Ex-Love Island star slams ITV bosses who are ‘overdoing it’ with winter series

Former winter Love Island star Eva Zapico has confessed that the return of the winter ITV2 dating series is “overdoing it” and hints that she prefers the summer edition.

At the start of the eighth series of the reality show back in June, ITV bosses announced the return of the South African series which launched on the channel back in 2020 during the peak of the global pandemic.

Much to the surprise of viewers up and down the country, the show was hosted in a similarly hot location to the usual Spanish resort instead of a cold area such as Iceland.

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And now, the 23-year-old model has admitted that as much as she loved taking part on the winter edition of the show, she’s not over the moon at the introduction of two Love Island shows a year.

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In an exclusive interview with Daily Star, the brunette beauty – who met her long-term partner Nas Majeed on the show two years ago – confessed that two versions of the show a year it “a lot” for any viewer to watch.

She admitted: “I’m really excited I think it will be so good and I do think that two Love Island’s a year is great but then I also think is it overdoing it slightly? I don’t know.

“I mean I can’t really talk because I jumped on the winter one but I think two Love Island’s a year is a lot and I think it is quite exciting to just look forward to the summer because that is when Love Island is.

“But I loved going on the winter one so I’m sure it will be really good,” she added.

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The starlet went on to add that although she loved her time on the show, she was slightly disappointed when she arrived at the South African villa rather than competing on the show in a colder environment.

Eva explained: “When I first heard that there was a winter Love Island before I went on, I was thinking it would be kind of like a skiing kind of vibe with like hot tubs, kind of like the cabins, something like that.

“But I do think the concept of Love Island just works so well and it’s such a big cash maker for ITV that they just want to stick with the same concept.

“Because they know that it does well rather than maybe change the idea of Love Island and then kind of damage its reputation off of the back of that.”

She concluded with: “They do have the cabins, they do have other dating shows I guess I definitely think it would be quite cool to do like a skiing version or an actual winter version.”

It comes after the ITV star explained how far the happy couple have come since they met in the Casa Amor villa all those years ago as fans of the duo continue to predict an upcoming engagement.

Eva shared how their relationship has blossomed over the years after they decided to take things at their own pace rather than moving in together months after the show like many couples do when they step out of the villa.

She said: “It’s been really good, obviously we’re two years in now and sometimes we can’t actually believe ourselves because no one thought that we would last.

“I think we just took it one step at a time but yeah it’s basically been two years now, I think our anniversary is in like a week and a half – I still needed to get him a present for that one.


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“Obviously we took it a lot slower than other Islanders, I think goal is to leave the villa and then there’s pressure on you to move in together and all of this stuff.

“But we’ve taken it really slow and, but we are looking to move in together which is really exciting.”

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