Marcus won £31,000

Marcus, cosmetic manager at Boots in Northern Ireland, second Irish man in two days. His ambition was to win £250,000, but then whose isn’t? Throughout his previous shows Marcus had been bubbly and upbeat, but given nothing away, and really this continued during the opening remarks.

Round one: £1, 50p, Marcus smiling and gesturing flamboyantly went to Lucy - ‘Babers’ – who gve him 10p, and this was closely followed by £5 – by this point the audience were going mad, one more to go, and it was £15,000. Marcus was not 'bovered'.

The banker phoned and having got make-up advice for the older man, he offered £8200 to his ‘favorite contestant to date’. High as it was, Marcus rejected it immediately.

Round two: £35,000, £750, £3,000, high but not overly significant. The banker offered £16,500 which Noel described as 'walking money'. Marcus acted as if he thought about the offer, but I suspect it was too early in the game to give it serious consideration – ‘No deal’.

Round three: 1p, Marcus excitedly begging for positivity from everyone around him, £250, and £10,000 from the ‘distinguished’ James. The banker phoned, said very little, he offered £23,000. The smile left Marcus, he had ‘food for thought’. He turned in his chair, picked up Noel’s mic and went into the audience, asking Sam – who said ‘Deal’, and Don who said ‘No deal’, and then he returned to his chair. Lucy said ‘you will be fine, keep going’, and Aaron said that for him it would be ‘No Deal’. So back to Marcus, Noel asked the question, marcus gasped and said ‘No Deal’.

Round four: £500, £20,000 (at this stage that was as good as a blue and the audience cheered), the top four were still in place, unknown at this stage in a game, and the third box of this round was £1000 – everyone was very excited now.

The banker phoned, 3 blues, 5 reds including the top 4, it could only be a good offer, just how much? The offer was £31,000, it seemed especially low against the board, but then the banker may have wanted Marcus to go on. The other contestants also wanted Marcus to go on apart from four which didn’t want to give advice. The audience, by a vast majority, also wanted Marcus to go on. Noel asked the question, and Marcus waited to build up the attention, and then said ‘Deal’. He couldn’t gamble away £31,000, but he had 4 numbers higher than the offer he accepted.

Round five: £50, £75,000, £50,000. The banker jubilantly shouted through £55,000, and Marcus feigned disappointment, but it was clear that he didn’t really care – he now had his wad of cash.

Noel did his best to maintain the interest, but really after the deal is done, especially when the player wins a reasonable amount, its difficult to resurrect the tension.

Round six: £100,000, £250,000, and £5000, leaving two low blues on the board, so Marcus had indeed dealt one round too early. But when you are on the cosmetics counter of Boots, and suddenly your bank account receives an extra £31,000, who cares?

Marcus' box contained £100, so the banker had been well beaten.