Piers Morgan to leave GMB

I just think they've got three strong female options within GMB already who would likely get the role ahead of Victoria, with Ranvir probably the favoured of the three. I think Victoria and Susanna would actually be too similar. It is noticeable though that when you look at the broadcast news media there are far more female names in the mix now than male names.

As for moving Susanna on - nowhere really for ITV to put her as I suspect she is best suited to news rather than elsewhere on daytime. After what happened with Mark & Julie they might be willing to give Mary Nightingale the boot to create a slot for her on the Evening News, but can't see it to be honest. The only other role would be replacing Julie standing outside to introduce Tonight alongside a couple of other primetime projects, but can't see that happening either.


Ben may be willing to up to three days a week now he is not with Sky Sports and they must have hundreds of Tipping Point episodes in the bag - they are still showing "new" pre-covid episodes despite being one of the first shows to resume filming post-covid.

Ben in today with Susanna from 6:30

I have remained silent publicly and not commented on this entire issue. But I will say one thing.

If Good Morning Britain wants to remain in a top position and see if it can best Breakfast again; they need to find a strong replacement for Piers.

I feel if GMB want to keep the opinion and debate tone of the show, they need to have a presenter with opposing views to Susanna to ensure a balance to appeal to all viewers. Somebody even the slightest right of centre.

Its already becoming cheesy this morning and going back to the GMTV 2015 area of GMB. Andy Peters competition guessing going on at the moment. Ben is not a bad presenter, but keeping the shows successful style requires finding at least a slightly opinionated presenter fast.

This is what I have been saying for years. Monday to Wednesday News and Opinions. Thursday similar but softer and Friday too relaxed at times.

Now this may not be the fault of the Friday presenters (I’m being careful not to appear too critical by mentioning names but you all know who I mean); it could be because of the too relaxed GMTV and later on Daybreak Days which have put them in a too relaxed style.

For the first time in God knows how long, I'm watching GMB and not wanting to shout at the TV.

Early days of course, but if this is the post-Piers GMB then it is going to completely tank. I feel they should have got in a novelty stand-in for a few days this week (John Humphries, Paddy McGuinness, Ed Balls....literally anyone to take people’s minds off Piers). Going forward, they need to have some novelties in the mix along with the likes of Adil Ray, Richard Madeley etc before going with a semi-regular replacement in the autumn.

To revert to Ben Shephard on the first Monday sans Piers is just quite depressing and lacking in originality.

How very boring and predictable it is to read all the knee-jerk comments about how the show will never survive losing Saint Piers. People seem to forget that he joined the show in November 2015, more than a year and a half after the show launched perfectly capably without him.

By his very 'love him or hate him' nature, he turned off as many people as he attracted.

For me, if it's a choice between watching Ben Shephard professionally and calmly interviewing guests and having a bit of fun with a woman who was at the centre of a funny TV moment on this weekend's Ant & Dec's Saturday Night Takeaway or watching Piers Morgan mocking the concept of gender identities, moaning about veganism and 'wokeness', continuing his pathetic vendetta against Meghan Markle, or generally shouting over anyone who dares to disagree with him, I know which I'd prefer over my cornflakes.

The show wasn't very successful when it launched, and turning it into GMTV in early 2015 worsened it. I'm not a particular fan of Piers and his views, and I couldn't stand to watch it some mornings with all the shouting (personal opinion). We already have BBC Breakfast which is just reading the morning news, not being controversial and just doing what it does well. GMB doing the same things in a fluffier fashion, with ad breaks and competitions will just mean people will watch BBC Breakfast.

The GMB format has become a highly opinionated show and a clear alternative to BBC Breakfast and the ratings proved themselves with Piers (whether you like him or hate him).

I’m not a Piers fan, actively unfollowed the man on social media because I don’t subscribe to many of his views, but he brought something different to the table at GMB. While often polarising, some of views were actually the views of large parts of the British public, and like or loathe, his opinion was always interesting to hear in my book. Susanna did well to challenge him/play the other side of the argument on many occasion so it felt balanced.

I must agree that Ben Shepherd is fine, but he’s a different style to Piers and long term I can’t see it working. It’s going to feel a lot different, too much different I’d say. I have to agree that I do think they’ll need a strong anchor with some opinions (doesn’t have to be quite as opinionated as Piers) and as I said yesterday, I do think they’ll want to keep find a male replacement otherwise gender balance is going to off. I think they may need to look at radio for some potential names.

There was a slight change at some point recently where they seem to avoid two female headed pairings: at one time Kate, Ranvir or Charlotte would fill in with guest male hosts occasionally brought in, but then more recently using Sean or Alex seemed to be preferred over using two female hosts together. I imagine it’s probably down to the fact that the show can sometimes be female heavy with the third presenter and weather presenter predominantly female. So it’ll be interesting to see who fills in at the end of this week.

Sorry to be so ‘boring and predictable’, but if Ben Shephard ‘professionally and calmly interviewing guests’ was such a draw then ITV wouldn’t have deviated from what you prefer over your cornflakes in 2010 and 2015. Also, Ben presumably won’t be their long term strategy, but I’m surprised they’ve pressed the Ben button already.

The Markle stuff was out of order, but it’s obviously hugely inaccurate to say PM turned off as many as he attracted. The original format of GMB (which we’ve now reverted to) is too similar to BBC Breakfast and will be reflected in the ratings.