Strictly Come Dancing's Vito Coppola shares painful injury as he details 'taking a rest'

Strictly Come Dancing's Vito Coppola and Sarah Hadland narrowly missed out on the Glitterball trophy last year, with Chris McCausland and Dianne Buswell taking the top spot.

However, fans were thrilled to learn that they would have another opportunity to see the pair perform during the Strictly tour.

But there's a twist - Vito has revealed he'll be replaced by Nikita Kuzmin for the first few shows due to an injury. Speaking on This Morning with Ben Shephard and Cat Deeley, Vito explained his situation, reports the Mirror.

Ben queried: "We hear there was a little injury? You're not necessarily starting the tour, you will be on tour, but you're not necessarily starting."

Vito confirmed this, explaining that Nikita would be stepping in to dance with Sarah. He said, "I've got a little injury. It's a dancer thing, you know. We're kind of used to this pain a little bit in the body!"

When Ben asked if it was a back issue, noting Vito's hand placement on his lower back, the Strictly star confirmed, he added: "It's like a lower back pain at the moment."

He continued: "Of course, I can walk, I can sit and move but going to dance full on? Lifting and sharp twists of the body, it's better, at the moment, to have a little rest."

Despite the setback, Vito is optimistic about returning to the dance floor with Sarah when the tour reaches Sheffield at the end of January. He concluded: "Yeah, I'm going to do all the physio and all the assessments this week."

Sarah joined the conversation, telling Ben and Cat about Vito's struggle to stay still. He responded enthusiastically: "Looking at the rehearsals, I really want to jump in with the dancing!"

Vito isn't the only one who will be absent from the tour. Champion Chris McCausland is also unable to participate due to a scheduling conflict with his stand-up tour.

Discussing his absence on This Morning, Chris expressed mixed feelings: "It's fine to have two different feelings about the same thing."

He added, regretfully: "I would've loved to have done more dancing with Dianne, and it would've been a lot of fun, but also I'm very lucky to have people want to watch me do stand-up, and I'm enjoying getting back into that."

This Morning continues weekdays on ITV from 10am.