Emmerdale star Lewis Cope<\/a>, 30, made his debut on the 2025 launch episode on Saturday (21 September) and swiftly embedded himself as a firm favourite.<\/p>\n Based on the short amount of dancing he did after being paired <\/a>with Katya Jones, BBC<\/a> viewers suggested he might be the future claimant of the show\u2019s Glitterball trophy.<\/p>\n The soap star, who plays Nicky Milligan in the ITV series, was also defended by fans after revealing he has previous dance experience in his opening VT, an admission one viewer described as \u201ca cardinal sin\u201d.<\/p>\n After some chimed in to complain Cope has an unfair advantage over less experienced contestants, many defended Cope \u2013 and predicted he\u2019ll win this year\u2019s show.<\/p>\n \u201cUnfortunately I won\u2019t take any Lewis Cope hate,\u201d one viewer wrote, with another writing: \u201cOn the basis of that group dance, everyone needs to be VERY afraid of Lewis Cope\u2019s jive next week.\u201d<\/p>\n One person concluded: \u201cI\u2019m going to call it now: Lewis Cope will win,\u201d with many others sharing the same sentiment.<\/p>\n \u201cLewis Cope or Dani Dyer will win #StrictlyComeDancing this year,\u201d another viewer said.<\/p>\n open image in gallery<\/p>\n Lewis Cope has been paired with Katya Jones on \u2018Strictly\u2019 (BBC)<\/p>\n Cope starred in Billy Elliot on the West End, the musical about a northern boy who trains to become a ballet dancer, playing Elliot\u2019s best friend, Michael.<\/p>\n As well as his West End training, the actor performed as part of hip-hop troupe Ruff Diamond as a teenager.<\/p>\n The group finished as runners-up on the Sky One dance competition Got to Dance in 2013 and were told by judge Kimberly Wyatt that their initial audition was the best of the series.<\/p>\n Cope, who joined Emmerdale in 2022, was a last-minute Strictly contestant after Game of Thrones actor Kristian Nairn quit on medical grounds.<\/p>\n Asked how it felt to be joining the series late, Cope said: \u201cI think, if anything, it\u2019s probably helped me because I haven\u2019t really had time to think about it or anything so now the excitement has kind of just taken over. I think it\u2019s probably better for me.\u201d<\/p>\n open image in gallery<\/p>\n \u2018Emmerdale\u2019 star Lewis Cope is an early \u2018Strictly\u2019 favourite (BBC)<\/p>\n Meanwhile, Strictly viewers were left frustrated<\/a> over professional dancer Amy Dowden\u2019s pairing with controversial contestant, former Apprentice candidate Thomas Skinner<\/a>.<\/p>\n Some viewers have highlighted how the spotlight on Skinner\u2019s participation in the series may impact Dowden\u2019s longevity on this year\u2019s competition, while others suggested that the dancer\u2019s popularity among fans may help Skinner\u2019s chances.<\/p>\n Strictly airs weekly every Saturday and Sunday on BBC One.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Your support helps us to tell the story From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":150971,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[96,391,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-150970","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tv","tag-entertainment","tag-tv","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/150970","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=150970"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/150970\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/150971"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=150970"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=150970"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=150970"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Lewis](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/1758450127_194_newFile-2.jpg\")
<\/p>\n![\"\u2018Emmerdale\u2019](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/1758450128_474_newFile.jpg\")
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