Romesh Ranganathan and Sebastian Croft were crowned the winners of Celebrity Traitors series two on Friday evening (October 30), splitting a prize pot of £83,000 between their chosen charities.
Twenty-one well-known faces travelled to the Scottish Highlands earlier this month to compete in the ultimate contest of deception and betrayal, with the chance of claiming a cash prize of up to £100,000 for a charity of their choosing. Just seven contestants remained at the start of the finale: Traitors Maya Jama and King Kenny, alongside Faithfuls James Blunt, Michael Sheen, Romesh Ranganathan, Leigh-Anne Pinnock, and Sebastian Croft.
Finale twists and turns
This came just hours after James Acaster stunned the group by confessing to being a Traitor at the penultimate roundtable. Michael became the final Faithful to be murdered, before Maya was banished at the last roundtable. Leigh-Anne and Kenny were subsequently voted out around the firepit, as Romesh voiced his suspicions regarding James, reports the Daily Star.
This left James feeling uneasy, ultimately triggering a final vote. Romesh and Bash reluctantly opted to vote James out, resulting in a joint Faithful victory. The duo divided the total prize pot between their respective charities, the Refugee Council and Choose Love.
Romesh's reaction to the win
Romesh has since spoken out following his triumph, saying in a statement: "It's happiness tinged with a little bit of embarrassment. I feel that I've won the game, despite, I would say, my key development area in this game being identifying Traitors correctly. I think that's probably the thing that I was worst at."
He continued: "I don't hold on to my beliefs very strongly. I'm easily swayed, and I would say that I'm a mug. I've been a mug in this game, and as I discovered that I'd won, there was both joy at winning, and a sense of embarrassment at what I'd done during the game."
"I'm really happy to have won, but you've got to think about my level of contribution to the game, compared to some other people that have fallen by the wayside. James Blunt at some point in the future will kill me, and I'm saying that now. It's almost certain. I don't think his family are going to like me when they watch the show. I set up a hate campaign against Michael Sheen on camera. I genuinely said tonight we kill the King, which doesn't sound Faithful."
Reflecting on the Traitors
Reflecting on the moment he discovered the identities of the Traitors, Romesh disclosed: "Maya, I was almost certain. I felt like she had behaved exactly how I would think that I would behave as a Traitor at the roundtable, and so I felt pretty sure we had got rid of a Traitor."
"Kenny was a big surprise because I'd allowed myself to really believe that it might be James. And he just solidified that in our interactions after the roundtable, and now I'm just thinking about the conversations I've had on camera, and how embarrassing that is."
Recalling his time in the castle, Bash added: "[It was] everything I imagined, and so much I couldn't even imagine. I thought the missions would be TV hard, they were actually hard. I've made real friends - it was a lot harder than I anticipated it being, and there was a long section of the game where I really wasn't sure about anything, and I just had to trust my gut and survive."
Celebrity Traitors is available to stream on BBC iPlayer.
