Are you ready for the return of Strictly Come Dancing? The show’s producers will be hard at work finding a brilliant new celebrity line-up for the 2023 series, and it sounds like they have already landed their first contestant.
According to The Daily Mail, former Love Island star Zara McDermott will be the first star to join the dance competition. The report adds that bosses are hoping the 26-year-old will attract a younger audience to the BBC programme.
An insider told the Mail that Zara is over the moon by the offer to take part in the Strictly show - we can’t wait for it all to be official!
The TV personality, who is very popular on TikTok where she shares funny videos of herself with her partner, Sam Thompson, has had a very successful career following her stint on Love Island in 2018 and has since gone on to star in Made in Chelsea, The X Factor: Celebrity, and BBC Three shows Uncovering Rape Culture and Love in the Flesh.
The star is the latest in a line-up of rumoured Strictly contestants. Check out who else might be taking part here!
Zara has been in a relationship with Sam since 2019. He recently opened up about starting a family with her, telling The Mirror: "A big thing for me was kids. I do want kids and I want to know I can look after a child. I want to know I’m the provider and I’m the carer and that I can be the security that child needs to grow up.
"I was like, ‘I don’t feel like I can even look after myself a lot of the time.’ The older I was getting, the more I was thinking about that. Zara has always been a giver. She’s a gift-giver and a date rememberer. She’ll remind me of my family's birthdays, she’s such a thoughtful person. She shouldn’t have to book me a train journey."
Every Strictly Come Dancing winner so far
- 2004: Natisha Kaplinsky (partner Brendan Cole)
- 2004: Jill Halfpenny (partner Darren Bennett)
- 2005: Darren Gough (partner Lilia Kopylova)
- 2006: Mark Ramprakash (partner Karen Hardy)
- 2007: Alesha Dixon (partner Matthew Cutler)
- 2008: Tom Chambers (partner Camilla Dallerup)
- 2009: Chris Hollins (partner Ola Jordan)
- 2010: Kara Tointon (partner Artem Chigvintsev)
- 2011: Harry Judd (partner Aliona Vilani)
- 2012: Louis Smith (partner Flavia Cacace)
- 2013: Abbey Clancy (partner Aljaž Škorjanec)
- 2014: Caroline Flack (partner Pasha Kovalev)
- 2015: Jay McGuiness (partner Aliona Vilani)
- 2016: Ore Oduba (partner Joanne Clifton)
- 2017: Joe McFadden (partner Katya Jones)
- 2018: Stacey Dooley (partner Kevin Clifton)
- 2019: Kelvin Fletcher (partner Oti Mabuse)
- 2020: Bill Bailey (partner Oti Mabuse)
- 2021: Rose Ayling-Ellis (partner Giovanni Pernice)
- 2022: Hamza Yassin (partner Jowita Przystał)
- 2023: Ellie Leach (partner Vito Coppola)
The contestants are usually confirmed around early August, so we don’t have much longer before the very exciting line-up is revealed! In 2022, Hamza Yassin and Jowita Przystal won the dancing competition, with Fleur East and Vito Coppola, Helen Skelton and Gorka Marquez, and Molly Rainford and Carlos Gu coming in as runners-up.
