Ant Middleton insists he was 'going to quit' SAS: Who Dares Wins before he was fired
Ant Middleton has insisted he was "going to quit" SAS: Who Dares Wins before he was axed over controversial tweets.
The former soldier and presenter was dropped from the Channel 4 survival series in March after he made controversial comments about the Black Lives Matter movement and the coronavirus pandemic on social media.
In his new book, Mental Fitness, the hardman claimed producers "knew that I was going to jump so they pushed me first", alleging that he was planning to leave because he was fed up of changes being made that eroded the authenticity of the show.
"I'd been enduring rather than enjoying it for a while and had to be talked into doing the last series by my management team," he wrote, reports The Sun. "I already felt the show had become too scripted, and that health and safety had become too powerful. It had drifted away from what had made it so fun and exciting to be a part of."
When he filmed his last series in Scotland, he frequently clashed with the production team about health and safety and even threatened to walk off the set.
"I even said as much to one of the producers. 'You guys are going to be getting a call very soon. I don't agree with the way the course is being run. I'm not being allowed to do my job any more. I'm out,'" he recalled. "The first series was so exciting and real because of its brutality. We weren't pretending to be anything other than what we were - uncompromising alpha males from the military. That's obviously the opposite of the show they want now. The woke patrol have their victory, and I'll be very interested to see where the series goes next."
As for his controversial tweets, the 41-year-old admitted he regretted posting them and "could have worded them better" before adding, "I could have blamed other people for exaggerating or misinterpreting what I said, but that, at best, would have only been half the story. Only one person put those posts together, and only one person pressed send: Me."
