In the conference hall in Birmingham, many Tories said they were now more hopeful that May might be able to rally the party behind her — and avoid a disastrous exit from the European bloc.

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“I feel inspired,” said Jayne Rear, a Conservative Party member on the local governing council in Lancashire. “Theresa May is back in top form.”

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On social media, some posts praised the 62-year-old prime minister for her self-deprecating humor (she’d been poked fun of after busting a few moves on a recent trip to Africa), while others lamented that Abba was now ruined for them.

Abba’s “SOS” single may have been a better choice, critics quipped. The Liberal Democrats tweeted: “When Brexit is in chaos but your only answer is Dancing Queen.”

Going into the annual Conservative Party conference, there were questions about whether May might face a leadership challenge. Rumors swirl daily of plots to replace her. But it does not appear there is yet a challenger with the nerve and backing to topple May in a no-confidence vote.

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Many now think May’s Wednesday speech will help keep her in office — at least for the next six months.

On Tuesday, Johnson — who remains a Conservative member of Parliament and is widely thought to aspire to become prime minister someday — wailed about May’s compromise Brexit proposal, which seeks to preserve trade with Europe by aligning Britain with E.U. rules and regulations. Johnson called her approach sad, wrong, weak, dangerous and “a cheat” against the millions of Brits who voted to divorce the continent.

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He urged May to “chuck Chequers,” her plan named after the prime minister’s countryside manor, and instead try for a free-trade deal along the lines of the pact recently negotiated between Canada and the E.U.

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After Johnson’s speech — which was applauded by fellow Tories — May confessed to the BBC that she was “cross” with her colleague. She clearly had him in mind, although she never mentioned him by name, when she had her turn at the rostrum.

“If we all go off in different directions in pursuit of our own visions of the perfect Brexit, we risk ending up with no Brexit at all,” she told the conference.

May warned, “We are entering the toughest phase of the negotiations.”

She said, “What we are proposing is very challenging for the E.U.”

May also prepared her party and the country for the possibility that Britain will leave the bloc in March 2019 with no deal — a “doomsday scenario” for many businesses that rely on trade with the continent.

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“No one wants a good deal more than me. But that has never meant getting a deal at any cost,” May said. “Britain isn’t afraid to leave with no deal if we have to. But we need to be honest about it. Leaving without a deal — introducing tariffs and costly checks at the border — would be a bad outcome for the U.K. and the E.U.”

May promised that Britain would leave the union next year, and she heaped disdain on her Labour Party opponents who have been pushing for a second referendum on Brexit.

“They call it a ‘People’s Vote.’ But we had the people’s vote. The people voted to leave,” May said. “A second referendum would be a politician’s vote: politicians telling people they got it wrong the first time and they should try again.”

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Closing the Conservative conference, May sought to reassure Britain of its progress.

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“A decade after the financial crash, people need to know that the austerity it led to is over and that their hard work has paid off,” May said, promising help to bolster housing stocks, improve care at overwhelmed hospitals and make the trains run on time.

“I thought it was absolutely cracking,” Matt Hancock, Britain’s health secretary, told the BBC. “From the moment she came in dancing, you could see that she had mojo, and the speech delivered on that.”

Jon Tonge, a politics professor at the University of Liverpool said it was an “8 out of 10” speech that went over well with Conservative Party members, who “can’t make up their minds between her and Boris Johnson.”

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But there was one “huge omission,” the professor said.

“There was no mention of the Chequers plan on Brexit, a huge omission because ultimately if she can’t sell that plan to her party, her leadership and indeed the entire Brexit deal is in question,” Tonge said.

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“If you’re trying to sell a plan and you really believe in it, surely you’d put it in your most important speech of the year,” he said.

He said that May might be tacking toward a model of Brexit more favored by critics such Johnson in part to “usurp the threat coming from him.”