'Show must go on': Jack Tame replaces Matty McLean on Breakfast after positive Covid test

You may have spotted a familiar face on TVNZ’s Breakfast this morning, stepping in for host Matty McLean.

Q+A’s Jack Tame stepped in on his behalf after it was revealed McLean had to go home in the middle of his early morning shift due to a positive Covid-19 test.

McLean appeared when Breakfast went to air this morning alongside co-hosts Jenny-May Clarkson and Indira Stewart - but about 40 minutes in, Clarkson revealed the team was in “a little bit of a tizz”.

McLean found out his fiance Ryan Teece tested positive for Covid-19, with the host himself testing positive just moments later.

“He’s gone home, we’ve tested, we’re okay ... the show must go on,” Clarkson told viewers.

The 7.30am news bulletin was running just a little late, but by that time presenter Jack Tame had stepped into his old Breakfast shoes after being woken up from a “deep sleep” to fill in for McLean.

Clarkson said of the Newstalk ZB host, “You may be wondering who this guy is, standing next to us ... You were in a deep sleep, apparently!”

Tame, a longtime friend of McLean’s since journalism school, joked, “Hopefully the pillow marks on my forehead aren’t going to be pressed in too much.”

McLean’s positive diagnosis comes the Monday after a surprise hen’s do thrown for him by his friends over the weekend.

In an Instagram post shared yesterday, the TVNZ host revealed his partner Teece had engineered the surprise party “and then left us to it”.

“It was the most incredible, overwhelming, amazing, laugh til you cry time with the best group of friends a guy could ask for,” he wrote alongside a photo of himself posing in a bride-to-be sash, cowboy hat and frilly garter.

“Cup is full, heart is bursting. Bring on the wedding!”

And with the couple’s wedding day rumoured to be just around the corner, McLean and Teece will be hoping for a speedy recovery before they tie the knot at Parihoa.