Marcus Shoberg Wanted Daisy Kent to Be the Bachelorette: He ‘Liked’ Her and Maria on Joey’s Season

Before he was cast on season 21 of The Bachelorette , Marcus Shoberg was hoping for a different leading lady than Jenn Tran , a source exclusively tells Life & Style .

“He thought Maria [Georgas] would win the show and was hoping that Daisy [Kent] would be the next Bachelorette,” the insider reveals. “He liked both of them, but he seems to be most interested in blondes.”

The source says that Marcus, 32, watched season 28 of The Bachelor “with another woman,” who he then “ghosted” when he left to film The Bachelorette just days after the finale aired in March. “Looking back, he must have known he was going to be cast on the show and it seems like he was trying to figure out who would be the next Bachelorette and studying how he could win her over,” the insider adds.

Daisy, 25, and Maria, 30, were both on Joey Graziadei’s season of The Bachelor with Jenn, 26. All three women were contenders to be the Bachelorette, but Daisy and Maria have publicly claimed that they turned the gig down. Meanwhile, Jenn has slammed the “narrative” that she was only chosen because Maria and Daisy didn’t want the role.

“This show has been going on for years and years – 21 years of this show specifically – and every season there are multiple people in contention for the role,” she explained on the “Call Her Daddy” podcast in June. “Multiple people are doing interviews or doing fittings or filming intro packages. And it’s never really you until it’s you. That’s why I was a little disappointed. The narratives out there aren’t exactly true.”

Unfortunately, it seems like Marcus isn’t the only one who was hoping for a lead other than Jenn. During week 6, contestant Sam McKinney admitted that when he first got out of the limo and met Jenn, he thought, “This girl is not my type. I thought the Bachelorette was gonna be Daisy or Maria.”

During the Men Tell All episode, he hinted that other guys in the cast felt the same way. “Whenever we all came out here, we had no idea who the Bachelorette was going to be,” Sam, 27,  shared. “But if anybody’s going to sit up here and say they didn’t think it was going to be Daisy or Maria, you guys are liars.”

Jenn chose Devin Strader over Marcus during The Bachelorette finale and they got engaged. However, it seems that even Devin, 28, was secretly hoping for a relationship with someone else. He broke off his engagement to Jenn in August and she revealed during the live finale aftershow on Tuesday, September 3, that he began following Maria on Instagram the very next day.

“Not only is that so disrespectful to anything we shared together, I just don’t understand why you would do something like that,” she told him.

While Maria was extremely supportive of Jenn’s journey as the Bachelorette when the casting news was first announced, she reportedly unfollowed her on Instagram after Jenn’s “Call Her Daddy” interview. Jenn still follows Maria on the social media site.

Meanwhile, Daisy publicly showed support to Jenn on Instagram after her heartbreaking split from Devin was confirmed. “Absolutely shook by the finale last night,” Daisy wrote. “But so proud of you @jenntran and the way you have handled yourself.”