of the World Cup,” Skoll said.
In Volgograd, Skoll will join FA officials and supporters’ groups in laying a wreath to the war dead of Stalingrad. “What you see here in terms of enthusiasm for the England team isn’t manufactured,” she said. “It’s sincere, and the more we do to show that – particularly when political tensions exist – I think [it] will bring out that shared history.”
The loaf was a nice touch – but it seems every country here is being given one.