{"id":3268,"date":"2025-04-06T07:55:13","date_gmt":"2025-04-06T07:55:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/3268\/"},"modified":"2025-04-06T07:55:13","modified_gmt":"2025-04-06T07:55:13","slug":"gladiators-final-thrown-into-chaos-after-contestant-is-forced-to-quit-following-serious-injury-as-bosses-scramble-to-find-a-replacement","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/3268\/","title":{"rendered":"Gladiators final thrown into chaos after contestant is forced to quit following serious injury as bosses scramble to find a replacement"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Gladiators<\/a>\u00a0final has been thrown into chaos after contestant\u00a0Zavia Hill was forced to pull out at the last minute.<\/p>\n

The hopeful stormed to victory during Saturday’s semi-finals but was forced to forfeit her place in next week’s show after suffering a serious injury during one of the games.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Speaking about her exit a devastated Zavia said: ‘I got very emotional after I realised I’d hurt my leg as bad as I did. When I got home and the adrenaline had worn off, I realised I could hardly move my leg’.<\/p>\n

Despite her disappointment Zavia, who will cheer on from the studio audience, gushed about her time as a competitor: ‘It was transformative. I feel like a butterfly with newfound confidence. Reaching the final felt special.’<\/p>\n

Bosses quickly scrambled to find a replacement with Aneila Afsar, who was the fastest female runner-up from the semi-finals, being drafted in.\u00a0<\/p>\n

She will now take Zavi’s place to compete against\u00a0Amanda Wah, alongside male finalists Joe Fishburn and Mus.<\/p>\n

\"The <\/p>\n

The Gladiators final has been thrown into chaos after contestant Zavia Hill (pictured) was forced to pull out at the last minute.<\/p>\n

\"The <\/p>\n

The hopeful stormed to victory during Saturday’s semi-finals but was forced to forfeit her place in next week’s show after suffering a serious injury during one of the games<\/p>\n

Last week\u00a0Gladiators<\/a> viewers blasted the BBC<\/a> for the \u2018dumb and really unfair\u2019 rule that turned the contestants into \u2018open targets\u2019.<\/p>\n

The first challenge that Poppy, 32, Stacey, 36, Joe, 23, and Junior, 44, took on was the ‘ultimate game of chase’ AKA Unleash.<\/p>\n

The players earned points if they managed to get back to the start point with their tag, however it’s not easy as they are only given a three-second head start.<\/p>\n

They also have to charge through wall blocks and touch each step with their feet to pass the task.<\/p>\n

Stacey was up first and Electro caught her as she was running up the stairs.<\/p>\n

Next up was Poppy and she was chased by Fire. She was also caught just before the stairs.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Joe was nearly captured by Apollo on the stairs, but managed to get away from him, meanwhile Junior was caught by Phantom just moments before the steps.<\/p>\n

Those watching at home rushed to X, formerly known as Twitter, to point out how ‘unfair’ the stairs in the challenge were.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Zavia <\/p>\n

Zavia (R) said: ‘I got very emotional after I realised I’d hurt my leg as bad as I did. When I got home and the adrenaline had worn off, I realised I could hardly move my leg’.<\/p>\n

\"Bosses <\/p>\n

Bosses quickly scrambled to find a replacement with Aneila Afsar (R) who was the fastest female runner-up from the semi-finals, being drafted in<\/p>\n

\"Aneilia <\/p>\n

Aneilia (right) will now take Zavi’s place to compete against Amanda Wah (left) alongside male finalists Joe Fishburn (far right) and Mus (far left)<\/p>\n

One fumed on the social media platform: ‘The stairs in Unleash are so unfair! How is anyone going to make it up going one at a time?! #Gladiators.’<\/p>\n

Another said: ‘Unleash is such a pointless game and almost impossible to win. Who cares if they take two stairs at a time?! Really?!’\u00a0<\/p>\n

A third added: ‘#Gladiators the rules on the stairs are stupid, there is no way the contender can win on Unleash unless the gladiator falls.’<\/p>\n

‘Catching up on #Gladiators and to be honest I do think that the rules do need to change for Unleash,’ a fourth chimed in.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0Host Barney opened up about the challenge ahead of this year’s series.<\/p>\n

Speaking about the task, the host said: ‘The contenders start in a smoke filled tunnel and race around a track and up some steps to grab the winning flag, but an unknown Gladiator is unleashed behind them trying to chase them down.\u00a0<\/p>\n

‘You\u2019re going to love it.’<\/p>\n

Fans will be happy to know that a star of the show has hinted that there will be a third series.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Last <\/p>\n

Last week Gladiators viewers blasted the BBC for the \u2018dumb and really unfair\u2019 rule that turned the contestants into \u2018open targets\u2019\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\" \"\" \"\" \"Those <\/p>\n

Those watching at home rushed to X, formerly known as Twitter, to point out how ‘unfair’ the stairs in the challenge were<\/p>\n

Gladiators returned to our screens in 2024, which is a second revival of the programme which originally hit our screens in 1992.<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n

Giant AKA Jamie Christian-Johal dropped a huge clue during an exclusive chat with Mail Online at the TV Choice Awards.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He told us: ‘I think series three isn’t quite confirmed but I’m sure we will be back. It’s been really nice having a positive influence on children and fitness.<\/p>\n

‘When we were younger we would sit down with our families on a Saturday night but that has been lost because of streaming and technology so this has brought that back and I think its a great message and thing to do.’<\/p>\n

Gladiators final airs on BBC One and is available to stream on iPlayer.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Gladiators\u00a0final has been thrown into chaos after contestant\u00a0Zavia Hill was forced to pull out at the last…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3269,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[192,92,77,1861,382,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-3268","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entertainment","8":"tag-bbc","9":"tag-dailymail","10":"tag-entertainment","11":"tag-gladiators","12":"tag-tv","13":"tag-uk","14":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114289949018020027","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3268","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3268"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3268\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3269"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3268"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3268"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3268"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}