Cheryl Cole affair is ‘embarrassing’ for Cowell

Simon Cowell has a "bad migraine" and his protégée, Cheryl Cole, is "remaining behind closed doors" after US TV bosses made the decision to fire her from the US X Factor.

Even more shocking is the news today, reported by the Daily Mail,
that the wounded Cole is considering, behind those closed doors,
turning down the inevitable offer to return to the original UK version of the show as a judge.

At first we were told Cole had made her own decision to quit the US
show because she was homesick. We didn't swallow that one - and now it has emerged that she was given the shove because US studio audiences couldn't understand her Geordie accent.

Marina Hyde pulls no punches in the Guardian: "Special relationship? Special relationship? Let me tell you something, Mr President ...nothing says 'you guys are so special to me' like hightailing it to the airport just as news breaks of what America has done to Britain's Cheryl Cole."

Getting over that, Hyde says she's sure Simon Cowell must have seen this coming. After all, Cole's replacement on the US show, Nicole Scherzinger "has more of it than Cheryl ... whatever 'it' is".

Over at the Daily Mail, where tongues are less firmly in cheeks,
Alison Boshoff mourns a "terrible public humiliation for Cheryl"
immediately under a headline ('They could hardly make out a word she said – and when they could, they STILL didn't like her') which lends a distinctly reptilian taint to Boshoff's tears.

Cole got everything wrong, says Boshoff: "American magazines deemed her big hair the 'Chewbacca look' after the hirsute Star Wars character." She was "out of her depth". But, Boshoff concludes: "It's a decision that is hugely embarrassing to Cowell... it appears Cowell is not quite as in control as he claims to be."

And that's a theme picked up by a Daily Mirror editorial, which
claims Cole's departure makes Cowell look "more like a muppet than a mogul". Not only that, but the Mirror detects "little respect for women" in the impresario's hiring and firing habits: "He has treated Cheryl... like a human bauble. Pretty and shiny, but ultimately disposable."

And just in case we were in any doubt as to whose side the Mirror is taking, we conclude with one final, fawning, thought:

"Come back to the British show, Cheryl. Your fans, who are all fully
fluent in your native Geordie, will welcome you with open arms." ·