Tory leadership race: Boris Johnson has been praised by an academic (Image: GETTY)
The former Foreign Secretary took a mammoth 143 votes in Wednesday’s third round of voting which saw Rory Stewart eliminated from the contest. Jeremy Hunt received 54 and Mr Gove 41, while Sajid Javid came in last with 38 votes. Mr Johnson has been the favourite to win the contest shortly after Theresa May announced her resignation and deputy director of think tank, The UK in a Changing Europe, Dr Simon Usherwood has praised his strategy.
Speaking to Express.co.uk, Dr Usherwood insisted that Mr Johson has crucially focused on gaining support from the MPs rather than concentrating on the public.
Although Mr Johnson will have to appeal to the 160,000 or so Tory members in the final two run off, for now, his strategy of remaining out of the limelight has worked.
Dr Sherwood said: “He won the ground war, he has a good team and that’s all that matters.
“The public image doesn’t really matter at this stage of the voting.
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