If you had been queuing up to buy tickets at Wimbledon yesterday, then you might have been forgiven for doubting your eyesight to see none other than the Princess of Wales appear. Like a fairy godmother, she was there to distribute the first few tickets to those who had already been waiting, in some cases, for several hours that day.
Princess Catherine – or Kate Middleton, as she was popularly known in her former, non-royal capacity – was wearing a suitably stylish pale blue linen suit in her quest to bring a touch of stardust to SW19 on the fourth day of the championships. She bantered with the thirsty and weary tennis fans and told them, in a splendidly English touch, that ‘you must be desperate to get in and have a drink’ after queuing uncomfortably in the heat for ages.
Undoubtedly, when these tennis fans staggered off to the Pimms tent, it might have been with a slight air of eye-rubbing disbelief at their close encounter with the Princess. Yet Catherine proved a dab hand, as usual, at the PR aspects of her responsibilities, which come with her patronage of the All England Lawn Tennis Club. She operated a card machine (refreshingly poorly), met disadvantaged children from the Shine Camera Club and watched a couple of matches in the company of, variously, Tim Henman and Sir Andy Murray.
