Professional dancer and Strictly Come Dancing star Katya Jones has defended her partner on the show, Wynne Evans, following backlash from the public following the 'hand incident'.
On Saturday (12 October) night's show, Jones was seen moving Evans' hand away from her waist, and even refusing a high five from him later on along with an eye roll.
However, she made a statement on social media about the viral incident, which you can view here:
Evans is best known for the voice behind the memorable GoCompare adverts, and paired up with Jones after a performance to ABBA's 70s' hit 'Money, Money, Money'.
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She said in a statement on her Instagram Story this morning that the situation had to be made 'crystal clear', explaining: "The hand incident that happened on Saturday night was a very silly inside joke between Wynne and I.
"So even the idea that it made me feel uncomfortable or offended in any way is complete nonsense. It’s actually absurd," she stated.
Adding that her Strictly partner was doing 'brilliantly' and becoming an 'amazing dancer', she then spoke about the subject once again to clarify what had happened.
Jones also took to BBC spin-off show It Takes Two tonight (14 October), as she stated that her aim was to 'get something out of the way that I feel overshadowed our performance for absolutely no reason'.
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Jones stated: “Quite frankly I can’t bear sitting here watching this man being portrayed as someone he is not.
“And in fact it couldn’t be further away from the truth so I have to make this absolutely clear, that this whole incident with the hand and the high five on Saturday night, it was an inside joke between Wynne and I.
"Was it a silly joke? Yes. Was it a bad joke? Yes,” the 35-year-old told It Takes Two host Fleur East.
The pair have since talked about the incident together in a short clip posted on social media channels, where they said they were 'messing around' and they were 'sorry' for the 'silly joke' to their fans.
Since the incident, Evans has also watched the clip back and admitted that he 'could see how people may have misinterpreted it', though he did speak about how 'heartbroken' he was on his radio show on BBC Wales.
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The 52-year-old said: "Basically, firstly, I want to say I'm absolutely heartbroken about the things that are being said about me in the past day. It's not nice to live in that time.
"Katya and I are really really close and we're really good friends and on Saturday night, we made a stupid joke that went wrong. We thought it was really funny. It has been totally misinterpreted."
He spoke about her posts on social media that rubbished claims she was uncomfortable, adding: "Everything is on Katya's socials, she's explained she doesn't feel uncomfortable and we have a great friendship.
"I'm sorry if anybody was offended by it. It was a joke. There's no real story really. I feel weird apologising as I don't feel like I've done anything.
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"I misjudged it. If there's a joke, I'm usually at the centre of it. That's basically it and now I just want to keep dancing," he concluded.
Topics: BBC, Strictly Come Dancing, TV, UK News
Joshua Nair