As we enter the final 48 hours, we are getting to what Sir Alex Ferguson termed ”squeaky bum time”.
“What if the public polls get it wrong again?”, sleep deprived campaign staff will ask themselves, after five weeks living off Deliveroo.
They needn’t worry. The classic error every losing campaign makes is to mistake the mood of journalists and activists for the pulse of the country.
In moments of crisis, the Downing Street machine revs into gear and the political machinations will have been put to the side while ministers ensure a thorough response to the tragic security challenges that have overshadowed the campaign.
But that doesn’t mean that the last few days have been comfortable in Conservative campaign headquarters, where hard-nosed political analysts will have had 72 hours to chew over where we are.
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The great myth of the 2015 campaign is that a massive Facebook media spending spree and day-by-day CrosbyTextor constituency polling gave the Conservatives a quiet confidence that they would increase their number of seats. In truth, I’m told most days were spent asking: “Are you sure the polls can really get it this wrong, Lynton?”
This time round, the private polling will always have seemed too good to be true – just a few weeks ago, every one in two people planning to vote was saying they would back the Tories. That’s a sentence that would have been impossible to write when David Cameron was prime minister and so there will be plenty of Conservative apparatchiks who have a feeling in their bones – based on nothing but sheer paranoia and the media narrative of a tightening race – that Jeremy Corbyn can pull off a miracle.
I still remember the giddying journey that was the 2010 battle bus tour with my then boss Gordon Brown – planning the next trip on speed dial with your key seat co-ordinator, trying to cross-reference the local newspaper publication cycle with your constituency data to make the most out of a prime minsiterial visit.
Of course, in the end, our efforts came to naught. We stopped an absolute majority for the Conservatives but we were out of government. And yet there were moments along the way when you could absolutely convince yourself momentum was with you.
It’s an enticing elixir, supported by a press pack that seeks to build the sense of a close race even when the reality is different (if you don’t believe me, google some of the hagiographic coverage that was written about plucky Michael Howard in April 2005, when hacks were trying to make that election a genuine contest).
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At a time when pollsters are trying out new methodology, there seems to be massive divergences in what vote we can expect. And yet all of them predict the Conservatives to be getting 40%+, meaning the Tories look pretty certain to become only the second governing party in modern history to increase their share of the vote.
That the election may not be a complete walkover – and the missteps Theresa May has made in a bruising and ineffective campaign – is a question of election momentum and one that the media would be remiss to ignore.
Along the way Jeremy Corbyn and his team have provided some real surprises. I was particularly impressed by the way he boxed the Tories into a corner over the TV debates, ensuring that very few people actually watched the show but every person down the pub would know the PM didn’t bother to join a debate in an election she called.
But the fundamentals haven’t moved. As voters walk into the ballot boxes this Thursday, they will still ask themselves whether they can picture Jeremy Corbyn leading the country through a crisis such as the London Bridge attack. Sadly for him and the Labour Party, no speech or public rally he makes in these final two days can change that.
Those who live and breathe all things SW1 miss the mood of most “ordinary people” (or people, as you might call them), confusing inside analysis for the sentiment of citizens who switch off from the day-to-day campaign.
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What has changed is the level of expectation. Just as in 2005, when Labour staff and supporters convened at the National Portrait Gallery to “celebrate” winning a general election but instead commiserated losing many good MPs, the mood of Conservatives on Thursday night will likely be soured. Hopes of a strong mandate for Brexit will be reframed, with any sort of increase in number of seats and share of vote considered (rightly) as a win.
Whatever we wake up to on Friday, we will need the prime minister to get a spring in her step as her citizens need her to deliver a plan that unites the country at a time when we are completely divided.
The endless focus on polling, repeating the mistakes of 2015, has meant that the media and opposition have failed to properly scrutinise the government’s agenda for Brexit.
What is Theresa May’s plan in the likely event of a tough negotiation with the EU? What red lines does she believe the voters are giving her? We simply don’t know.
The last minute flutters of interest in Her Majesty’s Opposition were just a distraction.
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This campaign has been a sideshow and, as the real work begins, everyone has a responsibility to challenge themselves why we didn’t ask harder questions on what we are doing next.
Iain Bundred is the managing director of PR for Ogilvy Group. He worked as a communications adviser to the Labour Party during the last three elections.