Anton du Beke has joked that his role as judge on the Strictly Come Dancing tour is his "audition" to take over from the show's head judge Len Goodman.

Anton du Beke

Anton du Beke

The ballroom dancer says he has no idea if Len has any plans to step down from the BBC One series, but quipped that appearing on the tour's panel is giving him good practice to replace him.

Asked on ITV's This Morning about whether he'd take over from Len, he replied: "Well I know it's been said ... But I haven't heard any of this ... I don't know what Len's going to do. As far as I'm aware, I don't think Len's not going to be doing it, but if they asked..."

He went on to add: "I'm doing a couple of guest [judging] spots on the 'Strictly' tour so they've probably got it from there.

"And it's lovely, it was lovely to be asked and to see it from the other side of the fence - but as far as I'm aware I don't know that Len's not doing it. They probably would have mentioned it [by now] but maybe [the tour] is my audition?"

Len recently confessed that he had no plans to quit his judging role as it's "such an easy gig".

Previously he said: "I love that show. 'Strictly' is fantastic and I love it. So as long as I can keep going, I will.

"And it's such an easy gig! A car picks you up and takes you to the studio, you sit there for a couple of hours saying, 'Keep your head up'. And then a car takes you home and then they pay you!"

Anton was also linked to Sir Bruce Forsyth's job after he stepped down as host of the show last year, however, co-host Tess Daly took over the role with Claudia Winkleman joining her.


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