The Apprentice episode six review: how does Bognor's Phil Turner handle this week's breakfast cereal challenge?

At the end of this week’s episode, Lord Alan Sugar, glaring up from his paperwork like a bull terrier in a fitted suit, tells Bognor’s Phil Turner he’s the luckiest man alive – and, to be totally honest, it’s hard to disagree.

Bognor’s home-baked businessman found himself in the bottom three tonight, having lost his sixth task in a row. A hair’s breadth from a sacking, and on the wrong end of Lord Sugar’s trademark scowl, it seemed like he was for it but, somehow, it was fitness coach Sam Saadet who got the boot.

This week’s task saw Team Nexus and Team Supreme making, designing and branding a cereal for children aged six to eight – all before pitching their products to some of the biggest supermarkets in the country.

Phil’s losing streak – as well as his previous foodie flops – had clearly taken its toll on his teammates, none of whom supported his bid for project leader despite the fact that the brief matched his skillset quite nicely. Instead, it was Sam who took charge, making Yoga instructor Maura Rath sub-leader after she suggested an arctic theme for Polar Crunch – their arctic themed cereal.

Over at Team Nexus, management consultant Steve Darken took charge, blazing a trail with a superhero theme which, he hoped, would appeal to the primary school-age audience. Tasked with designing his empowered female superhero was sub team leader Noor Bouziane, with colleagues Tre and Felucia. They eventually settled on the name Power Hoops.

Phil is obviously known for pies, not Coco Pops, but designing the cereal itself should have played to his strengths. But sticking to a trend which started with week two’s cheesecakes, he managed to drop the ball. After Sam settled on passionfruit flavouring and slices of dried banana (neither of which felt particularly arctic) for the cereal, Phil urged his team to apply flavouring “to taste”, rather than follow the expert guidance.

It was one of Phil’s few constructive contributions to this week’s episode, and it was a total misfire. No one in the team thought to adjust the three grams they put in the bowl for the hundred gram box they had to eventually produce, so their kid friendly breakfast treat came out bland and boring and tasteless.

Steve’s team had the opposite problem: settling on a frankly rancid combination of apple, chocolate chips and raspberry flavouring that went down – if their faces were any indication – like a bogey in a pat of butter.

The branding team did a little better. Tasked to design an interactive augmented reality app to go with their cereal, dentist Paul put his all into a dance routine for Team Supreme’s Polar Crunch that, though it didn’t fail, felt a little too young for the target audience.

Team Nexus struggled even more. Mascot Megabella left a lot to be desired, with her uninspired design and barely-there conceit, it was hard to design a game for her and Noor’s team just couldn’t pull a solid pitch together. Their final design – a game in which players capture gems to help Megabella develop her powers – failed to impress the board.

But, in the end, it was the design of the box which made all the difference. Asked to pitch the final product to some of the biggest names in the cereal business, it was the box that business leaders kept coming back to. They felt the Polar Crunch box was too grey looking – unlikely to stand out in a market full of big, bold colours – and the lack of a cereal bowl on the box would leave customers unsure as to what they were buying.

Despite the fact that the mascot was bland and the cereal itself was gross, Power Hoops did really well. So well that supermarket giants Iceland approached the team with an offer; three months of exclusivity for a huge 200,000 units. Given Team Supreme’s gloomy prospects, that sealed the deal alone, without the other two offers they secured.

It was a tough week at the office for Phil, then, but I can’t help but think his luck will run out soon if he doesn’t change his ways. We’re fortunate to have him on the show, but both last week’s loser Oneyka and this week’s, Sam, were, in my opinion, much worthier candidates, who would have done a whole lot more with the second, third and fourth chances Phil has now had.

He’s clearly a great guy, don’t get me wrong. I think he’s honest, forthright and clearly very capable. I think his pies are great, and he’s full of potential, but he just hasn’t found his stride yet.

And the way things are going, we never will. You can count his positive contributions on one hand, and, if he keeps losing, it won’t be long before he makes that last walk out of Sugar’s office, never to return.

Here’s hoping I’m wrong.

Watch The Apprentice from 9pm every Thursday on BBC One or BBC iPlayer.