'Divine intervention' means vicar has second shot at Deal Or No Deal jackpot after he opens empty box

In the middle of a tense round of Deal Or No Deal, he chose a box to be opened - and discovered that it was empty. It should have contained £250,000, which would have ended his chances of winning the jackpot.

Instead, the remaining boxes were reshuffled and the game continued.

Instead of his chances being wrecked, Reverend Schofield got another chance and was able to continue the game.

And he is delighted because his Guardian Angel helped him scoop £12,500 for his five charities.

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It was the first such blunder on the Channel 4 game show, where contestants reject numbered boxes in the hope of being left with the one containing £250,000. However, they stand as much chance of ending up with just a penny to take home.

Mr Schofield, of Bromley Cross in Bolton, said: "I was only six or seven boxes into my game when I asked for box number two to be opened, and lo and behold, there was nothing there.

"It transpired that it ought to have been the £250,000 box and the independent adjudicator had simply missed sticking the sum inside.

"Taking the big sum out so early in the game would have changed things completely. It seemed miraculous."

While producers switched the boxes around, Mr Schofield and his wife Lilian led the audience in an impromptu hymn-singing session.

Now the 67-year-old, who is vicar at St Luke's Church in Dukinfield, Greater Manchester, believes his "guardian angel" was watching over him.

He has recently fought cancer and also survived a fall off a mountain while on holiday in Australia. He said: "It was quite strange because at various times in my life I've been in peril and I've always maintained I've got a guardian angel watching over me.

"So when this all happened on the show, people started to say it was my guardian angel looking over me again."

He refused to reveal how much he won on the programme, but said: "I did do very, very nicely. I didn't have any sum in mind when I went on the show."

He added: "I've always maintained there's no gambling involved in Deal Or No Deal, because whatever you come away with is bound to be more than you went with, whether it be 1p or £250,000 - that's how I justified myself being on there.

"I went on the show because I thought, 'What an easy way to get some money for my favourite five charities, for the church and a little bit for myself to repair my caravan'."

The grandfather of five also revealed that he wanted to go on the show to meet presented Noel Edmonds.

He said: "I've been a huge fan of his every since he was a radio DJ and I thought it was a great pity when he was off TV for a while. I had a wonderful time on the show and I'd advise everybody to give it a go."