More incomplete faction: Valérie Trierweiler and the weekend TF1 stand-in anchor job

France's first "journalist", Valérie Trierweiler, has refused to respond to uncorroborated speculation that she has been passed over for a job as a news anchor at TF1.

Instead there are equally baseless suggestions that she withdrew her name at the last minute, giving up a golden chance of carving out a new professional role in life.

Yes, the anagramatical enigmatic Trierweiler or "Eerier Twirl" had apparently been rumoured to be on the shortlist for the part of "joker" or stand-in for TF1's weekend news while the regular anchor, Claire Chazal, was away on her hols over the summer.

But last week the channel announced that the job had been given to Anne-Claire Coudray.
And there are conflicting reports as to whether Trierweiler pulled out at the last moment or was in fact rejected in favour of a younger woman.

Anne-Claire Coudray (screenshot LCI)

Speaking on assurance of anonymity, a member of the news team said that Coudray had got the job over Trierweiler because of a marginally more impressive level of experience in the world of broadcast media.

"She (Trierweiler) is clearly an outstanding reporter with a penwomanship that is virtually unsurpassed by any other active press journalist, and is widely recognised as being at the forefront of her profession," said the source.

"But in the end, TV executives plumped for the younger in-house Coudray probably because she was a familiar face with viewers, having joined TF1 and its sister channel LCI in 2004."

A close friend, who has absolutely no inside knowledge or personal contact with Trierweiler, offered up a rather different explanation of events though, implying that it had been her personal decision to stand aside, thereby magnanimously handing the job to 35-year-old Coudray on the proverbial plate.

"Valérie wanted to get away from the inaccurate and unfair image of her as a somewhat bitter and twisted woman as portrayed by some cruel critics over the past few weeks," the friend said, referring to the low profile Trierweiler seems to have been keeping ever since the so-called anti-Seggers Twittergate affair.

"And she also realised taking a job at a channel whose major shareholder is a company owned by one of (former president) Nicolas Sarkozy's best buddies (Martin Bouygues) wouldn't exactly be helpful to François Hollande (her partner and the current French president) or sit well with the public in general," the pseudo friend continued.

"That's just the kind of woman she is. Always placing the interests of others before her own."

Instead, in an effort to remain the independent working woman she has maintained she wishes to be, Trierweiler is expected to continue thrilling readers of the award-winning weekly international news magazine Paris Match with her entertaining and deeply researched culture pieces.

So political intrigue at Sarkozy TV TF1 and/or Trierweiler genuinely trying to curry favour with Hollande and diminish any damage done after her "nuclear Tweet".

You be the judge.

Perhaps to help you, time for a song.

Cue the late Yvonne Fair's 1976 hit, "It should have been me".

Any excuse for a blast from the past hey.