Cheryl Fernandez-Versini badly burned her foot when she stepped on a pair of hair straighteners backstage at Wembley Arena.
Auditions were delayed by an hour as poor Chez received treatment and had to be helped to her seat by security, say The Mirror.
Simon Cowell joked to the audience that her foot ‘may have to be amputated’, adding: ‘She still wanted to work.’
Instead of walking out on stage with the other judges – Cowell, Rita Ora and Nick Grimshaw – she was taken directly to her seat, hobbling.
As things got underway, Grimshaw quipped: ‘Do you want to say anything, Cheryl, or is your leg too injured to speak?’