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Strictly’s Anton du Beke hits out at judges’ “harsh” comments

He thinks they were were too hard on Ruth Langsford

Anton du Beke has hit out at Strictly Come Dancing judges, claiming that their comments about his celebrity partner, Ruth Langsford, were mean.

Ruth and Anton appeared on This Morning earlier today, and it didn’t take long for the conversation to inevitably steer towards their elimination from the competition at the weekend.

Anton told This Morning host, Holly Willoughby, exactly what he made of the judges’ critique as they lost out in the dance off to Jonnie Peacock and Oti Mabuse, saying: “I thought they were a bit harsh.”

Following the dance off on Sunday’s show, Craig Revel Horwood called Jonnie Peacock and Oti Mabuse’s performance “the better dance”, while Bruno Tonioli dubbed it more “emotionally moving”.

Read more: Strictly Come Dancing fans furious at ‘rude judges’ as fan favourite contestant is eliminated. 

And Holly was quick to agree with her guest, suggesting the judges were “just a bit mean” on Saturday’s show.

“Unnecessarily so,” Anton agreed. “I didn’t understand why they were quite so harsh, but there you go – that’s the show.”

After performing together for so long, Ruth and Anton have formed a solid friendship. The pair were clearly upset to be leaving the show, and had nothing but lovely things to say about each other.

But ever the diplomat, Ruth admitted on This Morning that she was the right person to leave the competition. “It wasn’t my best dance, especially because I made a mistake in the dance off.”

Ruth admitted she found the pressure of performing every week hard work… “It’s that fear of going out there and not doing it well and letting your partner down. So then the frustration of that and the embarrassment of getting it wrong.”

She also admitted she found the gruelling training schedule hard work: “There was ‘Teary Tuesday’ and ‘Weepy Wednesday’…” she joked.

Read more: Strictly Come Dancing’s Anton du Beke makes a heartbreaking confession

Despite their disappointment at the weekend, the dancing duo still managed to poke fun at themselves following their now famous Paso Doble fall the pervious week…

“I thought, we might as well make it comedy. On the last dance, Anton got on the floor and everybody piled on!” Ruth joked. “That’s why I love this man.”


Claire Crick
Freelance Soap Writer