A Coronation Street legend has reportedly signed up for the new series of Strictly Come Dancing.

Shayne Ward – who won The X Factor nearly two decades ago – is best known

by fans for playing Aidan Connor in the ITV soap. However, he will soon be swapping

his acting and singing gigs for a go on the dancefloor.

The BBC show has been hit by scandal in the recent weeks, when Amanda Abbington accused her professional partner Giovanni Pernice of ‘bullying’ her in rehearsals, leading to a misconduct investigation. Giovanni has strongly denied all allegations made against him and the results of the investigation are expected to be revealed presently, with Giovanni’s camp confident he will be cleared.

Now Shayne is said to have signed up to the new series, and bosses are no doubt hoping he can bring in the viewers with his connection to Coronation Street. The Mirror has contacted representatives of Shayne Ward for comment.

Shayne Ward as Aidan on Coronation Street

“Shayne is a previous winner of an audience-voted talent show so will have high hopes of doing it again. He is excited to begin training. He has some dancing experience so could be a contender for the glitterball trophy. He also has a whopping fan base from his years as a Coronation Street hunk,” a source told The Sun of Shayne’s latest job.

It comes after Tom Dean announced he was the first star who had signed up to the new series. He made the announcement after reaching the final of the men’s 200 metres individual medley earlier this week at the Olympics in Paris.

Speaking at the time, he said: “Naturally you want to take a break after you’ve had a full Olympic cycle and the opportunity arose. I thought it would be really exciting to try something a bit different. I’ll be doing that and straight back into training after it. It’s something to look forward to.” When discussing whether his fellow sports star Adam Peaty – who competed on the show – would be giving him tips, he added: “I’ve not seen [Adam] yet. He did brilliantly on it so I’ll be getting a few tips from him, for sure.”

Admitting he’s not so good on dry land as he is in the water, he shared: “I don’t do too well out of water in gravity sports. I’m throwing myself into it and I know what a hard day’s training is like so I’m looking forward to it. I guess we’ll find out. It’s something to look forward to and once I finish this, back home, relax a bit with the family and then we crack on end of August time. It’s exciting.”