It’s long known that the call ‘Legs Eleven’ gets any male visitors to the bingo hall all worked up, and as such it’s often accompanied by banging tables or even a wolf whistle or two. However it seems the days of wolf whistling might be exactly what the bingo industry is trying to move away from as one bingo loving customer is banned from his local hall for doing exactly that!

Bingo fan Gerard Merry often visits his local BJ’s bingo hall in Kitts Green in Birmingham, and like many men have in the past, he likes to wolf whistle on the Legs Eleven call, but that and some other misdemeanours at the hall mean that now Mr Merry is barred for life!

His raucous wolf whistling is what first got complaints, and he’d already been warned about toning down his behaviour. Then on losing a full house on Heinz Beans 57, he shouted out in the bingo hall and was asked to leave. However, bingo mad Merry didn’t see why he should leave the hall and the impending scuffle saw him receive a lifelong ban!

Interestingly, his wife Ann Merry supports the bingo hall and says he had been warned about his behaviour, but now Mr Merry has nowhere to go. He’s not a drinker and bingo was his number one hobby, seeing him play four times every week, now he’s going to be at a bit of a loose end!

The whole industry has changed a lot over the last few years, and in trying to keep up with the hip-crowd of the online bingo set, many bingo halls are dragging themselves and their punters into the 21st century. But is this really a response to a sexual innuendo too far, or was Mr Merry just the noisiest bingo player ever?