Strictly Come Dancing tour chaos almost forced Sarah Hadland to quit

Another Strictly Come Dancing star has admitted to almost quitting the BBC show's live tour after their partner was forced to pull out of the running following an injury

Sarah Hadland has confessed she nearly hung up her dancing shoes on the Strictly Come Dancing live tour.

The 53-year-old Miranda actress was left in tears and had a serious case of the jitters when her dance sidekick Vito Coppola bowed out after an unfortunate back injury post the inaugural show in January. While she bravely continued with new partner Nikita Kuzmin, Sarah confessed that she mulled over quitting as the thought of proceeding without Vito seemed too daunting.

She divulged: "I don't know who was more upset, me or him, we were both crying." The rapport she'd built with Vito made her waver.

She recalled to Metro: "Because my trust definitely took a long time to build up and that was all Vito's hard work, so yeah, I had a bit of a wobble and thought, 'I don't think I can do this tour if it's not with Vito.'" However, her connection with Nikita blossomed swiftly. She went on, "But then I began a relationship with Nikita, he started coaching me and we made the routines our own, and very quickly you build that trust again."

Sarah confessed thinking she was very lucky to having a second go a the experience. Despite not clinching the Glitterball Trophy in the BBC One series, she wrapped up 2024 with a cherished friend in Vito. She expressed her feelings poignantly: "I miss Vito terribly, and Nikita! Because you build these amazing relationships, friendships, partnerships that are quite different to anything else I've ever experienced, because they're so intense and you're so reliant on your partner, but then that suddenly stops."

She added: "But Vito and I message and FaceTime all the time, so I feel like I've just gained a really special friend for life."

Previously speaking to the Mirror as the Strictly live tour kicked off in Birmingham last month, Sarah explained how after a lifetime of putting limits on what she thought she could achieve, the dance competition helped to unleash a new confidence. "Women come up to me every day and it makes me cry because there are two things they all say. They feel people have written them off – but, worse, they've accepted it.

"It's one thing to have other people say, 'Are you really going to do that? Aren't you a bit old?' What's worse is you going, 'Yeah, I am'. It's like, no! Vito wouldn't accept that from me. It did cause friction at times because I'd be like, 'I can't do it', and I'd get annoyed when he'd tell me to try it anyway… and then I'd do it."

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