Who will succeed Nicola Sturgeon?

This evening the SNP’s executive committee will meet to decide the rules of the leadership contest following Nicola Sturgeon’s decision to resign both as party leader and First Minister of Scotland.

In a sign of how the news has come as a surprise to many even in her own party, there is no heir apparent. Speaking this morning on the Today programme, the SNP’s Westminster leader Stephen Flynn declined to say who he might like to take over – instead pointing to the fact he had ‘not seen anyone throw their name in the ring yet’.

As I say in this week’s cover piece for the magazine, there are plenty of SNP politicians who have asked themselves what they would do if the ball came loose from the scrum. While no candidate is yet to declare, the bookies’ favourites include Angus Robertson – the SNP MSP who previously served in parliament as the party’s Westminster leader – and Kate Forbes, the 32-year-old Gaelic-speaking Cambridge-educated finance minister.