Last updated 09:01, Saturday, 22 November 2008

Reality check number one: It’s only a game! No, not football – Strictly! And good old dance-like-your grandad John Sergeant; he’s only a bloke who saw through the stitched up game plan and took his patent pumps home – which was the first bit of recognisable reality in Brucie’s ballroom.

Head held high: John Sergeant, with partner Kristina Rihanoff, who has quit Stricly Come Dancing – with his dignity intact

Merely a coincidence, of course, that the Beeb’s version of phone-voting lunacy managed to dominate the national news agenda for a whole week, just as ITV’s jungle bug-crunching nonsense dominated the ratings race... which we know the BBC never enters, on account of its sacrosanct, non-commercial, public service purpose.

Only the seriously cynical would suspect a set-up. Only the sadly handicapped by nothing better to care about would give two hoots – and please don’t mistake me for someone who cares about Strictly.

But it’s also true that only the blissfully gullible could be shocked by a game show that relies on public opinion – then turns on the public for not giving the opinion it wants. Hey, it’s Strictly Come Dancing, not Zimbabwe. It really doesn’t matter... much.

John Sergeant knows he is well out of this sham of a show which lines up judges – that no one had heard of before the game began, for a bit of interactive fun – then sanctions their grandiose, bullying delusions of selecting for the 2012 Olympics.

Did Sergeant jump or did he stumble onto something unpleasantly slippery on the dance floor?

He said that, owing to the massive waves of sustained public support, he was in danger of winning the competition and that would have been too big a joke – even for him.

He’d only wanted a bit of fun. His audiences too, as it turned out.

But he’s far from daft. John Sergeant knew it may only have been a matter of a very short time before his phone-voting, blindly faithful audiences were given the push... so he went first.

Nice guy. Greater love hath no man than he lay down his inconsequential trophy and newfound superstar status for the Beeb’s already tarnished reputation.