Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn received an apparent snub from Andy Burnham one of his party's few big winners on a day when his party suffered heavy losses.
Mr Corbyn held a rally with supporters on the steps of the Manchester Convention Centre where Mr Burnham was elected to the post of mayor of Greater Manchester just hours before with a thumping majority.
But while Mr Corbyn described Mr Burnham's majority as "stupendous" his colleague had left the conference centre and did not return to attend the event held by his party leader.
Instead Mr Corbyn, who received a tumultuous reception from around 200 supporters, said: "I have been in touch with Andy to congratulate him and he's already hard at work on behalf of the people of the Greater Manchester region.
"And I congratulate all our mayoral candidates for the work they did.
"Our message now has to be to challenge the Tories. Absolutely challenge them."
Mr Corbyn was cheered and clapped as he gave a passionate speech against homelessness and zero hours contracts and tax cuts for the wealthy, promising a Labour government "for the many, not the few".
Mr Burnham was not available for comment.
The former Cabinet minister and MP for Leigh took more than 60% of the Greater Manchester poll with 359,352 votes, well ahead of Tory candidate Sean Anstee in second place who won 128,752 votes.
Mr Burnham was beaten to second place by Mr Corbyn in the Labour leadership election following the 2015 general election defeat.
Earlier Mr Corbyn had been in Liverpool, where he did meet and congratulated Steve Rotheram, who had been elected the new mayor of the Liverpool city region.
After the rally asked why Mr Burnham had not been seen, Mr Corbyn said: "Andy's busy working for Manchester already, don't worry about that, we'll be here again this week."
Earlier he described Labour's poll showing as "variable" but warned supporters against media coverage of the results.
He said: "We have had results around the country that have been variable, I understand that, we all understand that. I get that.
"I congratulate every Labour candidate for all the work they did in the election yesterday and in the run up to it.
"I congratulate those that won in Cardiff, in Neath, in Swansea and Port Talbot, Doncaster.
"Who gained seats in often very unlikely places, I was talking to some friends this evening in north Kent, in Ramsgate where they gained seats."
To cheers he added: "Don't let the media write this story.
"Let us write the Labour story."