I took the Eurostar straight to Paris after Brexit – to watch the rugby

French people appeared reluctant to express a view on Brexit. It was our choice, was the closest I could get to an opinion, finds John Rentoul

A trip to Paris was a chance to assess the mood on the continent (Reuters)

I took the first Eurostar out of the country after Brexit. This wasn’t a protest, although I would have been happy to pretend to a furious Remainer fellow passenger that it was. It was in fact a long-arranged trip to watch the rugby: England vs France at the Stade de France. It wasn’t actually the first Eurostar out of St Pancras International last Saturday either; we made a leisurely lunchtime getaway.

However, it was a chance to assess the mood on the continent immediately after we all ceased to be EU citizens together. Or it would have been, if Paris had not been absolutely full of British people who had come for the rugby too.

As we disembarked at Gare du Nord, we were accosted by our angry (British) fellow traveller. She demanded to know if we were Remainers, and I wanted to explain that it was complicated, but my companions were happy to be so labelled, and she told them that she hoped it all ended in disaster because then Leavers would be proved wrong.