Just months before Enda Kenny was elected Taoiseach, most of his key lieutants tried to ditch him.

Many of his own colleagues felt that he could not lead a country facing its biggest ever economic crisis.

At the beginning of the new millennium - after 25 years as a sitting TD, he astonished everyone by declaring that he wanted to be Taoiseach. It took him more than a decade to achieve that goal.

His 36 years in public life have seen slow progress. Supporteres have often been hard - pressed to counteract his doubts about his suitability for high office.

Here we ask, who is Enda Kenny? How much guile and steel lies behind that smiling face he presents to the world? What are the influences that forged him? How much input has his wife, Fionnuala, into his work?

Is he really a hopeless but lucky poser? Or, has he been badly under - estimated by colleagues and disrespected by pundits for too long? 'The Unlikely Taoiseach' confronts these and other crucial questions about Enda Kenny.