How can Countdown chiefs persuade Anne Robinson and maths wizard Rachel Riley ...

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Beloved by students and pensioners, Countdown has won an army of fans with its friendly competition to come up with the right words. But producers of the usually genial show fear the arrival of new host Anne Robinson has created a tricky conundrum.

Sources on set report an ‘awkward and uncomfortable atmosphere’ between the acid-tongued former Weakest Link presenter and the programme’s glamorous maths whizz, Rachel Riley.

Staff at Media City studios in Salford claim that off-camera, there’s tension over Ms Robinson’s ‘rather grand ways’, which have earned her the nickname ‘Queen Anne’.

Resident lexicographer Susie Dent is said to have sided with Ms Riley in what is seen by some as a ‘young versus old’ divide.