The producers of TV’s ‘Countdown’ have been criticised for the ‘nasty’ way in which they have released long serving Carol Vorderman.
“This was dealt with in such an awful way,” a friend told BBC Radio 5 Live. “How below the belt.”
Vorderman, who is paid up to £1m for 225 episodes a year, was offered less than £100,000, according to her agent.
“Now Carol, please choose your nine letters.”
“I’ll have three vowels and six consonants, please.”
“Ok, you have ‘a’,’e’,’u’, two ‘d’s, two ‘n’s, an ‘r’ and a ‘t’. Your thirty seconds starts now.”
The clock counts down and Carol scribbles furiously on her paper and frowns at the results.
The thirty seconds is up.
“Right, what do you have, Carol?”
“I have a seven letter word; ‘daunted’,” says Carol.
“Ooooh, not quite good enough I’m afraid. We have nine letters; ‘redundant’.”
“Oh.”
“Never mind, Carol, perhaps you’ll do better in the Numbers Round. Let’s see what you can make from a ‘one’ and five ‘zeros’.”
