Taylor Swift in Australia: Travis Kelce joins his girlfriend in Sydney in a bid to shake off ‘anti-hero’ tag

Love, and a nice little good news story, has helped Taylor Swift’s boyfriend heal after a bruising Super Bowl that dented his reputation.

Travis Kelce’s pilgrimage to Australia – an arduous 10-hour flight via a plush private jet tailored for 17 passengers from Hawaii – to join his girlfriend Taylor Swift goes to show, she really is the brains of this romantic operation.

When it comes to public relations, no one does it better than Swift.

She garners the type of coverage communist dictators would kill for (some have).

Not just mainstream media coverage; her life, lyrics and love interests continuously trump social media algorithms and see content about her, of her and relating to her dominating platforms around the globe.

Kelce – her NFL playing boyfriend – is reaping the benefits of being associated with the biggest cultural phenomenon of recent times.

“I’ve never been a man of words. Being around her, seeing how smart Taylor is, has been f...ing mind blowing. I’m learning every day,” he told The Wall Street Journal.

His podcast, New Heights, was discovered by a broader audience than ardent football fans, luxury fashion labels are clambering to dress him for his pre game arrivals at stadiums and despite all the media saturation, the couple have managed to avoid the usual criticism most celebrity couples in their position have endured before – think David and Victoria Beckham in the 1990s.

Granted a third Super Bowl championship helps them escape the “yips” commentary, considering he played better when Swift was present at games last season. A fact the NFL broadcast during the most recent Super Bowl which saw Swift jet back to the US following the Tokyo leg of her blockbuster Eras tour to support her boyfriend.

An estimated 123.7 million US viewers tuned in for the footy match earlier this month according to average audience estimates from Nielsen.

The broadcast averaged 120.3 million viewers on one US network alone, making it the largest audience for a single telecast over there.

As talented as R’n’B star Usher is, his half time performance was overshadowed by cut away shots of Swift and of Kelce seen shoving his 65-year-old coach Andy Reid. Something he has since agreed was “unacceptable”.

“I immediately wished I could take it back,” Kelce said on a New Heights episode.

“Coach Reid actually came right up to me after that and didn’t even have harsh words for me. I was ready to get a f … ing a …-chewing and for him to just tell me to ‘f … ing be better,’ and he just let [me] know, ‘Hey man, I love your passion. I got cameras on me all over the place man, you don’t want things to come off’ … and it just made me … fired up to get a f … ing victory for him, man. Because that’s how much I love that dude, man. So Big Red, sorry if I caught you with that cheap shot, baby,” he said.

It was there some of Kelce’s knight in shining headgear started to come off, with think pieces being published calling the incident an “ick” moment for Swift and why his behaviour should be seen as a relationship “red flag”.

That’s on top of the fact he had to follow his beloved’s lead in donating more than $100,000 to the victim who was killed in the mass shooting at the Kansas City Chiefs Super Bowl victory parade.

Where Swift goes, Kelce is smart enough to follow, like he said, he’s learning, and he quickly deposited a similar amount to the GoFundMe appeal.

Now he’s in Australia in a supposed sign of solidarity for Swift. Just like the kind she showed him at work when it may just be that he’s in his “Reputation era” in the sense that he needs to repair his.

Travis Kelce's private jet lands in Sydney to reunite with girlfriend Taylor Swift at her Eras Tour

Love makes us do silly things and huge superstars have made us Australians go all crazy in love.

Taylor and Travis enjoy a happy day out at Sydney Zoo. Picture: Channel 9

Sunrise live tracked the plane Kelce was travelling on with hosts Natalie Barr and Matt Shirvington yelling “touchdown” as he was greeted by more security than most diplomats receive after disembarking in Sydney on Thursday.

A flight tracking website even crashed due to overwhelming demand to follow his journey.

“What surprises me is that people are acting like there’s never been a pop star before,” cultural critic Fran Lebowitz summed up during her Australian speaking tour last week. “The world seems to be obsessed with Taylor Swift. People ask me a lot of questions about Taylor Swift, despite there being no one who knows less about Taylor Swift than me. I only know about Taylor Swift in the same way you know about the Kardashians, you can’t not know,” Lebowitz said.

“She has a boyfriend. He’s a football player. High school never ends. Everyone went to high school and there was a girl that was Taylor Swift who went to your high school and her boyfriend was a football player. What a surprise. A surprise would be if Taylor Swift’s boyfriend was a physicist.”

Therein lies the appeal of both Swift and Kelce – they’re everyone but nobody at the same time. They are attractive, non-controversial personalities whose appeal is in them being attainable and “the couple next door”. We can all see, or want to see, ourselves in them, the same can’t be said for superstars of yore like Frank Sinatra and even Madonna.