And then there were three. The home secretary Sajid Javid is the latest to bite the dust in round four of the Conservative leadership contest.

That leaves runaway winner Boris Johnson to be joined in the ballot of Conservative Party members by either Jeremy Hunt or Michael Gove.

Johnson will want a run-off against Hunt rather than Gove. Why? Well Gove is a Brexiteer like Johnson. A run-off between two Leave candidates could shift the ground and debate on to the personality, temperament and judgement of the two men.

Given Johnson's seeming impulse for controversy, that would not be good terrain on which to fight.

A straight run-off between a Leaver and a Remainer (Hunt) in a party which is becoming increasingly hardline on Europe would all but guarantee that Johnson wins the contest.

Might some of Johnson's voters in round four (he won 157 votes) vote tactically for Hunt in round five to make sure that Gove is the next to be eliminated?

Even if Gove were to get through Johnson would still be the overwhelming favourite as Gove is more closely tied to Theresa May's Brexit deal, a deal hated by the Conservative grassroots.

And for all that Johnson has a pitifully low attention threshold and his demeanour is at times the stuff of pantomime, it probably trumps his opponent's personality.

For all his humble roots, Mr Gove sounds as if he is permanently auditioning for a role in Downton Abbey. In short, Tory members are likely to judge that Johnson is more marketable in electoral terms.