In Veneto's regional election the current League-sponsored governor Zaia appears to have beaten his centre-left rival by 75% vs. 15.6% His own personal list (linked to his candidature) apparently gains the support of 52% of voters, while the League's gains 15% (the PD 13.6%).

This is still based on exit polls + partial counting, but the scale of his victory is now quite apparent. On top of my head, I think this is the best performance of any candidates to this job ever.

Understandably, there is now much talk of Zaia challenging Salvini for the leadership, or anyway causing him problems in the months or years to come.

No doubt Salvini would have preferred Zaia's victory to be more limited, and the League's own list to do better than this.

It is also true that Salvini needs to continue to perform well in electoral terms, & show that his "nationalist turn" is paying off in central & southern Italy to avoid problems in the north by those who have never forgotten League's regionalist and federalist, "pro-north" roots.

But I don't think much will happen (concerning the relationship btw Zaia & him) in the short term, for 3 reasons:
1. Zaia is not even "pro-north", he is "pro-Veneto" -consistently and coherently throughout his career. Veneto, of course, has very rooted separatist tradition...

... for important historical, cultural & linguistic reasons.

Liga Veneta predates Bossi's League (& got into Parliament before he did). Put simply, Zaia is not credible as a nationalist, "Italy-first" leader. Picking Zaia would mean another ideological revolution for the party.

2. Even if the party embarked on such revolution, Zaia could not even be the unitary "back to regionalism", "back to the north" leader. This is a party that has always been dominated by Lombards throughout its history...

... Look at its leaders & look at those it has sent to government as ministers (remember: the League is a party of government).

3. Finally, his current popularity is explained in large part by how well he's been perceived to have managed response to the pandemic.Everyone within party knows this -replicating it 3 years from now (not to mention on a national scale) would be an entirely different story /END/