Everyone is talking about their last encounter with Alex Salmond so I’ll do it too. It was late last year, we talked on the phone a couple of times, and as it happens we didn’t discuss Scottish independence, we discussed his childhood, his views on the Scottish Government (not good), his views on the UK Government (not good), his love of Indiana Jones, and his thoughts on one of the Scottish politicians he admired above all others (not someone from the SNP as it happens).

As usual, the former First Minister and leader of Alba was assertive and confident and caustic and articulate and knowing (he knew the game so well he’d often say ‘here’s a quote for you’ or ‘use that quote, that’s a good one’). However, it struck me too, as it always did when I came across him, that his talents and skills – the ones that turned him into one of the most able and extraordinary Scottish politicians of the last 100 years – were also his flaws, which is often the case with great people: what makes you also destroys you.

The alpha-male energy for example. He was sometimes criticised for it but Salmond loved the blokey atmosphere at Westminster (mostly male then and mostly male now) and his banter and style was well-suited to debating chambers and pubs and loud restaurants but less well-suited to meeting rooms and TV studios when over-confident male behaviour began to be questioned much more. I remember a young colleague of mine turning up to his first conference with him and Salmond chucking a packet of sweeties on the table, the implication being “I’m the man and you’re the boy”. Salmond later laughed it off as a joke but everyone knew it was calculated to make a point, and you've got to ask: who would do something like that?

People who worked with Salmond, men and women, knew this........

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