Phillip Schofield’s This Morning departure addressed by hosts
Piers Morgan has slammed ITV bosses as he revealed that Phillip Schofield told him he is “utterly heartbroken” after being axed by This Morning.
The 61-year-old television veteran announced his departure from the long-running ITV daytime show after more than 20 years on Saturday. Reacting to the media frenzy following Phil’s announcement, Piers described it as “brutal to watch” but also “entirely unsurprising”.
The TalkTV presenter revealed that he’d heard from the Dancing On Ice host since his dismissal, adding that he’d been left devastated by the manor of his exit. This Morning’s stand-in presenters Alison Hammond and Dermot O’Leary addressed Phil’s departure at the very beginning of Monday’s show.
“We can’t start the show without paying tribute to the man who spent the last two decades sitting on the This Morning sofa,” said Alison, adopting a serious tone.
“Quite simply, we all know he’s one of the best live television broadcasters this country has ever had and we and all the team wish him all the best.”
Dermot added: “As a show, everyone on and off screen want to say a huge thank you to Phil for what he’s done to make the show a success over the last 21 years.”
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Piers, who also found himself at the centre of a media storm when he left ITV breakfast show Good Morning Britain (GMB) two years ago, described his former employer’s handling of Phil’s departure as “churlish”.
“I don’t know the full story behind Phillip Schofield’s downfall, but where I feel personal empathy with him is over the manner of his sacking,” he wrote for the Sun.
“For ITV to not even give him the chance to say a proper goodbye to his large, loyal audience after 21 years struck me as needlessly churlish, and I know he’s utterly heartbroken about it because he told me himself.”
Defending his fellow presenter, Piers wrote: “Phillip’s not the evil monster he’s being painted as, nor is he the angel his previously halo-clad reputation suggested.”
But he lashed out viciously at some of his former colleagues, saying “the abyss-like depths of ruthless backstabbing in the world of daytime television” made the “seething cesspit of Westminster politics seem like an oasis of loyalty”.
Continuing his attack, Piers wrote: “These two-faced wastrels would billow constant adoring smoke up my a** to my face and bask in the reflected glory of the soaring ratings and awards that I brought in, but behind my back many of the same smiley, happy, nicey-nicey people were pouring toxic buckets of foul-mouthed manure over me.”
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