Miliband delivers after sticky wicket TV appearance

Barack Obama accepted his presidential nomination in front of 84,000 people at Mile High Stadium in Denver. British politicians and sports grounds both normally being less ambitious, Ed Miliband chose to speak on Friday at the Gloucestershire county cricket ground in Bristol, which might hold 12,000.

That would be if he spoke outside. But, good lord, he was never going to do that: this is the Vitamin D-deficiency election - there might be voters outside. Risky. Instead, he spoke to a couple of hundred local party trusties inside the pavilion, in a function room named after Gloucestershire's greatest cricketer, Dr W G Grace.

And it was quite a gracious speech - relaxed, too. The night before he had stumbled on TV, arguably three times: once literally, as he tried to dismount an irritatingly designed platform, and twice metaphorically, as he defended himself on Labour's economic record in office and on the nature of his possible relationship with the Scottish Nationalists.

It was his first bad night of the endless campaign and maybe it was liberating. He has spent so long trying to say as little as possible and do himself no harm that he seemed simultaneously both more relaxed and more energised, just as David Cameron had stared into the abyss a week ago, realised he was in danger of sleepwalking out of office and got stuck into the great game.

Among friends, rather than a crowd of Yorkshire burghers with teeth-bared, the Labour leader was able to lean on his lectern - which he uses as a transitional object, like an infant's stuffed rabbit - snort contempt at the prime minister and make a passable joke or two, such as over Mr Cameron's muddled description of the election as "career-defining" instead of "country-defining".

"After weeks of people saying he lacks passion," said Mr Miliband, "he's found something to be passionate about. He thinks the election is about him."

He had two warm-up speakers. One was 2015's most magnificently named candidate Thangam Debbonaire, who is the favourite to regain Bristol West from the Liberal Democrats and already very, very pleased with herself. "How exciting is THIS?" she began triumphantly. Well, the main event was a speech by Ed Miliband, so not as exciting as a hot date on a promise but better than root canal surgery, especially as he always keeps these campaign stops short.

She then introduced herself with a mock-modest "in case you don't know, my name is . . . " and then reluctantly gave way to Rachel Reeves, the shadow work and pensions secretary, who got on to the stage safely enough despite being several months pregnant. However, she failed to negotiate the candidate's name: "Thunger, umma, mumma, um, er, um, Debonnaire." She almost called her Thingummy. Debonair it was not.

The exciting star turn actually managed the candidate's name with surprising ease, then latched on to a new theme: "The prime minister was asked three times last night if he planned to cut child benefit. He used 600 words but none of them was No. We have six days to save your child benefit from David Cameron."

Oh gawd, I hope he's not going to spend the next six days bleating about "Save child benefit" the way William Hague meh-ed "Save the pound" up and down the country in 2001.

Thus far this has been a tortoise and hare campaign: Tortoise Mili plodding onwards, Cam the hare contemptuously asleep under a bush. Now the tortoise feels the hare's hot breath on his carapace. Aesop's ending was salutary. This one, after all the tedium, may be less predictable.

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