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From Shaun Ryder’s ban for swearing live on TFI Friday and the much-criticised Brass Eye, to unapologetically airing genitalia close-ups in Naked Attraction and broadcasting a live autopsy, Channel 4 has always been known for pushing boundaries.

But when it started back in November 1982 the channel launch was a rather more wholesome affair, with Richard Whiteley and Carol Vorderman debuting on Countdown – the simple letters and numbers game still going strong 40 years later, proving you don’t always need controversy to make a TV hit.

Loved by pensioners and students alike, the afternoon staple finished its 40th year with its 86th finale just before Christmas, and begins 2023 with a new Champion Of Champions series.

While quizzes such as Who Wants To Be A Millionaire? and The Chase bring the drama, Countdown is comfort TV; the timeslots and presenters have changed over the years but it is always there with a teatime teaser, gentle humour, and a treasure trove of word knowledge from long-time resident lexicographer Susie Dent – or “that woman in Dictionary Corner” as she is known to her million-plus Twitter followers.

Tom Stevenson is the winner of the 86th series of Countdown
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Tom Stevenson was crowned the winner of Countdown’s 86th series just before Christmas

Ahmed Mohamed, who became the first ever black Countdown champion when he won the 84th series in 2021, and Tom Stevenson, who triumphed in the latest series just a few days ago – after setting the record for the programme’s highest ever score of 154 during his heats – will both take part in the upcoming Champion Of Champions series.

Throughout his entire run in his heats, Tom remained unbeaten in every single round – something that had never been achieved before.

“I was there to just have a good time, try and win the teapot and hopefully not to disgrace myself,” he says. “But Colin [Murray, the current presenter] was seriously invested.

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“It got to the final game and there were a couple of occasions when my opponent declared a longer word than me, but it wasn’t in the dictionary. And then it got to the final conundrum, and I managed to solve it and Colin was very excited. You can see the clip on YouTube.”

During his time on the show, Tom also scored with the word “hornier” – not a rude one that had to be cut out, forever to live on in Countdown blooper memes, but one he was proud of nonetheless.

“I can assure you that nobody has let me forget the fact I declared that word on national television,” he says. “Forget about all the other achievements, that is definitely something that stuck with me as a result.”

Knowing your nines: Bolection and tepidaria

Ahmed Mohamed, pictured with his mum, was the first black contestant to become a Countdown champion, winning the 84th series in 2021
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Ahmed Mohamed pictured with his mum and Anne-Marie Imafidon, who stood in for Rachel Riley on the numbers when she was on maternity leave

Ahmed, 28, also wowed during his time on the show. However, he freely admits his impressive ability at coming up with good words – and spelling them correctly – isn’t necessarily based on knowledge of meaning, but rather studying Countdown vocabulary.

In the opening round of his third show, Ahmed scored a nine-letter word, “bolection… something to do with architecture”, and says he was also proud to decipher a final conundrum as “tepidaria”. Just don’t expect him to have the definitions at his fingertips.

“Every time I declared a word that sounded a bit crazy, Anne [Robinson, host at the time] would ask me every time, like, what’s the meaning of that word? ‘I don’t know, Anne. I don’t know!'”

Anyone who loves the show will tell you the key to its success is its simplicity: spell the longest word possible from a mix of nine consonants and vowels; calculate a three-digit number from a mix of six small and large numbers using basic arithmetic. All followed by the conundrum, Countdown’s equivalent to the Gladiators travelator.

They will probably also credit its longevity to Whiteley being at the helm for so long.

Finalist Mark Nyman, who took part in the third series in 1983, says there was “a general feeling of family from the start”. After going on to be crowned the first ever Champion Of Champions in 1984, he later became a producer on the show and also appeared in Dictionary Corner himself in dozens of episodes.

‘He was like a god, really’

Mark Nyman and Stephen Fry in Dictionary Corner on Countdown
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Countdown’s first Champion Of Champions and later producer and Dictionary Corner presenter Mark Nyman, appearing alongside Stephen Fry

Initially, he says he was brought in as a programme associate, or a greeter, to meet contestants and help put them at ease the night before filming. “Have a couple of drinks and make them feel part of the Countdown experience,” he says. While it wouldn’t be the first show that comes to mind when it comes to raucous behind-the-scenes tales, he says “there were probably a few hungover contestants” playing back in the day.

Whiteley, the presenter who hosted until his death in 2005, was “the cog at the centre of it all”, says Mark, who was made a co-producer in the 1990s. “He appealed to the older demographic but also to students and younger ones as well, which is quite rare, to appeal across the board.

“That was because he was a bit of a bumbling oaf at times and the students loved to take the mickey out of him, but in a nice way. He was like a god, really. So welcoming. And once you’d earnt his respect, he would do anything for you.”

‘I just thought he was a bit cocky’

As a producer, Mark also interviewed potential contestants, deciding whether or not they were good enough for the show. He says he must have carried out about 15,000 in total and that a “few quite well known” people applied over the years, including The Chase quiz mastermind Mark “The Beast” Labbett.

It was a no from Nyman.

“He was really good at the numbers at the interview, but he was average on the letters. In borderline cases, I would go on personality and it wasn’t that I didn’t like him, I just thought he was a bit cocky. So I rejected him. But if there were borderline cases, I would always give them a second go… and he did try again and he got through the second time round.”

Countdown was never about picking people purely for “good telly”, bad contestants for cheap laughs, he says. It is 100% about ability. “It doesn’t matter if you get someone socially inept winning eight shows, people admire their brilliance… and they might say something stupid, there’s nothing wrong with that.”

With the next Champion Of Champions series set to air, Tom and Ahmed are getting ready to see themselves back on Channel 4 once again.

Both say the experience has been life-enhancing, for different reasons.

Tom, who suffered from agoraphobia as a teenager, says appearing on the show was something he pushed himself to do. “I nearly did drop out on one occasion, but it was something I could say to myself, it doesn’t matter how I do but I can say that I’ve done it, and it’s something that’s pushing me massively out of my comfort zone because I haven’t been on TV before.

“I was just hoping to win one episode. And even if I did end up losing that, as long as I felt I’d done myself justice then all was good by me. But it’s been an incredible experience. People have remarked that they think my confidence has gone up.”

Ahmed says he was proud to become the first black champion. “I was really happy about that. I live in Tottenham and it was going a bit viral – I was getting a lot of mates I haven’t talked to for years finding me online saying they’d heard about me on the news.”

The upcoming Countdown Champion Of Champions series begins in January

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Kim Kardashian’s Paris robbery trial: Everything you need to know

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Kim Kardashian's Paris robbery trial: Everything you need to know

In October 2016, Kim Kardashian was robbed at gunpoint – with jewellery worth millions of dollars stolen during the audacious heist in Paris.

It was the biggest robbery of an individual in France for more than 20 years – and made front pages around the world.

Now, almost a decade on, the case is finally coming to court.

Why has it taken so long? Will Kardashian give evidence? And who exactly are the “grandpa robbers” facing trial?

Here’s everything you need to know.

Pic: Rex Features
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Kardashian at the Siran Presentation on the day of the robbery. Pic: Rex Features

What happened?

Two years after Kardashian and rapper Kanye West tied the knot in an ostentatious week-long celebration spanning Paris and Florence, the Kardashian-West clan were back in the French capital for Paris Fashion Week.

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Her then husband had returned to the US to pick up his Saint Pablo tour – but Kardashian, along with her sister Kourtney and various members of their entourage, remained in Paris, staying in an exclusive set of apartments so discreet they’ve been dubbed the No Address Hotel.

Nestled on Tronchet Street, just a stone’s throw from Place de l’Opéra, and close to the fashionable Avenue Montaigne, the Hotel de Pourtalès is popular with A-list stars staying in the French capital.

A stay in the Sky Penthouse, the suite occupied by Kardashian, will currently set you back about £13,000 a night.

Kardashian was staying at the Hotel de Pourtales
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Kardashian was staying at the Hotel de Pourtales

On the evening of 3 October, after attending a fashion show with her sister, Kardashian remained in the apartment alone while the rest of her convoy – including her bodyguard Pascal Duvier – went out for the night.

At about 2.30am, three armed men wearing ski masks and dressed as police forced their way into the apartment block – and according to investigators, they threatened the concierge at gunpoint.

Two of them are alleged to have forced the concierge to lead them to Kardashian’s suite. He later told police they yelled at him: “Where’s the rapper’s wife?”

Kardashian said she had been “dozing” on her bed when the men then entered her room.

She has said she believes her social media posts provided the alleged robbers with “a window of opportunity”.

“I was Snapchatting that I was home, and that everyone was going out,” she said in the months after the incident.

The Keeping Up With The Kardashians star vividly described the attack in a police report, as reported in the French weekly paper Le Journal du Dimanche.

“They grabbed me and took me into the hallway. They tied me up with plastic cables and taped my hands, then they put tape over my mouth and my legs.”

She said they pointed a gun at her, asking specifically for her ring and also for money.

Police guard the entrance to the building where Kim has been staying
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Police guard the entrance to the Hotel de Pourtalès the day after the robbery

Kardashian says they carried her into the bathroom and put her in the bathtub. She said she was wearing only a bathrobe at the time.

She had initially thought the robbers “were terrorists who had come to kidnap me”, according to a French police report taken in New York three months after the robbery.

Kardashian told officers: “I thought I was going to die.”

According to police, the robbers – who left the room after grabbing their haul, escaped on bicycles with items estimated to be worth about $10m (£7.5m), including a $4m (£3m) 18.88-carat diamond engagement ring from West.

After they had left, Kardashian said she escaped her restraints and went to find help. After speaking to detectives, she immediately returned to the US on a private jet and later hired a completely new security team.

Kim Kardashian shows off a ring on Instagram
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Kardashian shows off her $4m ring on Instagram

What was stolen?

As well as her engagement ring, Kardashian said the thieves took her large Louis Vuitton jewellery box, which she said contained “everything I owned”.

In police reports given to the French authorities at about 4.30am on the night of the alleged robbery, Kardashian listed these items as having been stolen:

• Two diamond Cartier bracelets
• A gold and diamond Jacob necklace
• Diamond earrings by Lauren Schwartz
• Yanina earrings
• Three gold Jacob necklaces
• Little bracelets, jewels and rings
• A Lauren Schwartz diamond necklace
• A necklace with six little diamonds
• A necklace with Saint spelt out in diamonds
• A cross-shaped diamond-encrusted Jacob cross
• A yellow gold Rolex watch
• Two yellow gold rings
• An iPhone 6 and a BlackBerry

Police recovered only the diamond-encrusted cross that was dropped by the robbers while leaving.

It’s likely the gold in the haul was melted down and resold, while the diamond engagement ring that is now so associated with the robbery would be far too recognisable to sell on the open market.

Kardashian at the Siran Presentation on the day of the robbery. Pic: Rex Features
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Kardashian at the Siran Presentation on the day of the robbery. Pic: Rex Features

What will happen in court?

The hearing will begin at the Court of Appeal of Paris – the largest appeals court in France – on 28 April and is scheduled to last a month.

It will consist of a presiding judge, two professional assessors, and six main jurors.

The hearing involves more than 2,000 documents and there are four civil parties.

Kardashian at the Balenciaga show on the day of the robbery. Pic: Rex Features
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Kardashian at the Balenciaga show on the day of the robbery. Pic: Rex Features

Who is being tried?

There were initially 12 defendants in the case, but one person has died and another has a medical condition that prevents their involvement. This means 10 people – nine men and one woman – are standing trial.

Five of them, who were all aged between 60 and 72 at the time of the incident, face armed robbery and kidnapping charges. They are:

• Yunice Abbas
• Aomar Ait Khedache
• Harminv Ait Khedache
• Didier Dubreucq
• Marc-Alexandre Boyer

Abbas, 72, has admitted his participation in the robbery. In 2021, he published a book about the robbery, titled I Kidnapped Kim Kardashian. In 2021, a court ruled he would not benefit financially from the book.

Aomar Ait Khedache, 69, known to French crime reporters as “Old Omar”, has also admitted participating in the heist but denies the prosecution’s accusation that he was the ringleader.

The remaining five defendants are charged with complicity in the heist or the unauthorised possession of a weapon. They are:

• Florus Heroui
• Gary Mader
• Christiane Glotin
• François Delaporte
• Marc Boyer

Among those, Mader was a VIP greeter who worked for the car company Kardashian used in Paris, and Heroui was a bar manager who allegedly passed on information about Kardashian’s movements.

With many of the accused now ageing and with various serious health conditions, and some having spent time in jail following their arrest, all are currently free under judicial supervision.

If found guilty, those accused of the more serious crimes could face 10 years to life imprisonment.

Pic: Rex Features
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Kardashian at the Off-White show three days before the robbery. Pic: Rex Features

Will Kardashian give evidence?

Yes.

Lawyer Michael Rhodes said Kardashian has “tremendous appreciation and admiration for the French judicial system” and “wishes for the trial to proceed in an orderly fashion in accordance with French law and with respect for all parties to the case”.

A trainee lawyer herself, Kardashian has become a high-profile criminal justice advocate in the US in recent years.

(R-L)Kanye West, Kim Kardashian, Kourtney Kardashian, Kris Jenner. Pic: Rex Features
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(R-L) Kanye West, Kim Kardashian, Kourtney Kardashian, Kris Jenner in the front row three days before the robbery. Pic: Rex Features

Why has it taken so long to come to court?

There was initially a manhunt after the robbery, with French police under pressure to prove that Paris’s security was not in question.

Just the year before in 2015, the capital had been shaken by terrorist attacks by Islamic militants, in which 130 people were killed, including 90 at a music event at the Bataclan theatre.

French police initially arrested 17 people in the Kardashian case in January 2017 – three months after the robbery – assisted by DNA traces found on plastic bands used to tie her wrists. Twelve people were later charged.

It was ordered to be sent to trial in 2021 – at a time when limited court proceedings were happening due to multiple COVID lockdowns, and France was holding its largest ever criminal trial over the November 2015 terror attacks.

Kardashian at the Givenchy show on the day of the robbery. Pic: Rex Features
Image:
Kardashian at the Givenchy show on the day of the robbery. Pic: Rex Features

What has Kardashian said about the incident?

Kardashian has described the robbery as a “life-changing” moment. She took three weeks away from filming her reality TV show Keeping Up With the Kardashians, and took a three-month break from social media.

In a March 2017 episode titled Paris, Kardashian first spoke publicly about her ordeal.

She described first hearing a noise in her apartment, and calling out, thinking it was her sister and assistant: “At that moment when there wasn’t an answer, my heart started to get really tense. Like, you know, your stomach just kind of like, knots up and you’re like, ‘OK, what’s going on?’ I knew something wasn’t quite right.”

She went on: “They asked for money. I said, ‘I don’t have any money’. They dragged me out to the hallway on top of the stairs. That’s when I saw the gun, clear as day. I was looking at the gun, looking down back at the stairs. I was like, I have a split second in my mind to make this quick decision.

“Either they’re going to shoot me in the back or if I make it [down the stairs] and the elevator does not open in time or the stairs are locked, there’s no way out.”

Three months later, she told a Forbes Power Women’s Summit she had changed her approach to posting on social media: “They had followed my moves on social media, and they knew my every move and what I had.”

She added: “It was definitely a huge, huge, huge lesson for me to not show off some of the things that I have. It was a huge lesson to me to not show off where I go.

“It’s just changed my whole life, but I think for the better.”

West and Kardashian at the Off-White show three days before the robbery. Pic: Rex Features
Image:
West and Kardashian at the Off-White show three days before the robbery. Pic: Rex Features

In October 2020, Kardashian told US interviewer David Letterman she feared she would be raped and murdered during the heist, and that her sister had been at the forefront of her mind during the incident.

Speaking on My Next Guest Needs No Introduction, Kardashian said: “I kept on thinking about Kourtney, I kept on thinking she’s going to come home and I’m going to be dead in the room and she’s going to be traumatised for the rest of her life if she sees me… I thought that was my fate.”

When speaking to French police about the impact the robbery had had on her three months after it, Kardashian said: “I think that my perception of jewellery now is that I am not as attached to it as I used to be. I don’t have the same feeling about it. In fact, I even think that it has become a bit of a burden to have the responsibility of such expensive jewels.

“There is nothing of sentimental value to compare with the act of going home and finding one’s children and one’s family.”

She went on to describe Paris as “not the right place” for her, and didn’t return to the French capital for two years following the robbery.

Kardashian has since said in a 2023 episode of Keeping Up With The Kardashians that she did not purchase any jewellery in the seven years following the robbery, kept no jewellery at her home and only wore items that are either borrowed or fake.

She said the realisation that material items don’t matter has made her “a completely different person in the best way”.

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The Magic Circle’s first female member fooled them into believing she was a man – how did she do it?

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The Magic Circle's first female member fooled them into believing she was a man - how did she do it?

How did one woman fool the most famous magic society on the planet?

Back in 1991, Sophie Lloyd pulled off the ultimate illusion, tricking the Magic Circle into thinking she was a man.

But over 30 years after being unceremoniously kicked out, the Circle has tracked down the former actress to apologise and reinstate her membership.

She told Sky News how returning feels like the society has “made good on something that was wrong”.

Sophie Lloyd, who tricked the Magic Circle into believing she was a man
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Sophie Lloyd, who tricked the Magic Circle into believing she was a man

How did she infiltrate that exclusive group that nowadays counts the likes of David Copperfield and Dynamo as members?

In March of that year, she took her entry exam posing as a teenage boy, creating an alter-ego called Raymond Lloyd.

“I’d played a boy before,” she explained, but “it took months of preparation” to secretly infiltrate the Circle’s ranks half a year before it would officially vote to let women in.

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“Really, going back 30 years, men’s clubs were like, you know, just something you accepted.”

The men-only rule had been in place since the Circle was formed in 1905. The thinking behind it being that women just couldn’t keep secrets.

Aware of the frustration of female magicians at the time, Lloyd felt she was up for the challenge of proving women could be as good at magic as the men.

The idea was, in fact, born out of a double act, thought up by a successful magician called Jenny Winstanley who’d wanted to join herself but wasn’t allowed.

She recognised the hoax would probably only work with a much younger woman posing as a teenage boy, and met Lloyd through an acting class.

Sophie Lloyd as teenage magician Raymond Lloyd. Pic: Sophie Lloyd
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Sophie Lloyd as teenage magician Raymond Lloyd. Pic: Sophie Lloyd

Lloyd said: “We had to have a wig made… the main thing was my face, I had plumpers made on a brace to bring his jawline down.”

To hide her feminine hands, she did the magic in gloves, which she says “was so hard to do, especially sleight of hand.”

The biggest test came when she was invited for a drink with her examiner, where she had to fake having laryngitis.

“After the exam, which was 20 minutes, he invited Jenny and I – she played my manager – and I sat there for one hour and three quarters and had to say ‘sorry, I’ve got a bad voice’.”

Raymond Lloyd passed the test, and his membership certificate was sent through to Sophie.

Then, in October of the same year, when whispers started circulating that the society was going to open its membership to both sexes, she and Jenny decided to reveal all. It didn’t go down well.

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Rather than praise her performance, members were incandescent about the deception and, somewhat ironically, Raymond Lloyd was kicked out just before women members were let in.

Lloyd said: “We got a letter… Jenny was hurt… she was snubbed by people she actually knew, that was hurtful. However, things have really changed now…”

Three decades later the Magic Circle put out a nationwide appeal stating they wanted to apologise and Lloyd was recently tracked down in Spain.

While Jenny Winstanley died 20 years ago in a car crash, as well as Sophie receiving her certificate on Thursday, her mentor’s contribution to magic is being recognised at the special show that’s being held in both their honour at the Magic Circle.

Lloyd says: “Jenny was a wonderful, passionate person. She would have loved to be here. It’s for her really.”

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Counter terror police assessing Kneecap concert video

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Counter terror police assessing Kneecap concert video

Counter terror police are assessing a video reported to be from a concert by Irish rappers Kneecap.

A social media clip of the hip hop trio on stage appeared to show one member of the group shout “up Hamas, up Hezbollah”.

The footage was posted online by Danny Morris from the Jewish security charity, the Community Security Trust.

He said it was from a gig last November at London’s Kentish Town Forum.

A Metropolitan Police spokesperson said: “We have been made aware of the video and it has been referred to the counter terrorism internet referral unit for assessment and to determine whether any further police investigation may be required.”

Hamas and Hezbollah are both proscribed as terrorist groups in the UK. Under Section 12 of the Terrorism Act 2000, it is an offence to express “an opinion or belief that is supportive of a proscribed organisation”.

Sky News has contacted Kneecap’s management for comment.

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Starmer: Farage will ‘eat the Tory party for breakfast’

It comes after TV personality Sharon Osbourne called for Kneecap’s US work visas to be revoked after accusing them of making “aggressive political statements” including “projections of anti-Israel messages and hate speech” at Coachella Music and Arts Festival.

In November last year, Kneecap won a discrimination case against the UK government after former business secretary Kemi Badenoch refused them funding.

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