Series 22 of Strictly Come Dancing is officially over and it did not disappoint

Over the weekend, comedian Chris McCausland and his partner Dianne Buswell were crowned the deserved Strictly Come Dancing champions.

I’m not usually one to back the favourite- I love a good underdog- but from the moment I saw Chris dance on the first show I knew I wanted him to win, even if he immediately shot to be the bookies favourite.

When Chris danced in episode one, I cried at the brilliance of what I was seeing, and then 12 weeks later, when he was performing in his last ever show, I cried even more.

His first dance was the epitome of cheerful but I’m not at all surprised it still made Motsi (and myself) cry - the song choice’s message of ‘We all Shine on’ emphasised how inspiring it was that Chris has overcome his rather obvious obstacle to become the dancing star of not only this series of Strictly but probably the whole show since its inception.

Over the rest of the episode, a spotlight was then shone on the friendship between Chris and Diane and it truly is truly beautiful: Diane deserved to win the glitterball trophy just as much as Chris for everything she has helped him achieve.

Last week I said Chris was the most extraordinary person the show has ever had on it and Anton must read my articles as he said the exact same! Truly, if anyone else had won the series this year, it would have been a right shame.

The actual results as to who came in 2nd to 4th place hasn’t actually been released yet but I doubt the remaining three couples really mind where they placed as they all had a brilliant night and we would be splitting hairs between them.

Chris, Tasha, Sarah and JB all gave their best performances of the series - so many tens were flying around on Saturday night- that I have to agree with the judges that it was the best Strictly final ever.

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Blackpool of course got a special mention in the final episode and indeed this year’s Blackpool week was as iconically fabulous as ever.

Another highlight of the final was the dance number featuring all of this year’s contestants: that was a lot of fun, my favourite moment of course being Pete’s routine, although I was sad to see both Nick Knowles and Paul Merson couldn’t make it.

Raye’s performance was also a fabulous segment, and to get a superstar like her on the show two weekends in row just shows the draw Strictly has- after all at peak 9.6 million people tuned in on Saturday night, that’s 6 times the population of Lancashire.

In entry one of my new Strictly diary, I said that the controversial year Strictly had had so far - what with professional dancers Giovanni Pernice and Graziano Di Prima both facing misconduct allegations over their treatment of Amanda Abbington and Zara McDermott respectively- had put a dark cloud over series 22.

I wrote that this series was the show’s opportunity to prove that they still deserved a prime spot in the Autumn/Winter schedule for years to come and I believe they certainly did that.

Strictly bosses introduced new duty of care measures this year and the series was indeed free of controversy- save from when Katya Jones rejected Wynne Evan’s high five in week five which looks trivial looking back now.

Ultimately Strictly bosses perfectly sprayed the show in a new bottle of glitter this year and brought back that trust with the audience.

I can’t however see next year going quite as well purely because there will be no Chris McCausland competing.

What I can say for certain is that the Strictly casting team are in for a right challenge in 2025 if they want to get it even half as right as 2024…

Have you enjoyed our new Strictly diary this year? Let us know in the comments.