What was Prue Leith’s Bake Off winner 2017 Twitter gaffe and when else have celebs spoiled results shows?

PRUE Leith truly stuck her face in the batter when she revealed that the winner of The Great British Bake Off was Sophie Faldo on Twitter hours before the final was set to air.

Here's all you need to know about just what Paul Hollywood's co-judge did, the impact it's had and what she said about it after.....

What happened when Prue Leith tweeted who won Bake Off 2017?

Prue Leith gave away the results of the Bake Off 2017 final by congratulating the eventual winner, Sophie Faldo, on Twitter at 10.37am, Tuesday October 31 2017.

This was more than eleven hours before viewers would learn who won the series on Channel 4.

So naturally a lot of people were upset that the tweet - which Prue deleted soon after it went online - had told them which of the three finalists had won.

Prue had intended to congratulate the winner, and wrote: "No one told me judging a #gbbo final would be so emotional. I wanted them all to win."

She then said "bravo" to the baking champ, who lifted the trophy months ago during filming.

Why did Prue Leith tweet who won Bake Off 2017?

While it seemed as though she'd fallen foul of a tweet scheduling error, or simply forgot the show had not been on yet, Prue actually made the mistake due to a time difference in South Asia.

Talking from 4774 miles away, Prue told PA: "I'm in Bhutan. The time difference is massive.

"I thought that they got it six hours ago. I'm in too much of a state to talk about it. I f***** up."

She also posted a tweet reading: "I am so sorry to the fans of the show for my mistake this morning, I am in a different time zone and mortified by my error #GBBO."

Speaking on This Morning on Wednesday November 22, Prue added: "I quickly tweeted, as soon as it went I thought, ‘Oh my God!’ I went into a panic mode.

"I couldn’t work for my phone and I couldn’t think how to delete it quickly. I rang my trusted PA and she’d already deleted it. It was 89 seconds after I’d done it but it was already too late.
“I felt suicidal, awful. The thing that upset me the most was that this would take attention off the winner.

"And Sophie has worked for months and months for this moment. The column inches would be about my tweet and not her triumph.

"I emailed her and she said, ‘Don’t be silly’. Actually everybody was really nice about it. Celebrities would tweet me and say, ‘It’s exactly what I could have done’.

"But you have to be a real idiot to do that. We had kept it secret for eight years until I come along and screw up!”

What was the reaction to Prue's mistake online?

Most Bake Off fans were devastated that the result of what would have been a nail-biting hour and a half of telly had been revealed to them.

But while many described it as a "nightmare", jokes began rolling in thick and fast, with many people posting triumphant pics and GIFs of Prue's "rival" - former Bake Off judge Mary Berry.

Others posted gags like: "Going as Prue Leith's Twitter fail for Halloween."

Another, referencing Kevin Spacey's controversial response to sexual assault allegations, wrote: "Prue Leith is now choosing to live life as a gay man."

Has this kind of TV show spoiler happened before?

While Bake Off has never suffered this level of results spoiler before - probably due to how far ahead it is recorded - it has happened on other shows.

On October 8, Strictly contestant Debbie McGee let slip to listeners of her own Radio Berkshire show that Rev Richard Coles had left the dance contest that week.

That was broadcast on Sunday morning, a whole 11 hours before viewers would have learned who went.

And Strictly star Simon Rimmer, who left the show this weekend, was heard saying on his live Channel 4 programme Sunday Brunch ahead of the results show: "It's been an incredible journey, yeah."

For some fans, this confirmed that he had left the show, which was of course proven to be true many hours later on BBC One.

Also in October, X Factor star Talia Dean posted a video to pals online revealing who would be leaving in that coming Saturday's show.

She also revealed a huge twist that happened, leaving show bosses livid.

Much less catastrophic mistakes like this happen very regularly on The X Factor during the live shows.

In 2015 Olly Murs caused a huge stink and prompted fix claims by telling Monica Michael she was leaving the singing show before the judging vote result had even been decided.

He had jumped the gun before hearing the final judges' vote.

In the end Monica went home anyway which left viewers confused and suspicious.