Alex Salmond has said he would be sad if he and Nicola Sturgeon never reconcile.

The two former allies haven’t spoken in five years, following a bitter falling out over sexual misconduct claims against the former MP for Banff and Buchan.

Mr Salmond took Ms Sturgeon’s government to court and was awarded £512,000 in costs after proving it had botched a probe relating to the allegations.

He later claimed that his successor had misled Holyrood about the matter, a resignation offence which she was cleared of.

Mr Salmond was charged with multiple counts of sexual assault but cleared of all of them at a High Court trial in 2020.

Mr Salmond and Ms Sturgeon later gave conflicting evidence to a Holyrood inquiry into the Government’s actions, when Ms Sturgeon said she had not spoken to Mr Salmond since the misconduct claims became public knowledge in August 2018.

READ MORE: Nicola Sturgeon does not think she will speak to Alex Salmond again

At that inquiry, Mr Salmond said there had been “a deliberate, prolonged, malicious and concerted effort amongst a range of individuals within the Scottish Government and the SNP to damage my reputation, even to the extent of having me imprisoned.”

Last year, when speaking to LBC presenter Iain Dale at his Edinburgh Festival Fringe show, Ms Sturgeon was asked if she had spoken to Mr Salmond in the last three years.

She said: “Nope.”Asked if she thought she ever would speak to him, she again replied: “Nope.”

Mr Salmond was in front of Mr Dale on Tuesday, and was asked how his successor’s answer made him feel.

He was also asked if he could envisage a situation where the two would rebuild their relationship.

The Alba leader said he was "oblivious" to the remarks last year. 

On reconciling, he replied: “You should never say never."

On not speaking again, he admitted that he "would be sad if that was the case, but there we are."

"I think, to be quite, frank, Nicola’s got more immediate things to worry about,” he added, almost certainly referring to the police probe into the party’s finances and funding.

Ms Sturgeon, her husband the SNP’s former chief executive, Peter Murrell, and former treasurer, Colin Beattie have all been arrested, questioned and released without charge pending further investigation as part of the probe.

Detectives are looking at claims that £660,000 raised by the SNP specifically for Indyref2 had been misspent.

READ MORE: Investigation: Inside the SNP money machine

Earlier this month, Police Scotland Chief Constable Iain Livingston said Operation Branchform had “moved beyond” the initial allegations into “potential embezzlement” and possible “misuse of funds.”

The police have not yet reported any cases to the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service for consideration.

Ms Sturgeon has insisted she is innocent of wrongdoing.

She is due to be interviewed by Mr Dale on Thursday. The LBC host told the audience that former Tory MP and broadcaster Gyles Brandreth was primed to replace the Glasgow Southside MSP if, for some reason, she was unable to attend.