The Apprentice is back, so let’s rank the 2022 candidates by how useless they are

Nothing quite brings me such delicious joy like tuning into a new series of The Apprentice. 16 disastrous egomaniacs bunched together to fall apart in unison for our viewing pleasure. The between-season drought from season 15 to season 16 was naturally longer than ever before due to the impact of the pandemic, but Lord Sugar is back full throttle and thankfully, so is the delectably cringe car crash TV. And after our first week with the 16 investment hopefuls, it’s time to get the candidates of The Apprentice 2022 ranked from most to least useless after a shaky week one where hardly anyone emerged seeming worthwhile.

After the usual opening of Lord Sugar doing his pre-written 10 minute Live At The Apollo standup set in the boardroom, this week’s task pit the lads against the lasses and went all Below Deck on us – tasking them to create cruise holidays and brands. And it went as well as expected: A logo that looked like someone had just ejaculated a Tango Ice Blast. But who emerged the least scathed? Let’s find out.

16. Harry

Truly hell on earth, and a deserved first boardroom casualty. Spent half an hour mansplaining the most complex logo of all time to his team when all he needed to say was that it looked like a cat’s arse hole. The team hated working with him, we hated watching him, bye Harry!

15. Nick 

Nick is personally responsible f0r coming up with the brown-green wave turd logo, and we can not forgive this.

14. Akeem

As sub-team leader, Akeem personally agreed to the aforementioned turd wave logo and we can not let that slide. He literally said the words “we’ve got something really solid here.”

13. Akshay

Truly disastrous project manager who steamrolled over the opinions of all his colleagues and ran a dictatorship.

12. Kathryn

Decided without hesitation that the girls’ team would be going with Bouji Cruises, refused to accept alternatives and then spent the entire episode being unable to tell a soul what the word bouji actually meant. Kathryn should be thanking her lucky stars the lads’ went with a turd logo or she would have been in a taxi home.

11. Sophie

Wore a green dress against a green screen and was then shocked to find that she’d look invisible. How do people who live like this function in society?

10. Brittany

Not really sure what Brittany brought to the table this week besides a miserable face and a moaning attitude.

9. Harpreet

Same as Brittany, albeit slightly more likeable. Spent the episode defining the term “too many cooks spoil the broth.”

8. Conor

It’s the fact he’s called Conor and has seemingly done everything in his power to look and dress like Conor McGregor for me.

7. Navid

Navid trying to explain why the boys’ inexplicably chose a brown and green colour scheme for the horrible logo was toe curling telly and I’m sure his days are numbered, but anyone who is an out and out Barb is iconic TV for me and I hope he stays long enough to rap SuperBass for us all.

6. Stephanie

I could not tell you one single thing that Stephanie did this week. Not one. But perhaps that’s for the best, because I can’t hold her personally responsible for any disasters.

5. Francesca

Francesca unnerves me. Bad vibes ahead with her I fear, but she did talk a lot of sense this episode and called out Kathryn on the name and tried to get more democracy going – so at least she seems to have a crumb of business acumen.

4. Alex

Quietly decent, is how I’d describe Alex this week. I liked the way he tried to communicate with Akshay about his management style and he seems like a team player. A potential dark horse.

3. Amy

The main pop girl of fast food came off well this week, I thought. Perhaps if she’d just been left to do her a job of directing without being heckled by two swimsuit-laden backseat drivers she could have done even better. Seems like a good communicator, and with all the shouting on The Apprentice that’s what we bloody need.

2. Aaron

The best of all the lads by a country mile. Thank GOD the northern representation on The Apprentice is thriving in 2022, with two of the northern candidates getting ranked highest. Aaron had good ideas, talked sense and tried to fix all the problems. What a shame then that not a single member of his teams’ sinking ship decided to listen to him.

1. Shama

First impressions are often right. Gut instincts. My gut instinct on Shama? Winner. My thoughts on Shama after week one? WINNER. Everything about this queen is iconic. A northern accent matched with thoughtful opinions and a good head on her shoulders – give this legend the £250,000 investment now and let’s wrap the show up.

Nah, on second thought… Give me two more months of silly idiocy.

Featured image courtesy of BBC.

Catch up on all of the candidates ranked from The Apprentice 2022 by rewatching the episode on BBC iPlayer.

Related stories recommended by this writer:

• Meet the 16 new The Apprentice candidates for 2022 hoping to avoid a firing

• Meet Tim Campbell: Lord Sugar’s new aide replacing Claude on The Apprentice

• Molly-Mae says to be as successful as her, you just need to work harder