Liam Delap: I love the battle — I'm a bit old school but I won't change
But that's irrelevant for Delap. He wants to be Chelsea's leading striker and so he wanted the No9 shirt too. Therefore he took it. Curses are for the birds. 'To me it doesn't really mean a lot,' he says. 'I'm not that type of person. It's something that people speculate about. But it doesn't mean anything to me.'
Delap prefers the use of grit to the whims of fate. That's why he is now holding court at the Four Seasons hotel, 60 floors up and with a panoramic view of Philadelphia, after his £30million transfer to Chelsea. His strong season with Ipswich Town, scoring 12 Premier League goals, meant Newcastle United, Manchester United and Everton were among the suitors queueing up for his services. 'It was a nice position to be in,' he says. 'You never know if it is going to be the right decision but you've just got to go with your gut and hopefully it works out.'
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'This seems rich, given what Harry has since told the world about his miseries as a misfit in the royal cage... But in a contest of dysfunctional families the Markles versus the Windsors is probably a toss-up.' The Royals believed that despite the obvious bad blood, it was best to invite all of Meghan's family members. As Lady Anne Glennconner told Brown: 'We all have black sheep in our families, don't we? But you know you have to somehow round them up and get them onside and bring them all in and stick them somewhere.' 'Though Americans are more inclined than the British to exclude difficult or embarrassing relatives, wiser heads would have recommended that Meghan grit her teeth and invite Samantha and Tom, with PR clamps firmly in place,' Brown said. But Meghan was 'a brand now as much as a bride' and filled the pews of St George's Chapel with the 'famous, the beautiful and the influential '. This guest list only led the half siblings to double down on the 'trash talk' with Tom Jr claiming in an interview that Meghan's refusal to invite him has 'torn my family apart' and Samantha tweeted: 'It's time to "man up"... "shout outs" about humanitarianism don't work when you are allowing Meg to ignore the Markles.' Then Tom Jr wrote an open letter to Harry in which he said the marriage was 'the biggest mistake in Royal wedding history' and described Meghan as a 'jaded, shallow, conceited woman that will make a joke of you and the royal family heritage. Not to mention, to top it all off, she doesn't invite her own family and instead invites complete strangers to the wedding.' Harry and Meghan's 'addiction to drama' followed by 'self-inflicted' wounds continued while they were working royals and even after 'Megxit'. During their royal tour of Australia in the autumn of 2018, the couple were praised for what was by all accounts a successful trip. However, behind the scenes the Sussexes' relationship with their royal aides was not so rosy and the couple's obsession with how they were being perceived by the public allegedly led them to clash with their team. Writing in his royal bestseller, titled Revenge, Tom Bower claimed that in contrast to 'glowing photos' of Harry and Meghan being recorded daily, the mood in Sussex headquarters was 'miserable'. In one particularly dramatic outburst, Bower claimed that Meghan 'allegedly threw a cup of tea into the air'. The tension within Sussex HQ was apparently partly caused by the Duke and Duchess' obsession with their media coverage during the games. Bower wrote Meghan's anger may have been 'partly fuelled by Harry. Every night, he trawled social media, searching for snide comments on the internet. Every morning he and Meghan turned on their phones to surf the internet. Thin-skinned, they were inflamed by the slightest criticism'. 'Then, both bombarded their staff with demands for retribution and removal of the criticism.' It was at this time that fresh stories about Meghan's father were reported in the America media including claims that Thomas Markle had first heard Meghan was pregnant on the radio, that he snorted cocaine and visited a Playboy club in Manila. Despite the stories having emerged in the American press, Harry allegedly 'blamed British newspapers for those reports'. Bower said: 'But the only jibe he could attach to the accompanying British journalists was a report that one of Meghan's outfits cost £19,660. As a sign of Meghan's intentions, she also wore a Serena Williams brand jacket. Soon afterwards, it was promoted on Instagram.' This coverage still angered Meghan, causing her to become 'irate' and blaming the senior royal aide Jason Knauf and his staff for not suppressing the stories 'Hollywood-style'. 'Her mistake, she would lament, was "believing them when they said I would be protected",' Bower wrote. He added: 'Unsurprisingly, Meghan's fury influenced Harry's attitude towards the small British media contingent accompanying the couple. "Thank you for coming, although you weren't actually invited", he sniped. He also brusquely snapped unprovoked abuse at a TV reporter.' 'The altercation bewildered the media. Beyond the Sussexes' entourage, no one was aware of the turbulent background in Kensington Palace and at the Sussexes' headquarters in Sydney.' And rumours of Harry and Meghan's troubled relationship with Jason and the other royal aides were growing. This included allegations that Meghan sent emails to staff at 5am and that her assistant Melissa Toubati quit after she was driven to tears by the duchess. But no falling out was as dramatic as the one which occurred between the Duke and Duchess of Sussex and Jason. In fact, Meghan's falling out with Jason was so bad that the Duchess did not even let him know when she was making a surprise appearance at an award ceremony, much to the anger of the royal press pack. He would step down as a royal aide in March 2019. After Harry and Meghan stepped down as working royals in 2020 a major flashpoint of drama occurred in March 2021 during Prince Harry and Meghan Markle 's bombshell interview with Oprah in which serious allegations were wedged against the Royal Family. One claim was the Sussexes' suggestion that the Royal Family was collectively racist, pointing the finger at one – unnamed – member who, they alleged, had speculated about the colour of their son Archie's skin when Meghan was pregnant in a racist way. While the allegations were shocking it was the Queen's calm and measure response that was widely praised. Writing in his tell-all book Courtiers, royal author Valentine Low reveals how the Queen's carefully crafted response became 'the stuff of royal legends'. After the interview was broadcast the Queen's first response was to stay quiet. 'The palace stayed completely silent, because the Queen decided she wanted to sleep on it,' Low said. 'She was not going to be rushed into saying anything precipitate.' Eventually a statement was released the next evening which read: 'The whole family is saddened to learn the full extent of how challenging the last few years have been for Harry and Meghan. The issues raised, particularly that of race, are concerning. While some recollections may vary, they are taken very seriously and will be addressed by the family privately. 'Harry, Meghan and Archie will always be much- loved family members.' According to Low, the statement 'some recollections may vary' not only instantly became the stuff of legend but it also proved that the Queen was still firmly in charge of the family. 'The statement was notable for two other things: for the informality - and affection - for which it referred to Harry and Meghan, rather than the Duke and Duchess of Sussex , and for the fact that it dared confront the issue of race,' Low wrote. The Queen's response was widely praised at the time. Speaking to MailOnline in 2021, Royal author Phil Dampier said: 'The phrase "recollections vary" is telling. 'The Queen is really saying that Harry and Meghan might be giving their version of events or their interpretation of a conversation a couple of years ago, without going so for as to say they are lying, which they might not be. 'Clearly she has spoken to the person who allegedly made the remark about Archie and they have given her their version of events.' Likewise it was warmly received by the British public, with polls finding an increase in support for the Royal Family after an interview and a decrease in support for the Sussexes. Ofcom also received over 6,000 complaints about the interview which became the most complained about show of April 2021. And while the rift between the family does now appear to be healing, the interview did lasting damage to the Sussexes' relationship with the rest of the family.
