When the news came through that Sir Bruce Forsyth had decided to step down as host of Strictly I was at The One Show preparing for a night on the sofa with Louise Minchin and KathleenI have worked and known the gorgeous Louise for a couple of years and as for Ms Turner, she and I were the only two people in a posh hotel rooftop gym one morning, years ago. When it comes to comfort, Nissan has done a pretty good job of ignoring anyone else other than the pilot ‘Do you wanna throw medicine ball with me?’ drawled Jessica Rabbit. How could I refuse? the story to her when she arrived at the studio. She had no recollectionAnyhow, The Six O’Clock News asked if I would record a short interview before our show about what I thought ofThe kind of request I would usually decline, on this occasion I found myself eagerly agreeing to appear instead. minutes later and I was living proof that our thought process is ten per cent conscious and 90 per cent subconscious.

‘So would you like to be the new guy?’ asked the incisive BBC reporter once the camera wasFILTER ALERT, FILTER ALERT, careful what you say now, tact might be a good idea. ‘I’d kill for it,’ I blurted out. ‘You didn’t actually say that, out loud into a BBC microphone did you?’ asked a pal when I told him what had happened laterWell yes I did, and it was the truth – no TV presenter in their right mind would turn down the chance to host Strictly Come Dancing and it wasn’t as if Brucie had popped his clogs or anything – he’d just decided to call it a day. The job was up for grabs. The instrument cluster is so far outside the driver's field of peripheral vision that you are required to look down, away from the road, to see anything of note always wondered why Michael Portillo and Michael Heseltine didn’t do the same when it was clear to anyone with a pulse how much they wanted to lead the Tory party back in the day.

You snooze, you lose; So there you go, it’s official, I would love the Strictly job. telling you all this again when I said it on The Six O’Clock News? that’s the thing, you see, I didn’t: they edited most of it out when it came to the actual broadcast. I can only presume because they’d alreadyv-bot robotic floor vacuum cleaner - t270 review been tipped off that I wasn’t even going to be in the bookies’ top tenkirby vacuum cleaner model g10d to take over the next day. philips t520 vacuum cleaner why am I still bleating on about this now? Well, partly therapy, but mostly to put off having to talk about this week’s car for as long as There's the added ear-bashing of road noise coming up to meet you

With an instrument cluster that is so far outside the driver’s field of peripheral vision that you are required to look down, away from the road, to see anything of note, welcome to what I found to be an entirely underwhelming motoring experience. The engine is a woefully dire diesel affair that instantly teleported me back to the days when all diesels were hard-bitten, rough and so, so loud. And then there’s the added ear-bashing of road noise coming up to meet you – deafening byNext, to the automatic gearbox, or rather the automatic gearbox Nissan forgot to fit. A gearbox the Qashqai desperately needs but probably couldn’t cope with anyway because of the conflicting combination of big torque and teeny weeny turbo, confusing the heck out of itself. As it stands, the considerable torque there is (all 320Nm of it) seems to disappear in a puff and a wheeze the moment any load is applied. Other major irritations for me included the

needlessly enormous rearview mirror and the mysterious (but massive) black box mounted behind it. And why is it so big? the potentially good bits end up being tainted merely by association with the rest of the car. Take the brakes which, ironically, are way over-powered, not just for this car but for any car. Surely this is a braking system designed to stop a  35-ton truck? As for the poor unfortunates in the rear, what they have to sit on reminded me of the Lancaster bomber I was lucky enough to experience last year pedal anything north of gentle and you can feel the rear of the car rising up behind you like a pantomime baddie. When it comes to comfort, Nissan has done a pretty good job of ignoring anyone else other than theTry setting the front passenger seat to a position that affords the occupant behind half a chance of ever walking again, then ask your shotgun to open the glovebox and achieve anything more than a sneaky

More from Chris Evans Event for The Mail on Sunday...The new Tesla is so fast and so advanced that our petrolhead did the unthinkable... fell in love with a self-driving electric car California dreaming: He had visions of a late summer road trip down to the coast. But did VW’s new camper van give Chris good vibrations? Chris is still basking in his post-vacation feelgood glow ...so Peugeot couldn’t have picked a better time for him to review its nippy new SUV King of the road ...and on it, of course. Bentley’s opulent SUV is in a league of its own Swede little mystery: Spacious, stylish, oh so clever. If only Volvo’s gizmo-packed S90 drove more like a... It rumbles like thunder and is joyous to drive... you could take a family round the world in this stunning new coupé Born in America, made in Italy, loved by Brits. The Renegade is all the rage, but to our man it’s just... The DS 3 is a spacious and powerful small car and though not very cute it's worth every penny of £25k

CHRIS EVANS: This Megane is a fox... that looks chic, sounds great (what a growl!) and races out of the blocks like an Olympic champ The car I tested had a driver-only electric seat. I’ve never seen this before. The poor shotgun again comes off as a second-class citizen, having to make do with a series of handles and levers. As for the poor unfortunates in the rear, what they have to sit on reminded me of the Lancaster bomber I was lucky enough to experience last year. Whether it’s the roof that’s too low or the floor that’s too high, this is certainly not the vehicle for the big boys’ rugby weekend. So what about the boot space – not much can go wrong there, can it? Oh don’t be so sure: lift the boot panels even slightly and they just fall out of their guides. Plus, is the whole of Japan right-handed? Because this is what the notable absence of a pull-down slot on the left-hand side of the tailgate suggests. The biggest crime the Qashqai commits, however, and it’s only my opinion – there are lots of Qashqais on the road so they must be doing something right – is that it’s so boring to travel in.

This could be the best justification yet for the advent of those lane-change alarms I detest so much… to wake you up when you find yourself drifting off, having lost the will to live.I didn’t know what the word Qashqai actually meant, so I looked it up and discovered it’s not even Japanese, at least not spelled the way Nissan spells it. I wonder if anyone’s told them. The Japanese themselves actually call this car the ‘Dualis’. I have no idea why but how about they change it to something that is slightly more autobiographical? The ‘Dulliss’ sprung to my mind. Or perhaps just the Dullest. TECH SPEC£26,670, nissan.co.uk Engine 1.6-litre, four-cylinder diesel Transmission Six-speed manual Power 128bhp 0-60mph 10.5 seconds Top speed 118mph Fuel consumption 57.6mpg CO2 emissions 129g/km (£110/year tax band)The biggest crime the Qashqai commits is that it’s so mind-numbingly boring to drive' Few cars come with such a bold statement of intent as the striking-looking new Lexus NX300h 4x4, the luxury marque’s new Range Rover Evoque rival.