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Daily Mirror
Daily Mirror
Entertainment
Josh Luckhurst

This Morning loses almost 100k viewers amid Phillip Schofield and Holly Willoughby 'feud'

This Morning has lost nearly 100,000 viewers as the reported 'feud' and tension between presenters Phillip Schofield and Holly Willoughby continues.

It has been claimed that Holly has "cut ties" with her former TV bestie following a string of bumps in the road in recent months.

The pair faced furious backlash over false claims they jumped the queue to see the Queen lying in state in September and, last month, Phillip took time away from the programme amid his brother Timothy Schofield's sex abuse trial. He is reported to have kept Holly in the dark about his brother's case.

The 61-year-old later shared a statement on his friendship with Holly as he said things haven't "been easy" but praised Holly as his "rock".

Holly and Phillip have been hosting This Morning together for over a decade (ITV)

The statement is said to have "blind-sided" and "deeply upset" his fellow Dancing on Ice host as feud speculation continued to grow.

Phillip has fronted the popular ITV daytime show since 2002, with Holly joining him at the helm in 2009.

However, that popularity has dwindled in the past week following the reported fallout between the presenting duo.

Monday's episode 724,000 people tune - a drop of 20 per cent - before Tuesday's show averaged a viewership of 663,000 for the three and a half hour magazine programme.

Wednesday saw over half a million turn to the ITV daytime show but this was a drop from 647,000 for the same time last week. Peak viewership tumbled from 905,000 last week to 683,000.

Thursday's programme saw the pair get briefly replaced in the presenting hotseat by a robot.

The robot welcomed everyone to the show today, before it was seen standing alongside Holly and Phil as they confirmed they'd be interviewing the robot later on in the programme as well as some of their usual guests and segments.

A robot introduced Thursday's episode of the ITV morning show (Ken McKay/ITV/REX/Shutterstock)

Phillip has planned to "tough out" the growing speculation over his job and friendship. And it's now been reported he is refusing to throw in the towel at This Morning.

The Mirror told on Saturday how ITV are prepared to axe Phillip from the show if viewers "no longer believe in the chemistry" between him and Holly.

Their contracts are up at the end of the year, with renewal negotiations set to start in the summer.

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