Gorka Marquez has attempted to offer some much needed reassurance to his Strictly Come Dancing partner Helen Skelton,. after she walked out of rehearsals by escaping through a fire door.
Helen, who was at the centre of 'fix' allegations after her tap dancing success as a youngster came to light, went into Saturday's first live show as favourite to win this year's Glitterball trophy, just edging out early frontrunner Fleur East in the odds before the contestants took to the ballroom for the first time.
However, while both bookmakers and fans had plenty of confidence in Helen and her abilities to do well, Helen herself was the complete opposite, so much so that she fled training and was then then left in tears after Gorka managed to talk her into returning.
Helen's 'walk out' was raised by Lorraine Kelly as she gave a Strictly update on her show on Monday's while praising Helen for her 'beautiful' performance on Saturday night, which earned her plenty of positive feedback from the judges.
As he and Helen joined Strictly host Claudia Winkelman, Gorka said: "She just needs to believe in herself. I know her confidence at the moment is not great but I believe in her," as Helen quipped: "I kept trying to leave."
Offering another public show of support to Helen as they began training for this weekend's second live show, Gorka took to Instagram to post a picture of the pair together and wrote: "Week one and I am already so proud of you @helenskelto. I know how hard you work but you made it look effortless Bring on week two. A new dance and more coffee breaks."
Gorka and Helen's American Smooth score of 26 put them in the middle of the week one leaderboard and, in the aftermath of Saturday's show, bookies hastily rejigged their odds on who will win Strictly 2022 to make Will Mellor the new favourite, following his blistering ballroom debut alongside pro partner Nancy Xu.
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