However, his plan backfired, and instead of winning more seats he secured a drop from 123 to 120 seats, while Podemos also went down from 42 to 35.
Meanwhile the far-right Vox party surged forward as did the PP party, which spurred Sanchez to do something about striking a coaltion which was now inevitable if they were to retain power.
At a joint press conference, which was televised, Sanchez and Iglesias announced that they had reached a pre-agreement to form a progressive government. "It is an agreement for 4 years," they said.
However, sources in other parties lost no time in predicting that the coalition would not last 4 years.
13-11-2019 PANORAMAdailyGIBRALTAR