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'X Factor' Contestant Falls Backwards Off Stage After Losing His Footing

'X Factor' Contestant Falls Backwards Off Stage After Losing His Footing

Going on the 'X Factor' is hard enough - without falling off the stage, as singer-songwriter Tommy Ludford did last night

Mike Wood

Mike Wood

The X Factor is often full of surprises - but usually, it's finding out that someone can sing, or that Simon Cowell is actually a sentient human rather than a faceless fun-sponging robot man.

Well, viewers of tonight's show will be treated to a genuine shock - as contestant Tommy Ludford managed to fall off the stage midway through his performance.

Ludford, who is just 20, is all set to finish his song when he takes a quick step back, only to stand directly in the gap of the X-shaped stage and plummet to the floor.

Dermot O'Leary was on hand to race over to the stricken singer and offer him a helping hand. Fortunately, Tommy was alright and emerged from the incident with nothing more than a bruise to his pride.

It's not like it was a small drop either: the stage appears to be around a metre high, and people were genuinely concerned about him. Stagehands and Dermot O'Leary rushed to him, but Tommy managed to get himself to his feet and show the fans that he was OK with an air punch.

Ludford, who is a kitchen porter in Sussex, has so far wowed the judges so far with his self-penned songs.

The performance was Tommy's bid to make it as far as the judge's houses stage of the competition, with previous songs having impressed Simon Cowell, Louis Tomlinson and new husband and wife pairing Robbie Williams and Ayda Field.

Speaking after his audition, Ludford said "It was amazing and definitely the most surreal experience in the world. I was really nervous beforehand but once I got on the stage I just got into the zone."


via GIPHY

"I was there all day waiting for my audition and seeing the amount of people with their guitars. A load of them came back looking upset after their auditions and in the back of my mind, I was like 'oh God, this isn't good, I've got to do something special'.

"Anybody who says they aren't trying to impress Simon the most is a liar."

Ludford paid tribute to fans from his hometown of Peasmarsh, who have been sending him messages of support since he made his TV debut.

"This whole town is like a massive family," he told the local newspaper, the Rye and Battle Observer. "People have been coming up to me saying they saw me on the X Factor. It's not like they want to know me now, it's that it's one of their boys who is conquering the world.

"Online, it has been amazing. You get the occasional tweet or message from people saying I'm just like Ed Sheeran but I'm not like him and there is only a limited amount of originality out there.

"That sort of stuff gets to me but I just try to bite my tongue and ignore it all."

Ludford will find out whether he has made the judge's houses stage in the second part of the show later on today.

The X Factor is back on ITV tonight from 8pm.

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Topics: TV and Film, x factor