Winning Streak will not be returning this year, The Irish Daily Star can reveal.
We can reveal the popular game show – hosted by Marty Whelan and Sinead Kennedy – will not be back this autumn.
And we understand the TV show might not return until late 2023.
A spokesman for the National lottery said: “The National Lottery can confirm that the Winning Streak TV Game Show will not be returning this year. It’s not possible to return this year due to the health restrictions which were in place earlier this year and the timelines required to produce the Winning Streak show and scratch card game.”
It is understood that there are a number of factors which hampered the return of Winning Streak.
At the time of planning broadcast schedules last year for 2022, Ireland was at the height of covid restrictions and planning a contestant-based game show was very difficult.
There is also a long lead-in time in producing a physical scratch card game. The game itself (odds/prize structures etc) has to be designed – there is an approval process with the Regulator of the National Lottery and then the game has to be printed and distributed to the retail network.
Winning Streak, which first aired in 1990, was among the first shows that was taken off air in March 2020 as the COVID-19 pandemic halted productions across Ireland. It now appears it will be the last show to go back into production.
Winning Streak halted production on March 7, days before former Taoiseach Leo Varadkar announced widespread school closures and work-from-home measures to curb the spread of Covid-19.
But host Marty Whelan previously said he wasn’t worried that the show would never return to our screens, saying that the programme has been loved right across Ireland for three decades because it resonates with so many people.
Marty told RSVP Magazine earlier this year: "Always in this business, someone could make a decision about a show that could affect your life.
"And that is what being a contract player is all about, there is nothing you can do about shows being cancelled and that has always been the way."
"The appeal and success of Winning Streak over the last 30 years suggest to me that it is highly unlikely that it won’t come back.
"It is one of those programmes that is loved right across the country, it brings people good news and it is loved right across the country. It shows real people who are not being talked down to but talked with.
"Our job is to entertain the viewer and not make a fool out of anyone. My wish and hope is that Winning Streak comes back and let’s put it this way, no one has suggested that it won’t be coming back when the world reopens."
But The Star contacted a rep for RTE who said there was “no update” on when the show will return to our screens.
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