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Oh, great, and here come the waterworks. I can’t hold it in any longer.

‘You’re not losing me,’ he replies.

‘When I saw you unconscious…’

‘I’m okay, I promise you,’ he insists. ‘And I’m sorry too. I should never have talked about you like that, and I shouldn’t have wound Jamie up last night. Or this morning.’

‘You just seemed so smug…’

‘I was happy,’ he corrects me. ‘I was happy about us.’

I didn’t even think about it like that, I thought it was all just a game.

‘Are you actually all right?’ I check.

‘As much as I ever was,’ he jokes, but then his face switches to something more serious. ‘They think so. The doctor said everything looks reassuring so far, I’m going to have more scans, to make sure, but I took a hard knock, I lost consciousness, but I was awake again before they took me off the pitch.’

I blow air from my cheeks, letting some of my worry go.

‘I’ll probably miss the rest of the warm-up matches,’ he says seriously. ‘Maybe some of the tournament games too, depending on the tests and how the symptoms go.’

‘All I care about is that you’re okay,’ I insist. ‘We’ll worry about work another time. Hopefully Jamie will miss them too, the idiot,’ I say.

‘I heard what happened,’ he tells me. ‘They say he was trying to do to me what I did to him.’

‘It was a smart tactic when you did it, and you didn’t hurt anything but his pride,’ I point out. ‘He did it to his teammate – and he injured you.’

‘I whipped him up,’ Eddy admits. ‘I’ve been whipping him up for years. I used to think it brought out the best in his game but it all went too far this time.’

‘Well, I was reading social media on the way here, and everyone is on your side. Everyone’s saying England should send him home,’ I tell him.

‘They shouldn’t.’

‘What? Eddy, he knocked you unconscious,’ I point out. ‘Do I need to get someone in here to look at your brain?’

‘He made a stupid challenge under a lot of stress and pressure.’

‘He hurt you!’

Eddy shifts carefully against the pillows.

‘By accident,’ he reminds me. ‘We need him if we’re going to win, especially if I’m out.’

‘That is very noble, Eddy, but I am not currently interested in England’s World Cup efforts.’

‘You should be. It’s your job,’ he reminds me.

I smile.

‘You know, some people are saying he did it on purpose,’ I tell him.

‘Not a chance,’ Eddy replies. ‘Probably the same people who have been fuelling our rivalry for years. He was trying to prove something. He saw the ball, saw me under it and wanted to get there first. It was reckless and stupid, but he wouldn’t deliberately do that.’

I think about Jamie after the collision, standing with his hands on his head, and that worried look on his pale face.

‘I don’t know how you can be so chill,’ I tell him.

‘I’m in a hospital bed. There’s not much I can do but chill,’ he jokes.