Bernard Grech's time as Nationalist Party leader has come to an end. It was a surprise when he announced his resignation on Tuesday at midday, even if there were rumours that Grech was to step down meandering around a few weeks prior.

Grech's resignation came after a disastrous survey result showed that the PN is now 39,000 votes behind its political adversary the PL - and, perhaps worse, that Grech was over 30 points behind Robert Abela in the trust ratings.

His resignation on Tuesday was a surprise, yet it appeared planned and done in a tranquil manner - the pain and angst of the last time the PN had to change its leader appeared as a thing of the past. All PN exponents flocked to thank their now departing leader for his service.

It felt so calm in a sense in fact, that it gave off the impression that there was an actual plan for the party to move forward after Grech's leadership that had the backing of, at the very least, the vast majority of those in the upper echelons of the party.

What has transpired since, however, shows that there has been anything but.

The only plan that there seems to be is to grovel and beg at Roberta Metsola's feet, and hope that she will ditch one of the most powerful positions in European politics to come back to Malta and take on the leadership of what is, objectively, an ailing party.

Metsola, a PN MEP and the party's most popular candidate in the 2024 European Parliament elections, is by all accounts the first option of many within the PN: MPs have increasingly touted her, without necessarily naming her, while Grech himself made a not-so-veiled call to her to take up the mantle when he was interviewed on party television.

The call to Metsola is a serious gamble - one that can either pay-off and turn the party's fortunes around, or one which can backfire on the party and have a knock-on effect on Malta's democracy as a whole.

It's a gamble in more ways than one. First of all, it is somewhat logic defying that Metsola would ditch her post as the European Parliament President some 18 months before her term expires in order to come back to local politics - so the premise of the gamble is already a somewhat shaky one.

But it is also a gamble on Metsola herself: within the current scenario, many of the party faithful feel that Metsola has a duty and responsibility to the party to become its leader. A failure by her to do so could see supporters turn their backs on her, and by extension see the credibility of someone who many agree is a potential Prime Minister muddied with the voter base she would need to rely on.

The biggest gamble however is because this appears to be the only coherent option that the PN has come up with. Should Metsola choose not to contest for Grech's vacant seat, then nobody knows what will happen next.

The party risks reverting to a scenario of serious internal instability, as different candidates and factions vie for the role of party leader, that is if some sort of agreement is not found. There are some front-runners - but already some supporters are finding issues: one is too young and perceived by some to be too similar to Robert

Abela; another too divisive; others too lacking in charisma and political standing.

It's a stage which will be ripe for possible internal disagreements and infighting.

If no agreement is found, whoever would be elected would have to contend with first reconciling with the factions and candidates that he'd have just defeated - something which is no easy feat, as Adrian Delia found to his own detriment when he became leader in 2017.

But whoever is elected would also have to contend with one simple fact: they would still be living in Metsola's shadow - Metsola being, in the eyes of many, the party's ideal leader.

If the PN's gamble blows up in the party's face, then there is a risk that the party will find itself neck deep in a mess of its own making.

It risks an election process which will be pounced upon by its opponents to continue building the narrative that the party remains divided. It risks a process where it will come out weaker than when it started. A process which voters may not look kindly upon - which may turn even more people away, and increase the Labour Party's majority.

Irrespective of political belief, it's an objective fact that any country needs a strong Opposition that is capable of holding the Government to account. If the PN ends up getting any weaker, then it's Malta's democracy that is going to suffer due to a lack of any credible Opposition.

The PN has gone all in - its cards are on the table. Now the party is waiting to see if it's struck a royal flush, or a bust.

Its future, and the makeup of Malta's democracy, might well depend on what happens next.