Girish Mahajan (Editor)

Play to the Whistle

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Country of origin
  
United Kingdom

No. of series
  
3

First episode date
  
11 April 2015

Number of episodes
  
16

Networks
  
STV, UTV, ITV

6.5/10
IMDb

Original language(s)
  
English

Executive producer(s)
  
Dan Baldwin

Presented by
  
Holly Willoughby

Cast
  
Holly Willoughby

Genres
  
Comedy, Panel show

Play to the Whistle httpspbstwimgcomprofileimages5835946378620

Starring
  
Bradley Walsh Frank Lampard Romesh Ranganathan Seann Walsh Jimmy Bullard (2015)

No. of episodes
  
17 (as of 14 March 2017) (list of episodes)

Similar
  
Celebrity Juice, Mad Mad World, Through the Keyhole, Sweat the Small Stuff, A League of Their Own

Christine bleakley hates when frank lampard bites his toenails play to the whistle


Play to the Whistle is a British sports comedy panel game show that airs on ITV. It was first broadcast on 11 April 2015. In each episode two teams of three compete in sports knowledge rounds and physical games to achieve points for their teams, at the end the team with the most points is declared the winner.

Contents

The show is hosted by Holly Willoughby. One team is captained by entertainer, actor and presenter Bradley Walsh and the other team is captained by former professional footballer Frank Lampard. Lampard is joined by comedian Romesh Ranganathan as a regular panellist. Seann Walsh, also a comedian, is the resident scorer. Former professional footballer Jimmy Bullard was the host's assistant in the first series.

Frank lampard christine bleakley face swap play to the whistle


Production

The show was commissioned as part of ITV's endeavour to find a panel show for their flagship channel after other pilot series have aired. The show is made by Hungry Bear Media and the executive producer is Dan Baldwin, Holly Willoughby's husband. Despite the sport theme, ITV say that they are not targeting sports fans specifically but producing the show for the whole family audience. Baldwin stated that the host's lack of sports knowledge "will help viewers in the same position". Filming of each episode takes place at the Fountain Studios in Wembley in front of a live studio audience. The first two episodes of the first series were recorded on 31 March 2015, the next two on 20 April, one on 27 April and the final two on 3 May. It was revealed in November 2015 that ITV had ordered a second series. Episodes for this series were recorded on 8 January, 15 January and 17 January 2016 with 2 episodes being recorded each day.

The show's title comes from the phrase used in football where players should continue with the game, despite thinking an incident has taken place to stop it, until the referee has blown his whistle to halt play. In the show it is when Willoughby blows her whistle that the rounds are concluded.

The animations used on the opening titles and the round names are produced by Dave Whyte Animation Ltd.

References

Play to the Whistle Wikipedia