The Great British Bake Off's Diana defends herself: "it was very bad editing"
"There is nothing I can do about it. I’m just stating my side of the case. I’ve no idea why they did that. It’s very unfortunate and I think the Bake Off is the worse for it"
SPOILER ALERT. It all got rather heated in the Bake Off tent last night, didn't it? With Iain - GBBO's very own "russet Gandolf" - sent packing after his baked alaska boo-boo, social media has been awash with viewers heaping the blame on fellow contestant Diana Beard.
To recap: Iain put his baked alaska in one freezer, deemed not to be his allocated freezing space. Diana and Nancy were seen discussing the matter. Then, when Iain returned to collect his showstopping dessert, it was outside the freezer and looking ominously soggy. Iain lost his temper, dumped his creation in the bin and stormed out of the tent. No dessert meant he was shown the door by a reluctant Paul and Mary.
With no blame apportioned during the hour-long episode, Diana - the only contestant not on Twitter - has instead born the brunt of criticism. This morning she spoke to FreeRadio's breakfast hosts Cat and Nelly of the "bad editing" she says is responsible for the wave of online vitriol.
"It was utter chaos in there," she explained. "We were all struggling a bit. We were all allocated our freezer space which was limited. Iain doesn’t hold me responsible at all. If you knew me you’d know I don’t have that sort of bone in my body."
Questioned about whether the version of events presented to viewers portrayed what actually happened, Diana responded: "I was utterly confounded with that last night. It didn’t happen like that. I found Iain’s ice cream in my freezer, I asked whose it was, took it out and Iain took it away. It was not out of the freezer more than about 40 seconds.
"I think it was very bad editing. There is nothing I can do about it. I’m just stating my side of the case. I’ve no idea why they did that. It’s very unfortunate and I think the Bake Off is the worse for it."
How has she been affected by the online backlash? "I’m positive about it because everything else we did last night was good. It’s going to be whipped up into some sort of storm which was not there."
In response to last night's episode, the BBC have put out the following statement:
"As shown in the episode, Iain became the fourth baker to leave the tent because he didn't present Mary and Paul with anything to judge in the showstopper challenge and both judges were very clear about the reasoning behind the decision. Due to the extreme temperature in the tent that day, many of the bakers struggled to get their ice cream to set as seen in the episode. Diana removing Iain's ice cream from the freezer for less than a minute was in no way responsible for Iain's departure."
What do you think? Were Paul and Mary right to send Iain home? Have your say in our poll below...
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