𝓤𝓷𝓲𝓽𝓮𝓭 𝓝𝓮𝔀𝓼

Kemi Badenoch may be a former junior chess champion but this week’s PMQs clash with Keir Starmer had a distinct whiff of cricket about it. Six times the Tory leader attempted to bowl out the Prime Minister, who is currently on a very sticky wicket over the Peter Mandelson scandal.

But as hard as she tried, each and every time Mrs B fired in one of her exocet deliveries, Sir Keir simply refused to play a shot. As a former director of public prosecutions he knows a thing or two about defence.

It showed, as the Prime Minister hid behind a tangle of mind-numbing legalese in a desperate attempt to duck and dive.

In cricket the art of sledging is the practice of using verbal insults to unsettle the batsmen.

A similar thing happens during Prime Minister’s Questions, although the volume is turned up several notches.

The Tory benches were in full cry as they tried to force Starmer into a misstep.

The usually gentlemanly Alex Burghart became so incredulous with what he was hearing that John Glen, Mrs Badenoch’s Parliamentary Private Secretary, gave him a calming tap on the shoulder.

Starmer himself was flanked by the gloom squad of David Lammy, Rachel Reeves and Yvette Cooper.

Not exactly the life and soul of the party, that lot.

Their mood darkened further when Sir Keir was forced to admit that conversations took place about a potential diplomatic role for his former senior aide Matthew Doyle.

He just happens to be the ex-communications chief who was made a Labour peer after leaving Downing Street but then suspended from the party over links with a convicted sex offender.

Polls already show that Starmer is the most unpopular PM on record, his Cabinet now clearly doesn’t support him and neither do his backbenchers.

As he left the Chamber the friendless Labour leader gave a hopeful raised eyebrows to Shabana Mahmood.

It was left to Sir James Cleverly to deliver the final sledge – a mock goodbye kiss and a wave.