Tory leadersip: Who will emerge as Sunak’s natural challenger?

1. The hateful eightAnd they’re off. Rishi Sunak, Penny Mordaunt, Liz Truss, Tom Tugendhat, Suella Braverman, Nadhim Zahawi, Jeremy Hunt and Kemi Badenoch face off in the first ballot of the Conservative leadership election from 1.30pm.

To the electorate – as Alan Clark once put it back when Tory MPs were willing to describe each other using words longer than one syllable, the most sophisticated and duplicitous in the world – only one question really matters. Who will emerge as the natural challenger to the former chancellor?

Overnight Sunak added two more cabinet backers, health secretary Steve Barclay and Cabinet Office minister Michael Ellis, to his long list of supporters. That he will come out on top of this very crowded field is almost