Strictly Come Dancing hosts Claudia Winkleman and Tess Daly have announced they are leaving the BBC dance programme.
In a joint statement shared on Instagram on Thursday, the co-hosts said they would be leaving the show together at the end of the current season.
"We will have the greatest rest of this amazing series, and we just want to say an enormous thank you to the BBC and to every single person who works on the show.
"They're the most brilliant team, and we’ll miss them every day.
"We will cry when we say the last "keep dancing", but we will continue to say it to each other. Just possibly in tracksuit bottoms at home while holding some pizza."
Daly has presented since the first series 21 years ago. Winkleman joined in 2014, having hosted Strictly's sister show It Takes Two since 2004.
Strictly Come Dancing is one of the BBC's most-watched shows. It launched in 2004 and was originally hosted by Daly and Bruce Forsyth, who stepped down in 2014.
In a short video accompanying their statement, the pair said they had decided the time was right to step aside.
Winkleman said: "Hi, it’s Claud and Tess. There have been some rumblings and we want you to hear this from us."
Daly said: "We have news. After 21 wonderfully joyful years on Strictly, we have decided that the time is right to step aside and pass over the baton."
"The very sparkly baton," Winkelman added.
Daly went on: "It’s been a huge part of our lives hasn’t it? Since our children were literally babes in arms and now they’re young adults and I think genuinely we have cherished every second."
Winkleman then said: "We have. We’re so lucky to have been part of this amazing show and just want to thank the Strictly team because Strictly is the people who make it."
Source: Press Association
