Donald Macintyre's Sketch: Guess what? The sports minister likes sport!

Tracy Crouch had an engagingly personal answer to almost every question

Tracey Crouch is the Under Secretary of State for Sport, Tourism and Heritage (Getty)

Welcome to the Tracey Crouch show. You name it, Tracey’s been there first. Today was Mike Dugher’s debut as the new shadow Culture Secretary. But his workmanlike question about the Government dropping a “central” Leveson recommendation for easier libel actions against newspapers was overshadowed by the sports minister. She had an engagingly personal answer to almost every question. As she herself said, after drawing appreciative grunts from the SNP by suggesting “some might argue that at least one of our home nations should still be in [the Rugby World Cup]”, “I know how to play the crowd.”

And how. Rubbish youth football pitches? “Having been involved in grassroots football for many years, I have spent goodness knows how many Sundays wondering whether a stud will go into a frozen pitch or whether a muddy middle is fun or dangerous,” she began, before acknowledging that Germany has 4,000 artificial pitches and Britain only 680.

A welcome for NFL games at Wembley? “As a fan of American football – the Green Bay Packers are doing incredibly well at the moment – I look forward to seeing more games here in London.”

More girls doing sport? “I feel very strongly about this issue, having coached a girls’ football team for many years.”

But her coup de grace came when fellow Tory Nigel Evans suggested a novel way to encourage female sport. “It might not make parents the most popular people in the household on Christmas morning, but they might consider buying their daughters gym membership and a pair of trainers,” he said.

“As someone who is hopefully producing a future sports star”, the minister replied, “I do not think it is for me to dictate to parents what they buy their children for Christmas.”

Was this the first public news of Ms Crouch’s pregnancy, helping to explain her sparkling form? But then it’s often said that if you want keep something secret, announce it in the House of Commons.