Strictly Come Dancing star Paul Merson was forced to pull out of the spin-off show It Takes Two due to his “dad duties”.
During Friday’s visit (October 18) to the BBC studios, Janette Manrara welcomed professional dancer Karen Hauer onto the famous purple sofa – but her sporting partner was noticeably absent.
It was at this point that the former football ace joined the dynamic duo via video link as they chuckled over his recent ballroom performance.
The TV presenter couldn’t help but point out that the sporting legend was missing from the studios as the dad-of-three continues to balance his dance commitments with his fatherly duties.
She began: “Paul, you’re on dad duties this evening, so you can’t be in the studio this evening. That comes first.”
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Paul went on to discuss the show’s surprises and how they aligned with his expectations throughout his time on the programme so far.
He chuckled: “Obviously, a BBQ, a vindaloo, and footballs are coming in and he looks like someone who works on a ship. Yeah, it was nice to dance. I thought Karen deserved that as well, to be fair.”
Reflecting on his time on the show, Paul confessed: “It felt nice when I first took up the chance to come on to the show. This is what I thought it would be roughly, you know what I mean? So it was nice to get one of those dances in.”
Janette replied: “You feel like you’ve got the whole Strictly experience with this under your belt now.” Looking ahead to the competition, Paul giggled: “Yeah, but no it’s back to reality again this week.”
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It didn’t take long before fans flooded to X – formerly known as Twitter – to agree with his thoughts online. One user penned: “He’s quite right... They need to stop all these stupid dances they give to ex sports people.
"It’s embarrassing and never works properly. Paul’s dance was far better with the correct music and outfit.” Another agreed: “Stop with the joke dances #ittakestwo #strictly.”
A third echoed: "It makes me annoyed to see Paul and Karen talking about how much he loved being Fred Astaire during the quickstep, and that's what he always expected #Strictly to be, not the silly stuff. And then this week they have a samba to Car Wash, back to being the joke again."
Another fan commented: "#Strictly Please listen to Paul and Karen! The expectation when signing up was to learn to dance, with all the associated elegance, not silly songs and silly themes."
Strictly Come Dancing airs on Saturdays from 6.20pm on BBC One or catch up on BBC iPlayer.
