Claudia Winkleman once nearly exposed the Traitors' identities in heart-stopping round table moment

The Celebrity Traitors is well underway, and Celia Imrie's fart is a thing of the past as Richard E. Grant became the first person in history to immediately out himself as a Traitor on the show, and the nation can't get enough of Ross Kemp's paranoia every time someone breathes in his direction.

However, Richard was once nearly given a run for his money by the host of all versions of the brilliant show, Claudia Winkleman.

In an absolutely heart-stopping confession, Claudia reveals she one time came perilously close to giving away the Traitors' identities during a very tense round table moment.

The presenter discussed what happened during a clip of her appearance on Elizabeth Day's How To Fail podcast, that has recently been re-shared.

Claudia explains that while she's present at the round table, she "knows too much" and needs to keep her distance from the players and "melt into the wall" during discussions.

But one year, while observing the action, she had an urgent message come through her earpiece. The earpiece is something she usually wears for those "just in case" moments and the team behind the scenes "never really talk" to Claudia through it as there isn't the need.

On this occasion, two Traitors "turned on another Traitor," and a voice came through to Claudia's ear to say, "Watch your breathing."

She recalls that she knew instantly, "This is not nothing," to be given a message like that, and that the crew must've seen her breathing change so noticeably that they believed she could give the game away with it.

Luckily, the warning came through in time, and nobody noticed the presenter's altered breathing and change in demeanour, and the game played out normally.

During the podcast, the presenter also reveals her initial trepidation to take on being host of The Traitors, despite really wanting to do it.

"I knew I wanted to do it, but they said, 'Can you go to Inverness for three weeks?'" Claudia says of the initial conversations she had about joining the series.

Her response was very her. "I was like, 'You don't seem to understand I don't leave my bed, it's a no,'" was her first reaction to being asked to spend time filming in Scotland.

After producers got her to watch the Dutch version of the show, Claudia instantly changed her mind about presenting the UK version and became "obsessed" by the episodes she was sent as a taster of what she'd be expected to do as host.

But still, she was unsure what the British reaction to the series would be. "I literally got on a train to Inverness holding some red leather gloves and a cloak," she recalls.

At that moment, she thought maybe agreeing to present The Traitors was about to end her career.

Sharing the thoughts she had on that train journey, Claudia reveals she told herself, "It's all over, night night, you've had a really good run." She even phoned her husband to say, "Right, we're going to have to rethink everything."

Of course, the star didn't have to rethink anything at all, because The Traitors and its spin-offs have been a phenomenal success and a lot of that is down to Claudia's approach to her role - even if she did once nearly do something as potentially disastrous as give away who the Traitors were.

The Celebrity Traitors is currently airing on BBC One and BBC iPlayer.