Strictly Come Dancing‘s Halloween Week saw the departure of comedian Judi Love from the 2021 line-up, after the judges decided to save swimmer Adam Peaty in Sunday’s dance-off.
Judi had to miss a week due to testing positive for COVID-19, with her Cha Cha alongside pro Graziano Di Prima landing her in the bottom two for the third time in the competition.
And it seems the Loose Women panellist will be sorely missed among her fellow contestants, including Dragons’ Den entrepreneur Sara Davies, who sat at the bottom of this week’s Strictly leaderboard.
“Do you know what, the close-knit group that we’ve got is unreal,” Sara told fellow contestant Dan Walker on BBC Breakfast earlier this morning. “And Judi was such an essential part of that and I was so pleased that she got to come back and do that dance.”
She added: “And I know she’d been struggling all week – it just gave her that little bit of closure, but I was distraught to see her and Adam in the bottom two.
“I was like, ‘Do you know what, I can’t win either way – either way one of my best friends is going home and it’s just not going to be the same this week.’”
Dan also revealed that the trio stay in the same hotel on Friday nights, with some of the other contestants popping in as well. He said that Judi was a “founding member of the hotel club”, adding: “We all know that somebody has to leave each week but [Judi] has been such a bundle of fun and laughs.”