Phil Hogan given trade portfolio - A new dealer at the card table

If those sound-the-charge Leavers who, after the 2016 vote, assured their peers that they held all the cards in looming negotiations with the EU have come to regret that exuberance, it would be understandable.

If those gung-ho voices, many safely sidelined, who promised the “easiest negotiations ever” have come to regret that misjudgment, that would be understandable too. It may be understood that they had no reason to know who Phil Hogan is.