Melody Thornton has been booted from ‘Dancing on Ice’.
The Pussycat Dolls singer narrowly missed out on a place in next week’s semi-final of the ITV ice dancing competition, after she faced the dreaded skate-off on Sunday (24.02.19) and lost out when judges chose to save former ‘X Factor’ finalist Saara Alto instead.
Asked by host Holly Willoughby if she’d enjoyed her time on the show, Melody said: "Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. I know my father would be very proud of me, because he is the best athlete in the world, and that’s all he wanted for me."
And the 34-year-old singer’s professional skating partner Alexander Demetriou was impressed with how far the star had come on the show, saying she "pushed herself" to her limits despite suffering setbacks including a "nasty fall" a few weeks ago.
Speaking after their exit, he said: "I couldn’t have asked for a better partner. Every single week she wants to improve. She took a really really nasty fall two weeks ago and it did knock the confidence, but she still pushed herself. She still wanted to show it."
Melody finished in third place overall from the judges scores, after having scored an impressive 35.5 for her main routine, as well as picking up an extra three points in the skate battle – in which every couple took to the ice at the same time, in a battle to win extra points.
However, the audience chose to send first place Wes Nelson, second place James Jordan, and fourth place Brian McFadden straight through to the semi-finals, leaving Melody and Saara – who placed last in the judges scoring – to take on the skate-off.
All four judges – Christopher Dean, Jayne Torvill, Ashley Banjo, and Jason Gardiner – ultimately thought Saara had a more "polished" skate-off performance, and so chose to save her from elimination.