Brendan Cole has admitted that "something" happened between him and Natasha Kaplinsky.
The 45-year-old newsreader won the first ever series of ‘Strictly Come Dancing’ with her professional partner Brendan in 2004 and there has been speculation ever since that their extraordinary chemistry on the dancefloor bubbled over into real life.
Brendan’s then-fiancee Camilla Dallerup was also a professional dancer on the same series but he insisted that nothing happened with Natasha while he and Camilla were still together.
Speaking on the upcoming ‘John Bishop In Conversation With Brendan Cole’ on W, he said:
"The chemistry was there, plain for all to see."
"I didn’t have an affair. Camilla chose to leave. Once you do something, after that it’s not an affair.
"Camilla left me three weeks into the show, the night she got kicked off.
"I still remember, she stood there in the line-up and it gets down to Camilla and myself. Her and David Dickinson, and myself and Kaplinsky.
"They announced that we were safe and Camilla and David were leaving. And, you know, your natural reaction to news like that is you go like, you know, we’re safe. She took that as, ‘you unsupportive so-and-so’."
Speaking previously about the split, Camilla said it was like a "mini-death" and said Brendan, 42, lost interest in her when he was partnered with Natasha.
She said: "It was like a mini-death. You go through the arc of grief, anger, bitterness.
"My best friend and dancing professionally with Brendan had both gone. That felt pretty scary. It seemed like everything I’d ever wanted and worked for had been removed, just like that.
"He’d lost interest in me. He was more than happy, though, to get up in the morning to watch Natasha reading the news!"
Brendan Cole: ‘Something happened with Natasha Kaplinsky’
