WE'RE halfway through the Holyrood election campaign and one thing is clear. The Scottish Parliament will be able to field a formidable cross-party pool team when the business of touting for votes is over and done with. And not just pool. The prospects for table tennis and five-a-side look good, too, judging by the daily avalanche of campaign trail photo opportunities.

This time last year, Scotland was gripped by the most intriguing and hard fought General Election for a generation.

Labour and the Conservatives were neck and neck in the polls and the country appeared on course for a hung parliament.

Exactly a year ago, Nick Clegg was launching the LibDems' manifesto with a dire warning that the SNP or Ukip could end up holding the balance of power. Let the LibDems form a "coalition with conscience," he said, rather than allow the country to "lurch off to the extremes" with Nicola Sturgeon or Nigel Farage pulling the strings.

The SNP was running perhaps its most exciting election campaign ever. A series of TV debates showed the rest of the UK what Scotland knew already: its First Minister was one of Britain's brightest political stars.

Barely six months after losing the independence referendum, her party had exploded to more than 100,000 members, confidence was high and, with poll after poll putting support for the SNP at more than 50 per cent, the big question was how many seats they could win. Forty? Fifty? All 59? Surely not.

It was compelling stuff. The contrast with this year's Holyrood election could not be starker.

The campaign became so becalmed one day this week that the main talking point was the ejection of a Tory press officer from a protest-disrupted Ruth Davidson photo opportunity in a mildly amusing case of mistaken identity. At this rate, Holyrood 2016 will be remembered as the election that generated its own silly season.

So what's going on? There is a growing sense the SNP is having an uncharacteristically lacklustre campaign.

Ms Sturgeon has been out on the stump as you'd expect, this week donning a hard hat at Ferguson's shipyard in Port Glasgow and - daring! - sipping a gin and tonic at 11am during a visit to a Highland distillery. The SNP's army of activists is also busy on the ground, as a glance at social media reveals.

But the party's messages have been a little underwhelming. Its tax plan is cautious compared with Labour, the Lib Dems and the Greens, which has blunted Ms Sturgeon's anti-austerity claims of last year. On the NHS, the Nationalists are highlighting plans for new hospital units that were announced six months ago. At the shipyard, the First Minister talked about boosting the economy and pledged to triple the number of export advisers helping Scots firms. In the Highlands yesterday, she promised measures to shine a light on who owns land in Scotland. It begged the question, why didn't the SNP do it as part of "radical" land reform legislation passed only a couple of months ago? That, of course, is a problem faced by any government seeking a third term in office. Bold election proposals might serve to show a lack of action in the past. Overall in this election the SNP has come across as sensible rather than inspiring.

There have been some grumblings. Sections of the Yes movement have questioned Ms Sturgeon's "Both Votes SNP" pitch, arguing second votes might be wasted or simply used better in support of a more radical pro-independence party such as the Greens or socialist alliance RISE. It explains why the latest YouGov polling puts support for the SNP in the regional vote five percentage points below its support in the constituencies.

That's not insignificant. But the real story is in the headline numbers. Support for the SNP is at a remarkable 50 per cent for the constituency vote and 45 per cent for the regions.

In fact, the SNP is fighting the most brilliantly effective lacklustre campaign ever devised. At this stage, at least, they are happy to hand the headlines to Labour and the Conservatives and their battle to finish second. It reinforces the SNP's pre-eminence and embarrasses Labour in particular.

The picture might change a little next week when Ms Sturgeon unveils the SNP's manifesto. With a couple of weeks left to polling day, it would be a good moment to step up the campaign and hog the limelight. Far from cautiously defending their big lead, the Nationalists could yet add to it.