Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink was the latest celebrity to be voted off Strictly Come Dancing. The former Chelsea FC footballer became the fourth celebrity to be eliminated from the 2025 series of the BBC dance show, after he found himself in the dance-off against Amber Davies.
After the show exit, his Strictly professional dancer partner Lauren Oakley, has spoken about feeling “gutted” as their chance of the Glitterball trophy came to a swift end. Sharing a heartfelt message to Jimmy on Instagram, Lauren said: “You are wonderful, commitment, enthusiasm and complete trust in me to guide you through each week.
“You understood and respected how close dance is to my heart, and carried it with care. No performance of showbiz experience at all, just complete and utter hard work and dedication to learn something now.”
She added: “My joy was seeing that love for the music and movement transfer into you each week as you achieved something incredible. It’s been an honour to be able to teach the perfect student, we gave it our all.”
The professional dancer thanked fans for their support along the way, writing: “Gutted that our time in the competition is over, thank you to all our supporters and everyone that voted along the way.”
After his exit was confirmed, Jimmy said: “I have absolutely loved my experience. I can only say thank you very much for letting me have this experience and to my daughters for pushing me to come here and do this. I never expected that I would enjoy it this much.”
He shared: “This experience is going to live with me forever. Most importantly, this girl is just absolutely incredible. She has been absolutely amazing with me. You are a diamond.”
Jimmy previously confessed that he was stepping out of his comfort zone by taking part on the TV show. The sports star told Radio Times magazine: “Football, for me, is so easy. Dancing is out of my comfort zone. But that’s a good thing. When you stop playing football, you’re not really in that competitive kind of world. It’s nice to dip back in.”
For Icon’s Week, Jimmy had transformed into Prince to perform an American Smooth to Purple Rain and finished joint third of the leaderboard. While Amber and Nikita took the second spot from the judges’ scores with their Cha Cha Cha to Break Free by Ariana Grande.
After both couples had danced a second time, the judges unanimously voted to save Amber who was seen crying after Jimmy was voted off.
The remaining 10 couples will take to the dancefloor for a Halloween special, when Strictly Come Dancing returns to BBC One and BBC iPlayer on Saturday, November 1 at 6.35pm, with the results show on Sunday, November 2 at 7.15pm.