The Voice triumphed over rival show Let It Shine last night. The ITV talent show pulled in an average of 5.5 million viewers.
ITV talent show The Voice continued to prove its popularity over BBC rival Let It Shine in its last round of blind auditions.
It drew in an average of 5.5 million viewers, peaking at six million, on the final Saturday before the battle rounds begin.
The semi-final of Gary Barlow’s competition show was watched by an average of 4.3 million, peaking at 4.6 million.
One of The Voice’s last auditions of the series saw former Take Me Out contestant Gavin Ellis fail to impress a single judge.
While he found success on the ITV dating game show, where he met his now-wife Gemma Gordon, his singing skills let him down as none of the judges lit up their spinning chairs for him.
But many viewers were surprised at the response to his performance of Eric Clapton’s Tears In Heaven.
As the last few hopefuls made their bid for a slot in the competition, judge Jennifer Hudson was the first coach to complete her team with Kit Rice who sang Bill Withers classic Ain’t No Sunshine, closely followed by Sir Tom Jones who picked guitar-playing Linda Jennings as his last team member.
Will.i.am filled his final two places with Tim Gallagher and Victoria Louise, leaving fourth coach Gavin Rossdale to pick up whoever came out to audition last.
Rossdale ended up with supermarket product demonstrator Ruth Lockwood, who performed an operatic version of the Britney Spears hit Toxic.
Meanwhile on BBC1, viewers said goodbye to semi-finalists Iron Sun and were treated to a show by Gary himself as he brought his bandmates on stage for a performance.
In the show’s finale next week, remaining groups Nightfall, Drive and Five To Five will battle it out for the chance to star in Gary’s upcoming Take That-based musical. The Voice UK returns to ITV on Saturday at 8.30pm and Let It Shine will return to BBC1 at 6.45pm.
