PLEASE, PLEASE SPARE ME.

University Challenge is going to attempt to be more gender neutral. In future you’ll be unable to spot, in the unlikely event you care, which sex has written the questions. The producers have bowed to a few squeals that women allegedly are reluctant to take part because they’ll be humiliated on social media.

Really? Let me tell you a thing or two about quiz show contestants. They are so fiercely competitive that you could send them to Afghanistan and the conflict would be over by Friday week.

Women are the bitchiest, while men are often comically delusional. In 11 years of hosting The

Weakest Link, I lost count of the times I said to an ugly one, “Have you always been so devastatingly attractive?” and had him thank me profusely.

When quiz shows are being cast, what producers are searching for is “characters”. Even I, usually regarded at the most wicked, evil, horrible of quiz show hosts, was never looking for kittens to drown.

We did our best, as I imagine Countdown, Eggheads, and the rest do, to have a spread of genders, ages and classes, but you are leg-ironed by the range of people who apply.

I’m sick of people harping on about equality at the expense of decent enjoyment. I happen to be the oldest woman on television not baking cakes. Arsenal don’t keep calling me for a trial. I might never be invited to front This

Morning instead of Holly Wobbelly or whatever she’s called. But we’re talking TV entertainment for goodness sake, not a government means test.