Popular entertainment show Strictly Come Dancing, famous for mixing teams of professionals and laypeople who shouldn’t be dancing even when nobody is looking, has a few surprises set in its 2022 calendar, not least an arena tour that stops in at the Utilita Arena Birmingham. The tour, known as Strictly Come Dancing Live 2022, has six dates at the Utilita, taking the gig through from 20-23 January.
Matinee and Evening Programmes
Things are hotting up in the Strictly fandom, ahead of a festive final on 18 December. So far, bookmakers covering Strictly Come Dancing have Rose Ayling-Ellis and Giovanni Pernice as the 1/5 favourites to reign over this year’s cast while John Whaite is 9/1 to mount a late challenge for Ayling-Ellis’ throne. Fans placing a bet on Strictly Come Dancing 2021 can also vote for Best Man, Best Woman, and the gender of the winner using their bets.
The Strictly tour of Birmingham is likely to take much the same format as in previous years. So far, the event has crammed all its Utilita Arena dates into just three days, meaning that there are separate matinee and evening programmes on January 22 and 23. While this might seem a little odd, Birmingham is actually the first stop on Strictly’s wider UK tour, which heads north until February 11, when it concludes in London.
As usual, the judges pick seven couples from the previous year’s groupings for the Tour, including the most recent winner. However, the recently exiled Dan Walker and partner Nadiya will be conspicuously absent from the 2022 leg of the Tour, despite becoming a much-requested inclusion by fans. Dan stressed that his absence is due to work commitments rather than any behind-the-scenes juice that’s spilling into the light.
A Polarising Influence
Confirmed for the tour so far are seven pairings, including Rose Ayling-Ellis and Giovanni Pernice, Sara Davies and Aljaž Skorjanec, Max George and Katya Jones, as well as AJ Odudu and Kai Widdrington. Tilly Ramsay and Nikita Kuzmin will also make an appearance, as will Rhys Stephenson and Nancy Xu, and John Whaite and Johannes Radebe. This year’s winner is yet to be announced but is contained within this group somewhere.
Oddly enough, Dan’s absence from the tour has created some consternation in the Strictly community, with several fans opting to sit out the 2022 instalment of the Tour. Walker was known as a polarising influence on the show, frequently placing close to the bottom of the rankings, and taking his thoughts to fans on Twitter when things weren’t going his way. Still, people have loved worse things in the soap opera world, and that kind of bad boy persona could have produced some magic on tour.
Strictly Come Dancing Live 2022 will visit the cities of Birmingham, Leeds, Newcastle, Manchester, Sheffield, Liverpool, Glasgow, Nottingham, and London, for a total of 22 evenings of dancing. Tickets begin at £41. However, there are still two more events on the regular Strictly Come Dancing calendar to come before anybody can climb on the tour bus.
