The Traitors star Linda Rands has backed faithful Jake Brown to win the hit BBC show ahead of the grand finale, despite him being responsible for her downfall.
The retired opera singer became the second traitor to be banished by the faithfuls last week after suspicions were raised about her, with Brown leading the charge.
In the first episode, Rands appeared to respond to host Claudia Winkleman saying “traitors”, moments after she was secretly selected to be a traitor.
Brown spotted the slip-up and shared it with the rest of the contestants, pushing for her banishment throughout the series.
Ahead of the finale on Friday evening, Rands told ITV’s Loose Women she “weirdly” supported Brown to walk away with the cash prize.
She added: “He’s playing such a blinder, he is really. And all respect to Jake, he always told me before we went to the roundtable, he always discussed what he was going to do at the roundtable, he never blindsided me.”
Discussing the moment Brown appeared to catch her out, Rands said: “My brain was like ‘ugh’ and I just heard words, I didn’t hear a specific word I was just hearing (Claudia) speaking.”
She also revealed she only told her son her fate and “swore him to secrecy”, which meant her family could watch the excitement of the show in real time.
Despite some contestants being forced to stab their colleagues in the back, Rands said they have all remained friends and stay in touch on a WhatsApp chat group.
The hit psychological reality series returned to BBC One earlier in the month with Winkleman welcoming 22 strangers into a Scottish castle where they compete to win a prize pot of up to £120,000.
The programme, which is based on a Dutch format called De Verraders, involves Winkleman selecting a small number of players to be the traitors, while the rest of the players are the faithful and are unaware of the identity of the traitors.
While trying to avoid being killed by the traitors or banished, the faithful players must figure out who is a traitor and vote them out so they can take the prize money for themselves.
The final episode will see faithfuls Francesca Rowan-Plowden Brown, Alexander Dragonetti, Leanne Quigley and Brown go up against traitor Charlotte Berman.
Freddie Fraser, who was recruited as a last-minute traitor, narrowly missed out on a place in the final after he was banished by the other contestants from the castle on Thursday.
The final episode will feature a twist after Rowan-Plowden secured the power to unmask the identity of one of her fellow players in a private meeting.
In Friday night’s finale the contestants will have the chance to keep voting out their fellow players until they have decided no traitors remain in their group.
However, in another change to the format, this year’s finalists will no longer reveal whether they are a traitor or faithful after being voted out.
The final of The Traitors series three airs on Friday at 8.30pm on BBC One and is also available on BBC iPlayer.
