BBC Strictly Come Dancing's Ellie Leach in emotional admission as she marks 'one year' in Vito Coppola message

Ellie Leach has made an emotional admission as she watched the latest crop of Strictly Come Dancing stars in the position she found herself in this time last year.

As fans of the BBC One dance contest will know, the actress competed and won the 2023 run of the hit show alongside professional dance partner Vito Coppola.

They emerged victorious during the 21st series of Strictly after seeing off stiff competition from Layton Williams and Nikita Kuzmin and Bobby Brazier and Dianne Buswell in a rare three-couple final.

Actress Ellie, who was famed for playing Faye Windass in Coronation Street, has since been seen supporting Vito as he got a new dance partner for the 2024 series. He was seen making it all the way to the final with actress Sarah Hadland before they missed out on Glitterball trophy to Chris McCausland and Dianne Buswell.

But now, Ellie is missing the string of live shows she took part in last year as some of the stars from Strictly 2024 continue to perform up and down the country as part of the Strictly Come Dancing Live tour.

Sharing a picure taken of her backstage on the tour last year, Ellie wrote on her Instagram Story: "tour life I miss you," alongside a red heart emoji.

She also marked a year since she and Vito cemented their win in the dance show with a permanent tribute. Ahead of the final, they promised each other they would get matching tattoos if they got to the final and at the end of January in 2024, they showed off their matching tattoos.

The inking depicts a bee with an aubergine body, which relates to an inside joke they shared as the veg became their team name while competing in the show. Ellie has now shared a picture to her story of their tattoos and captioned it: "One whole year with our