The Apprentice Week Six: Who did Lord Sugar fire? What happened to Reece Donnelly?

The Apprentice is back on BBC One and iPlayer and this year 18 ambitious candidates will battle it out for a £250,000 investment with billionaire boss, Lord Alan SugarThe Apprentice is back on BBC One and iPlayer and this year 18 ambitious candidates will battle it out for a £250,000 investment with billionaire boss, Lord Alan Sugar
The Apprentice is back on BBC One and iPlayer and this year 18 ambitious candidates will battle it out for a £250,000 investment with billionaire boss, Lord Alan Sugar
There were shocks on The Apprentice Week Six with not one but two candidates leaving – one of them before the task was even carried out.

The remaining 12 candidates lined up at Heathrow Airport to hear they would be heading to Dubai for the corporate away day task. But eagle-eyed fans will have spotted only 11 actually did the task – Reece Donnelly was nowhere to be seen.

In the boardroom, Lord Sugar made a brief mention of it, saying Reece was unable to take part in the task and had subsequently left the process. The usual compilation tribute to his time on the show was played on The Apprentice: You're Fired, the companion discussion programme, but presenter Tom Allen announced Reece would not be appearing in person.

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So what happened to Reece? In an interview with national newspapers Reece has stated he left for medical reasons but some are reporting an incident on the flight to Dubai. The official statement says 'Reece was unable to continue in the process, this was discussed and agreed between Reece and programme-makers'.

Either way, no loss as far as I am concerned. He should have gone already after his performance on previous tasks.

Also leaving the process this week was Joe Phillips, a popular candidate who was fired by Lord Sugar for his part in costing Affinity a 60 per cent refund for their corporate clients.

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Members of a leading global arts club were taken into the desert for a camel ride followed by a three-course meal with a coffee making experience. Not only did they have to wait FOREVER for their food but they learned they were limited to two glasses of water and one glass of juice each. In the desert? No wonder they were furious!

Frankly, their whole away day looked boring. Team leader Rochelle Anthony admitted from the start that she had no experience of corporate away days so that can't have helped.

Victoria Goulbourne, however, said she had lived in Dubai for six years and knew the place inside out so when she took charge for Apex it seemed they were on to a winner.

It wasn't long before her repeated cries of 'they'll pay anything' failed to ring true, as the beauty family beat her down to half the ticket price she was looking for.

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All through the task, it seemed it was going wrong for Apex, as Mark Moseley and Megan Hornby enfuriated Karen by paying way over the odds for a DJ masterclass and then messed up the food by simply taking too long to serve. Things got even more muddled when Megan had to stop due to seasickness.

Back in the boadroom, Apex looked disappointed when their figures were announced, with the clients requesting a 20 per cent refund. And Victoria's face fell when she learned Affinity had been paid a much higher ticket price and spent much, much less. That was until the 60 per cent refund was revealed, making the Affinity profit about £100 less than Apex.

Watch The Apprentice on BBC One on Thursdays at 9pm and The Apprentice: You're Fired on BBC Two on Thursdays at 10pm.