The idea is simple — take someone who has never danced at anything more serious than a family wedding and turn them into a modern answer to Astaire and Rogers — but Strictly Come Dancing is a true television phenomenon, copied, right down to the theme tune and the ballroom set, in more than 30 countries.

The programme was inspired by a 1992 low-budget Australian film directed by Baz Luhrmann, who went on to direct Nicole Kidman’s Oscar-winning musical Moulin Rouge. Strictly Ballroom had no stars and was set in the world of ballroom dancing competitions. It was an unlikely combination, yet the film was a hit, gaining a cult following around the world, both for its humour and its dance scenes.

The BBC knew a bit about ballroom dancing already, having screened Come Dancing for almost half a century before it was ditched in 1998, but Strictly was a world away from the quick-quick-slow themes of Come Dancing and managed, crucially, to pander to the cult of celebrity at the same time.

Natasha Kaplinsky, the newsreader, won the first series, since when sportsmen have proved to be the successes. Darren Gough and Mark Ramprakash, the Test cricketers, won, while Matt Dawson, the England rugby union international, and Denise Lewis and Colin Jackson, world champion athletes, have been runners-up.

Then again, some sportsmen might be better sticking to what they know. The surprisingly flat-footed Martina Hingis, the former tennis world No 1 — whose game, famously, was based on touch and balance, in contrast to some of the Amazons she faced on the opposite side of the net — was eliminated in the first round of the current series and was followed quickly by Richard Dunwoody, the former jockey, and Joe Calzaghe, the undefeated world boxing champion. Let’s hear it, then, for those cricketers and athletes, again: Phil Tufnell, the former England spin bowler, and Jade Johnson, the Olympic long jumper, are still flying the flag for sport.

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