Rebecca Adlington has a new nose, and good for her. Who wouldn’t do the same?

This enchantingly natural role model has had the sense to buy a little artifice

Not since the latter stages of the Duchess of Cambridge’s confinement has the wait to see a new arrival caused such prurient excitement as Rebecca Adlington’s reportedly streamlined nose. Whatever the Harley Street rhinoplasty cost her, she could make at least tenfold with an exclusive sale of the first pictures. I for one would buy OK! magazine for a feature headlined “Beccy Adlington introduces us to her gorgeous, retroussé bundle of joy”.

Good for her. Having endured so much torment about her looks – some from online bullies, though primarily, as she has said, from private engagements with the mirror stretching back years before her heroics in Beijing’s Olympic pool – this enchantingly natural role model has had the sense to buy a little artifice and, touch wood, to end the misery.

Who wouldn’t do the same if they could? A grizzled, middle-aged schlub cannot begin to imagine the anguish a young woman experiences when she believes herself to be plain, let alone when scores of vinegary morons confirm the fear on social networks. But we have our neuroses, too. So if any of you feel inspired to an act of charity by Beccy’s wise decison – and frankly you should – £20,000 would buy me a first-rate hair transplant.