Senior Victorian Liberal figure John Pesutto is one step closer to winning the title of Opposition Leader, after clinching victory in the inner-Melbourne seat of Hawthorn.
The seat of Hawthorn was called in favour of Mr Pesutto by the ABC's Antony Green on Wednesday after a tight contest.
Roughly 1,000 votes separate Mr Pesutto and high-profile independent candidate Melissa Lowe, with nearly 80 per cent of the vote counted.
Mr Pesutto was first elected as Member for Hawthorn in 2014, but suffered a surprise defeat at the hands of Labor's John Kennedy in 2018.
On Wednesday afternoon, Mr Kennedy took to social media to congratulate Mr Pesutto on his victory and wish him the best for his term in office.
Earlier this week, Mr Pesutto announced he intended to run for leadership of the shattered Victorian Liberal Party, in a contest that includes Berwick MP Brad Battin and Polwarth MP Richard Riordan.
Six lower house seats still in doubt: Northcote, Preston, Pakenham, Bass, Mornington and Hastings.
Meanwhile, in the state's upper house, Reason Party leader Fiona Patten said yesterday she was "trying not to look" as her prospects of retaining an upper house seat came down to the wire.
Handful of votes in Pakenham contest
The Victorian Electoral Commission (VEC) has warned that it will not conduct preference distributions — a crucial step in close contests — until next Tuesday, December 6.
"This is because all eligible votes must be admitted to the count first, and rechecked," it warned in a statement.
The commission is still receiving postal votes submitted before the close of voting, which have until December 2 to arrive.
By Wednesday afternoon, Liberal candidate David Farrelly had streaked ahead of Labor's Emma Vulin by more than 200 votes in the seat of Pakenham in Melbourne's south-east.
The seat was previously held by the ALP by a 2.2 per cent margin.
Leading up to the election, the Greens had Northcote in its sights, but Labor's Kat Theophanous remains ahead of the Greens candidate, Campbell Gome.
Mr Gome initially pulled ahead, but pre-poll and postal votes later favoured Ms Theophanous.
In Preston, a two-horse race has emerged between Labor's Nathan Lambert and independent Gaetano Greco, according to ABC analysis.
The VEC is still counting Mr Lambert's primary vote against that of Greens candidate Patchouli Paterson.
Hastings is another seat in Labor's sights, with the ALP's celebrity candidate Paul Mercurio just ahead of Liberal Briony Hutton.
Like some other close contests, it appeared Mr Mercurio had won the seat on election night, but pre-poll and postal votes tightened the race substantially.
In the district of Mornington, which covers suburbs such as Mount Martha and Mount Eliza, Liberal candidate Chris Crewther remains ahead of teal independent Kate Lardner.
Retaining Mornington will be important to the bruised opposition as its charts its future in the wake of its election loss.
Further east, Labor is battling to hold on in the notionally Liberal seat of Bass, which remains too close to call.
Upper house looks to favour major parties
While the counting of votes in the complex upper house continues, analysis by the ABC's Antony Green suggests some micro-parties will be left without seats.
The Greens are likely to wind up with three seats, with about 15 seats for both Labor and the Coalition.
Minor parties likely to be represented in the new Legislative Council are the Legalise Cannabis Party, the Animal Justice Party and the Shooters, Fishers and Farmers.
The Democratic Labour Party also looks likely to pick up one seat, with a possible second which may come at the expense of Reason Party leader Fiona Patten.
According to Antony Green, Transport Matters, Sustainable Australia, Liberal Democrats and Derryn Hinch's Justice Party are unlikely to pick up any seats.
The VEC has warned that the computerised calculation for the upper house will take place on December 13, meaning some results may not be clear until then.
Informal voting trends similar to last election
Meanwhile, the VEC will examine the incidence of formal votes in the Victorian election next year, which is the body's usual practice after a poll takes place.
As part of its research, the commission will categorise and sort the informal ballots into apparent intentional ones and those that appear to be accidental.
Once divided into intentional and accidental categories, there are a series of sub-categories used to help inform how future elections are run.
The districts of Melton and Broadmeadows had the highest rate of informal votes in this election, with both sitting at 9.4 per cent.
Those districts also had some of the highest informal voting rates at the last election, with Melton's at 10.06 per cent and Broadmeadows at 10.10 per cent.
The seats with the lowest rates of informal voting at this election were those in the inner east, such as Hawthorn, Kew and Malvern. That was similar to what was seen at the 2018 election.
Analysis conducted after the 2018 election found 60 per cent of the informal votes appeared to be accidental, while 40 per cent appeared intentional.
