A BRIGHT north Lancashire boy made it all the way to the final of a national television programme to crown the 'child genius' of Great Britain 2017.

Ronan Maher, of Brookhouse, near Caton, entered himself into the Channel 4 show, and, of 20 applicants to make it onto the programme, he fought his way to the last two.

Nine-year-old Ronan pushed eventual winner Rahul Doshi, 12, who lives in Barnet, close in the concluding buzzer round in the head-to-head final broadcast on Saturday.

Unfortunately though, Ronan, a pupil at Caton St Paul's Primary School and member of Carnforth Otters swimming club, lost 10-4 on maths, general knowledge and spelling questions and had to settle for being the runner up. He had earlier come through a specialist round on London 1666 – society, politics and the urban environment in the year of the Great Fire to book his place in the last two.

"We are in a state of shock that he got this far but it's just total dedication," said dad Steve. "We came into this hoping to get to the first round and we've ended up getting to the final."

After missing out in the final round, a modest Ronan said: "I've met some nice friends and done quite well so I'm quite happy."

Child Genius pitted children between the ages of eight and 12 in a week of quizzes led by Richard Osman, co-host of the popular BBC programme Pointless.

20 competitors were whittled down to five for the final episode, with scores on each child's specialist subject deciding the last two.

During the show, Ronan, who also represents Great Britain in the modern biathlon, said the challenge did not faze him.

"Competing with Team GB gives me a bit of an advantage over other people because I know what it's like to train hard and train with the top (competitors)," he said.

His dad added: "We're actually getting driven by Ronan. We come home from work and the first thing he says is 'can we do some more revision?'."

Mum Miriam said: "He sets himself goals and then he wants to achieve these goals."