EU brands Brexit deal ‘essentially impossible’

You’d be forgiven for being confused.

The chances of a Brexit deal being reached were described as “overwhelmingly unlikely”, “essentially impossible” – but then the desire to reach that deal was reiterated, again.

And the messages all came from the same place – Downing Street.

Boris Johnson and his team attracted the ire of the EU over their reaction to a frosty phone call with Angela Merkel – the EU Council president telling them not to play a “stupid blame game”.