The Chase viewers were left questioning what they had just watched after a tense episode took an extraordinary turn, with some fans accusing ITV of making the outcome look “scripted.”
Host Bradley Walsh found himself at the centre of the drama during Wednesday’s episode, as contestant Adrian went head-to-head with Paul Sinha, better known as “The Sinnerman,” in a battle that kept the studio guessing.
The episode, which aired on December 11, saw four contestants attempt to build a substantial prize pot before facing the Chaser in the Final Chase.
Fans accused the show of being ‘fixed’(Image: (Image: itv))
Adrian risks £7,000 for a £40,000 offer
Adrian, from Oldham, had already put £7,000 into the team’s bank during his Cash Builder.
He then faced a crucial decision: play it safe or gamble on the Chaser’s high offer of £40,000.
Adrian chose the bigger prize, setting up a tense head-to-head against Sinha.
At one point, Adrian appeared to have given himself a major problem after answering a question incorrectly.
But Bradley Walsh then asked whether viewers and the team thought Sinha might make the same mistake.
And remarkably, that was exactly what happened.
Player Adrian caught two lucky breaks(Image: (Image: ITV))
Sinha also gave the wrong answer, allowing Adrian to remain in the game.
The drama intensified moments later when Adrian slipped up on another question that appeared relatively straightforward. It looked as though his high-risk decision had finally caught up with him.
Yet once again, Sinha failed to capitalise.
The Chaser repeated the mistake, leaving Adrian safely in contention and prompting a wave of disbelief among viewers.
Fans question whether the moment was “scripted”
Paul Sinha made some obvious mistakes(Image: (Image: ITV))
The unusual sequence quickly sparked reactions online.
Some viewers found the timing of Bradley’s question—and Sinha’s subsequent mistake—so unlikely that they began questioning whether the show had been manipulated.
One frustrated fan described the episode as “100% scripted,” while another questioned why Sinha making the mistake felt so deliberately timed.
A third viewer simply asked why the Chaser’s wrong answer “felt scripted.”
Others were less suspicious and focused instead on the difficulty of the questions.
One viewer celebrated Adrian’s survival, while another pointed out that Mercury was the smallest and closest planet to the Sun, suggesting that the answer may have been easier to identify from home than it appeared under the pressure of the studio.
By that stage, the team had £46,000 in the prize fund, thanks in part to Elena, who had earlier secured £6,000.
Ben’s controversial £7,000 gamble
The drama did not end with Adrian.
Contestant Ben then faced his own crucial decision after managing to raise just £2,000 during his Cash Builder.
Rather than attempting to protect the team’s existing total, Ben accepted a lower offer of minus £7,000.
That meant the team’s prize fund would fall from £46,000 to £39,000 if he successfully made it back.
The decision did not go down well with some viewers.
One fan questioned why Ben would take a £7,000 negative offer and said they would have been furious if he had been on their team.
Another joked that they would have “pushed him off his stool” after seeing him accept the minus offer.
But Ben’s risky strategy ultimately paid off.
He managed to evade Sinha and return to the team for the Final Chase, meaning the controversial decision had not cost the contestants a player.
Even Sinha acknowledged that the move was a legitimate tactical choice.
“You had their blessing you took the lower offer,” he told Ben. “It’s a tactical game — you’re fine.”
The team’s luck finally runs out
Despite surviving several dramatic moments earlier in the episode, the contestants could not produce a winning performance when it mattered most.
The team eventually faced the Final Chase against Sinha, but their efforts were not enough to prevent the Chaser from catching them.
After all the twists, the contestants were ultimately left with nothing.
For viewers, however, the biggest talking point was not the final result. It was the extraordinary sequence involving Adrian and Sinha, which left some fans convinced they had witnessed something that seemed almost too perfectly timed to be accidental.
The Chase airs Monday to Friday at 5pm on ITV1.